by Emma York
One night, I told myself. That was all we had. I could walk. That meant I could go home. Sort my career out.
I sent a message to my mom, telling her to book me a flight. It took a while to send, the signal feeble, but it made it eventually. Then I looked outside again. There was no harm in going and talking to him.
I got washed and dressed and then headed outside. I found him climbing out of the water when I reached the shore, water dripping from him as he rubbed the towel through his hair.
“Morning,” I said.
“Good morning,” he replied. “Fancy a dip?”
“A bit cold isn’t it?”
“Good for you. Wakes you up.”
“I’ll pass for now.”
“Suit yourself.”
I was confused. He was acting for all the world as if nothing had happened between us.
“I signed your contract,” he said. “The one you needed.”
“I wasn’t even sure you’d seen it.”
“You left it in the smoking room. It’s ready when you are.”
“Then I guess we’re all done here.”
“I guess we are.” He slung the towel over his shoulder and headed back to the castle, leaving me sitting feeling utterly miserable. I had been sure something special had happened last night but it looked as if I was the only one who felt that way. He was clearly indifferent.
I waited until he was gone before getting up and heading inside. I was going to go straight up to my room and pack. If he was going to act like that, there was no point staying any longer than I needed.
As I walked along the grass, I saw a boat approaching from the mainland. It was Hedley bringing someone. Another minute and I could see it was Dr Montgomery standing next to him. I walked down to the jetty in time for them to tie the boat up.
“Good morning,” Dr Montgomery said as he stepped off. “Looks like your leg’s doing better.”
“It is, thank you,” I replied. “Hedley, would you mind waiting to give me a lift back over?”
“Aye,” he said with a slight incline of his head. “Dinnae be awa long though."
“I won’t. I just need to grab my case.”
I walked with the doctor towards the castle. “How’s the pain?” he asked.
“Much better.”
“You’re still limping but only a little. Should I have a look?”
“No, please don’t consider me rude but I need to catch a flight. I hope you didn’t come all this way just to see me.”
“No, I need to speak to Angela about her back anyway.”
“Then if you’ll excuse me.” I pushed open the castle door and headed straight upstairs. Cramming things into my case, I couldn’t get done fast enough. I didn’t want to look at the bed. That would mean thinking about last night, about me being naive enough to think something special had happened with someone special. Nope, just me being an idiot as usual.
There was a knock on the door and I spun round hoping it was Robert, hoping he’d come to talk to me properly.
It was Angela. “Mr King asked me to tell you it’s time to check out,” she said.
“Don’t worry,” I replied. “I’m leaving.”
I was downstairs a few seconds later with my case, Angela watching me go. I paused briefly at the smoking room to grab the contract before heading outside.
The boat was ready for me and as soon as I stepped aboard, Hedley untied the rope and we were off. “Goodbye, Castle Doon,” I said as we started chugging over the waves.
Hedley didn’t say anything and I saw no reason to start a conversation. I made it to Doon village in time to catch the morning bus. I sat on it, watching the loch fade away behind me, feeling an intense sadness. I had the rights for filming, I had achieved what I had come to do but that didn’t seem to matter anymore. It seemed unimportant compared to the knowledge that I’d been used. How could he have acted so casual about it all? And then to disappear knowing I had to leave? That was the most cowardly part of all.
I felt no better by the time I was on the train. Mom messaged me. The flight was booked. I was going home. By the time I got to Glasgow, I began to feel if not happier, at least calmer. It was over. It was never meant to be.
TEN - ROBERT
One year later…
They were on their way. I hung up the phone. I’d asked Hedley to give me notice of their arrival. It was the kind of thing Angela used to take care of, dealing with the comings and goings from the castle.
Once I’d got rid of her, I realised there wasn’t enough money to hire anyone else. Until the check from the movie company arrived, I had to do pretty much everything myself.
I walked out of the back door of the castle, passing by the scarred section of wall. It didn’t look like much unless you knew what you were looking at. The spot by the study where she’d left, turned, and thrown the statue at me.
I’d told her the truth. I knew that she’d signed my mother up for all kinds of suitable investments. I knew it was her who was gunning for the place, hoping to buy it out from under me. “Why?” I asked, genuinely interested. “After all the years you’ve given to the place, why would you do this?”
Her face went through a range of colours before she swallowed down her anger and answered me. “Because I deserve it.”
“You deserve it?”
“I gave my life to this place for a pittance.”
“You were paid more than anyone else, Angela, I saw the books.”
“You can prove nothing, you know that, don’t you?”
“I don’t need to prove anything. The house is off the market and I’m giving you notice to leave. Unfortunately the role of housekeeper has been made redundant.”
She barked out a laugh. “I suppose you’re going to run the place yourself, are you?”
I nodded. “I guess I am.”
“Then this is goodbye.”
She turned and walked out but barely made it to the hallway before she picked up the statue of Bacchus from its plinth, hurling it at me with a scream of rage.
It was heavier than she expected and badly aimed. It thudded into the wall next to the door, falling to the floor and shattering. “That’s the last bit of damage you do to the place,” I said, not moving from my seat behind the desk. “Hedley is waiting for you. Get out of my sight.”
I should have felt happy about sorting that problem but I was only filled with regret. Dealing with that problem meant rewriting history, coming to terms with the past in a way I never expected. The woman who I’d looked up to, who’d taken care of the castle and me during my childhood was not who I thought she was.
As I stepped outside into the sunshine, I thought about Tilly. That felt the same. She wasn't who I thought she was. I should have felt happy about her going. One night together. That was what I had offered and she had accepted. One perfect night.
I had thought there was more to it. I had thought something happened between us, something special.
It was clear she hadn’t felt the same way. The way she talked to me the next day, the way she left without saying goodbye, told me the truth. It wasn’t that she’d done it to get me to sign the contract, she wasn’t that cheap. It was that she had agreed to one night and that was what we’d had.
I thought about calling her. So many times over the last year, I came close to ringing her across the Atlantic but I never did.
It was always the same. I would sit with the phone in my hand, ready to dial, often late at night when I felt at my loneliest.
But what would I say? She lived five thousand miles away. We had only been together for one night. It would be ridiculous to dial her up and say, “I love you, Tilly. I realised the moment I found out you were gone. I can’t stop thinking about you. I have missed you every single hour of every single day since you left and you took a huge part of me with you when you went. I’d like it back and I’d like you back. Move to a castle that’s falling down with a man rich in property but poor in money and live in the m
iddle of nowhere, say goodbye to your career too, not really a movie networking hotspot out here.”
Yeah, that would do it, she’d be on the next flight out.
So I didn’t call her. Instead, I kicked myself for not saying something the morning after. It was my stupid pride that had stopped me. One night I had asked for and she’d willingly given me that. I deserved no more.
I walked along the path to the walled garden, the spot she had loved so much. What would she think of it now compared to when she was here?
I had told myself I worked on it for the sake of manual labour, honest work to keep myself trim.
Manual labour was the last part of monastic life that I clung to. I had contacted the abbot, told him I wouldn’t be coming back. “Do what must be done,” he had written back to me. “I will pray for you.”
I couldn’t leave the castle. I realised that at the same moment I realised I loved Tilly. It might have been too late for me and her but it wasn’t too late for the castle. It had brought me back, something I never expected to happen. I had fallen in love with it anew as I had fallen in love with her. It wasn’t until she was gone that I realised the building and her had got into my bones. This was where I belonged and she belonged here with me. It was a crying shame that she didn’t feel the same way.
I shouldn’t have cared. I got my one night with her. She did exactly as I asked. I had been alone for years, I was used to the solitary life. But a castle that big with only me inside? Something about it wasn’t right.
When the check came, I’d be able to hire staff again, get the repairs done that were so badly needed. Until then, it was just me, picking up a spade and turning over the corner of the walled garden, preparing the soil.
I dared not hope she might come with them. I’d spoken to the producer on the phone a couple of times. I dared not ask if Tilly would come with them when they started filming. I dared not hope. I did find out I'd only get paid once filming was done. Somehow, I kept the creditors at bay but they wouldn't wait forever.
I didn’t know what would happen if I saw her again. Would it all come flooding out, all the questions I’d built up since she left? Why did you go without saying goodbye? Did you not feel what I felt? Why did you agree to one night in the first place?
I looked around me at the herbs and vegetables growing in all four corners of the walled garden. The vines cut back in the greenhouse, the panes of glass replaced. The turf was neatly mowed, the pond in the middle cleared out of weeds, light sparkling on the surface of the water. What would she think of this place?
I ate alone. The film crew were due around two. It would be the last peace I would enjoy for a week.
Afterwards, all debts would be paid. I would be at square one of a new life, able to choose where I wanted to go without the bank hanging over me like a cloud.
After I’d eaten, I washed up and then went through to the smoking room. I sat next to her chair. I hadn’t sat in her chair since she left. It wasn’t mine. It was hers.
I tried to read but my mind wandered. What if she did come with them? What would I say?
I told myself there was no reason for a location scout to come to the shoot. Her job was done. She’d got the consent to film here, her job would be secure and she’d be busy with two dozen other projects around the world.
Why did I miss her so much?
I’d never felt like this about anyone. In the short time she’d been here she’d sunk into my bones just like the castle. She had become a part of me even in absence. I didn’t do things. I did things without her. I didn’t just eat. I ate without her. I didn’t sleep. I slept without her. Her absence left a hole I tripped into every day.
I only had to close my eyes to remember how it had been, that night together, the way she’d submitted to me so readily, like we were always meant to be together.
But I had told myself it was one night. I had told her the same. I had acted casual when I saw her the next moment, something I had regretted ever since. I had wanted to tell her the truth, from the moment we first kissed, I couldn’t imagine kissing anyone else ever again. She had taken my soul into her in that moment and it belonged to her forever, even if she was five thousand miles away and we never saw each other again. I belonged to her.
I kept those feelings to myself. I was a fool. I thought I’d scare her by telling her the truth. Whatever I might have planned to say next, my plans were scuppered by her leaving without even saying goodbye.
I knew I had no right to be upset. We had our night together. She left as she was always going to. I was alone again as expected. But I was upset. I was hurt. I locked away my feelings as best I could, the only way to deal with the pain of her absence.
As time went on, things didn’t exactly become easier but my emotions became more manageable. I told myself it would get easier but instead each day that passed embedded the pain deeper into me like a splinter that constantly reminded me of its presence every time I moved. I saw the chair she sat in and I wondered if she would ever sit there again.
There was a knock on the door. They were here. I stood up, walked through the hall and pulled it open. “Hi, Robert,” Tilly said, smiling in at me. “How’ve you been?”
ELEVEN - TILLY
He looked just the same as last time I saw him. A little more careworn perhaps, that twinkle in his eye dulled when he first opened the door. But then he looked at me and a smile appeared on his face.
My insides did somersaults. It was exactly the same as last time I saw him. One look at that face and I was lost. Had it really been a year since I’d seen him? It felt like minutes since I last looked into those eyes.
“Tilly,” he said, sounding as if he didn’t believe I was really standing there. I didn’t believe it either.
It took until the day of the flight for me to make my mind up. For twelve months I’d been trying my hardest to forget about him. I knew he’d have forgotten about me before I was even out of the country. I was proved right. He never once rang me. My number was on his copy of the contract. He had every chance to get in touch, to apologise for throwing me out, for not saying goodbye. I heard nothing.
I tried to get over him. I tried to forget how he’d made me feel, how safe I’d felt beside him, how desirable.
When I told Mom, she was sympathetic but realistic. “He’s in another country and he’s got a castle to look after. You’ve got a career. See it as a vacation romance, you’ll forget about him soon enough, especially now the movie’s greenlit all the way.”
She was wrong. I never forgot him. Not for a moment. I often thought of that night on the boat. Every time I looked up at the stars at night, I thought of being on the loch with him.
“Should I go?” I asked Mom when the production schedule was organised.
“Are they expecting you to go?” she replied, asking a perfectly reasonable question but one that annoyed me nonetheless.
“Eli said I’m welcome to come if I want to see the castle again. He was so happy I got the consent, I think he’d have bought me the place if I asked.”
“What do you want to do?”
See Robert again, I thought. But would I just be torturing myself? If I went and he was as nonchalant as he’d been the day I left, would I be able to cope? Especially if I then had to spend a week in the place watching him flirting with the make up girls.
“I think I’ll stay here,” I said, making my mind up once and for all.
But then on the day the flight was due to take off, Mom knocked on my bedroom door and said something I never expected. “I think you should go.”
“What?” I asked, sitting upright in bed. “Why?”
“Because I’ve seen you get more and more nervous as today got closer and I’ve never seen you like this before.”
“I can’t go. He probably doesn’t even remember my name.”
“Then at least you’ll know for sure. Or would you rather spend the rest of your life thinking what if?”
So I took the
flight. I travelled with the advance crew to Doon. I sat in the cafe as the rest of them ate far too slowly. I sat at the table by the window, thinking of last time I was here, his hand on my thigh. I sighed happily at the memory.
I got on Hedley’s boat, my heart pounding as the castle grew closer. I couldn’t believe I was here again. He was in there. Robert was inside there, so close to me.
My throat felt dry. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking as I climbed off the boat and walked to the front of the group, marching up to the castle and knocking on the door.
He stood there. The door opened and there he was. All of the emotions I’d tried to shut away came roaring back in a flood. The sound of his voice saying my name made me melt. I was about to reply when Eli shoved his way past me, hand outstretched.
“Eli Caffrey,” he said, pumping Robert’s hand up and down. “Good to finally meet you. Robert, right?”
“Good afternoon,” Robert replied, looking past him at me.
Eli slapped him on the shoulder, turning him and walking with him back into the castle, leaving me on the doorstep. “I thought I’d come see how the money’s being spent. Love the place but I got one question for you, Robert my man. Where’s the booze? It’s been a hell of a long trip to get here.”
They disappeared together into the study and I turned away. I couldn’t stand there any longer. The castle was stretching out towards me, trying to pull me inside. I couldn’t handle the memories of last time I was here. This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come. He might have remembered my name but there wasn’t a chance in hell he felt how I felt.
It was stupid. Imagine telling anyone you’d fallen in love with someone after one night together. It was crazy. He’d said one night with me and that was what we’d had. I didn’t deserve anymore and I had no right to be angry with him for giving me exactly what we had agreed to.
I was angry though. Not just with him but also with myself. I wanted to be relaxed about the whole thing. I hadn’t come to Scotland to fall in love. I’d come to get consent to shoot the movie here. I’d done what I came to do. I should have been happy.
