‘Beautiful eh?’ Jake says, a hint of pride at his adopted city in his voice.
Fran watches the light motes sparkle as they hit the water and she suddenly feels lighter, as though the unexpected occurrences of the day – David’s confession, meeting Jake again, the rush of memories – have outweighed the reality of things, giving her a day off from her problems, a reprieve.
‘The sea is looking very inviting,’ she says.
‘Would you like to walk down to the shore?’
They take the lift back down and head towards the beach. They take off their shoes and Jake rolls up his trousers as they wade slowly into the sea. The cool water on her skin makes Fran feel instantly better, as though it is cleansing everything away. She wishes it could – leaving her with a clean slate. A clean slate where her husband hadn’t cheated and they could start again with a new hope for this pregnancy.
‘What brought you out here?’ she asks Jake, trying to stop herself thinking about Will, or the baby, of the many possible scenarios that could be her future.
‘Dad,’ he says, that one syllable loaded with meaning.
‘Did you find him?’ Fran asks quietly, almost scared to hear the answer. When they were together Jake would talk about his father to the point of obsession, as though finding him would make everything better. Neither of them knew what ‘everything’ was though.
Jake shakes his head. ‘No,’ he says as he stops walking and looks out towards the horizon, his shoes in his hand and his shoulders slumped. Fran is suddenly reminded of Will on the Sunday before she left to come here, just before he told her everything. Her stomach lurches. Why can nobody have a happy ending?
‘What happened?’ she asks.
‘I found where he lived eventually, but it was too late. He died in 2007 – a year before I arrived in Barcelona.’
Fran reaches out, touching his arm, feeling the strength of the muscle there.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she says.
‘It turns out I have a half-sister I didn’t know about though,’ he goes on with a smile, lifting his head to look at her. ‘And two nephews and a niece.’
‘How old are they?’ Fran asks.
‘Samuel is eight and Alejandro is six. Juanna is only three but she’s so smart already, smarter than her brothers!’ The look of pride in his eyes when he talks about them makes Fran smile, her hand inadvertently covering her belly again.
She realises Jake is looking at her, holding her gaze. The hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. Her eyes drop to his lips and she doesn’t know why; she suspects the question she dreads most is coming.
‘Do you and your husband have children?’ he asks.
She shakes her head in answer. She wants to bluff it out, put on a smile, pretend they never wanted children, but Jake knows her too well and she doesn’t know if she can.
‘Fran?’ he says, his brows knitting together, his arms reaching out for her. ‘Are you all right?’ She shakes her head and he draws her towards him, leading her back onto the beach, towards a shady spot. They sit down on the hot sand and he holds her while she cries. She wants to stop but she can’t; she feels as though she never will.
Eventually her breath slows and she pulls away, embarrassed that she’s let go so easily, that she’s let down the façade she’s worked so hard at building up.
‘I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘I’ve not been sleeping, I’m tired and—’
‘Why don’t you just tell me the truth?’ he interrupts.
For a moment she almost tells him everything, but just before she does she looks at him and she realises that when he sees her he still sees the woman she used to be. He can’t see the heartbreak and the devastation because he doesn’t know. As soon as she realises that she knows she can’t tell him. Not yet.
There is something she can tell him though.
She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand.
‘My husband,’ she says. ‘He cheated on me. I found out just before I left.’
*
‘Did you ever get married?’ she asks, as Jake drives them back to Salou in his air-conditioned BMW.
He’s not said very much since she broke down on the beach. He hadn’t judged Will or given an opinion; he’d just sat next to her, stroking her hair while she told him about Will and Karen, about the text message. She knew how it sounded without the other details thrown in. She knew that without explaining to Jake about Oscar that she was painting her husband in a very dim light, but she didn’t want to examine all the reasons why she didn’t want to tell Jake anything else just yet.
She asked if he could take her to the taxi rank. Instead he offered to drive her back to her hotel.
‘No,’ he replies now, not taking his eyes off the road. ‘I never really settled down after you left. I couldn’t afford the flat on my own so when it was clear you weren’t coming back I went travelling for a while.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Fran says quietly, unable to ignore the sound of blame in his voice.
Jake places his hand on her thigh gently for a moment and she feels a shiver of memories again. ‘Don’t be,’ he says. ‘You did what you had to do. We were young, too young to settle down like that. It’s OK really, water under the bridge.’
‘I could have dealt with things a bit better though, not just left you high and dry.’
‘Your mum had just died. Don’t be so hard on yourself.’
‘Where did you travel?’
‘Australia, New Zealand, Southeast Asia, all the usual places. None of it really excited me though; none of it spoke to me or changed my world like it seemed to for other people. So I came back to England, stayed with Mum for a bit until my feet got itchy again.’
‘And then you came to Spain?’
‘Then I came to Spain. I went to Marbella at first – that was where Dad had gone when he left but he hadn’t been around for years. I worked in all sorts of jobs: bars, hiring out jet skis, that kind of thing. Eventually I met someone in Torremolinos who used to know Dad and told me he’d moved to Barcelona – and that’s how I ended up in Catalonia.’
‘And you never met anyone special on your travels?’ Fran asks again.
‘Not really, no. People come and go around here. It’s not somewhere you make long-term relationships.’ Jake’s eyes remain fixed on the road and Fran still feels as though she is missing something. She decides to change the subject.
‘So how did you make the money to invest in all these businesses then?’ She realises how nosey it sounds as soon as the words come out of her mouth. Jake looks at her and smiles.
‘Hard work,’ he says. He slows the car down and Fran realises they are back in Salou. ‘We’re here.’
‘Thanks for the lift, Jake,’ she says, suddenly feeling awkward about her nosey questions and how she’s going to end this strange day. ‘It really has been lovely to see you again.’
Jake starts to take off his seatbelt. ‘I’ll come in with you,’ he says. ‘Say hello to Amado.’
‘You know Amado?’ Fran asks.
‘Everyone knows Amado!’ Jake replies with a grin.
‘He won’t be back from Barcelona,’ Fran says.
‘He went to Barcelona too?’ Jake asks. ‘It’s not like him to take a day off.’
‘Between you and me I think he’s got a crush on one of my retreaters.’
Jake smiles slowly. ‘Well good for him. Is she single?’
Fran nods. ‘I wouldn’t be encouraging it if she wasn’t.’ She pauses. ‘Is Amado single?’
‘He’s been widowed for years. All he does is work – it’ll do him good to have a bit of fun. Want to play matchmaker with me?’
Fran’s smile disappears. ‘I’m not really in a place to be playing matchmaker,’ she says.
‘No, perhaps not.’ Jake starts to get out of the car. ‘I’ll come in anyway, see if Pierre’s around for a beer.’
‘You know Pierre too?’
‘I know everyone,’ Jake replies with a smile. He
always did know everyone. In that way he is similar to Will. Perhaps Fran found herself attracted to men who know everyone so she doesn’t have to.
They walk into the hotel together still not quite touching. Pierre is standing in the middle of the atrium having a very loud, very rapid conversation in Catalan with a couple of other members of staff. Fran can’t understand but she watches as Jake’s brow furrows. Pierre spots him and rushes over to him, embracing him and drawing him into the conversation. Jake is soon embroiled in the rapid exchange as well and Fran wonders what’s going on, especially when all four men start looking at her.
‘What?’ she asks.
‘There’s been a bit of a disaster,’ Jake begins.
Fran’s stomach drops into her feet. What’s happened? Her mind races. Has the bus crashed on the way to Barcelona? Has something happened to her retreaters? To Elizabeth? To Amado?
‘You know the hotel has an in-house yoga teacher?’ Jake goes on.
Fran nods. Pierre and the other staff members are staring at her.
‘Well she’s broken her leg and the replacement teacher can’t get here from Barcelona for another couple of weeks. Pierre is terrified of how Amado’s going to react – this is the busiest fortnight of the year and this is one of the best wellbeing hotels in northern Spain.’
Fran nods again. All eyes are still on her. She thinks she knows where this is going. She feels a fizz of excitement in her stomach again, just like she did when she first arrived – as though the adventure she has been waiting for is about to begin.
‘We were wondering,’ says Pierre slowly, ‘if perhaps you would like to stay in beautiful Salou for a further two weeks and help us out.’
‘If they could get this sorted out before Amado returns you’d be doing them a huge favour,’ Jake says. He looks at Fran for a moment and drops his voice so only she can hear. ‘And after what you told me on the beach earlier, I wondered if you might appreciate a little bit of time and space away from home as well?’ he says.
The fizz of excitement turns into an explosion, as though the universe has given her a gift.
*
Pierre and Jake and Fran retire to the bar to discuss details. Quite why Jake has become involved Fran isn’t sure – perhaps because he is friends with Amado and will break the news to him on his return – but Fran is glad he’s there. She would have begun to doubt the whole plan long ago if he wasn’t there to encourage it. She doesn’t let herself wonder if he has an ulterior motive for keeping her here; she just thinks about what she needs.
The truth is she isn’t ready to go back to Suffolk, to go back to the claustrophobic village, to face the reality of what has happened, to face her pregnancy. Two weeks here, teaching yoga twice a day and doing very little else will be exactly what she needs to work out what she must do next. The reason she decided to lead this retreat in the first place was to try to find her strength again, to try to rediscover who she was, to try to find the Fran from before. Before Oscar, before the miscarriages, before life had become so difficult, so heartbreaking.
But finding out about Will and Karen, and finding out that she is pregnant has thrown that plan off course and Fran feels now that if she is to find the strength to deal with her pregnancy and to deal with whatever it is that will become of her marriage, she has to find the strength to be herself again. One thing is certain: she isn’t going to find that strength in Suffolk with Will fussing and the memories flooding over her at every turn.
‘You’re absolutely sure this is all right?’ Pierre asks again, as though he is unable to believe his luck at having solved the problem so quickly and before Amado returns.
‘As long as you’re sure it’s all right for me to teach in English?’ Fran replies.
‘Of course,’ Pierre says. ‘Most of our guests over the summer are English and everyone speaks it to some extent.’
‘Then we have a deal,’ Fran says with a smile. ‘I need to contact a few people, but I can’t see it being a problem at all.’ She’ll find people to cover her yoga classes back in Cambridge for a couple of weeks – there are always teachers looking for more work. As for Will, well Fran doesn’t think he’s in a position to argue.
Jake sits back in his chair and spreads his hands out in front of him. He looks at Fran. ‘Some things are just meant to be,’ he says.
When Amado comes back he is on such a high from his day in Barcelona and so delighted to see Jake and so pleased that the problem has been solved without him having to become involved, that he invites Jake to stay for dinner. He makes no comment about Jake and Fran knowing each other. Amado lives in a world where everybody knows each other anyway so the situation isn’t unusual. When Fran catches Elizabeth’s eye, however, she raises an eyebrow. Fran looks away. She’s not sure she wants to talk about Jake with Elizabeth just yet.
Dinner is late that evening, but Jake is a huge hit with the group, particularly with Constance who engineers the seating arrangements so that she is sitting next to him and, as far as Fran can see, barely lets go of his arm all night. Poor Jake.
Amado also joins them for dinner, sitting next to Elizabeth, but he is constantly up and down supervising his staff. Jake tells the group about his bike tours and invites them all to join him in the Montsant National Park on Monday. Fran opens her mouth to protest but everyone is so caught up in the enthusiasm and adventure that she decides she can make sure that people really want to do this the next morning. She doesn’t want to ruin the camaraderie of the evening.
Amado extols the virtues of Jake’s bike company, telling everyone about the awards he has won and how it is the number one Catalonian attraction on TripAdvisor – although Fran suspects that honour might actually go to PortAventura, the huge theme park down the road. However good Jake’s bike trips are, she doubts they attract as many people as that!
She leans back in her chair and watches Jake bask in the praise. She is happy to take a back seat for the evening, pleased to not be the centre of everyone’s attention. She’s happy for Jake, happy that he’s managed to make a life for himself, even if it isn’t the life he had hoped or imagined. She wonders if that’s the key to contentment – letting go of the life you always imagined. She and Will had been so rigid in their plans, their goals – so tunnel-visioned, that when it didn’t work out there hadn’t been a Plan B and they had been lost, unable to fathom out life when the family they’d planned for, hoped for, never happened.
Her hand automatically rests on her abdomen again as she tries not to think of worst-case scenarios. Instead she imagines a future that is more fluid, a life that feels less restricted. She wonders how Will fits into such a life.
As she watches Jake she feels her stomach flip again and knows the attraction is still there, as strong as it was when she was eighteen. When he catches her eye over the top of Constance’s head and smiles, she knows she has to try not to be alone with him again. She knows that isn’t going to solve anything. She ignores the small voice in the back of her head that asks her why she ever let him go.
Elizabeth
‘I’m surprised you’ve taken on this extra teaching,’ Elizabeth says to Fran as she stands next to her at the bar after dinner. Fran is glowing with happiness but underneath it she seems exhausted. ‘I’d have thought you’d be eager to get home, get back to Will.’
Fran shrugs. ‘I could do with some time alone,’ she says, noncommittally.
‘Fair enough, but you and Will always seem so close.’
‘Not everything is as simple as it looks.’
Elizabeth looks at Fran and thinks about what Constance said on the first day of the retreat about Fran not coping as well as she seemed to be, and about what Fran said at dinner on Molly’s birthday about how she and Will were struggling.
‘Is everything all right?’ she asks.
She watches as Fran bites her lip and her eyes dart from side to side as though she’s trying to make a decision. Elizabeth senses Fran wants to say something but doesn’t know
if she should.
‘He cheated on me,’ she says. The words come out quietly but in a rush as though she’s hoping they won’t be heard. ‘Will slept with someone else,’ she goes on, her head bowed.
Elizabeth takes a step back, surprised by what Fran has said, but more surprised that she has confided in her at all. She has always felt that she wanted to be friends with Fran, to be a mother figure in her life, more than Fran wanted her to be.
So Constance was right after all, she thinks. She usually is.
‘Let’s go for a walk,’ Elizabeth says eventually.
The two women walk onto the beach in silence, neither of them really knowing what to say. They slide off their sandals and walk barefoot on the sand.
As they walk, Fran begins to speak. ‘It was someone in our village,’ she says, looking down at her feet. ‘She works in the local pub. I don’t know her really. He says it was over by Christmas, but I only found out the day before we came here. Will wanted me to cancel, to stay at home and see if we could work things out but I needed to get away, away from the village, away from the memories.’ She stops. ‘I just don’t feel like I can go back yet,’ she says. ‘I know I have to, I know I have to face it all eventually, I know Will and I have to talk about it. But not yet – I can’t face it yet.’
Elizabeth still doesn’t know what to say so they keep walking and Fran keeps talking. Fran tells Elizabeth everything – about the cold, rainy night in October, about the argument she had with Will, about what he did before he walked out on her.
‘He wanted to talk about Oscar,’ Fran says. ‘He tried all the time to talk to me about what had happened and I just cut him off. I think he felt as though he’d lost everything that night.’
Elizabeth sucks in air between her teeth. ‘You can’t blame yourself for his behaviour,’ she says.
‘I don’t. I’m not making excuses for him either. But I’m not going to pretend my behaviour has been exemplary either.’
The Things We Need to Say Page 13
