The Rose Petal Beach Page 6

  Ding-dong, the doorbell chimed again. I licked oil off my fingers and reached nonchalantly for the tomato ketchup and salad cream.

  ‘This family is out of order,’ Sarto said, pushing out his chair and stomping to the door. ‘You’re all out of order.’

  Genevieve smirked and I smiled to myself. Poor Sarto was really feeling it today. ‘Tam-mia!’ he called a few seconds later. ‘Door.’

  The way he said my name told me who it was. I couldn’t quite believe he had the audacity to show up knowing most people didn’t welcome his type (Challey) round these parts.

  ‘Tam-mia!’ Sarto called again, louder this time. ‘Scott Challey’s here to see you.’ He did that to let those at the table know what I was up to, who I was fraternising with. As he guessed it would, his pronouncement caused everyone to look at me, blinking in shock.

  ‘A Challey?’ Dad said quietly.

  ‘Here?’ Mum said just as quietly.

  Genevieve did not speak, she simply pushed the waves of her long, black hair off her face and glared at me until I met her eye. Her expression softened from shock into deep, sorrowful disappointment. Has this been going on since you were twelve? she was asking me silently.

  ‘Don’t let Sarto eat all my chips,’ I said to fill the hole that shock had blasted into the room. ‘I only said he could have some of them, not all of them.’

  ‘I’ll guard them with my very life,’ Genevieve replied, now unable to even look in my direction. She had joined my parents in feeling disappointed in me. She had no idea how disappointed I actually felt in myself – becoming involved with someone I knew I shouldn’t have and discovering after I’d fallen in love, had become pregnant, that he wasn’t the person I thought he was after all.

  With their eyes on me, I stood shakily and left.

  While I grabbed my coat, Sarto muttered darkly, ‘Your lunch is waiting. Don’t be long.’

  ‘You’re not my father, Sarto, in case you’d forgotten,’ I replied, stepping over the threshold to leave.

  ‘Things would be very different if I was,’ Sarto called as I shut the door in his face.

  ‘Are you mad, coming here?’ I hissed to Scott when we were clear of the front path and on the pavement. I daren’t look back at the house in case they were all in the front-room window watching us. I marched quickly up the road out of sight. ‘My whole family were in there and now they all think …’ The truth, I realised so stopped talking.

  ‘Sorry, sorry, I had to see you. I came after you but you’d gone. You weren’t at your flat and I remembered you said about your Saturday lunches here so obviously …’

  ‘Obviously what? What do you want?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I behaved very badly. Of course I love you. Of course I know the baby’s mine. You’re the best thing that has happened to me, and the baby will be too if you want to keep him or her. If you don’t, that’s fine, too. But whatever you decide, I’ll support you. I’m sorry I didn’t say all that before.’

  ‘Thing is Scott …’

  ‘No, no. No, don’t.’ He stopped walking and threw himself to his knees. ‘Please don’t say “thing is” and my name in that tone of voice because that means it’s over. And I can’t stand the thought of that. I wish I had been a better man, but I’m here now. I want to be with you. I want to support you. Please give me one more chance. I probably deserve to be – what’s that thing they say on Jerry Springer – “kicked to the kerb” but please don’t.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t I?’

  ‘Because I love you. Because we’re good together. Because every time we’re apart it feels as if there’s a piece of me missing. Because I love you.’

  ‘Yeah, well, sometimes love isn’t enough, you know? How do I know you aren’t going to freak out again about something we’re both responsible for? Or suddenly start questioning if I’ve been sleeping around? A baby puts all kinds of pressure on people and if you can’t handle it, I’d rather you weren’t around.’

  ‘Please, I’m begging you. I’ll do anything to make this work. Anything. You name it, I’ll do it. Just don’t give up on me, please.’

  I could feel people in the street staring at us from behind their net curtains, formulating their gossip as fast as they could: the Challey boy on his knees in front of the Berize girl, hands clasped together as he begged her for something.

  ‘Get up, Scott.’

  ‘No. No, I can’t until I’ve made you understand how sorry I am and how much I love you and how much it would kill me if you didn’t give me a second chance.’

  ‘People are staring at us.’

  He looked around, the street was empty but the weight of a dozen pairs of eyes was still upon us. ‘I don’t care. I love you and I don’t care who knows it.’ He opened his arms wide, threw his head back. ‘I LOVE TAMIA BERIZE!’ he bellowed suddenly. He lowered his head. ‘See? I don’t care who knows it. I’m yours from now until eternity. And I want to be the baby’s, too.’

  Around us, front doors were opening and net curtains were being pulled back as people who hadn’t been watching came to see what the shouting was about.

  ‘Right, listen, I’ll give you another chance. But only one more chance, Scott, anything remotely bastard-like and I am gone. Do you understand me?’

  ‘I won’t need another chance, I’m not going to mess up like this ever again.’ He got to his feet, grinning from one ear to the other. He kissed me in front of all our neighbours, his hand resting on my abdomen, completing the circle that made us a family.

  My mobile bleeps on my lap. My heart leaps and I immediately check it hasn’t woken Cora and Anansy. Their two forms lie undisturbed under the chocolate-brown duvet. It won’t be Scott. I know he’s not getting out tonight, his mobiles are downstairs and what could he say in a text that would possibly explain what happened tonight? Without checking who the sender is, I turn off my phone, pull my legs up to my chest and tell myself I need to sleep.

  Fifteen years ago

  She was gentle and kind, her calmness filtered through the fug of pain and exhaustion. ‘How are you feeling, Miss Berize?’

  ‘OK, I suppose,’ I murmured through my blue-tinged lips. The tiredness wouldn’t allow me to keep my eyes open for more than a few seconds at a time; they kept slipping shut while the rest of me tried to drift off to sleep.

  ‘You’ve lost a lot of blood so I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re feeling exhausted right now.’

  I nodded. Exhausted, devastated.

  Scott’s hand was curled around mine like a sleeping cat laced around the feet of its beloved owner. He hadn’t let go in the time we’d been waiting in this cubicle.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ her gentleness continued. ‘There’s nothing we can do. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘You can’t save the baby?’ he asked.

  ‘Not at such an early stage. We’re not sure what causes this to happen, often it’s just one of those things. I’m truly sorry.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Because of how much blood you’ve lost we’re going to have to admit you until we’re sure the process is complete. Is that OK?’

  I nodded again, too drained and broken to say anything.

  Scott’s tears crawled down his face in an unstoppable flow. He didn’t let go of my hand to wipe away his tears, he held onto me and let the world see how his heart was breaking too.

  Fourteen years ago

  ‘Come outside,’ Scott said to me in the middle of the night. He tugged at the corner of the red and white eiderdown on our bed, untucking it from where I’d wrapped it around myself.

  Scott had stayed over to take care of me when I came home from hospital after the … miscarriage, and never really left again. Working in bars to fund his studies meant he kept odd hours sometimes but he always came back to me. Always crept into bed and curled up around me, the cold of his body often shocking me awake for a few moments before the comfort of his familiar shape let me drift back to sleep. ‘Love you, TB,’
he’d always whisper into my ear. ‘You’re everything to me.’

  ‘No way!’ I replied, turning over, trying to find that lovely warm spot I’d created. ‘There’s all sorts out there.’

  ‘Just come outside for one minute. I promise you won’t regret it.’

  Huffing and puffing, I sat up and threw back the covers. ‘This had better be good, Challey boy.’

  Standing at the foot of the bed, he was still wearing his black overcoat and still had his grey scarf wrapped around his neck. In his hands he held my long, grey coat. I gratefully slipped into it. The heating in the building was off till the morning and the chill of the February night had seeped inside. At the front door he handed me my snow boots, even though it wasn’t snowing outside.

  ‘Do I have to close my eyes or something?’ I asked, as we stood at the top of the stairs that led down from my flat.

  ‘If you want, but if you fall down them that’s your look out,’ he said, laughing to himself.

  ‘You!’ I said and gave his shoulder a playful shove.

  Outside, the crisp, clean atmosphere chased away any remnants of sleep that might have been lurking in my head and I was suddenly wide awake.

  ‘Tah-dah!’ he said, his hands pointing in TV-presenter fashion at the car that sat directly outside the flat. It looked older than either of us, was probably more rust than anything else, but was clean and shiny.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘A car! The car! I bought you a car.’

  I blinked in surprise. ‘You what?’

  ‘I bought you a car.’

  ‘Wow,’ I said, staring at the shiny burgundy surfaces of the car in front of me. I didn’t even know what make it was but it was a car. ‘I can’t believe … Where did you get the money?’

  ‘I earned and saved every single penny,’ he said, immediately on defensive. ‘If you don’t believe me—’

  ‘I do believe you,’ I cut in. ‘Of course I believe you. I’m only curious how you could afford a car when you’re working at two different bars just to keep your head above water and afford college as it is.’

  ‘I’ve been working extra shifts during the day so I could save for this.’ He draped his arms over my shoulders like a casually thrownon cardigan. ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘I love it,’ I replied. ‘But … How can you take on more daytime shifts if you’re in college most days?’

  ‘I took a break for a while. I’ll go back to it soon.’

  ‘Scott! College is important.’

  ‘Says the woman who didn’t even go.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I can always go another time. You’re already there, you don’t want to throw away that opportunity.’

  ‘Do you know why I bought you a car?’ he asked, changing the subject.

  ‘Ummm, no.’

  ‘Because I think we should do it. I think we should go to Brighton with that promotion you were offered.’

  ‘No, we already talk—’

  ‘No, no, look, staying here because of me is stupid. And, no matter what you say, it is because of me.’

  ‘There’ll be other opportunities.’

  ‘TB, you’ve got a promotion to become head of Corporate Communications for a multinational company, and you’ll be the youngest person to hold that position in their history. Do you have any idea how proud of you I am? You can’t throw that away for a boyfriend.’

  I leant my head back so I could look up at him, he bent his head to look down at me. ‘You’re not just a boyfriend,’ I said. What happened had fundamentally changed us and how we were together. Our love was never hidden, always spoken, always shown. Our time together was always relished and revelled in.

  ‘I say, we pack up everything in this car, and we head on down to Brighton. We get there, get settled and then, you know, think about trying again in a couple of years.’ I knew exactly what he meant: we both wanted to try for another baby, we both knew we were scared in case it happened again. We would, though, when the time was right, when everything was in place. ‘I can always use the car to come back for college until I find another course down there.’

  ‘Will you marry me?’ I asked.

  His whole face softened into a smile I had never seen before. It needed to be remembered in paints, on a canvas, anything, because it showed the texture of happiness. ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Yes, I will. Can’t believe it’s taken you so long to ask.’

  ‘Well, I had to be sure, didn’t I?’ I joked before returning my gaze to the car. Our car. ‘This is so special,’ I said. ‘This is a present with a whole new life attached to it.’

  ‘You deserve it, my love.’

  ‘You do realise I can’t drive, don’t you?’

  ‘What?’ He was stricken. ‘I thought you could. Oh, great, typical Scott, buy a present without checking the person can actually use it.’

  ‘Just tricking you!’ I laughed.

  ‘You!’ he laughed and tickled and tickled me until, gasping with laughter, I agreed never to trick him again.

  My fingers close around the smooth metal of my platinum wedding ring. I rotate it back and forth around my finger. Nothing makes sense. In all of this, nothing is making any sense.

  4

  Beatrix

  Here’s the thing I don’t like about being single: waking up alone. The rest of it I really can handle, no matter what other people might try to tell me. It’s this part I find hardest.

  I long to have someone to sleep with. You can get sex anywhere, it’s all around you and you can pluck it out of the air almost – if you’re willing to compromise (a lot) on quality, usually – but it’s difficult, really difficult to find someone you connect with enough to sleep with.

  I love waking up with a man’s arms around me and his body next to mine, feeling like I am part of something whole instead of mostly incomplete. I like it and I crave it, sometimes more than sex. It doesn’t seem to work as well with one-night stands, not sure why. Maybe it’s because you can’t pretend too hard? You can’t allow yourself to relax and sleep properly if you know at the end of it he’s probably going to be gone very early the next day, if he stays more than a few hours at all. Even if he stays till dawn, even if you have that early connection that leads to morning sex, you know he’s leaving and never coming back. When you crave the intimacy of sleeping with someone, having it faked for only a few hours is worse than not having it at all.

  I’ve opened my eyes this morning feeling flat. My mobile is definitely be-janxed, which means I have to go to the office when I’d planned on working from home today. I could do without driving all the way to Kent now, but they’ve got no way to get in touch unless it’s by email and for some reason that’s not enough for my company. They need to know they can talk to me at whatever time they want.

  My limbs don’t come anywhere near the edges of the bed, my body is not enough to fill it up on its own.

  Tami and Scotty pop into my mind. I bet they’re waking up right about now, curled up together, their skin so close it could almost be that they’re one person. I bet he kisses her on the top of her head as I’ve seen him do a million times, I bet she smiles and snuggles into the crook of his neck. I sound so jealous, and that’s because I am. I am of pretty much every couple who sleep together, not just Tami and Scotty.

  I’ve mentioned them a couple of times now, so I’m sure you’re curious about how I know them. Well, about nine years ago, the banker who lived at number eighteen Providence Close lost his job – couldn’t have happened to a nicer wanker, sorry, banker, if you ask me. I knew him because I used to work in the City and he’d been on the fiddle for years. Anyways, he had to sell his house pretty quickly, so when this couple came along with a huge deposit and the ability to move quickly he sold it to them and never looked back.

  Nine years ago

  Whenever I saw the neighbours who I talked to on the Close they’d always have a different story about who was about to move into number eighteen. Gus at number forty-eight said it was a wido
wer and his six children, Leenie at number three said it was a single mother who’d won the lottery, Cleo at number ninety-six said it was the banker who’d had to sell the house in the first place under a different name so he could cheat the tax man. So when I saw the new owner coming out of the house, dressed in a dust-smeared T-shirt, old jeans, and wild, ‘manual labour’ hair, I kind of guessed he was none of these things.

  ‘Hi,’ he said, a grin taking over his face when he saw me.

  ‘Moving in, I see,’ I replied, pausing outside the small iron gate and then leaning against the gatepost.

  ‘Yes, a very long process, considering I’m moving a one-bedroom flat into a five-bedroom house. There’s so much stuff.’ He shrugged. ‘It doesn’t make sense, you know?’

  He had this cute way of wrinkling his nose to emphasise how baffling things seemed to him. And his habit – which is what I could tell it was from the way he did it – of running his right hand through his brown locks started a tingling in my stomach. But it was his smile, the way it was a little bit higher on one side of his mouth than the other, that made me fall for him. In my head, we’d kissed, made love, set up home, got engaged, had a huge wedding and were trying for a baby by the time he’d said ‘you know?’

  I nodded at him.

  ‘So it’s only you moving in, then?’ I said, trying to hide my hope. One-bedroom flat, no visible sign of anyone else helping with the moving process, all on his own at what seems a crucial phase … Ergo, moving in alone. Single. Available. As was I. Available, that is.

  ‘No. God, no. I couldn’t live in a house this big on my own. My wife is at home directing the packing. She’s six months pregnant and would be here doing this bit herself, too, if I’d let her. She’s pretty amazing. I can’t get her to slow down.’ Ah, married. The second he said that, I switched off the ‘available’ light I’d been metaphorically flashing and focused on his wedding ring – pretty unusual it was – and, most importantly, backed off. I liked the thrill of the chase, I liked that bit when you meet someone and you know it could go any way, but, as I said to you a minute ago, I’d been cheated on, my husband did it to me, my husband left me for someone else so I was not going to ‘go there’.