Hortense glared at him. ‘That is not what you said last night! And just because you’re emotionally stunted,’ she huffed, ‘doesn’t mean that’s the way we all deal with these things.’
‘It doesn’t make me emotionally stunted. Sometimes these things iron themselves out if you leave them to breathe.’
Hortense folded her arms. ‘When did that ever happen in the history of the world? Woman ignores problem, problem goes away? Perhaps if a man ignored it he might imagine it had gone away, but women are far too practical to imagine that avoidance is any kind of solution.’
‘Give the man some space and he might come to talk to her…’ He turned to Esme. ‘I mean you, pet. He might come and talk to you. It wasn’t meant to be rude.’
Esme smiled. ‘I know you did, and I didn’t think you were being rude.’
‘Rot,’ Hortense said. ‘I keep telling you, Esme, the direct approach. It’s the only way. Churchill didn’t win the war by waiting for Hitler to come and talk to him.’
Esme exchanged a look of confusion with Brian. She wasn’t sure what it had to do with Churchill and Hitler and she guessed he didn’t either.
‘Perhaps you could talk to him, Brian,’ Hortense said. ‘On Esme’s behalf.’
Esme bit back a cry of frustration. ‘No! Thank you both, but there’s no point in stirring things up and I get the feeling Zach wouldn’t want to talk about it. I’d quite like to forget about it too.’
‘But—’
‘I thought you’d just agreed to go and see him,’ Hortense said with a look of faint surprise.
‘I did, but on balance I’m not sure it’s the best idea.’
‘But, my dear girl—’
‘I appreciate everyone’s concern,’ Esme cut in, ‘but, really, I’d rather leave it be.’
Brian exchanged a glance with Hortense, where he was obviously feeling vaguely triumphant and she was more irked by him than ever. Then he gave a cheerful shrug.
‘I’ll go and get my breakfast then.’
Hortense watched him go, swirling the last corner of her cinnamon bun in her coffee. ‘Don’t you think you might come to regret your decision?’ she said mildly.
‘Maybe, but if it spares any further difficulties between me and Zach then I’ll live with the consequences.’
‘What if it creates more?’
‘I don’t see how it can.’
Hortense turned to her with a vague shrug. Clearly, for possibly the first time in her life, she was holding back on something she really wanted to say. So much for the direct approach.
* * *
It was as she was getting ready to go out to the fireworks that evening that Esme’s mobile phone rang and she noted, with mild surprise, an unknown number showing on the screen.
Shelly?
Her suspicions were confirmed as she took the call.
‘Is that Esme?’
‘Shelly?’
‘Look, this doesn’t mean we’re friends or anything, but I thought you might want to know that Warren came round here last night – just after you phoned me. Trying to worm his way back into the flat, telling me we’re meant to be together and all that bullshit. I don’t know what’s changed but something has, and he was doing his persuasive best to move me this time.’
Esme was thoughtful for a moment. ‘I take it you’ve told him no?’
‘Told him to sling his hook. What’s the situation with you two now? Be straight with me – it’s the least I deserve.’
‘You’re right – it is, but I can’t tell you. Not because I don’t want to but because I don’t really know. It’s complicated.’
‘Isn’t it always? You don’t need to tell me about complicated – it’s all Warren and me have ever been. So you’re not living together now? Or you are and he’s bored? It doesn’t take him long to start wandering and he usually ends up back here. Probably because I’m stupid enough to take him back.’
‘I thought you didn’t want to know what was going on with Warren and me,’ Esme replied with a wry smile.
‘That was before he turned up here with flowers and wine. I always know something’s amiss when there’s flowers and wine. Good wine too, so I know for sure he’s after something.’
‘Oh, yes. And the flowers. The bigger the bouquet the more trouble he’s trying to fix.’
‘Oh God. You should have seen the size of them when he first messed me around. Julie, her name was. I think he’d cleaned out Kew Gardens. Silly bloody moo I am forgave him too. Back then I thought big flowers meant big remorse. What an idiot.’
‘You’re not. If you’re an idiot then I think there are quite a few of us around.’
‘So you’ve chucked him out?’
‘Not exactly.’
‘You’ve left his other flat?’
‘I’m not even in England right now.’
‘Not in England? I know he can be a pain but that’s a long way to run.’
‘I suppose it is. It’s a holiday, though.’
‘I’ve got to hand it to you – dump Warren and go on holiday. Cool as you like.’
‘Not even that,’ Esme said, and she couldn’t help a little laugh at the notion. ‘It was booked by my grandma for me as a Christmas present.’
‘So she’s with you?’
‘No. She died before the trip. I had wanted Warren to go but he didn’t fancy it.’
‘I suppose he had to pay for the ticket?’
‘No, he could have had my grandma’s. I asked him but he said no.’
‘Bloody hell – there’s a turn up. He’s not one to pass up on free. He’ll even take cut price. We’ve been on some shit holidays because he’s had the accommodation cheap. His mate’s caravan… ugh!’
‘Is that in Clacton, by any chance?’
‘Yeah. Gary’s place. Don’t tell me you’ve been there?’
‘He wanted to take me there instead of this holiday.’
‘Oh God, you’ve had a lucky escape. It’s a shithole! Doesn’t get cleaned from one month to the next – used condoms down the side of the bed, food left rotting in the fridge…’
Esme smiled. It was funny, but she was warming to Shelly already now that they were able to talk properly, and she got the impression that the feeling was mutual.
‘When Warren didn’t come home, where did you think he was?’ Esme asked.
‘Where did you think he was? He must have been doing the same to you when he came home to me. Or whoever it was that week.’
‘Away on training courses—’
‘Oh, yeah, that was one of his favourites.’
‘He did use that one a lot. Sometimes he said he’d been at a lock-in and he’d stayed there all night or crashed with a mate. It’s funny because I sort of didn’t mind. It almost felt like a break when he didn’t come home. Sometimes he said he’d got a conference with an overnight stay.’
‘I had all those. I know what you mean about a break too. I think on some level I knew he was lying, but I didn’t want to think about it because I enjoyed the peace too much when he wasn’t here. I didn’t have to tread on eggshells all the time and constantly think about whether he was pleased with me or not.’
Esme blinked. ‘You felt like that?’ Shelly seemed so confident to Esme, so mature and collected. She couldn’t imagine that Warren would make her feel just the way he made Esme herself feel – like nothing she ever did really pleased him.
‘He has a way of making you feel shit. Like you’re an essay and he’s a teacher who never marks it with anything but red pen no matter how hard you try. You can study and you can revise and you can research all you like, but it will never be good enough for him.’
‘But we don’t leave him, even though he makes us feel like that.’
‘It’s because he makes us feel like that we don’t leave him. It took me a long time to realise it. He makes us feel like we’re not worthy, and then he lets us believe he’s making this huge sacrifice to be with us, how we’d never be good enough
for anyone else and so staying with him is saving us from a life of loneliness. He puts up with all our imperfect crap as a favour and we ought to be grateful he’s there at all.’ Shelly paused. ‘Sound familiar?’
‘And yet you kept taking him back…’
‘You did too – right?’
‘I suppose I did.’
‘Took us both for mugs then, didn’t he?’
‘Yeah.’ Esme sat on the bed and stared at the wall. ‘How stupid do I feel?’
‘However stupid it is, you can bet I’ve been there.’
‘Not anymore though?’
‘Do you know what I did yesterday?’
‘What?’
‘I went for coffee with a boy I knew at school. We’d been mates all those years ago, and he’d been off round the world on a cruise ship doing shows. Every time he came back to England for leave he’d message me to ask if I wanted to meet up for coffee and I’d always said no.’
‘Because Warren was jealous?’
‘Because Warren likes to control the contact you have with other people. He likes to decide who you see and don’t see, and it usually ends up being his friends you see – not yours. I told him time and time again he had no need to worry about my mate Danny – he’s gay for a start. But Warren just wouldn’t have it. Once I said I was going anyway and he went mental, threatened to lock me in the flat. In the end it was just easier to make excuses to Danny and not go. But yesterday, I got to decide who I saw and where I went, and I walked into that coffee shop and I met Danny and I felt properly free for the first time in years. I can’t tell you how valuable that is and I’m not giving it up again. I’ve wasted too much of my life already trying to please a man who can’t be pleased. It’s about time I pleased myself.’
Esme was silent as she took in all that Shelly had told her. It was time to be brutally honest – hadn’t she already seen all of this for herself in her own relationship with Warren? Hadn’t she lost her friends and her family because he’d made it just too difficult to stay in contact? She’d persuaded herself it was a reaction to their dislike of him, but perhaps it was about control.
‘Am I describing your life with Warren too?’ Shelly said into the gap.
‘Yes.’
‘Do you want some advice from an old discarded wife?’
‘You’re not any of that.’
‘I still feel like it. I think that feeling will take a long time to go. Still, my advice is this – and I don’t owe you anything so let’s make that clear; this is just my altruistic side coming to the surface – get out. Get away from him before he wears you away so completely you can barely see yourself when you look in the mirror.’
* * *
It was almost certainly the coldest evening Esme had endured so far, but she wasn’t going to let that stop her from watching the fireworks. So she stamped her feet and shivered and wished that she had some mountaineering thermals or whatever it was that Hortense said she was wearing that kept her happily impervious to the chill.
Despite this, however, the Christmas carols had lifted Esme’s mood. The children in the choir had been adorable, and the whole thing had been surprisingly moving, so it had been quite impossible not to feel uplifted by the end of it. The fact that Zach hadn’t shown up had been something of a relief in the end too. Out of sight, out of mind, her grandma used to say, and although he wasn’t exactly out of mind, the emotional turmoil had been put to one side for a while at least. She’d have to address what it all meant at some point, if only in her own mind, but not now. Then again, they were going home tomorrow. By sending the text before breakfast she considered that she’d made the first move. She’d made it clear she was available and willing to discuss things. If Zach didn’t come to her today and talk things through then she could only assume he didn’t want to talk – not now or ever, and that he wanted her to leave him alone. As much as the notion stung, she’d have to respect his wishes all the same. It was all very well adopting Hortense’s direct approach if you were exactly like Hortense – strong and resilient enough to take whatever consequences may result from it, but Esme wasn’t like Hortense and it just wasn’t an option.
That wasn’t the only thing that had Esme’s head in a whirl. Snippets of her conversation with Shelly kept replaying in her head, along with the warning Shelly had left her with. In many ways, everything looked clear for the first time since she’d met Warren, but in so many ways Shelly’s insights led to more questions than they answered. Most importantly, why had Esme herself been so utterly taken in by him? For that matter, why had Shelly been taken in? Esme felt she’d got a pretty good measure of Warren’s wife now and she didn’t come across as a fragile flower who’d be that easy to hoodwink or control, and yet he’d done both those things to her for a number of years. One thing Esme did know, Warren needed to be stamped with a government health warning. It didn’t seem fair to set him loose on the female population without one.
For once, perhaps out of respect for delicate feelings, Brian and Hortense kept a respectful distance from each other – merely holding hands as they waited for the show to begin, and every so often one of them would fire a knowing look at Esme, or at her and then each other. Esme didn’t know whether she wanted to scream with impatience or throw her arms around them both for being so concerned for her welfare. She certainly couldn’t argue that they didn’t care.
‘Oh dear. There’s still no sign of him,’ Hortense said. She looked at Esme like Esme ought to ask who she meant but, of course, Esme didn’t need to.
‘He missed the carols too,’ Brian said, perhaps a slightly unnecessary observation in the circumstances. They were all well aware Zach had missed the carol concert because they had all been at the carol concert. ‘That’s a real shame.’
‘Oh, it is a shame,’ Hortense agreed. ‘I don’t suppose you went to talk to him after all,’ she added. ‘As you said you might this morning…’
‘I thought you told me not to,’ he replied. ‘And Esme made it clear she didn’t want me to.’
‘Thank you,’ Esme said, giving him a grateful smile. While their situation troubled her, the only people she wanted to involve in it were her and Zach – any more would only complicate things.
‘Although I did go to his room while you waited in that big queue for chestnuts,’ Brian announced, and this time Esme turned sharply. ‘Only because he’s part of our gang and I didn’t want him to think we’d forgotten him or that we weren’t bothered. He told me he felt under the weather but he’d try to join us later.’
‘How did he look?’ Esme asked, unable to stop herself. She was doing her best to look as if she didn’t care but was beginning to resign herself to the fact that she was probably fooling no one.
‘Alright. Not very talkative.’
‘But he looked OK?’
‘Right enough.’
‘Not ill?’
‘Not really.’
‘Right… good.’
Esme didn’t know what to make of the information. What was she supposed to do?
‘Don’t give it another thought, dear girl,’ Hortense said. Esme tried to smile.
‘I just feel bad about how it all wound up. I feel as if it’s ruined the holiday for everyone.’
‘Nonsense! I’ve had the most marvellous time! It’s been a pleasure spending it with you. I hope I’ve made a rather wonderful friend for life.’ Hortense turned to Brian. ‘Don’t you agree?’
Brian nodded. ‘Oh, yes. We’ll have to meet up again back in England sometime.’
Esme wasn’t sure Zach would be quite as keen for that, but she liked that Hortense and Brian were. At least that was something. And despite all their obvious differences in age and background, she had become very fond of them both. Like Zach, she harboured a secret hope that Hortense and Brian would stay together once the holiday was over, and looking at them now, she had a feeling they just might. It looked as if Esme, however, would have to be content with that and with the memories of the good
bits with Zach. Maybe she’d try to see him once more before their flight tomorrow, give it one more shot, once the fireworks were over. That was assuming he didn’t show up at all tonight, and that was looking increasingly likely right now.
‘I’d like that,’ she said in answer to Brian’s offer. ‘And when I get settled in my new house you’re welcome to come and stay with me.’
Hortense raised her eyebrows. ‘You never said you were buying a property! Congratulations! When are you able to move in?’
‘No.’ Esme smiled. ‘I’m not. It’s my grandma’s house. At least, it used to be. I suppose it’s mine now.’
‘Ah. I hadn’t realised. Did she leave it for you in her will?’
‘Something like that. I must admit I’d been a bit hesitant to live in it but now…’
‘Oh, you simply must live in it. It’s a wonderful thing to be able to keep it in the family for the next generation. You must fill it full of new memories – it’s the best way to honour your grandmother’s memory.’
‘I never thought about it like that. I just got… well, I got a little lonely there. I mean, I lived there for a few weeks after she died but…’
‘It was bound to be strange at first. Have you tried redecorating?’
‘I can’t say I’ve given it much thought. I was so busy holding on to her stuff… I suppose to try and hold on to her. Trying to hold on to the last few months with her. They were the happiest I’ve been in a long time and…’
Hortense rushed to give Esme a hug. ‘Oh, dear one, you simply must let these emotions out. There’s no shame in grief. When Mummy died I cried and cried for weeks.’
Esme shook her head and smiled through her tears. ‘It’s OK, I’m not ashamed. Not with you and Brian. It’s just… I’m angry with myself. I’m angry that I threw away what I’d achieved in that time with my grandma and I’d let myself slide back into a life I hadn’t wanted, a life I’d tried to run away from.’
Hortense threw Brian a puzzled glance. ‘I don’t want to pry but if you need to talk about it…’
‘I don’t, not really. But I do need to remember it because I have a lot to sort out when I go home tomorrow. I need to hold onto this feeling I have now, and I need to remember how much I love Grandma’s house so I can stay strong enough to resist the temptation to take the easy path again. Sometimes I’ll get lonely but I have to remember it’s OK.’
The Christmas Wish: A heartwarming Christmas romance Page 23
