The urge to shove the woman in front to one side and chuck her wheelie trolley under the shuttle bus was overwhelming – and out of character because Leonora wasn’t prone to aggression. But at that moment, her only desire was to be with Joel.
The hail turned to sleeting rain and her jeans were soggy, the denim rubbing her skin as water seeped into her boots. It was as though someone up there was deliberately thwarting Leonora’s plans, intent on preventing an illicit liaison.
The idea of being watched from above turned Leonora’s thoughts to her grandmother and if anyone was prone to meddling, it would be her. Not content with spreading rumours and ruining everyone’s day up in heaven, her gran probably felt the need to niggle the evildoers who still dwelt on earth too.
That was how Leonora imagined her dear departed grandmother, and even though she was a cantankerous, opinionated pain in the arse at the best of times, Leonora and her sisters really loved their Granny Sylvia. She was tough as a pear drop on the outside, but once you knew how to wince through the acid layer there was a surprisingly squishy core of mush in the middle. And as much as she tested everyone’s patience, her behaviour was borne purely from love, the result of a bruised and broken heart, and the desire to protect her family from hurt of any kind. Which was why they always forgave her.
Oddly enough, even though she wasn’t a believer, it gave Leonora great comfort to think of Granny Sylvia zooming straight up to heaven in the arms of her beleaguered angel who couldn’t wait to dump her charge and finally, after seventy-five long and trying years, be done withthemost pious and bigoted woman in Cheshire. Despite all that, Leonora really missed her. They all did.
Saint Sylvia. That was what Leonora and her two older sisters secretly called their gran. She had come to live with them after their dad was killed in a horrific accident. Their mum was heavily pregnant with Leonora and had two children and a rattling leaky house to care for. And as much as she was a stickler for routine, manners, early bedtimes, cod liver oil – basically everything most things children absolutely hate, nobody could deny that she had arrived at Appleton just at the right time. Granny Sylvia had swept in like a blonde, cockney Mary Poppins to take care of her grieving daughter and shell-shocked granddaughters and set about putting the world to rights. Once she was ensconced at Appleton Farm she became an integral part of the family, someone they couldn’t do without which made losing her so much harder to bear.
Leonora swallowed down the blob of sadness that had welled in her throat. She cheered herself with thoughts of Joel, who was just minutes away, only to be plunged back into misery when she thought of Caspar and his whiny voice. It was as though his self-pity had stuck to her eardrums. Lately, it seemed like everything he did or said irritated her and his negativity soaked into her pores, dragging her down like soggy trainers.
He was like a limpet who spied on her and on more than one occasion had turned up unannounced at a wine bar when she was with her friends. Or by pure coincidence in a packed Arndale Shopping Centre he would ‘bump into her’ – fancy that! Leonora sensed he was following her and was increasingly obsessed with her whereabouts and routine, making it easier for him to pin her down.
Then there were the questions about her colleagues and who she talked to during the day, gave a lift home to, where they lived. The guy was seriously giving her the creeps, turning up at her mum’s unannounced like he was trying to catch her out and poking his nose into family affairs, never mind their business.
The rain was easing slightly. She couldn’t wait to be inside the warm home that Joel was house-sitting for his brother who was in Italy skiing. They were making the most of having a place where they could escape from everyone, real life, and Caspar.
The traffic in and around the huge shopping centre was ridiculous but would suit Leonora’s purposes because everyone knew that at Christmastime the place was packed with shoppers, diners and cinemagoers; therefore if she was delayed getting home, her tragic story of roads being blocked would be totally believable.
‘Honestly, Caspar. It was bumper to bumper in and out, and you should have seen the crowds inside. My feet were killing me so I stopped in the food hall and had something to eat, I was knackered. I know, I can’t believe it either, that in all of those lovely shops I still couldn’t find a dress I liked. You know I prefer to try things on so I might nip over to Cheshire Oaks at the weekend, otherwise I’ll have to take a chance online.’
There was no way Leonora could stay the whole night with Joel: it was too risky. And as much as she was looking forward to Christmas, it would also mean being apart from Joel and putting up with Caspar tagging along. The whole family would be there and Christmas Day fell on a Saturday, which had thrilled her mum no end.
Usually the garden centre would remain open until 4pm on Christmas Eve but this year it would close on the Thursday and all of the staff and their families were invited to a ‘thank you’ party in the café. It had been a tough year and her mum wanted to show everyone who’d worked so hard to keep the garden centre ticking how grateful she was.
It was going to be ‘open house’ and Leonora and her sisters, nieces and nephews could invite anyone they wanted, the more the merrier. The only thing was, the person Leonora didn’t want to be there was Caspar, and the one she did want to be there couldn’t even show his face because all hell would break loose. And that was the last thing anyone wanted. A pre-Christmas Eve punch-up!
The Big Weekend (as they’d all taken to calling it) meant a lot to her mum, who’d been planning it since the end of summer – that’s what it felt like anyway. Ever since Leonora could remember her mum had made Christmas Day special. According to Rosina, even when everyone was grieving the loss of their dad, a dad Leonora had never met, she pulled out all the stops to make sure it was a happy day. Being a single mum would have been tough – especially once she started building the garden centre – but she was their absolute rock who never let them down and was an inspiration to all of the Appleton women. So no way was Leonora’s illicit affair with the man who broke her heart when he ran off to the Far East, going to ruin it.
That little drama was scheduled for after Christmas, as soon as she plucked up the courage to tell Casparandher mum that the big white wedding which had been halted the year before wasn’t going to happen this year either. And then, while she was on a roll, she’d hit her family with the double whammy. She and Joel were back together, madly in love and this time it was for keeps.
To be fair Leonora hadn’t expected Caspar’s proposal but as she imagined thousands, maybe millions of blindsided people had done in the past, she’d said yes to save embarrassment. For Caspar and all the people in the Parisian restaurant. It wasn’t wrong to have accepted when she wanted to scream, NO! It was merely an act of panic-stricken kindness.
Two months later, the terrible virus that was ravaging the world helped her avoid the massive mistake of marrying someone totally unsuitable. She wasn’t remotely upset when they’d had to shelve their wedding plans and her mother’s new notebook was stuffed in the kitchen drawer, permanently as far as Leonora was concerned. They had watched the big lockdown announcement in the kitchen of Appleton Farm and while her mother commiserated and Caspar cursed Boris, Leonora wanted to hug the tatty-haired bearer of bad tidings, even if it wasn’t allowed.
Her future didn’t lie with Caspar even though he one hundred per cent believed that his lay with her. Or, as she’d come to realise, he believed his future lay with the Appleton Farm family and the thriving business that his wife-to-be would one day inherit.
On paper, Leonora knew that the garden centre, its land and tenanted properties put her mother in the millionaire bracket. And, unfortunately, so did Caspar, because he worked for the firm of accountants that looked after their financial matters.
Leonora also knew that she and Caspar were completely mismatched and had she not been recovering from a broken heart, wouldn’t have given the handsome and suave accountant the time of day. At the beginning, if she were honest, she’d hoped that word of her new relationship would filter across the airwaves and oceans via mutual friends. She wanted to piss Joel off and make him rue the day he chose Thailand and an internship at a wildlife reserve over her.
* * *
The nice half of Leonora, because she did have one, had begrudgingly accepted that Joel’s trip was an opportunity he couldn’t miss and she tried hard to be pleased that he was going to live his dream. But she’d loved him too much to let him go.
Every bone of his beautiful body, his unruly fair hair that he had to tie in a bobble while he worked in the pine forest at Appleton, and those soulful brown eyes that couldn’t look at hers when he told her he was thinking of leaving. The same eyes that danced with excitement when he explained about the elephant sanctuary and how the local villagers would teach him about bio-diversity and sustaining the environment.
So to begin with, nice Leonora waved him off and promised she could live without him for six months, convincing herself that it would go in a flash. Then when he came home he could put his skills to good use at Appleton where her mum had already promised him a job managing the forest. And his own brand-new Land Rover. Who could resist?
Joel, that’s who.
When she received the phone call, telling her he’d been offered a full-time position by a global conservation trust, nice Leonora disappeared in a puff of angry black smoke and nasty Leonora emerged from the flames. This version was riddled with disappointment while humiliation whispered that she was a gullible fool, whipping up fury that vented itself in angry, intolerant words.
No, she didn’t believe that a job wasn’t already on the cards the day he boarded the flight to Bangkok. No, she wouldn’t consider joining him over there. No, she wasn’t prepared to give him another six months to see if it worked out. And no, they couldn’t be friends. Leonora didn’t regret calling him a dirty perv who was probably enjoying the backstreet pleasures of Thailand. Or insinuating stuff about ladyboys. And hoping he’d catch something that would make his dick drop off, just before jabbing the red phone icon and ending the call.
Yes, messages were sent back and forth for a week or two but in the end they both accepted it was over. It still didn’t make loving someone, every day, any easier to bear.
