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Instinctively, I started to nod my head the way I do when I don’t know something but don’t want to appear stupid. But something told me I didn’t need to try to impress Saffron.
‘No. What is it?’
‘We’re a group of like-minded people who have chosen to live together. There’re fourteen of us.’
‘Why?’ I was curious.
‘For different reasons. Some because it’s just too damn expensive to get on the property ladder. There’s a chance of a better quality of life here, splitting the bills, sharing the chores. Daisy is hugely into all that save the planet stuff. Hazel is here because she got divorced. We also get drop-ins. People that temporarily want to step out of their daily grind whether for a weekend or a week.’
‘And you? Why are you here?’
‘I lost my mum when I was small, and then later I lost my dad. I was confused. I wanted to find out who I was, away from all the pressures of society. Where I fit. What I want to do with my life.’
We were heading towards the farmhouse. Fields and sky merging on the horizon. Without the hum of constant traffic I got at home the world seemed slower. Stiller. Smaller. Or maybe I just felt bigger without the incessant noise and movement.
‘It’s hard to explain,’ Saffron said. ‘And I know it sounds a bit arsey to say I’d lost my identity, but that’s how I felt.’
‘Yeah. I get that,’ I said. It was how I had been feeling for months. Mum and Dad had been watching a documentary a while back when she said, ‘It must be nice to live without technology.’ I thought she was having a dig at me because I was on social media, but when I looked up I saw these women in long dresses and hats on the TV making a quilt. They looked so content and their happiness formed a knot of envy in my chest. I spent so much time taking selfies for Instagram. Running them through a filter to make myself as flawless as possible. Posting them with captions that had to be funnier, snappier than the previous one. It was in that moment I realised I had become a patchwork version of myself. Each photo, each square, had to be brighter, more vibrant, more beautiful than the last. So dazzling people didn’t know where to look first, didn’t see things too closely. The stitching coming apart. The hem where it’s starting to fray. The material dull and fading from constantly being in the light. What everyone saw on the outside never matched how I felt on the inside. I had become a black and white, washed out version of myself. Tattered and threadbare.
Thunder clapped. Saffron grabbed my hand. ‘Run!’
A stitch burned in my side as we tumbled through the door of the farmhouse into the kitchen.
I didn’t know what to make of what I saw inside.
Chapter Eleven (#ulink_551c29ea-30a5-5f91-a5f0-9e3079d71e37)
LAURA
There’s nowhere to run to.
‘You can’t leave,’ Alex said. ‘I know it’s incredibly difficult to ask for help but you’ve taken the first steps coming here. Don’t go before we’ve talked about your situation. Seen if I can help.’ He waved the gun. ‘I’ll put this away. Sorry. I forget it’s there.’ He must have caught my horrified expression. ‘It’s Dafydd’s, he owns the farm.’
‘Is it loaded?’ I was repelled and yet strangely fascinated.
‘No. Do you want to hold it?’
I couldn’t help taking it from him. I’d never held a gun before and it felt cold and heavy in my hands. My finger curved around the trigger. Although it was harmless I couldn’t bring myself to squeeze.
‘Here.’ Abruptly, I handed it back to him.
While he took it out of the room I noticed the clock on the mantelpiece was displaying seven when I knew it was nearly lunchtime.
‘I think your clock needs winding,’ I said when Alex came back in.
‘I purposefully keep it like that,’ he said as he sat at the table, gesturing for me to join him. We’re too governed by time. When we should eat. When we should sleep. We should listen more to our bodies. Our instincts.’
‘I can’t see my daughter’s head teacher being pleased if I rolled up late because I hadn’t set the alarm.’
He laughed, although it didn’t reach his eyes. I could see a gap in the back of his mouth where he was missing a tooth, but it didn’t detract from the obvious. He was incredibly handsome.
‘Time is unavoidable in some circumstances, but life is a series of moments and if we clock-watch and plan, we miss the here and now. If you think about it, each moment could be our last and I don’t want to spend mine thinking about what I have to do next. It’s what I’m doing now that’s important.’
I couldn’t help trying to picture what Gavan’s last moment was like. What his final thought was. Me? Tilly? Did he know he was going to die as he plummeted from the scaffolding?
‘Sorry, have I upset you?’ Alex lightly touched my arm and I blinked away the film of tears glazing my eyes.
‘It wasn’t you. It’s just…’ The choke in my throat was held back by the rest of my words. I pinched the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger. It was several seconds before I could speak again. ‘God. I’m glad Saffron took Tilly to look around so she didn’t have to see me like this. Everything seems so hopeless.’
‘I know how that feels.’ This time it was his eyes that filled with tears.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes. Sorry. It’s been one of those weeks. What I was clumsily trying to say is that nothing is hopeless, Laura. And you’re not alone.’
There’s no one to help you. The sour-breathed truth in my ear so many years before had rung true again in recent months.
But perhaps, now, there was someone to help me.
‘Saffron told me you have a dispute with your insurance company. I’m so sorry. Let’s have a look, shall we? See what we can do?’ The way he said ‘we’ was as warming as the fire. He clicked the end of a ballpoint pen and flicked through his notebook containing rows of figures before he came to rest at a blank page.
‘I’ve been writing a business plan,’ he said.
‘Look.’ I was torn between need and good manners. Politeness won out. ‘I know this is an imposition. If you’ve too much on…’
‘Not at all. Sometimes helping someone else is just what you need to take your mind off your own problems.’
‘Oak Leaf Organics is a wonderful idea. It just needs time to find its feet,’ I said.
‘Let’s help you find your feet. Tell me all.’
‘We’ve been paying into a joint life insurance policy for years, and never missed a monthly premium. They’re supposed to pay out £500,000, but they’ve said they won’t settle on an interim death certificate. The inquest could take months.’ Anxiety lifted my voice an octave higher. ‘I just don’t know what to do. It’s all too much.’ I dropped my head into my hands. ‘We’ve only just had the funeral and I just want everything to slow down. Stop.’
‘The first thing is don’t panic.’ Alex paused until I lifted my head and nodded. ‘It’s not unusual to get a no before you get a yes. Some companies will pay out on an interim certificate. Some won’t. Who are you with?’
‘Ironstone.’ I pulled a letter from my bag and thrust it towards him. His eyes scanned the page.
‘Evans? Your husband was Gavan from Evans Construction. Saffron didn’t mention that.’
‘I didn’t tell her.’ A sinking feeling in my stomach. How stupid to think he wouldn’t have heard of us. Toxic waste is probably something they campaign about here. ‘Look, I know building on a landfill probably goes against all your principles but…’ I fiddled with the wedding ring on my finger. The gold digging into my flesh as I twisted it round and round trying to find the right words.
‘We’re quick to judge others.’ His brow furrowed. ‘Too quick.’ He placed a hand on my arm and my fingers stilled. ‘Here we practice acceptance. I’m sorry for all you’ve been through.’
He turned his attention back to the letter. The wait for him to speak again was painfully slow.
‘Ironstone is one of the newer companies, so it’s likely they won’t pay out on a suicide. The modern ones rarely do.’
‘Gavan didn’t jump.’ He wouldn’t have chosen to leave us.
‘Of course not. I’m just running through their thought process. They’ll be wanting to know what caused the accident. Did he have a blackout from some previously undiagnosed condition? Did he have a heart attack and then fall? Did he have a brain tumour that burst?’
‘The post mortem didn’t say any of those things. He had a subdural haematoma and midline shift.’ Phrases I’d only previously heard on Casualty tripped off my tongue. ‘It was the fall that killed him.’ It was impossible to discuss the love of my life with a detachment I didn’t feel. I fished a tissue from my pocket as I asked, ‘I don’t understand why that’s not enough.’
‘Gavan was an experienced builder?’
I nodded as I blew my nose.
‘Then the inquest will also be asking why he was up on the roof in bad weather? If he’d been drinking? Taking drugs?’
‘He had 50 milligrams of alcohol in his blood.’ I don’t know why; he was supposed to have been at work all day.
‘I can’t imagine how you feel, losing your husband and… I’m so sorry.’ A beat, then, ‘Look, I’m not saying it will be easy but it’s certainly not impossible to get an interim payment.’
‘Do you think…’ I trailed off, hoping he would fill in the gaps but he didn’t. I started again. ‘Do you think you could help me please? I can’t afford to pay you right now but Saffron said I could perhaps help out with planting or something.’ Even to me, my offer seemed inadequate.
He studied me.
‘Here’s the thing,’ he began, and my spirits sunk even lower. ‘The policy is in your name, Laura, and I can’t speak on your behalf so I can either walk you through the process or you can sign a permission form so Ironstone have to deal with me. I’d need a copy of your policy of course.’
I could have kissed him. ‘If you could speak to them directly that would be great. How long do you think it might take to get an answer?’
‘I’m not going to lie to you, Laura.’ He spoke with such sincerity. ‘The inquest might happen sooner than I can get any sort of pay-out.’
I turned away to blow my nose, not wanting him to see my disappointment.
His stomach growled. ‘That’s my internal body clock letting me know it’s lunchtime. Are you hungry? Shall we head over to the main house? Find Tilly?’
‘Yes.’ We stood. I tried not to show my disappointment that the insurance wouldn’t be resolved quickly enough to cover the arrears on my rent, but he saw it anyway.
‘Oh, Laura.’ He pulled me into a hug. ‘I can promise you I will do my absolute best for you and your daughter.’
His arm encircling my waist. The feel of him. The smell of him. I shivered.
Oddly, even then, something pulled me towards him. The only way I can explain it was that I’d spent weeks dealing with death and all its aftermath. Somewhere, inside my core, I wanted to feel alive.
Alex was magnetic but it wasn’t only me he was attracting. I wasn’t the one willing to kill for him.
Willing to die for him.
Chapter Twelve (#ulink_6a4ce929-03f6-5dbf-a5a5-44b52c05317f)
TILLY
I had thought Saffron was wearing white because she was funky enough to carry it off, but in the kitchen were two other women also dressed in white. Honestly it felt a bit weird, it was winter after all, but I tried not to stare.
‘This is Tilly,’ Saffron said. ‘And this is Daisy. She’s the youngest here at twenty-three, as she keeps reminding me, because I’m so ancient at twenty-seven.’
‘Not at twenty-seven,’ Daisy said. ‘But just wait until you get to twenty-eight! Hi, Tilly.’ She gave a little wave. I mumbled ‘hello’. She didn’t look much older than me with her hair hanging in two long dark plaits either side of her heart-shaped face. She reminded me of Tiger Lily in Peter Pan. As an only child I was always envious of the Darling family. Siblings. I used to beg Mum for a brother or sister. She always laughed and said she had her hands full with just me, but her eyes would cloud and I wondered if she meant I was too much.
‘Croeso, Tilly. Welcome.’ Hazel had the biggest smile and rosy red cheeks. Grey hair bobbed to her shoulders but her face only had the odd line. She didn’t look properly old and I wondered why she didn’t dye her hair.
‘And Hazel is—’ Saffron began.
‘Saffron, don’t tell her how old I am!’
‘What’s it worth?’ Saffron held out her hand. ‘I was just going to say a fabulous cook.’ She blew a kiss.
‘You can see how much I love my food.’ Hazel patted her rounded stomach and there was something so cuddly about her I wanted to see if my arms would fit around her waist and hug her.
‘We all live in this house, along with Dafydd who owns the farm, because we’re special.’ Saffron fluffed her hair. ‘And there are eight others who bunk down in the stables across the way.’
‘In a stable?’ I couldn’t help blurting out.
‘It’s not a stable in the traditional sense. It’s huge and it’s been converted into dorms. They’ve a kitchen and bathroom too. They don’t always eat with us, unsociable bunch. Speaking of eating…’ She raised her eyebrows.
‘I’ll start preparing lunch. Do you like soup, Tilly?’ Hazel asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Vegetable okay?’
‘Can I help?’ I asked.
‘If you want to wash the soil off the veg,’ Hazel said.
I must have looked confused because Daisy said, ‘We grow our own produce here which reduces our carbon footprint.’
‘Mum shops at a greengrocer sometimes.’ I didn’t know how, but I was sure that must be better than buying everything from a supermarket chain. Supporting local business.
‘And where do they get their stock from? It’s still a huge amount of fossil fuel to transport food to a local business. On average about one and a half thousand miles is travelled before the food is consumed,’ she said, but she wasn’t patronising.
‘Daisy’s our resident environmentalist. Diolch. Thank you,’ Hazel said as I took the carrots she was holding out towards me. After rinsing them clean, I began to chop. There was something almost therapeutic about the process. Before long, herby soup simmered on the Aga which was nothing like the gas hob we had at home.
‘Farmers often put weak lambs in the top oven if their mothers have died,’ Saffron told me as I stirred the pot. I must have looked horrified as she quickly added, ‘To keep them warm and give them a chance of survival’. She squirted washing-up liquid into running water. Hazel clanked a lid on the soup. I sat at the table listening to the gentle sloshing of water, the rain pattering against the window. The warm, safe feeling weighted my eyelids until they began to droop, only opening properly when Saffron spoke again.
‘Here’s Alex,’ she said, pulling her hands out of the bowl, suds floating to the floor as she dried her hands. Her face brightened, ‘Typically he’s just in time for lunch.’
Daisy smoothed her hair.
I turned towards the door as it opened. The room disappeared around me. I barely threw a cursory glance over Mum, her hair dripping wet. I didn’t register anything but Alex. He was beautiful in a way I never knew boys could be. Once, in biology, we had learned about processing. It takes on average fifty milliseconds for the retina to send visual information to the brain, but those fifty milliseconds were all I needed. The instant I saw Alex, I knew.
I wanted to be in his orbit.
Chapter Thirteen (#ulink_fe1ed1c5-2798-5535-bad9-ffa80e23f30f)
ALEX
Alex had known as soon as he laid eyes on her that she was the one, the one who would save him. Save them all. As he kicked off his muddy boots he breathed in the soup and he knew home was more than a building. It was a smell, a feeling. The people you surrounded yourself with.
