The Summer of Second Chances

by Maddie Please

  Part of the sitting-room ceiling had come down.

  There were chunks of plaster dropping onto the furniture, the ceiling horribly bowed and bubbled with the weight of water. There was water pooled on the floor, dark stains on the walls, a cold musty smell of mould and damp. I screamed and burst into tears.

  ‘Oh no,’ Bryn said. He put a comforting arm around my shoulders and hugged me.

  ‘How? How could this happen?’ I wailed.

  ‘It might be a burst radiator upstairs. But it’s not been cold enough for the pipes to freeze. You stay here and I’ll go and look. Don’t go into the sitting room, the ceiling might collapse.’

  He went upstairs and I could hear him moving around. Then distantly a muffled exclamation. And he came downstairs again.

  ‘The bath was full and overflowing. You must have left the taps on.’

  I shook my head. ‘No, I never have baths, I always use the shower. I haven’t tried to use the bath in all the months I’ve lived here.’

  Bryn shook his head. ‘The plug was in, the cold tap was turned on just a trickle, hardly anything but there was a pink flannel blocking the overflow pipe.’

  ‘That makes no sense at all. Why would I run a cold bath? Pink flannel? I don’t own a pink flannel.’ I ran my fingers through my hair. ‘Bloody hell, Jess is going to go mad when she sees this.’

  Bryn put a comforting arm around my shoulders. ‘Don’t worry about Jess. Accidents happen. She’ll understand.’

  ‘I bet she doesn’t! Oh sodding hell! What a bloody mess!’

  What on earth should I do? Was Jess insured? Would her insurance cover this? It almost looked as though I had deliberately flooded the place. She’d wonder what the hell I had been doing.

  I’d have to admit to her I had noticed the damp cushion, that I must have realised there was water coming from somewhere. But what had I done? I’d switched on the light, fused them, blown a light bulb then apparently skipped off to spend the day in bed with Bryn.

  I covered my face; I couldn’t bear to look.

  ‘I’ll have to ring her, tell her what’s happened,’ I said at last.

  Bryn took my hands and put them around his waist so that he could hug me.

  ‘Leave it for now. There’s nothing you can do.’

  ‘I can’t just leave it like that! It’s not going to magically get better!’

  ‘No but…’ Bryn hesitated. ‘Look, I’ll ring her in the morning if you like.’

  Oh, I was tempted. The prospect of him taking this burden away was very appealing. Should I just pass the buck?

  I straightened my shoulders. No, this was the sort of thing I needed to sort out myself. I was a grown up now. This was the sort of thing they did.

  ‘No, Bryn, it’s OK. Thanks, but I really should do this myself.’

  ‘Please, Lottie, let me, I don’t mind. I’ll drive over there in the morning, and tell her it wasn’t your fault.’

  I hugged him, remembering the bad blood that existed between Bryn and his brother. It was sweet that he would be prepared to do this.

  ‘It’s OK, Bryn,’ I said. ‘I need to stand on my own two feet. I can deal with this.’

  His face fell. ‘I just want to help you. Protect you.’

  ‘I know, and I appreciate it, but I’ll manage. I can’t phone from here, I’ve no reception. I’ll have to go into town and ring her. Unless I can use your land line?’

  He looked away, awkward. ‘I’m not sure if the handset works. I never use it anyway.’

  I frowned. ‘But that’s not true. I’ve heard it ringing before now.’

  ‘Yes but – oh, Lottie. Please just let me deal with it?’

  I began to wonder what all this was about and my stubborn streak started to surface. I’d grown used to being independent now; I wasn’t going to pass the buck.

  ‘Bryn, I know you want to help, but it’s my responsibility. If she is covered by the insurance then she needs to get a claim in as soon as possible. I need to tell her what happened.’

  He sighed. ‘Well, come back over to my house, we’ll sort something out. You can’t stay here.’

  Bryn took my hand and pulled me away from the devastation. We went back next door and I began to look through my phone for Jess’s number.

  ‘Do you want coffee?’ he said. ‘Or tea?’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m fine, I just want to get this over and done with.’

  I found Bryn’s landline in the sitting room and lifted the handset. There was a perfectly clear dialling tone; there was nothing wrong with it at all.

  ‘Look, I think it could have been Bonnie,’ Bryn blurted out. ‘Think about it. She could have run the water, put the plug in, blocked up the overflow.’

  I turned to look at him. ‘Bonnie? Why on earth would she do that?’

  ‘She’s jealous, possessive. She wanted us to get back together. She accused me of having someone else the last time I saw her. She freaked out when she first found out you were coming to stay in Holly Cottage. You know that dose of vandalism we found when you arrived? The rotten fish behind the radiator? The water and the ashes from the fire dumped on the carpet? Well I have a sneaking feeling it was Bonnie not Mr Webster. I can’t prove it and Bonnie denied it. I told her if I did have someone else it was none of her business. But then she must have worked it out. She left the earrings by the bedside. She wanted you – or whoever – to see them and feel uncomfortable.’ He put his arms around me. ‘And it nearly worked. I nearly lost you. I warned her off, told her I was going to change the locks.’

  ‘But how could she have got into Holly Cottage?’

  He wiped his hands over his face. There was a dry rasping noise as he rubbed his stubble.

  ‘I think that’s my fault, I’ve always had a spare key; Jess gave it to me in case of an emergency. I’d forgotten all about it but Bonnie must have found it. She could have taken the key ages ago – to be honest I wouldn’t have noticed. I’m guessing she let herself in, mucked around with the bath, turned the tap on a little so that no one would hear the water running.’

  ‘So she suspected something but how would she have known about me?’ I wailed. ‘About us?’

  Then I remembered. That first night when Bryn had invited me over for a meal and I had fallen into bed with him. I thought I had heard a car. Bonnie’s car. Of course.

  ‘Yes,’ I said after a moment.

  Then I remembered the open fridge door. The spilled milk, the digestive biscuits, the times when I felt someone had been in the house. The dead rat in the paint pot. I shuddered.

  ‘It all makes sense. I think you’re right. What a shitty thing to do.’ I felt like crying. ‘I wonder if Jess’s insurance covers malicious damage?’

  I picked up the phone again and Bryn took the handset from me.

  ‘Bryn?’

  ‘Will you let me sort this out? Please, Lottie?’

  I began to feel a bit annoyed. Didn’t he think I could cope?

  ‘No! I’ve told you, I’m quite capable of dealing with this, give me the phone back.’ I held out my hand to him. ‘Please.’

  Bryn looked at me for a long moment and then he took a deep breath.

  ‘You don’t need to phone her,’ he said.

  ‘I do! She’s my landlady, it’s her house, her insurance policy, it’s up to her to sort it out.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Bryn, stop making life difficult!’

  ‘Listen to me.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Will you sit down?’

  I sat down and he came to sit beside me. He took hold of one of my hands.

  ‘There’s no point phoning Jess because she doesn’t own Holly Cottage.’

  ‘Yes, she does! She said she decided not to sell after all!’

  ‘No, she doesn’t.’ He squeezed my hand between both of his. ‘I do.’

  There was a moment when I didn’t process this information properly and I started to laugh. Then I looked at his face and realised he wasn
’t joking.

  ‘When? How?’ I stuttered.

  ‘I bought it because Jess did want to sell up. She was on the point of getting an estate agent round and he told her he already had a buyer lined up. It would only have taken days to sell Holly Cottage.’

  ‘And?’

  Bryn swallowed hard and didn’t answer. At last he gave a shrug.

  My mind was spinning. ‘You felt sorry for me, didn’t you? Pity? Or was it something else?’

  I stood up and pulled my hand away from his.

  ‘No, Lottie, it wasn’t like that at all. But your sister said you’d had such a difficult time. I didn’t want to lose you.’

  My hearing seemed odd, the blood pounding in my ears. It was as though I could hear Ian from somewhere very far away.

  Look, Lottie, it’s a fact of life. All men play around a bit if they get the chance. You know that. Any man who says he doesn’t is a liar.

  ‘You thought I was just another stupid woman in trouble? Like Bonnie when her engagement broke down. I knew you were too good to be true. You can sniff out a vulnerable woman at fifty paces, can’t you, Bryn? That’s the way you work. You stepped in. Didn’t you?’

  ‘No, that wasn’t it.’

  ‘Didn’t you think for one moment that I might have wanted to stand on my own feet? That I was trying to manage my own life without interference? No, you just assumed that I wanted a big strong man to sort me out, take away all my problems and fuck me senseless in the process.’

  He winced. ‘No!’

  ‘You weren’t going to even tell me, were you? You would have pretended to get in touch with Jess. Pretended to contact her insurance people. Pretended she still owned this house.

  ‘When would you have told me, Bryn? Would you ever have told me? Or would you have kept on pretending – lying to me? Another handy little friend with benefits next door? Just like Bonnie? How can I ever thank you. I know, I’ll take my kit off and you can shag me into the middle of next week.’

  I was shaking with anger and disappointment.

  Bryn held out his hands to me.

  ‘Please, Lottie, please listen. You’re wrong.’

  He tried to put his arms around me but I turned away.

  ‘I think I’m going to go now. And by the way, Mr Palmer, there’s been a flood in Holly Cottage. You might like to get on to your insurance people and tell them. Your crazy girlfriend has wrecked months of cleaning and redecoration, not to mention a lot of the furniture. Whether you tell them that is entirely up to you. The ceiling has come down. Some of my things are spoiled. I meant to tell you, I have a little money now. I’ll find somewhere else to live as soon as possible.’

  ‘You can’t go back with the house like that, Lottie!’ he said.

  ‘Don’t tell me what I can’t do, Bryn. And by the way, you haven’t “lost” me, Bryn, because you didn’t have me in the first place.’

  My voice shook and I stopped to take a deep breath. I was crying; I couldn’t see him properly. I didn’t understand what had happened. I just knew I couldn’t bear it.

  I ran back to Holly Cottage, dashing away my tears, the sobs choking and hard in my throat. I tried to lock the back door behind me but it had broken when Bryn forced his way in. He had picked me up, kissed me, carried me outside into the garden, taken me to his bed and – and then what? What had he done? Had he made me fall in love with him, and then dashed all my hopes in one conversation?

  I went upstairs to my bedroom and lay down on the bed, deathly sick.

  Somehow I fell asleep and when I woke it was the middle of the afternoon. My face was puffy and sore with crying. I had a pounding headache. I couldn’t stay here. Apart from wanting to get away from the damp, the smell and the damage, everything I saw reminded me of Bryn. He had walked with me in the garden, talked to me, kissed me, carried me into his house, touched me and undressed me. He had stripped away my sadness, had given me a glimpse of how things might have been. It was hard now to close the door on that. I wished it had never been opened. I liked being in charge of my own life, that was the big thing I had learned. I wasn’t a fool, I wasn’t anyone’s pet.

  I got up, washed my face and collected a few things together, and then I got into my car, not looking around, not looking at his house, and drove away.

  CHAPTER 22

  Purple lilac – first emotion of love

  I don’t know what I was thinking, but I drove to look at my old house.

  I parked outside the gate and stared, recalling how it had felt to live there. The gravel drive that defied all my weeding attempts. The space in front of the garage with the splodge of an old oil spill where Ian used to park his car, until that time. That last time when he had driven away.

  I had put out a hand and grabbed his sleeve but he shrugged me off.

  I had tried to grab the car keys out of his hand but he turned his back on me.

  ‘Don’t be stupid, Ian. Give them to me. You’re drunk.’

  ‘Oh, shut up! Get off me!’

  ‘Please! Ian!’

  He opened the front door and slammed it behind him without another word. I ran out after him and banged on the car window to stop him. He didn’t even look at me as he drove away.

  I had waited, waited for him to come back. But he didn’t. I had shivered in the cold night air that brought with it the first few flakes of snow and the bitter chill of failure and then I went back into the kitchen to make a cup of tea.

  The ugly remains of our party cluttered every surface. Broken food remnants, half-empty bowls of crisps and smoked almonds, empty wine bottles on the windowsills lined up in neat rows. An opened bottle of celebratory champagne fizzed apologetically, untasted on the draining board.

  I found my cigarettes and lit one. Then I made some tea and drank it, sitting on a kitchen chair sticky with spilled cream. The oven was still purring away, diligently warming through a tray of cremated sausage rolls. I switched it off and shut the door on them. And then I smoked one cigarette after another until my head was dizzy. Where had he gone? When would he be back? What was I going to say when he did return?

  I put on some bed socks and my new pyjamas that were fetchingly decorated with Christmas trees and got into bed. I had expected to be cold. I hadn’t expected to be numb. I turned my face to the pillow. I didn’t think I would sleep, but I did.

  I woke some time later to hear a noise. I lay in the darkness and listened. Had I dreamt it? It was the front door. Someone was knocking to come in. Ian? He should have his keys and I hadn’t put the chain on.

  I ignored it for a few minutes and then I heard it again. A steady, determined, persistent knocking. I looked at the bedside clock. It was five to three.

  I got up and pulled on my dressing gown. My head began to ache. My mouth was foul. I would have to find some aspirin and a long drink of water.

  Looking down the stairwell I could see the front door. A dark figure was visible through the glass panel. Of course, the porch light was still on.

  I went down and put the door chain on before I opened it. I peered through the gap.

  ‘Yes?’

  I nearly fainted.

  There was a policeman outside. A tall, dark-haired man, and beside him a small neat policewoman.

  ‘Mrs Lovell?’ she said.

  ‘No, my name’s Calder. Charlotte Calder. I’m Ian’s partner.’

  She held out some sort of identity card.

  ‘Could we come in?’

  I could still remember the feel of the carpet in that house under my bare feet in the morning. The way the curtains on the landing stuck a little and had to be jiggled into place. The crack in the en suite sink that I had made a few days after Ian had died. I had been cleaning; I had dropped a bottle of bath oil, my hands cold and shaking.

  After a few minutes I saw the elderly owners looking out of their upstairs windows, clutching on to each other, obviously wondering if I was casing the joint.

  The front door had a new brass letterbox, the
re was a hideous stone donkey by the door with winter pansies filling its panniers and the hanging basket brackets were empty. Apart from that nothing much had changed. I wouldn’t have been surprised to see Ian come out of the house with his short, impatient stride, hurrying off to work. Or going wherever it was he went when I thought he was going to work.

  I gave a half-hearted wave at the house, to apologise for being there? I started up the car and drove to Sophie’s. I turned off the engine and unfastened my seat belt. Then I sat and thought for a good few minutes. Maybe she was out? Should I go in? Should I just drive away?

  I saw her move past the window a couple of times. I had spent so many evenings in that house drinking wine, eating scratch suppers when Ian was away on business. Or at least away. I could have navigated her kitchen blindfolded. I knew where the mugs were. How her coffee machine worked. Where the wine rack stood. Where she hid chocolate for emergencies.

  I tried to think it through. What would I have done if she had turned up at my door like this? I would have welcomed her in, of course. I would have done all I could for her. I had tried to be independent, self-sufficient, but I still needed friends and company.

  Sophie opened the door and stared at me for a moment.

  ‘What on earth has happened to you?’

  Always tactful, that’s Sophie.

  ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I didn’t know where else to go,’ I said. I took a step back, stumbling on the uneven ground.

  ‘For the love of – come in!’ she said, grabbing my arm and pulling me inside. ‘What the hell’s going on?’

  ‘Soph, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’ve made such a mess of things. I thought things couldn’t get any worse, but somehow I managed it.’ I started to cry. Loose easy tears, as though my tear ducts were faulty.

  ‘Look, I was just getting Tabitha to sleep—’

  ‘Oh shit, I’m sorry!’ I sniffed and fished in my sleeve for a tissue.

  ‘Stop apologising, it doesn’t matter. Jack’s out playing squash with Bruce, he won’t be back for ages. I’m going to settle you with a glass of wine and I’ll be no time at all. If there is one thing my daughter can do, it’s sleep.’