Summer Season

by Julia Williams

  ‘Oh God,’ said Kezzie, instinctively putting her hands on his. ‘Joel, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘So you see,’ said Joel, his voice ragged. ‘Now you know. I was a lousy husband and a lousy dad.’

  ‘Now stop right there,’ said Kezzie. ‘That’s ridiculous. Yes, you were crap at being a dad at first – but how old was Sam?’

  ‘Five months,’ said Joel.

  ‘And look at the two of you now,’ she said. ‘One thing you most definitely aren’t is a lousy dad.’

  ‘But I was a lousy husband. Claire deserved so much more.’ Joel put his head in his hands. ‘I don’t think she guessed what an idiot I’d been, but it haunts me, you know. The last night of her life, when I could have been at home with her, and I spent part of it kissing a stranger. I don’t think I’ll ever forgive myself.’

  ‘Joel, I think you’re being too hard on yourself,’ said Kezzie baldly. ‘Yes, you were wrong to do what you did, but you loved Claire, right?’

  ‘Of course, with all my heart.’

  ‘What would have happened in the normal course of events?’

  ‘I’d have woken up, felt like a heel, and made it up to her,’ said Joel.

  ‘But you never got the chance,’ said Kezzie. ‘You behaved very badly on one night of your life. You made a hideous mistake. But you couldn’t have known that Claire was going to die. If she’d lived, by now that would all have been forgiven and forgotten. I presume she loved you, too?’

  ‘I think so,’ said Joel. ‘Though God knows I didn’t deserve it.’

  ‘Then I’m thinking, if she were still here she wouldn’t want you to beat yourself up like this,’ said Kezzie. ‘You didn’t know she was ill. You thought you had all the time in the world. But you didn’t. You made a stupid mistake, which you regret, and you never got the chance to kiss and make up. You got a rotten throw of the dice. I think you should cut yourself some slack.’

  ‘Easier said than done,’ said Joel, with a sigh. ‘I just wish I could take that night back and replay it differently. At least then I’d know she hadn’t died hating me.’

  ‘I’m sure she didn’t hate you,’ said Kezzie, touching his arm gently.

  ‘Are you?’ said Joel. ‘I’m not. But what’s done is done. I can’t turn the clock back now, and I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.’

  Lauren was sipping a glass of wine and contemplating the sunset, waiting for Troy. The girls had gone to bed, neither of them had to work in the pub, and she was looking forward to an evening with just the two of them. It still felt wonderful to even think about it. Lauren had offered to cook a meal, but Troy had suggested a takeaway, ‘Save you working so hard, babe.’ So here she was, sitting in the evening sunshine, in anticipation of him returning home soon. She felt like a schoolgirl on her first date.

  The sun dipped over the horizon, sending lengthening shadows across the garden. In the darkening blue sky above, two bats flitted and flipped above her head. She heard the soft cooing of wood pigeons in the trees, and the cry of baby foxes in the woods at the end of her garden. Bloody things were a menace. She’d tried to persuade Troy not to feed them, but he thought they were cute.

  After half an hour, Lauren was getting bored. Troy had been gone ages. She was about to text him when the phone rang. The sounds of busy chat filled her ears, and then she could just make out Troy shouting, ‘Loz! Can you hear me?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Lauren, ‘they can probably hear you in Chiverton.’

  ‘I’m in the pub.’

  ‘I gathered,’ Lauren said, between gritted teeth. Try not to lose your rag straight away, she told herself, there might be a reasonable explanation.

  ‘I’ve got to wait for the takeaway, so I just popped in for one.’

  ‘So long as it is only one.’ Lauren was cross, but still prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  ‘It will be, babes. Don’t you trust me?’

  ‘Of course I do,’ said Lauren, somewhat reluctantly.

  ‘I won’t be long, I promise,’ said Troy. ‘Love you.’

  ‘Love you too,’ said Lauren, and put the phone down slowly. She still felt angry. Her plans for the evening hadn’t included waiting in for Troy, but maybe she was overreacting. If he had to wait for the takeaway, it did make sense to go and have a beer. So long as it was only one. She was probably making a fuss about nothing. He’d be home soon.

  Lauren picked up her wine glass and went inside. She turned the TV on; there was no point sitting in a dark, cooling garden on her own. Being summer, there wasn’t anything particularly interesting on TV. Sighing with frustration, she turned to her ancient computer, which sat on a table in the corner of the lounge, and started looking online for cupcake cases for the cake stall she was running at the Summer Fest. She may as well do something useful while she was waiting.

  Half an hour later the key turned in the lock. By this time, much to her surprise, Lauren had consumed the best part of a bottle of wine. Oops. She was also very cross and very hungry.

  ‘Just one more?’ she said angrily. ‘I’ve never known the Balti House to take so long to prepare a curry.’

  ‘God, I might have known,’ said Troy. ‘I went to the pub for one drink, like I said. They were busy at the Balti, I told you. Christ, it hasn’t taken long for the nagging to start.’

  ‘Oh come on, Troy,’ said Lauren, incensed by the use of the word nagging. ‘I was planning a lovely evening in and you go off to the pub for nearly two hours while I’m sitting here on my own feeling like a lemon. I think I’ve a right to be cross.’

  ‘Give over will you,’ said Troy. ‘Here’s your bloody curry.’ He slammed it on the coffee table, and stormed out into the kitchen and banged open cupboard doors noisily.

  Great. That was her romantic evening out of the window. Lauren was aware of the patter of footsteps. Immie was coming sleepily down the stairs sucking her thumb, and holding her favourite teddy.

  ‘Mummy, are you all right?’ she said, her little face crumpled in concern, ‘only you were shouting.’

  Oh lord. Lauren remembered how much she’d hated the arguments between her parents growing up. They’d had a fiery relationship, which ended in divorce when Lauren was seven, and Lauren had always hated to hear them shout at each other. She’d always vowed never to put her children through the same.

  ‘No, everything’s fine, sweetie,’ she said. ‘Daddy and I were just having a little chat that got a bit loud. Everything’s fine, isn’t it, Daddy?’

  She mouthed: ‘Say yes,’ to Troy, who had just come in with plates and a bottle of wine.

  ‘Of course it is, darling,’ said Troy. ‘Here, give us a kiss, and then Mummy will take you back to bed.’

  Lauren took Immie back upstairs and tucked her in. When she came back downstairs, Troy had opened the wine, put out the takeaway on trays and got a DVD ready for them to watch. He had been gone longer than she’d thought he’d be, but at least he was here now.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said, reaching for his hand. ‘I’m just grumpy and hungry. And I missed you.’

  ‘That’s OK,’ said Troy. ‘Honestly, I really didn’t have that much to drink. Come on, let’s tuck in. I’m starving.’

  Argument swiftly averted, Lauren sat down next to him on the sofa and started to eat her curry. The DVD Troy had chosen from the cheap rack at Macey’s, turned out to be a violent thriller, which he assured her was a classic of its genre, before crashing out on the sofa. Sighing, Lauren cleared up after him, poked him till he got moving, and then pushed him up the stairs to bed. Some romantic evening that had turned out to be. Maybe the honeymoon was already over.

  Kezzie let herself into her little cottage, thinking about what Joel had told her. Poor Joel. What a lot he had had to contend with. She’d ended up telling him all about what had happened with Richard, to show him he wasn’t the only one capable of idiotic behaviour, and by the time she’d left, she thought he seemed a little better. At least it must have done him some good to get t
hat off his chest. What a burden to be carrying around with him.

  She went into the kitchen and grabbed a can of lager, before settling down in the lounge to see what was on the telly. Discovering that there wasn’t much she wanted to watch, Kezzie decided to have a look at some of the letters and diaries from Edward’s trunk. She and Joel were slowly collating material for the exhibition, and Kezzie had been fascinated to read Edward’s account of creating the Memorial Gardens, apparently there’d been a huge fete on the day of the opening, which made her smile. Edward and Lily appeared not to have written anything very much after that, too busy bringing up their family she supposed, but the diary and letters had started again from around 1914. Kezzie had cried when she’d read a letter to Connie telling her her fiancé had died, and the last part of the diary she’d read had touched on the death of Harry, right at the end of the war, which struck Kezzie as exceptionally tragic.

  She picked up Lily’s diary for 1918, and started flicking through. It was filled with references about her worries and concerns for her only son, and then there was a gap with a few pages blank, before Kezzie came across an illegible scribble, 11 November, 1914. Harry is dead. Killed in the last battle of the war. I think my heart might break. After that there was no more, and Kezzie hadn’t unearthed any other diaries for Lily. How incredibly tragic. To lose your son like that, right at the end of the war. Lily must have thought he was safe. She must have thought it would be OK.

  Kezzie put her can of lager down, and roamed around her lounge restlessly. Her thoughts were getting all jumbled up. Joel had thought he had the rest of his life with Claire, and lost her swiftly and brutally. Lily had lost so much, those babies, then her only son. Life was a cruel business, and happiness had to be grabbed where it could. She had been extraordinarily happy with Richard in the two short years they were together. Despite their differences, until they’d split up she’d always felt they fitted together like hand and glove. And yet between them they’d thrown it all away. When she’d told Joel about Richard, he’d asked her what was stopping her trying to contact him again, and she’d told him that Richard didn’t want her any more.

  ‘Are you sure that’s not an excuse?’ Joel had said. ‘Did you actually ever say sorry to him about what had happened?’

  She hadn’t, of course, so blinded by fury had she been that he’d taken Emily’s part and wasn’t prepared to listen to her side of the story. And later on she’d accused him of being an old-fashioned prig who couldn’t let his hair down. He had been wrong and overreacted, but then so had she. It took two to make an argument, but maybe it only needed one of them to mend it.

  Without stopping to consider what she was doing, Kezzie sat down and wrote Richard a letter.

  12 The Lane

  Heartsease

  Sussex

  Dear Rich,

  I know you said you didn’t want to hear from me again. And I’ve tried, really tried to forget you, but I find I can’t. If you don’t reply I’ll try and understand, but I think I know now that a part of me will never be over you. I think we had something good going back there, and I’ll regret it to my dying day if I don’t try and get you back.

  So I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I was stupid enough to have those muffins in the house when Emily came round, and I’m sorry that I didn’t realize she’d drunk my vodka. But most of all I’m sorry for having not understood why you were so angry. I was cross with you for not taking my part. I thought you were overreacting, and I forgot that you have a duty to Emily first.

  It seems silly for us to have fallen out over this. Maybe there’s no way we can get back to where we were, but I do know that I miss you with every fibre of my being. If I never see you again, my life will be much the poorer.

  Love always,

  Kezziexx

  She addressed the envelope, sealed it, and put a stamp on it. She went to the post box at the end of the Lane and posted it before she could change her mind. It might not make any difference, but at least she could say she’d tried.

  Edward and Lily

  1919

  Lily continues heartbroken over Harry’s death, Edward wrote in his diary in the spring of 1919. All this long winter she has stayed indoors, no longer working at the hospital, though lord knows they need the help. She shuts herself away, poring over Harry’s letters, sitting in his room, touching his clothes, sometimes sleeping in his bed. I cannot reach her. And even now, as the spring returns and the crocuses and daffodils begin to emerge in the garden, I cannot persuade her to come and spend time with me there. The magic healing properties of our garden seem to be no cure for this.

  Even the return of Connie, to whom Lily now clung in a way she had never previously done, did nothing to help. Neither did the news, welcomed by Edward, but barely acknowledged by Lily, that Connie was to marry the doctor she had met in France, a young man called James Chandler, make any difference. In vain Edward tried to lighten Lily’s mood, encouraging her to start preparing for the wedding, but she would not be stirred. It is worse than the terrible time when she lost the babies, wrote Edward. I fear she is lost to me forever, locked in a grief so private and painful, even I cannot share it.

  As spring turned into summer, Edward’s hopes that Lily’s spirits would lift a little faded. He persuaded her sometimes to come and sit in the knot garden with her sketchbook, but more often than not he would come upon her sitting there, staring out across the valley, the paper barely marked. It was as if she had retreated into herself.

  James was now a frequent visitor, and a great favourite with all in the house. He was eminently suited to his work as a doctor, with his kindly gentle manner. Having been the head of his own house for some time, his father having died young, he showed great sensitivity towards Lily, admonishing Connie for her frequent impatience with her mother. ‘We are not all able to bear the pains of the world as well as you,’ he would say, and he would go out of his way to be even more solicitous to Lily. He was the only person who could occasionally make Lily smile, and for that Edward was grateful.

  He was pleased, too, that Tilly got on so well with her future brother-in-law. Tilly, whose youth had been blighted by war and suffering, deserved some fun now, Edward felt, and James certainly made her laugh and good naturedly let her join in expeditions with him and Connie. Tilly for her part was very taken with him, stating boldly to Connie when she first brought James home, ‘I do declare you’ve picked a fine one there.’ Connie had rebuked her for cheekiness, but Edward had watched with pleasure the way Tilly and James had become such good friends in a relatively short space of time – he hoped that James would in some way replace the much loved older brother that Tilly still grieved for. It eased his aching heart to think that although they had lost Harry, there was still a future for Connie, and in time, Tilly.

  But then a day came when the last remaining foundations of his comfortable happy family life fell away. Edward had been out for the afternoon, and come home to find the house deserted. Lily was sleeping in Harry’s room, and he didn’t like to disturb her. Of his daughters there was no sign. Thinking that they were probably in the knot garden, Edward went down there to find them. He pushed open the garden gate, where he stopped in mute horror. There on the iron seat, where he and Lily had sat so many many times, was James, locked in a passionate embrace with his youngest daughter.

  ‘Tilly!’ He had never been angrier with his youngest daughter. How could she betray her sister in this way?

  Tilly pulled herself away from James’ embrace in horror.

  ‘Father, I—’ She blushed scarlet, gathered her skirts up and said, ‘Sorry,’ before fleeing up the garden.

  ‘I suggest you leave, sir,’ Edward told James in icy tones. ‘You are no longer welcome in my house.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said James. ‘This is my fault, not Tilly’s. We didn’t mean it to happen, and we don’t want to hurt anyone. But we’ve fallen in love.’

  ‘I don’t wish to hear it,’ said Edward, in no mood to t
haw, ‘please, I want you to leave now.’

  As he watched James leave, Edward looked around at the garden he’d created. He’d fashioned it from love, with so much hope for the future. Over the years it had been a place of joy and comfort, through good and bad times. And this was the darkest of times, and now all his foolish hopes lay in ruin and despair. He felt his garden was mocking him. What was he going to tell his beloved Connie? For the second time in her life, she was going to have her heart broken.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  ‘So, have you been to Wimbledon before?’ asked Lauren, as they boarded the Waterloo train at Heartsease.

  ‘Once,’ said Kezzie. ‘I was fifteen and me and my mates bunked off school and camped out on the pavement. It was fabulous. We got to see Sampras and Henman. What about you?’

  ‘Nope,’ said Lauren, ‘but I’ve always wanted to. I can’t believe I’m here, or that Troy has agreed to babysit.’

  ‘He is their dad,’ said Kezzie. ‘And they are at school most of the day.’

  ‘I know,’ said Lauren, ‘but since the children were born, I’ve never had a whole day away from them up in London. I adore them, but I could really do with a break. I’m so excited about today, I feel like I’m on holiday.’

  ‘And so you should,’ said Kezzie. ‘You’re insanely responsible for someone your age.’

  ‘Hmm, well, I have a lot of responsibility,’ said Lauren. ‘But it is nice to have some time out.’

  The journey into London was relatively swift, and they changed at Clapham Junction and were on their way to Wimbledon in record time.