The Butterfly Storm (16 page)

Tall grasses line the sandy path all the way to the next village, which is hazy in the distance. There
are a handful of people on the path, some walking, others looking through binoculars towards the
marshes. I don’t go far, only until I find a spot in the sun to sit. People’s voices sound distant,
almost an echo. I like the feeling of being removed from everything and everyone. I wish I’d
brought a pencil and paper to sketch the view. I will next time, and a picnic to share with the
birds.

I check my mobile for reception and return Alekos’ late-night call.

His first words are: ‘What happened last night?’

‘We got cut off.’

‘Why didn’t you phone back?’

‘I was tired. I wanted to sleep.’

‘Who was with you?’

‘A friend of Mum’s.’

‘Right,’ he says slowly. ‘When are you coming home?’

‘Mum’s still in hospital. I can’t leave yet.’

‘I think what you’re doing is good.’

‘Really? Your reaction to me coming here could’ve fooled me, particularly when only a couple of
weeks ago you were telling me all about the importance of family.’

‘I understand now you need to sort things out with your Mum.’

Two cream butterflies chase each other through the tall grass in front of me and skim over the
sandy path. I stretch my legs out and lean back, resting my free hand on the mossy grass behind. ‘Then
why were you so reluctant about me coming here?’

‘To be honest I thought you had an alternative motive, that you wanted to escape
O
Kipos
rather than help your Mum. I’m sorry I thought that but I was surprised, that’s
all.’

‘Why?’

‘Because you rarely have a good word to say about her.’

‘That doesn’t mean I don’t care.’

‘Maybe not. It’s only my opinion.’

‘I think you’d like her.’

He sighs. ‘I’m sorry I’m not there with you. I’m sure I’ll meet her when she’s well again.’

‘You mean when she’s able to come and visit you in Greece.’ I pluck a blade of grass and flick it into
the air.

‘It is empty here without you,’ he says.

‘How can it possibly feel empty? There’s no room to sneeze without someone hearing. There’s
always someone there. Always.’

I’m conscious of my voice rising. A young couple is walking towards me hand in hand along the
path.

‘There’ll be a time when it’s only us,’ he says.

‘When Aleko? When?’ I don’t get an answer and wasn’t expecting one. We say goodbye. He’s got
things to do. Our lives and routines seem opposed to each other.

I do some shopping on the way back up through Blakeney. I buy bread, milk, cheese and tomatoes in the
Spar before I find a man selling dressed crabs from a shed off the main road. I can’t stop
thinking about Alekos, but it’s not because I’m missing him. I walk back down the hill
towards Mum’s house. It’s quite a view across the fields towards the village and the church.
Marshton is just a cluster of houses behind the pub and the green.
Salt Cottage
stands alone
with its back to the village. Its nearest neighbour is the farm at the end of the muddy
lane.

I have crab salad for dinner with a lettuce from the garden. I eat it on the patio with my back to
the cottage and watch the horses in the field. I don’t hear Robert until he’s almost beside
me.

‘Perfect timing,’ he says.

‘God you scared me.’

‘Sorry, I came through the side gate; Leila always keeps an open house policy. These are for
you,’ he says. He puts a punnet of strawberries and a pot of double cream on the patio
table.

I scramble to my feet. ‘There was no need but thank you.’

‘My pleasure,’ he says. He folds his arms across his chest and gazes across the field. ‘To think I
wasted so much time living in a city instead of here.’

‘Can I get you a drink?’

‘No thanks. I was only popping around to make arrangements to visit Leila tomorrow. Does ten
o’clock suit you?’

‘That’s fine with me.’

‘Great, well, I’ll see you tomorrow then,’ he says, and makes his way back up the garden. He reaches
the kitchen door and calls back. ‘If you don’t eat the strawberries and cream straight away then pop
them in the fridge.’

‘Of course!’ I shout back.

Sleep comes easily after fresh air, sunshine and food. There’s nothing to disturb the quiet, except an owl
hooting and the occasional car passing by. I don’t want to be uprooted tomorrow and heading back
towards a city. I don’t want to be making polite chit-chat with Robert on the forty-five minute
journey. Most of all, I don’t want to face the prospect of Mum coming home. I have no idea
how I’m going to deal with her. The owl’s hoots fade as I drift off into dreamless sleep.

Robert picks me up bang on ten o’clock. He hums along to the radio all the way to Norwich. We take the
lift and I note how familiar I’ve become with the stark white walls and seemingly identical corridors of
the hospital.

Thyroid lady’s been replaced with an equally inquisitive woman on Mum’s ward. Her knitting
needles click against each other; she has a pale blue ball of wool that she’s turning into some kind of
oversized jumper. She smiles warmly at us when we pull up two chairs and sit down opposite. ‘Your
family?’ she calls across from her bed.

Mum gives a drawn-out sigh. ‘My daughter, Sophie, and my friend, Robert.’

‘Oh lovely,’ thyroid lady’s replacement says before going back to her knitting.

‘You’ve got new roommates then,’ I say.

‘Tell me about it,’ Mum scowls. She’s sitting up in bed reading
Take a Break
. The whole of her bed
is strewn with magazines:
Woman
,
Hello
and
Now
.

‘You’re not bored then?’ Robert asks.

‘Not if you think reading about some woman’s stomach stapling operation is exciting stuff. They’re
all over a year old. I’m catching up on dead gossip.’

Her previously ashen face has colour and there’s a hint of make-up on her eyes and face, very subtle
but it makes a difference. A week ago she looked ten years older, now she looks younger than her actual
age.

I sit back and listen to Robert telling Mum about a villager’s art exhibition further down the coast.
The three of us together censors the conversation. Robert tries to include me but his talk is all about
people and a life I don’t know. One on one, we could talk properly, but this unnatural set-up forces us
to be too polite. We avoid anything emotional or personal. Talking about Darren, myself or any time
before this week are strictly off limits.

‘Ah, yes,’ Robert says. He reaches into his bag, pulls out Mum’s post and neatly arranges it on the
bedside cabinet. ‘I thought you might like to catch up with things.’

‘I hope you left the bills at home.’

‘I brought everything I’m afraid.’

‘At least it’ll be more exciting than
Take a Break
. Do I look like the type of person to read those
kind of magazines?’

Robert shakes his head. ‘No.’

‘How’s the cottage?’ Mum asks, her gaze flicking between Robert and me.

‘Being well looked after,’ Robert quickly replies.

‘It’s lovely,’ I say.

Mum smiles for the first time since I arrived in England.

‘You did it all up yourself, didn’t you,’ Robert says in a fatherly voice.

‘Almost.’

I don’t get what she sees in him, even if he is just a friend. He’s everything I thought she couldn’t
stand in a man… He reminds me so much of Despina.

‘It wasn’t hard making it look good in the state it was in,’ Mum says. She reaches for the glass of
water but Robert jumps up and hands it to her.

‘What state?’ I ask.

‘Tobacco-stained walls, flowery wallpaper and threadbare brown carpets. Bloody disgusting.’

‘But you fell in love with it,’ Robert says.

Mum nods. She’s beginning to look tired. Her energy seems to drain with our company. The ward is
filled with visitors; nearly every bed has people chatting round it. It doesn’t seem to be restful at
all.

‘Robert,’ Mum says. ‘Can you do me a favour and phone Pamela Swann about her daughter’s
wedding, let her know…’

He nods. ‘I’ve already spoken to her. She phoned the other day when I popped round. I explained
everything.’

‘Call her back and tell her I’ll be there on the day could you.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘They’re releasing me from this hell-hole on Tuesday,’ she says.

‘That’s earlier than expected, isn’t it?’ he asks.

‘They can’t wait to get rid of me. I made sure of that.’

I endure the forty-five minute journey back to Marshton by making small talk with Robert. But there’s
only so much we can say about the weather and the countryside. He seems to be afraid of a moment’s
silence between us. When we pull into
Salt Cottage’s
gateway, I find out what he’s being working up to
say.

‘Leila’s told me about what happened between you.’ Robert kills the engine and we sit awkwardly in
the car, not looking at each other. ‘I understand why things are difficult.’

‘You know more than you let on in the hospital then,’ I say. My hands are on the door release,
ready to make my escape.

‘I thought you might take it the wrong way if I blurted out that I knew the difficulties between the
two of you.’

‘And you don’t think I’ll take it the wrong way now?’

He’s quiet. His hands tense on the steering wheel. The heat intensifies the longer we sit in the
parked car. I open the door.

‘I care about Leila,’ he says. ‘I don’t want to see her unhappy, that’s all.’

‘It sounds to me like she’s very happy here.’

‘She is. But she misses you. She won’t admit it but I can tell.’ He unclamps his hands from the
steering wheel and glances at me. ‘I hope you can sort things out.’

‘I screwed things up with her. It’s not that easy.’

‘She was in the wrong. I told her that. She didn’t like it but it’s the truth.’

‘You actually said that to her? And you’re still friends?’

‘I was only telling her what deep down she already knew.’

I hear the crunch of tyres on gravel first. I’m upstairs in the bathroom cleaning the sink that was clean
to begin with and is now spotless. I get to the window in time to see Robert pull up in his
Toyota as close to the cottage as he can get. He’s cleaned the car since we visited Mum on
Sunday. By the time I’ve pulled off the rubber gloves, he’s out of the car and round to the
passenger side and opening the door for Mum. She looks much better in her own clothes - a
loose tunic top and long skirt that hides the scar on her arm and the cast on her leg. She’s
so thin. Even from up here her cheeks look hollow. She needs practice on the crutches or
simply enough energy to use them. Robert guides her towards the front door. I make my way
downstairs.

‘Hello Sophie,’ Robert says in an overly cheerful voice. ‘Everything all right?’

‘Yes, everything’s fine Robert, thank you.’

‘Where do you want to go, Leila?’ he asks. Mum struggles through the door, knocking the crutches
on the side as she comes in. I step back and stay out of the way.

‘Living room,’ she says.

While Robert helps Mum get comfy on the sofa, I put the kettle on. I find three mugs and pop a
teabag in one. I don’t know what to do. Should I go in and try and help? I stand on the doorstep while
the kettle boils and watch blue tits swoop across the garden and up into the safety of the
trees.

‘She’s comfortable now,’ Robert says, joining me in the kitchen.

‘Does she want a hot drink?’

‘No. She’s going to have a sleep. I think the relief of coming home has taken it out of her more than
she realised,’ he says. ‘I’d better get back. Are you going to be okay?’

‘Of course I’ll be okay,’ I say. ‘Why shouldn’t I be?’

He doesn’t say anything, but his dark eyebrows furrow. With a quick nod he backs out into the
hallway.

‘Tell her I’ll be over tomorrow,’ he whispers.

I open the door for him. ‘I will.’

I feel the need to creep from room to room, aware that I’m no longer alone in the house. I take a
deep breath and push the living room door open.

The bravado Mum had in hospital is gone. She’s lying on the sofa with her eyes closed and her arms
curled around a cushion. Her hair is lank against her pale face. Despite the warmth of the room she has
a blanket wrapped around her. I tiptoe across the rug and carefully pull the blinds halfway down
the window. The room darkens. There are two framed photographs on the mantelpiece
above the open fireplace. The first one is of Mum and me on the beach in Falmouth. The
other is Mum leaning against the back door of
Salt Cottage
, squinting in the sun. She’s
wearing paint-splattered dungarees and shading her eyes with one hand. The other hand
holds a paintbrush. The cottage walls are a dirty white, the border along the house is bare
and it’s obvious how much time and love she has put into the house. Mum shifts on the
sofa.

‘Are you hungry?’ I ask.

‘A little,’ she says without opening her eyes.

It gives me something to do and Mum time to herself. I shut myself in the kitchen and prop the
back door open. At least I feel like I’m doing something useful, making Mum her first home-cooked
meal in days. After all it’s what I’m good at. I’m able to forget about everything when I’m cooking. I
suppose it’s the same with anything you enjoy.

The late afternoon sun is shining on the patio, so I set the table outside. It’s shady beneath the
trees but warm. The view of horses being playful in the field, rubbing their necks together, is enough to
make anyone feel better. A fresh breeze wafts a ripe farmyard smell towards the cottage.
It’s a homely smell and reminds me of being at
O Kipos
, with its surrounding fields and
farms.

Mum’s asleep. I call her name twice from the doorway but she doesn’t answer. I squat beside her
and gently shake her good arm. ‘Mum?’