Heartstones (4 page)

‘Go on. Have a good cry,’ Nola’s voice grew louder. ‘It won’t do any good, don’t think I’m going to feel sorry for you. I suppose you think you’ve a right to grieve for David, is that why you’ve been moping around the flat for weeks?’ She paused and stood up as if to leave and then went on, ‘How am I ever going to look at Sandra again? I feel guilty and I haven’t even done anything! Sandra must never know what you did; she must never know that you seduced her husband.’

‘I didn’t seduce him; it was David that made the first move. He told me how unhappy he was with Sandra, how horrible she could be to him. He said he thought she had other men …’

‘Stop!ʼ Nolaʼs hand shot out like a policeman stopping traffic. ʻYou’re lying, they had a wonderful marriage.’ Nola moved towards the door. ‘I can’t bear to be with you any more. You make me feel sick, Phoebe; I don’t want to see you, I don’t want to be with you. I wouldn’t ever be able to trust you with Steve – you’ll probably be after him next, if you haven’t had him already.’

‘Stop it, Nola. That’s a horrible thing to say.’

Nola didn’t stop. ‘Goodness knows what you were up to when Steve used to help you with your homework and I was trying to deal with stinking nappies and cracked nipples and getting babies off to sleep.’

She looked down at the picture of Phoebe and David that she still held and, using both hands, crumpled it up into a small tight ball. Phoebe gasped.

‘No, please don’t!’

Nola threw it at her, hard; it missed and bounced onto the floorboards and rolled under the chest of drawers. Phoebe knelt down to retrieve it and when she stood up the room was empty, Nola had gone.

Phoebe unrolled the scrunched-up photograph and tried to flatten the crumpled paper; thick creases zigzagged the image, fragmenting the smiles, cutting across the shining eyes. She touched David’s distorted face; he seemed like a stranger, she could barely recollect his voice. She tried to remember things he’d said to her, words of affection, little jokes, intimate endearments – nothing came to her. Even the memories had died.

She lay down on the bed, still in her coat and boots. She wanted the world to end, life to stop. She wanted to die. What was the point of going on? No David, no parents, now Nola would never want to see her again, she was all alone. She tried to work out how many paracetamol tablets she had in the kitchen cupboard – probably not enough. Could you kill yourself with echinacea and evening primrose? She didn’t even have the energy to swallow tablets. She’d only make a mess of it and end up still alive but terminally ill, making her even more of a burden on Nola. She wondered if she could just will herself to die. In Australia she had heard that Aborigines could just lie down and let death overcome them. If only it was that easy. Her eyes closed but thoughts raced around her head as if her brain was desperately trying to override her aching heart.

If she couldn’t die, maybe she could leave, pack up and just walk away. That’s what she would have done in the past; if things got hard she got up and left. Ran away, as David would have said. She had a bit of money, but not much, not enough to get her very far in a hurry.

Think, Phoebe, think.
Where could she go? Where had she been happiest in her life? When had she ever been truly happy?

Paddling in a pebbly stream
 – the memory began to slowly develop, like a Polaroid in her mind
; hazy, purple mountains, flat sea, warm rocks on a beach of silver sand – 
she couldn’t quite remember where it was.
Whitewashed walls, a bright blue door, soft rain dampening her itchy Aran jumper,
she scratched her neck as though she could still feel it
. Red and purple fuchsia in a chipped brown jug, hot chocolate beside a peaty fire, her grandmother bent over a whirling lump of clay.

Phoebe opened her eyes. The boathouse at Carraigmore! She hadn’t thought of it for years, but she and Nola must still own that boathouse by the sea in Ireland. Along with a legacy of a few thousand pounds (Phoebe’s had been mostly spent on her travels, Nola’s went towards the deposit for her and Steve’s first house) her grandmother, Anna, had left the two girls the small stone boathouse that had been her home and pottery studio in the last years of her life, with the stipulation in her will that it was not to be sold. It must still be there, thought Phoebe, though Nola hadn’t mentioned it for a long time. Phoebe could remember her sister’s annoyance that they couldn’t sell it when she wanted money for a kitchen extension and Irish property prices were at their highest – but that had been years ago.

Phoebe stared at the ceiling, a hundred memories flooding back: sitting on the slipway to the sea – the rough concrete hot against her legs; picking at paint blisters on a window frame; watching her grandmother sitting at a potter’s wheel, lost in the rotations of the clay; eating biscuits in a big armchair, staring out at crashing waves; lying on her grandmother’s wrought-iron bed – her back stinging from too much sun; the slightly acrid smell of the gas kiln mixed with the smell of the sea; the beach with its pearly shells and long swathes of seaweed; the two boys from the Castle. Phoebe had forgotten their names but not their white blond hair or their ability to dive, sleek and smooth as gannets, from the black rock at high tide. And all the time the Castle up above them; impossibly romantic with its gothic façade and creeper-covered turrets, drawing her grandmother’s wistful gaze, luring Phoebe and Nola up the lane to peer through wrought-iron gates that they were never allowed to walk through.

Phoebe wondered if the boathouse was still standing. Maybe it had fallen down, been swept away by winter storms or maybe it had simply collapsed into the sand for lack of love or care. Even if it was still there it must be in pretty bad condition, not fit to live in, surely.

Suddenly she had to know if it still existed. Phoebe sat up. How long had it been since anyone had lived there? How long since they’d picked her grandmother up from the airport on that bright blue morning? Fifteen years? More? She stood up, determined to leave as soon as possible, get a ferry, buy a map, and she would drive her little Morris Minor until she found it. As she began searching in the cupboard for her rucksack she was already imagining the blissful isolation of the west of Ireland. 

Chapter Three

Phoebe didn’t take much with her; she dumped bags of clothes and books and ornaments outside the various charity shops along the high street – her life so far in a series of bunched-up black bin liners.

A letter to her landlord, a letter to the school, a letter to Nola that she ripped up at the last moment and threw into the dustbin along with the string of heart stones as she walked out of the flat for the last time.

She swung the battered rucksack into the back of her car. The rucksack contained a jumble of scrunched-up clothes and the few items that she’d thought worth keeping: the notes from David, the creased photograph, the copy of
Jane Eyre
, a sketchbook, pencils, a small, round, green-glazed, jar – a present long ago from her grandmother, a selection of drawings done for her by Amy and Ruben over the years and the details of a savings account which contained the last of her inheritance.

With a pang of sadness she remembered it was Rubenʼs birthday the following weekend. Phoebe had promised him sheʼd go to his party at Laser Quest. The previous year she had led a team of eight- and nine-year-olds to victory over Steve and Rubenʼs side; Ruben had been determined to be on Phoebeʼs team this year. Phoebe wondered if she should stay till after the party. She thought of Nolaʼs angry face and doubted that she would be on the guest list any more. Instead she went down to the corner shop and bought a brightly coloured rocket-shaped card. She put a twenty-pound note inside and added a brief message:

Hope that Laser Quest is a blast – go get ʼem space boy! Love you loads, Aunty Phee x.

p.s. give your sister a big hug from me – go on, give her the hug, sheʼs not that bad!!

Just as she was about to slip the key through the front door, Phoebe realised she had forgotten the school tea towel. It had slipped behind the kitchen radiator; she had to use a wooden spoon to poke it out, the linen creased and cardboard-hard. Phoebe’s heart lurched; she’d miss the children, miss her class. She stopped, staring round the empty flat. Was she doing the right thing? Should she at least go back to school until the end of term? Then she remembered the letter she’d already posted and winced at the thought of Victoria Leach’s reaction when she discovered that Phoebe had left without giving notice. There would be no going back.

The ferry was old. The smell of petrol and clanking of chains on the car deck immediately took her back to her childhood: nausea mixed with the excitement of the coming holiday, her father hurrying them up the stairs towards the lounges, the rush to get four seats in a row, she and Nola waiting for the duty-free shop to open so that they could try all the perfumes before sea sickness made the smells repugnant and they returned to cuddle into their parents for the rest of the journey. The memories filled Phoebe with sadness; if they had known then how little time they would have together, would she have hugged them harder, held them for longer? If she had known what would happen to David would she have forced him to leave Sandra, to spend every waking hour with her? Tears threatened and she blinked them back.

The boat began to move and Phoebe went outside despite the biting cold. Leaning against the rail, she watched the Welsh coast slip into the gloom and wished she hadn’t left her coat in the car.

Shivering, she looked down at the steely sea and wondered if Nola had even realised she had gone. Two days and there had been no message from her, no attempt to get in touch. But despite her sister’s silence every gust of salty wind seemed full of Nola’s condemnation, whipping around her as she stood on the deck.

Phoebe closed her eyes and tried to let thoughts of David fill her mind instead.

‘Are you not frozen?’ The voice made Phoebe jump, her eyes sprung open. She saw an old man standing no more than a foot away; his lined face looked concerned. ‘I didn’t mean to startle you,’ he had an Irish accent. He took a packet of cigarettes from the pocket his coat and offered her one.

Phoebe shook her head.

‘Sensible girl.’ He smiled and cupped his hands around the cigarette as he lit it. Phoebe wished he would go away.

‘Holiday or business or going home?’ The man blew out a long stream of smoke that was instantly whisked away by the wind.

Phoebe didn’t feel much like talking; in fact she wasn’t sure if she’d spoken to anyone since Nola left her flat. She shrugged and looked back down into the water.

A few minutes passed. Phoebe could still feel him looking at her.

‘If there’s one thing my many years on this earth has taught me,’ the old man finally said, ‘it’s that nothing’s ever as bad as it seems.’ Then he moved away to talk to someone else.

Phoebe tried to rekindle her thoughts of David but the man had interrupted her memories and made her feel annoyed. She looked up at the seagulls wheeling overhead. If only she could escape into the air and fly away from mundane conversations with strangers, fly away from the unbearable banality of life. That was what she would do in Carraigmore, find the solitude and isolation she longed for. She would walk; lots of long walks on the beach and on the headland, she would read
Jane Eyre
, and she would draw. She would draw every day.

She closed her eyes again and thought of the first time David had made love to her six months before. He’d asked her to stay after school to talk about a difficult pupil in her class. Afterwards heʼd insisted that she shouldn’t wait for the bus in the rain, insisted on giving her a lift even though he lived on the other side of town; outside her flat she’d been just about to get out of the car when he’d kissed her, melting her resolve to ignore the way sheʼd felt about him for almost half her life. Later he had picked up the sketchbook beside her bed and flicked through it.

‘You’re very good.’

‘These days it’s just doodling.’ Phoebe pulled the sheet around her shoulders, suddenly feeling exposed. ‘I haven’t done much real drawing since I finished college.

David examined a pen-and-ink study of a vase of tulips; he traced it with his fingers and Phoebe tried not to notice the wedding ring that glinted in the light cast by the bedside lamp. ‘This is beautiful,’ he said. He looked at her and she found herself hypnotised by the intensity of his eyes. ‘Don’t give up. You have a real talent.’ He put down the sketchbook and drew her closer to him until there was no room for guilt or doubt or thoughts of drawing.

Standing staring at the churning sea, Phoebe trembled at the memory of David’s touch but this was quickly followed by a cold wave of disquiet. Was Nola right? Had what she had with David really been a disgusting and deceitful thing? A sordid affair? Her hair blew across her eyes, temporarily blinding her as she shook her head. No, they had been drawn together by real love, a union of minds not just of bodies, they had been meant to be together. Phoebe felt in the pocket of her jeans and found the bracelet David had given her. She caressed it like a string of rosary beads, stroking each heart-shaped charm as it passed through her fingers. ‘
He loved me, he loved me.
’ She would not let Nola’s cruel words spoil something that had been so precious. She pressed the bracelet to her lips; the glass hearts were cold.

A misty rain began to fall and the familiar memories came back to her like the recollections of a horror film you wish you’d never been to see. Phoebe turned around and searched for the old man who’d tried to talk to her earlier, she needed a distraction. The man was heading for the sliding doors; they opened and he disappeared. Soon it would be too late. Phoebe clutched at thoughts of David but they were disappearing too; she tried desperately to recollect the meals they’d shared – he once had told her she made the best cheese on toast he’d ever tasted, he used to bring her pink Cava. What did they do when they’d been in Jersey? Surely the whole time wasn’t spent in bed? Phoebe remembered being in the airport shop with him, looking at the bookshelves – the only time he’d held her hand in public. Her frantic attempts at diversion failed and suddenly she was in an airport shop with Nola many years before. The memories appeared in her head like cine film flickering on a screen.

Polos or Refreshers? Her hand dithered between the two cylindrical packets. Nola stood beside her, tall and seventeen, her flat stomach exposed beneath a pale pink crop top, Levi 501s hanging low on narrow teenage hips. Or maybe just chewing-gum like Nola?

‘Come on, girls,’ her father shouted from the concourse outside. ‘They’ve just announced that the plane from Cork has landed. Granny will be here any minute.
’

Then Phoebe was sitting in the car with Granny wedged tight beside her, Granny’s skirt was rough against her leg, the satisfying fizz of dissolving sweets was on her tongue. Nola, on the other side of Granny, listened to her Walkman and chewed her gum. Her father, driving, fiddled with the radio, looking for the cricket, his mop of curls hanging down, obscuring his face.

‘Chicken pie for supper,’ her mother turned from the front passenger seat and smiled at her mother-in-law.

‘Oooo, my favourite,’ Granny replied and then she leant over and whispered to Phoebe, only to Phoebe, ‘I’ve got something wonderful to tell you all later.’ And then there was a thud and a lurch and the spinning; like being on a waltzer at the bank holiday fair. Phoebe wasn’t frightened; ‘It’s just a funfair ride’ she told herself, as the car spun round and round, metal crunching on unseen objects, pebbles of glass showering on top of her. Then the realisation that she wasn’t wedged in by Granny any more; the pressure against her thigh was gone, Granny was gone, the seat beside her was empty.

Then she was standing on a verge strewn with wild flowers; tall daisies swaying in the smoky breeze, the taste of Refreshers still on her tongue. Nola’s face was blank but Phoebe could hear her teeth chattering even though the siren sounds were getting louder.

‘Don’t look back,’ a stranger repeated over and over. ‘Don’t look back.’ Instead Phoebe looked down at her hands and was horrified to see them oozing little pearls of blood. ‘Mummy,’ she called and turned and then she screamed
and then there were no more memories until she was standing beside Nola in the graveyard, miserable and frightened in the awful coat.