The Secrets of Sunshine

by Phaedra Patrick

  My wife and I have now been married for over twenty-five years and, although we’ve enjoyed many happy times together, I know she isn’t the love of my life. I still see and admire the other lady from afar and hung a padlock on the bridge for her. It made me feel like a schoolboy carving initials into a tree and I feel better for sharing my story with you. Congratulations on taking a leap of faith for your own lady friend. All the very best to you both!

  Best wishes,

  Mr Smith

  PS: My wife loved her new hairdryer!

  Mitchell frowned, unable to tell if this was a story with a happy ending or if he’d just read something extremely sad. How awful it must be to keep such a secret, a longing, to yourself. And for the wife, whose husband was in love with someone else. The letter was definitely not suitable for Poppy’s project.

  The next one came in a pale blue envelope with Merci printed on the flap. Mitchell opened it up and read the letter.

  Dear Sir,

  My name is Henri and I am a French exchange student, aged almost seventeen. I am present in your beautiful city to examine your magnificent buildings and to practise my English.

  My teacher, Monsieur Ingres, brought our class to look at your bridges and I was very surprised to find so many padlocks hanging from them. I live in Paris and one of our bridges collapsed under the weight of locks. When they were removed, they came to forty-five tons in weight. It is likely there are thousands of keys in the river, which is dangerous to both fish and animals.

  I understand why people would like to fasten their locks, but not why they would want to damage fine bridges or hurt living things.

  Your friend from Paris,

  Henri

  Mitchell admired the boy’s ethics and he handed the letter to Poppy. ‘This one would be good for your project,’ he said. ‘It has an environmental message and the writer is from France.’

  She took it from him. ‘So, people’s stories can be part of history?’

  ‘Yes,’ he laughed. ‘I admit you’re right and I was wrong.’

  ‘Ha,’ she said triumphantly. ‘Do you know I kept some of yours, too?’ Poppy said.

  ‘Mine?’ Mitchell frowned.

  ‘The letters you sent to me and Mum.’

  Mitchell felt as if he’d stridden onto an escalator and missed his step. He’d sorted through all Poppy’s things when she moved into the apartment, and he didn’t recall seeing any letters. The only letter he’d kept from Anita was the one in the sealed lilac envelope.

  ‘Do you want to see them?’

  Before he could reply, Poppy sped off to her room. She returned and held out an old dictionary to him. ‘Open it,’ she said.

  Mitchell did so and saw the pages inside had been hollowed out, a gift box dictionary rather than a real one. Inside it, a few letters were tied together with a thin red ribbon. Poppy took one out and handed it to him.

  His words took up barely a quarter of the paper.

  Dear Anita and Poppy,

  Everything is very busy at work. I may have to stay over in the city again this weekend, so will let you know. I promise you the new bridge will be very exciting and I think you’ll like it.

  Love, Dad x

  He read it again and a chill ran over him at its sparseness. There was no emotion, no asking how they were, and what they’d been up to. It was all about him and his work.

  ‘Do you want to read another?’ Poppy said.

  Mitchell shook his head. He tried to inject lightness into his voice. ‘No, it’s fine. I don’t have much to say in this one, do I?’

  ‘Nope, not really.’

  ‘Why did you keep them?’

  She shrugged and took the letter from his hands to place it back inside the dictionary. ‘Mum said letters are important. They’re like a diary and nice thoughts you can keep.’

  Mitchell wished he’d kept the letters Anita and Poppy sent him. If he could go back in time, he’d cover whole pages with words and kisses. He’d never forget to send them.

  Poppy kneeled back down on the floor. ‘Shall we read another one of Susan’s letters? That pink one looks romantic.’

  ‘I think I’ve had enough of them for one day. Let’s look through your window before bedtime instead.’

  Half an hour later, they stood on her bed with their faces outside in the fresh air. Poppy’s pyjama top was inside out and she wore her new pug pendant.

  ‘What would you like to do tomorrow?’ Mitchell asked as he looked up at the moon. ‘Maybe the library, or a museum?’

  Poppy threw a piece of her crust to three pigeons that were strutting around the rooftop. ‘Um, can I go to the park with Rachel instead?’

  Mitchell tried to picture his plan in the hallway of what he’d scheduled in for the day. He’d have to readjust it. ‘I suppose I could take you both there.’

  ‘It’ll be with Rachel’s mum. There’s giant inflatables and a hot dog stand. Rachel said the sausages are so big they hang out of their bun. They said they’d pick me up at ten thirty.’

  Mitchell raised an eyebrow at her. ‘So, this is already arranged?’

  She nodded meekly. ‘I bumped into them in a shop. We made a plan.’

  Mitchell had looked forward to spending the day with her. However, if he was the same age and had a choice between a museum or bouncy castles and junk food, there’d be no contest. He liked how she’d inherited his planning gene.

  ‘Okay, Dad?’

  ‘Yes, it’s fine,’ he replied. ‘But try to give me advance notice next time so I can readjust our schedules.’

  After tucking Poppy into bed for the night, Mitchell went into the sitting room and picked up the pink envelope that looked romantic. When he opened the flap, he was surprised to see a wedding invitation covered in pink heart-shaped sequins from his schoolmate, Graham. He assumed Carl must have taken delivery of the card and placed it in the bag of letters, among all the others.

  Graham Gates and Rosie Gillespie are getting married at 2.00 p.m., Jupiter Hotel, Upchester on 28th July. Please tick and complete the following,

  I will/won’t be there

  I like cake

  I prefer cheese

  If I could listen to any song while riding a dragon into battle it would be

  I have a dietary requirement, which is

  PS: We know it’s very short notice, so if you can’t reply in time, just show up on the day!

  Mitchell frowned at it, not having known Graham was even dating. He hadn’t seen his friend for ages, and it wasn’t like him to send such a sparkly, silly-looking invite. The wedding was in just over two weeks’ time.

  Graham had lived with his mother for many years until she’d died a couple of years ago. When he wasn’t glued to his PlayStation, Graham had dedicated his time to taking her out to garden centres, and for afternoon tea. He called her his best friend, which didn’t go down well with any women he sporadically dated.

  Mitchell couldn’t recall Graham having had a serious girlfriend for a long time, and he wondered if Rosie shared his friend’s interests of gaming, graphic novels and sci-fi conventions.

  As he traced a finger over the sequins, Mitchell felt a thickness in his throat that his friend’s life had taken this major upturn without him realizing. He had been so wrapped up in his own grief over Anita that he hadn’t checked in with Graham much after his mother’s death. He had let their friendship slide.

  When Mitchell picked up his pen, he thought back to the carefree times he and Graham spent together when they were kids and he knew he should have been a better friend. He guiltily filled in his reply.

  I will be there

  I like cake (AND CHEESE)

  If I could listen to any song while riding a dragon into battle it would be ‘(K)NIGHTS IN WHITE SATIN’

  I have a dietary requirement, which is LOTS OF GREAT FOOD

  As Mitchell read over his answers, a smile twitched his lips. A feeling flooded over him of wanting to get away from his apartment and the city for
a while and to try to make some amends. If Poppy was going out with Rachel tomorrow, and Liza was speaking to her family, he would enjoy his own spare time, too.

  He decided to RSVP to Graham in person.

  16

  Swing

  Back when they went to school together, Graham had been one of those kids who wore a hand-me-down uniform from his brother, so the sweater wool balled on the elbows and the sleeves hung down over his fingertips. ‘My mum says I’ll grow into it,’ he said when other kids laughed at him, and that was how he got the moniker Grow-Into-It-Graham.

  There had been a hierarchy at the school, imposed by kids who had wealthy parents, were good-looking, or who passed their exams with ease. Graham was assigned to the group of outcast kids who were overweight, nerdy, poor or spotty.

  Mitchell found himself positioned somewhere between the elite and the outcasts. He got stick for the size of his nose, but there were other pupils who attracted more malicious attention. Katie Broadbottom had a problem with both body odour and an unfortunate name, and Andy Timmons once peed on the floor of the sports hall by accident.

  Mitchell and Graham didn’t get to know each other properly until they were thirteen, when Mitchell happened across Graham in the woods close to their school. He was attempting to make a swing out of an old rubber tyre and kept trying to toss the rope over a tree branch. He did it ten times before he lost his patience and kicked the tyre.

  Mitchell stepped out from behind the trees. ‘You need to add weight to the end of that rope, or get someone up the tree to catch it for you,’ he said.

  Graham gawped, unused to other kids talking to him.

  ‘I’ll climb and you throw.’ Mitchell shimmied up the tree trunk with ease and caught the rope when Graham threw it. He looped it around the branch, pulled on it and tied a firm knot.

  The two boys spent a fun afternoon pushing each other on the swing and spinning around, until two other boys from their school year approached them.

  ‘Spider’ Spencer and his friend, Birchy, shoved Graham clean off the swing. He landed flat on his back and breath wheezed out of his lungs. They laughed as he writhed in agony on the ground.

  Mitchell quickly scaled a tree and stealthily spread himself along a high-up branch, like a panther observing its prey. He weighed up the best course of action and dropped down onto Spider’s back and clung on with gritted teeth, pummelling his fist into Spider’s face. Spider spun around so Mitchell felt like he was on a bucking bronco, but he held on.

  Finally, after several minutes of trying to shake him off, Spider yelled, ‘Okay, okay. Get off me.’

  ‘Promise you’ll leave Graham alone.’

  ‘Yeah. Get off.’

  Mitchell jumped to the ground where Graham still lay prostrate and groaning, one of his front teeth broken. Birchy had vanished.

  ‘You’ll pay for this, Fisher,’ Spider sneered as he stood panting with his hands on his knees.

  ‘Yeah. And I’ll tell everyone how Mitchell battered you,’ Graham lisped.

  Spider glared at the two of them, before he tossed his head and ambled away.

  ‘You okay?’ Mitchell crouched down and helped Graham to his feet.

  Graham nodded and dusted off his clothes. He stuck a finger through a fresh hole in his sweater. ‘I owe you one for this, Mitchell. I’ll never forget it.’

  They had been best friends ever since.

  Graham lived in a boxy house with pebble-dashed walls on a street full of similar houses. He was a bus driver by day and loved gaming on his Playstation at night with a wide network of friends.

  Michell used to call around a few times a year, when the two men would revert to their teenage years and play computer games in Graham’s bedroom. When she was alive, Mrs Gates kept them supplied with toast, chocolate biscuits and cups of tea.

  After Anita died, Graham kept in touch with phone calls and notes, telling him to call him anytime, day or night, if he needed to talk. But, too wrapped up in his own grief, Mitchell often didn’t reply.

  When Mitchell attended Mrs Gates’s funeral, memories of Anita’s service brought on such a pain in his chest he found it hard to breathe. As the vicar spoke, he stared at his shoes and couldn’t meet Graham’s eyes for fear of dissolving into a quivering wreck. He had dashed off after the service, unable to face sandwiches and drinks in the local pub afterwards and the two men hadn’t met up properly since.

  Mitchell took the wedding invitation out of his pocket and thought again of how sequined hearts were so unlike his friend. He hadn’t been there for Graham for a long time, and it was time to change that.

  He rang the doorbell and noticed Mrs Gates’s chintzy curtains had been replaced with red velvet ones.

  ‘Mitchy Boy,’ Graham said when he opened the door. ‘Wasn’t expecting to see you here.’ He wore a dark green Adidas tracksuit and white running shoes. His skin had the deathly pallor of someone who rarely ventured outside. He’d never had his broken tooth repaired so when he pronounced the letter S it sounded like a hiss. ‘It’s good to see you.’

  The two men performed an awkward hug on the doorstep.

  Mitchell waved the card. ‘It’s amazing you’re getting married. I’d love to accept your invitation.’

  ‘It’ll be great to have you there, man. I mean it. Come on inside.’

  Mitchell followed Graham into his home. The flowery wallpaper, swirly carpets and burgundy tasselled lightshades that had been there since their childhoods were gone, along with the gold-coloured sofa and photo frames that proclaimed The World’s Best Son.

  The room now resembled a fortune-teller’s caravan. The walls were purple and tarot cards lay in a cross pattern on Graham’s coffee table. There was a foot-tall wooden man standing on the mantelpiece that Mitchell assumed was a fertility statue due to the size of a certain appendage.

  There were still definite hints of Graham around the place – a Lego Death Star displayed on a shelf, gaming trophies and piles of tech magazines everywhere – but the place looked very different.

  ‘Tea?’ Graham asked, gesturing for Mitchell to sit down.

  ‘Please.’

  ‘We have oolong, green tea, matcha or Lapsang Souchong. And we may have Darjeeling.’

  Mitchell stared at him. ‘You really have a tea menu?’

  ‘Rosie has opened my mind. I recommend the oolong, it’s of a very fine quality.’

  ‘I’d prefer a plain old tea bag, if you have one.’

  ‘I think I still have a box of Mum’s breakfast stuff somewhere,’ Graham said with a grin before ducking into the kitchen.

  Mitchell moved a mirrored velvet throw off the sofa and sat down. He felt like he was attending a job interview but, when Graham returned, Mitchell recognized one of Mrs Gates’s cups, bone china with a tiny rose print. It made him feel instantly more at home. ‘This place looks very… um, bohemian.’

  Graham beamed with pride. ‘Rosie,’ he said, as if her name explained everything.

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘When Mum died, I thought I was set to be a bachelor for life. I mean, I go to gaming conventions, but conversation usually revolves around wiggling your thumbs on a controller.’

  ‘Not a good dating environment?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘So, where did you meet Rosie?’

  ‘She works in a computer repair shop in the city. My PlayStation controller was playing up, so I took it to be fixed, and there she was, behind the counter.’ He smacked a fist into his hand. ‘I saw her violet hair and a twinkle in her eye and I was a goner. Just knew it. That woman knows everything about Fortnite and Overwatch. You should see her on Call of Duty.’ He sipped his tea. ‘I should tell you that she’s pregnant, too. Seven months.’

  ‘Oh, congratulations.’ The speedy wedding date suddenly made more sense to Mitchell.

  ‘I’m not the biological daddy, but I don’t care. I want them both to be part of my life forever.’ He thumped his chest. ‘Can feel it here. When you know,
you know, right? I’m ready to take that plunge. I’m not sure Mum would approve of Rosie, especially her interior design skills, but she was always a hard-to-please woman. I happen to think the house looks amazing.’

  Mitchell looked around him and noticed a dreamcatcher in the corner. ‘It’s very striking.’

  ‘I kind of feel like I’m emerging from a cave, after living with Mum for so long. Rosie’s helped to find the real me again. I know you’re not a romantic kind of guy,’ Graham said as he clasped both hands around his teacup. ‘But will you be my best man?’

  Mitchell’s jaw dropped. He felt touched his friend wanted him to do this. ‘Me?’

  ‘Yeah. You’ll have to dig deep to find good stuff to say about me in your speech. No talk about computers or school detentions, but yeah, I want you to do it.’

  The crystals and chunks of amethyst on Graham’s mantelpiece glittered in a shaft of sunlight, and Mitchell felt like he was shining, too. ‘I’d be honoured. Really. I’m sorry I’ve not seen as much of you as I should have done. This is a big deal…’

  ‘You can do it. Getting married feels like the easiest decision I’ve ever made.’ Graham laughed. ‘Never thought I’d be a lovey-dovey fool. And I always knew we’d be friends for good.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Mitchell smiled and held up the invitation. ‘This is definitely not the Graham Gates I know. Are you having a traditional ceremony?’

  ‘Rosie’s taking the reins and I’m going with the flow. I’ve got a PlayStation buddy, Brock, who owns the Jupiter Hotel in the city. He’s setting it up as a wedding venue and says we can use the place. He’s been ordained, too, so can officially marry us. That’s my main contribution. Though Rosie says we should do something really special for each other to demonstrate our love.’ He lowered his cup and gave a small shrug. ‘Any ideas?’

  ‘Can I recommend not hanging a padlock on a bridge?’

  ‘Yeah, we’ll try not to. I need a bigger gesture, something worthy of her.’ He gazed off into the distance, lost in thought for a moment, before snapping out of it. ‘Ahem, anyway, how about you, Mitchy? Are you seeing anyone?’