‘Did I lay awake at night, alone in a strange bed, the first time I’ve ever been anywhere, and wonder who the hell mighthave tried to poison me, or make me appear liable for cows being injured? As it happens, I spent a considerable amount of time questioning who I’d provoked to such disturbing levels of hatred.’
‘That can’t have been easy,’ Gabe said. ‘Thank you for staying and cooking for Iris and Hugh.’
‘It wasn’t.’ I stood up. ‘But being here, how welcome you all made me feel. Getting to know your family, and this incredible island, and the weird, wonderful way you live together on it, made it worth it. But all this stuff about Mum, and what happened with the lost letter, well, that’s not something I can hear any more about. There’s a lot you need to discuss as a family, that, me being a mainlander, I believe isn’t my business. If you don’t mind, I’ll head back and try to get at least some sleep before my flight.’
Nobody argued, so I grabbed my bag from where I’d left it on the hook of the door what seemed like a lifetime ago, and slunk out.
I didn’t know whether to feel relieved or frustrated when Pip caught up with me at the edge of the farmyard.
‘You’re leaving?’
I waved my hand back in the direction of the house. ‘Your mum hates me, Pip. As in, lost all sense of reason, frightening hatred. She snuck into my bedroom and put bird crap in the milk jug. If it was Celine, I could have stuck it out, as long as you believed me. Kept out of her way. But yourma? I can’t compete with that. Not the way you people love each other. And everyone else will now see me as the daughter of “that woman”. Who nearly wrecked everything. Staying here would be challenging enough without that hanging over me, people questioning why I’m really here.’
‘I’m really sorry about Ma.’ Pip ran an agitated hand through his hair. ‘I mean, clearly she needs help. Therapy, or something.’
‘In which case, the last thing she needs is me attaching myself to your family like a mainland limpet. How could she – how could any of you – handle me dating her son? And if nothing’s going to happen with us, then what’s the point? Why would I uproot my whole life to move here, given all the added complications? Having to either avoid you, somehow find a whole different social network on an island of three thousand people, who all know I’m Gabe Hawkins’ ex-wife’s daughter, or hang out with you, while never getting to hold your hand or kiss you again.’
He tipped his head up to the sky, the moonlight glinting off his tears.
‘There’s a whole world out there, Pip. Islands, mountains, other cultures… Why would I choose to stay in the one place where I’m viciously not wanted? Please, if you care about me at all, don’t make this harder than it has to be. Please let me go.’
I spun around, stumbling through the deserted garden to the footpath leading to the fields, only slowing when it became clear that Pip wasn’t coming after me, and I was free to release the noisy, soul-wrenching sobs.
I used my last dreg of energy tossing my things into bags, ignoring Blessing’s messages begging for an update, carefully draping Aster’s dress over the armchair, crawling into bed in my underwear and finding that, in actual fact, I still had the stamina to cry a whole load more before sinking into a fretful sleep.
32
At some point before I woke at four-thirty, an envelope had been slipped under my door.
I made myself one last mug of tea, curled up in the chair facing the huge window, and watched streaks of pink, gold and lilac sunrise spread across the sky for a long moment before I opened it.
4 April 1989
Gabriel
I don’t need to tell you that today is our third anniversary. I can’t help wondering whether you have written me a letter, despite knowing that it would surely be full of the pain and anger I’ve caused.
You may be wondering why I’ve written one (if you haven’t immediately tossed this into the living room fire).
Well. You are still my husband. And, I implore you – I will happily beg, if that would make a difference – that after reading what I have to say, you consider remaining that way.
I have made a hideous mistake, asking for a divorce. Not least because, for the first (and last) time, I lied to you. I liedabout falling in love with another man. It took thirty-seven years to find one man I could envisage sharing my life with. Can you really imagine me finding another?
You are the only man I have, and will ever, love, Gabriel. I asked for a divorce for the most cowardly of reasons – fear. I was afraid that you would choose the farm over me. And I was more afraid that you wouldn’t. That eventually, you would feel obligated to return to England, devastating your family, betraying your legacy and seething with buried resentment towards the wife who you were bound to discover sooner or later is by no means worthy of that sacrifice. I chose to believe that you belonged on your beloved island. That my love had a lesser claim on you. That even if I retried making a home on Hawkins Farm, we would live out our days in misery.
So, I invented a reason that you would find impossible to deny. You’ve always valued my happiness above your own, and I knew you would release me to remarry if I asked.
And, yes, a small part of me hoped that my letter would rekindle the fire you once felt. That you would ride in like a knight on a white horse, to claim your bride.
That, somehow, we would find a way to be happy. Or if not happy, then at least at peace.
Of course, that did not happen. You have fields to plough and calves to castrate. More common sense than money to waste going after a woman who has clearly told you she wants someone else.
So here I find myself, on our wedding anniversary, living with the single greatest mistake of my life.
I had spent so long alone, yet was never lonely until I met you.
I had rarely known joy, and yet never once encountered such despair.
