Under an Amber Sky: A Gripping Emotional Page Turner You Won’t Be Able to Put Down

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Anna slowed down as a cluster of houses approached. ‘Think about it.’

Chapter 2 (#ulink_5502f4f0-5717-54d9-9354-96a1cdf6e9eb)

The route to the beach took them all along the waterfront, past numerous other ancient stone houses, many restored, others even more romantically dilapidated than the one they had just viewed, with dark ivy growing thickly up crumbling walls and through broken windowpanes. Everywhere were tiny konobas, all boasting prime waterfront positions, the many piers that jutted into the flat blue sea bright with tables laid for lunch. Fishing boats of all sizes lazily drifted on the calm water and seabirds swooped and soared above. Alongside one house, a quaint but rusting communist-era, banana-yellow Trabant – barely bigger than a motorbike sidecar – was chocked up on bricks and awaiting restoration.

‘It’s like I imagine the South of France – Nice or St Tropez – circa 1950,’ mused Sophie, gazing out of the hire car window. ‘I keep expecting Princess Grace to appear in front of me, all priceless elegance and white gloves, and get into an open-top car and drive off to lunch somewhere divine.’

Anna laughed. ‘I know what you mean. And apparently, according to the guidebook I was reading on the plane, she loved it here.’ She paused for thought, frowning. ‘Or maybe it was Ava Gardner. I forget.’

‘Well, both always had immaculate taste, didn’t they?’ replied Sophie. She saw Anna glance at her, as if trying to work out what she was feeling before replying.

‘Sure did.’ Anna clunked the gears as she had to suddenly slow down for a fast-approaching vehicle. ‘So are you glad we came? Despite the reluctance?’

***

In the immediate aftermath of Matt’s death, Sophie had cocooned herself at her parents’ house, the house in which she had grown up, where she had lived until she and Matt had left home to move in together. For days, she had been unable to get up but had lain in bed in the bedroom that had been hers for so many years. Flat on her back, staring at the ceiling, the tears slid off her cheeks and soaked her pillow and nightie.

Her mother had lent her the nightdress, which was long and white and ethereal, like something a Victorian consumptive might wear whilst waiting to cough up her lungs. It was supremely unsexy and Matt would probably not have allowed her into bed with it on. But now Matt would never comment on her night attire, or any other aspect of her, ever again.

At short-spaced intervals, her mother Helena would come in with tea and biscuits and a look of quiet desperation in her eyes that grew ever more despairing as the days passed. Sophie would regard her, and the steaming mug on the bedside table, from beneath half-closed, swollen lids, unable to respond to either. There was no point in any of it.

‘You need to have something, love. You’ve hardly eaten or drunk anything since … You didn’t have any dinner last night, or the night before.’ Helena pursed her lips and inhaled deeply. ‘It won’t do any good for you to get ill.’

The absurdity of this remark temporarily stemmed Sophie’s tears. ‘What does it matter what happens to me? It doesn’t, does it? Nothing matters.’

Helena swallowed anxiously. ‘I know you feel like that now. I understand but …’

‘I don’t think you do understand, Mum.’ Sophie’s voice was harsh and shrill. She heard how she sounded and hated it. ‘I’m sorry, I just mean – I know you’re trying but you can’t possibly understand. You haven’t lost Dad, have you?’

Helena had wept then, her tears replacing her daughter’s on the white bed linen. ‘No. No, I haven’t. But you’re only young; you can’t give up on life now, at your age. You’ve got all your life ahead of you.’

Sophie wanted to scream, to tear the walls of the suddenly claustrophobic room apart, to bring the ceiling down and rock the house’s very foundations to replicate how her own had crumbled and disintegrated in just a few short seconds.

‘That’s the problem, Mum, isn’t it? That’s exactly the problem.’

She turned on her front, shoving the pillow away and burying her face into the mattress, the duvet up around her ears. She stayed like that for hours, her mother beside her, her eyes burning with tears already shed and those not yet released. Her heart had been ripped out from inside her and behind it had been left a lacuna that would never be filled. Her mind was utterly empty, unable to comprehend her insupportable loss.

She drifted in and out of sleep, remembered waking once, unclogging her sticky eyes, pushing back the bedcovers and raising her head to look around her. She was alone and the sun had disappeared to the west-facing side of the house. In the distance, she could hear the sound of a lawnmower; the faint scent of newly cut grass drifted through the half-open window.

She wanted to get up, to go and see who was cutting the grass, but it required too much energy so she didn’t. She merely turned onto her side and stared at the floor over the edge of the mattress, at the mustard-coloured carpet that was so dated now it had almost come back into fashion. Almost, but not quite.

Against the wall stood her washstand, the one she had bought from a junk shop in town and dragged home, with Matt carrying one end and her the other, too impatient to wait for her dad to hire a van to transport it. She had stripped it down with Nitromors, rubbed it with sandpaper, and lime-washed it in the popular style of the time. Eventually, she’d found and saved up enough money to buy a bowl and jug to fit in the hole and she saw now that her mum must have crept back into the room while she’d been asleep and filled the jug with white roses and peonies, her favourite flowers. The very ones she’d chosen for her wedding.

Her eyes closed and she wept again, sure that at some point her body must become so dehydrated with all the shedding of liquid that she would shrivel up like a desiccated leaf in autumn.

***

Back in her married home in London, she had spent days sitting, staring at the rain, contemplating how different the drops looked slamming against the huge panes of her London sashes rather than the small ones of her childhood home’s casements. They seemed bitter and angry, in a way she had never noticed before, hitting the glass and running evilly downwards until they met the wooden surround and accumulated in vicious pools. She had imagined the water eating away at the paint, the elements always trying to destroy what was manmade and protective.

Determined to rescue her, Anna had descended bearing homemade fish pie and the green olive soap that Sophie loved. Anna had also dealt with the flood caused by the blocked washing machine filter that Sophie knew existed but didn’t know how to fix because she had always let Matt take care of such things and, before that, it had been her father who had dealt with everything. Because of the constant availability of male help, she had allowed herself to become totally useless and dependent, possessing no practical skills whatsoever.

‘Good thing you live on the ground floor,’ was all Anna had said as she got down on hands and knees to clear the filter and mop up the water, Tomasz occupied with digging the soil out of the yucca plant pot and Sophie looking dazedly on. Anna had always lived alone, manless, and so she knew how to do useful things. Sophie would have envied her, if she had had the will or energy.

When she’d finished, Anna had shown Sophie the culprits: two five-pence pieces, a paperclip, and half a metal popper. Sophie picked up the popper. It was black and bore the brand name of Matt’s favourite make of cycling clothing. Just seeing the familiar logo had caused all the pain and grief and disbelief and shock to rise up inside Sophie once more. Anna soothed and patted and rocked her until the weeping had ended, and then ran her a bath and helped her in. Sophie had known that her hair was rank and that she smelt, but had not cared enough to do anything about it. As if she were a child, Anna had washed her hair for her.

The next day, she had returned and taken Sophie’s passport and bankcard hostage, telling her she’d found cheap flights to Montenegro and they were going on holiday.

‘Monte-where?’ Sophie had replied, not really focusing on what Anna was saying. Let her take charge; what was it to her where she went? And then, ‘I think the Caribbean’s a bit too far, isn’t it? I don’t like long plane journeys.’

‘It’s not the Caribbean, you dozy cow.’ Anna had laughed, with characteristic brusqueness. ‘It’s Europe, between Croatia and Albania, opposite Italy. You’ll love it.’

A few clicks on the laptop later, it had all been booked.

***

And now here they were. Sophie looked out of the car window again. They had left the bay behind, passed through the tunnel under the mountain, and were heading towards the peninsula. The slopes behind them were purple in the heat haze, the sky above huge and blue. Wild gorse exploded in bursts of hopeful yellow among the browning vegetation of late summer. She reflected on Anna’s question.

‘Yes, I’m glad I came,’ she said, finally responding. She turned to her best friend, steady hands firm on the wheel, always so confident and assured, always so certain. So unlike Sophie, who was more often than not filled with doubt until impulsion overcame her and she did something spur-of-the moment and perhaps unwise.

Like the time she’d vacillated for months about changing her hairstyle and tried to get Matt to give his opinion, which he never would because he said she was beautiful whatever her hair looked like, and then on an impulse she’d had it dip-dyed, badly. She’d hated it and Matt had too, although he wouldn’t say as much. The kids at school had teased her about it relentlessly and she’d ended up crying so much that Matt had paid for her to go to a really expensive salon and have it cut into a bob, removing all traces of blonde from her chestnut tresses. She simply couldn’t cope without people like Anna. And Matt.

She gave Anna a gentle, grateful pat on the knee. So many people had patted her since Matt’s death – her knee, leg, back, shoulder, arm – sometimes tentatively, quickly withdrawing their hands as if death might be infectious, sometimes with overfamiliarity or a boisterousness that made Sophie cringe. It felt good to be the patter rather than the pattee for a change.

‘Thank you for thinking of it and sorting it out. I needed to get away from … To get away for a bit.’

It occurred to her that, fleetingly, whilst absorbed in viewing the house, the grief that she had been imbued with since the day of Matt’s death, that felt so much like fear – shaky, shivery, insidious – had been absent. The beautiful old stone house, with its perfect setting on the frontline to the sea and its captivating views over the expanse of the bay, had driven away her pain, if only momentarily.

Silently contemplating this, she started as something soft and wet landed in her hair, accompanied by a cry of ‘Gophie’ from the back seat. It was toddler Tomasz’s best approximation of her name and clearly designed, like the flying missile, to get her attention. Instinctively, she put her hand to her head to retrieve the object. It was a soggy, half-chewed cheese stick.

‘Thank you so much, Tomasz,’ Sophie said as she showed it to Anna.

A giggle erupted from behind them. Both adults started to laugh and once she’d started Sophie found she couldn’t stop. They were still laughing when they pulled up at the beach ten minutes later.

As they got out of the car, the heat was even more intense than earlier, the sun burning high in the sky. Sophie lifted her face towards it and shut her eyes, relishing the sensation of its rays upon the skin that she knew was pallid and grey from lack of fresh air, good food, exercise, and happiness. Perhaps the sun, here where it shone with such brilliance from dawn to dusk, would sear the loss of Matt out of her soul, enough to begin to live again.