Damage (17 page)

Make sure he was okay.

Once she’d tuned into the gossip it became impossible to filter out.

“You say Millie reckons he’s gone? Good riddance to him. That’s what I say.”

She was reminded of Blunt’s comment about how the villagers hated him, and were just waiting for him to fail. It wasn’t fair: his only crime was that he was an outsider who kept himself apart. Was that so awful?

She worked through until three, then finally pulled on her coat and headed home across the green.

She couldn’t help but worry. She really should call, but something was stopping her.

She wondered if he was doing the same thing, checking his phone, waiting for her to make first contact. Scared to be the one to call.

Was he even thinking of her, though, or was he still lost in some dark place?

She almost turned and headed to the Hall, but she stopped herself. What she’d said to Ruby still held true: she needed time.

Time to think.

Time to try to work out what it was that she wanted.

§

She spent the rest of the afternoon doing things around the house that distracted her from doing that thinking. Housework, college work, prepping the side dishes to go with the roast her father had put in, as Ruby was staying another night.

Anything but think.

When Blunt called that evening she didn’t answer, and she didn’t understand why.

She was too busy, in the middle of making the batter for the Yorkshire puddings. She couldn’t just drop everything for the phone.

She hadn’t had time to think things through, anyway. She didn’t know what she would say.

She was scared of what
he
might say. Was he calling to end it? Or
not
to end it?

Was her subconscious stopping her from answering, a subconscious way of ending it herself?

So many reasons not to answer.

As soon as her phone stopped buzzing she felt petty for ignoring him.

What must he be going through? She remembered the look on his face as he stood beside Ruby’s wrecked car, confronted with a situation so close to the one in which he’d lost his wife: to drag Ruby out and risk harming her further, or leave her in the car?

All those memories of that night.

Sarah.

Always Sarah, the wife he had lost. Holly felt gut-wrenchingly awful to even think these things. How could she be jealous of Sarah?

But she was, and it was not something that would go away.

Sarah.

She’d been stupid to think there could be anything more for him than Sarah. That he might be ready for more.

He was too damaged, too hooked up in the tragedy of his past and his guilt and pain.

It was always Sarah, and it always would be so. She was foolish to think anything else.

“I’m sorry. So sorry. I just froze. And then I unfroze and I was some kind of monster. You must think I’m a total arse. And I am. Can I see you? That’s all I ask.”

Sitting upstairs in her bedroom’s window seat, she listened to his voicemail message, then listened to it again immediately. The village green looked ghostly tonight, the grass glimmering dimly in the light from The Bull and a few neighboring houses, the dark shapes of trees forming inky pools that seemed to float in her vision.

Her father had been on good form this evening, lifted by having both daughters here. It was bittersweet for Holly: a lovely thing but also she had to struggle not to feel jealous. Already jealous of Sarah and now jealous of her own sister, of the way their father perked up whenever Ruby was around.

What did that say about her? Had she really become some kind of bitter, twisted-up person? That wasn’t the person she wanted to be.

Blunt had called a second time while they were eating, but she’d ignored the buzzing of her phone in her pocket. This time the buzz of the call had been followed up a few seconds after falling silent by another buzz that indicated the arrival of this voicemail message.

I’m sorry. So sorry. I just froze. And then I unfroze and I was some kind of monster. You must think I’m a total arse. And I am. Can I see you? That’s all I ask.

She heard the clunk of a door as Ruby left the bathroom. She put her phone aside and went through. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, put some night cream on, peed and washed her hands.

Back in her room she stripped, and couldn’t help but recall Blunt’s touch, the hardness of his body. She hugged herself briefly, then pulled on her favorite brushed cotton PJs and climbed into bed.

She listened again.

His voice was hesitant, lots of pauses. The tone wavered in places. His Yorkshire accent was stronger on the phone, his voice sounding both deeper and a little tinny. Funny how you hear people differently when all you can do is listen.

She played the message again.

He sounded as if he was struggling to hold it together. Raw and emotional. But for her or for Sarah? She felt bad for even thinking such a thing, but she did.

She didn’t want to be a mere straw that he clung to. She was worth more than that.

She texted him.

I need time. Sorry. xx

§

Only the week before, she’d been hanging on the phone. Checking every few minutes to see if she’d missed a call. Watching the damned thing, just waiting for it to light up with a new message.

Now, things were reversed.

Blunt called again on Monday, but she didn’t answer. It was lunchtime and she was working through in the university library between classes. She was fine on the practical work, but she still struggled with essays like this. She was just sitting there, staring blankly at a half-written piece on abstract expressionism, which made her think of the de Kooning in Blunt’s collection, when her phone buzzed in her pocket.

She took the phone out. The screen told her the call was from ‘Mr Blunt’ – the name she’d put in her contacts list back when she’d agreed to take on the cleaning job at the Hall. She rejected the call.

All afternoon and evening she expected another call but there was nothing, and that was even worse. When does a man like Blunt give up trying? Could she measure how much he cared in how long it took for him to give up?

§

Tuesday, there was nothing. And Wednesday...

Wednesday, she stepped off the bus by the village green and headed across to the cottage. Her father was there in the doorway, as if he’d just emerged, or had been waiting for her. There was a strange look on his face: smiling, surprised.

“You’ll never guess,” he said, as she approached.

He had a piece of paper in his hand, an A4 envelope in the other.

“I might need a few more clues, at least,” said Holly.

He raised the piece of paper, a letter on headed stationery. It looked like something from a solicitor and immediately Holly was reminded of the day she’d come home to learn that the Estate had served them with an eviction notice.

“Nicholas was round,” he said.

Blunt. What had he been doing here?

“He’s a nice lad, that Nicholas. I knew him when he was a boy, you know. Got on well with his old man, Davey. I–”

“What did he want?”

Her father paused, thrown off his stride by her brusque interruption. “This,” he said finally, waving the letter in the air again. “He gave me the deeds to the cottage. This place. It’s ours, Holly. A gift from the Estate. Things always come good in the end, don’t they?”

The deeds? He’d handed over the cottage, just like that? What was he playing at? She felt a rush of emotions, none of which she really understood, but more than anything she felt manipulated.

“That’s great,” she said. Then she added, “I was thinking of finding a place of my own anyway, closer to the uni.”

Her father looked puzzled, and she felt a wash of guilt for snatching away the smile from his face.

“You seem to be coping fine these days, after all,” she said sharply, and stepped past him, into the house.

§

Why had she said that? Her father didn’t deserve such a waspish reaction. He’d been giving her good news.

She sat in the window seat and looked out across the green, half-expecting to see Blunt standing there, watching, waiting. He’d tossed her the bait, now all he had to do was reel her in. Did he think she could be bought so easily?

She took out her phone, tapped through to Recent Calls and then thumbed to call back, no pause for thought, no prevaricating because she hadn’t had time to think things through, or she didn’t know what to say, or–

He answered on the second ring.

“Holly,” he said. She thought he would say more, but he left it at that.

“That was so unfair,” she said.

Silence.

“The cottage. My father. I said I needed time. You didn’t have to–”

“Whoa,” he said. “Hang on a minute. The cottage? I... Holly, please. I didn’t even think... It wasn’t meant to be like that. Not at all. I wasn’t trying to buy your favor. That’d be such a crass, insensitive thing to do. I didn’t think... Well, of course it looks like that, but it’s not what I intended.”

“Then what
did
you intend?” It was all she could do to keep that steely edge to her voice when she heard him like this: raw and confused, exposed.

“I... I was just trying to do what’s right,” he said. “A lesson I learned from my father, and one he learned from
your
father. I saw a situation I could put right and so I did.”

“‘Put right’?”

“My dad owed your father so much. I do, too. He invested in my dad’s business when things were rough, and later that gave me the foundations to start on my own. I’d be nothing without your father’s support for my father back then. He’s a genuinely good person and it’s heartbreaking to see what he’s lost.”

The passion in Blunt’s explanation made Holly feel guilty all over again.

“That business over the eviction’s been eating away at me,” Blunt continued. “I wanted to make sure your father was never put in that position again. That’s all it was. I’m just... it’s like I’m waking up and starting to realize what really matters. Nothing more than that, I swear.”

In his words, Holly saw a glimpse of the Blunt that others had described to her: the man who gave back, who did his best to do the right thing. The man he’d been long before she’d ever known him.

The man who’d been put on hold ever since that one awful night the year before.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t just leap in like that.”

“You’ve seen the worst in me. It’s only natural.”

She’d glimpsed the best in him, too.

“Holly?”

“Hmm?”

“Can we talk?”

“I need time,” she said. That night was still raw for her. Ruby and Blunt, the crash, Blunt’s rage.

“I’m here.”

“That’s good to know.”

Another long pause, then she added, “And Nicholas? Thanks. For Dad. For me. For everything.”

§

It was true: she did need time. But she also needed a push in the right direction, and who better to provide that than Tommy Lefevre?

She had to get changed quickly after talking to Blunt. Distracted, she’d lost track of the time, forgetting that she had a six to eleven shift at The Bull.

Tommy couldn’t have timed things worse.

Striding across the green, she came to the far side, about to step out into the road and cross to The Bull, when Tommy pulled up on his motorbike, cutting off her path. Already worked up from talking to Blunt, angry with herself for being so abrupt with her father, and rushing because she was late, she snatched herself back, mid-stride.

“What the–?”

“Hey, Holly. Holly, calm it, okay?”

She hadn’t even realized it was him until he took his helmet off, and then she didn’t know if she was more mad that it was him rather than a complete stranger.

“What are you doing, Tee? I was in the road. You could have–”

“But I didn’t, did I? Sorry, Holly. I just saw you and thought it’s been a while, you know?”

“I’m late,” she said, nodding towards the pub.

“Working or drinking?”

“Work. Look, Tee, can this wait?”

“Sure, Holly. I’ll wait. I’d wait forever, you know I will. I already have.”

That did it. Bad enough that he’d nearly knocked her over, that he was delaying her now, but
this?

“Will you just cut that crap?”

The tone of her voice cut through him. His expression melted, his jaw sagged, his eyes widened.

“Holly?”

“This,” she went on, a tightly-coiled spring suddenly released. “All of it. Just cut it, Tommy. We were over years ago. Done. Finished. Okay? Just leave it.”

He looked like he’d been slapped. As if someone had punched him in the gut and knocked the wind from his lungs.

Where had that come from? That sudden anger? The need to lash out. Something pent up for far too long.

She understood then that Blunt wasn’t the only damaged individual around here, the only one broken by loss and hardship and suffering. They all were. Holly, her father, Ruby. Even Tommy, in his own way, unable to move on from something that had ended a long time ago.

“I’m sorry,” she said, more softly. “But just leave it, okay?”

“It’s him, isn’t it? Blunt.”

She looked at him. He’d done it again. Confronted her in a clumsy attempt to win her back only to make her see more clearly what she really wanted.

She nodded.

“Yes, Tommy. It is. It’s him. I love him. Will you just accept that and be my friend again, Tee?”

He opened his mouth to speak, then stopped himself. That act of checking his response seemed to be a turning point, marked by a sudden slumping of the shoulders. An acceptance.

He nodded in return, then before she realized what was happening he’d leaned forward on his bike and they were hugging, an oddly reassuring thing.

“We’ll always be friends, Holly. Just don’t let him hurt you, okay?”

She pulled away, smiled, and he flickered a smile in response.

“I need to be going,” she said, and she stepped past Tommy and his bike and crossed to The Bull.

§

Love. The L word.

She hadn’t expected to say it out loud, but it was just there and then it was out, spoken.