A Summer to Remember

When he arrived at The Mimosas, a pretty name that seemed to him to be trying to compensate for the less-than-pretty brick-built cottage, it was to find Genevieve three-quarters of the way down a bottle of wine, sitting out in her garden in the twilight looking balefully at the corner of her home, propped up for safety until the builders began the necessary dismantling, underpinning and rebuilding.

‘Hey,’ he said, pulling up a mismatched garden chair to join her, leaning down to brush her lips with his. ‘Feeling down in the dumps about the cottage?’

‘Yup,’ she answered flatly, putting down her wine glass to accept Nelson’s panting, pawing expressions of adoration. ‘Amongst other things. Like, whether we’ve got a future.’

Aaron had been about to go and get himself a wine glass but instead he dropped into the chair in surprise at this opening gambit. ‘Where did that come from?’

She sighed, still tousling Nelson’s grey hairy ears. He’d taken up station with his head on her lap and looked well happy with the situation. ‘I’ve been thinking about it ever since Clancy came up with the idea of me moving into the B&B. You were so relieved! You obviously don’t want me to move in with you.’ Her eyes glittered in the fading light.

He put his hand over hers, feeling bad that she’d read him so accurately and it had hurt her. ‘But you love your cottage.’

She shrugged. ‘Does that mean I’m forced to live alone in it for the rest of my life?’

‘Well, no,’ he acknowledged. ‘But we’d never talked about living together and suddenly you were hinting that we should, and as if it would become a permanent thing. Taking such a major step out of expediency, because your cottage needs work—’

‘—is not happening,’ she finished for him, her voice tight with tears, forehead furrowing with misery. She gulped a mouthful of wine.

‘I didn’t put it like that—’

But she wasn’t listening to him, just gazing at the sagging corner of her house as if it held all the answers. ‘We’ve been together a year. To be absolutely clear – do you ever foresee us taking our relationship to the next level?’

‘Hey,’ he said gently, patting the hand that lay unresponsive under his. ‘What’s going on? I feel as if I’ve missed half a conversation.’

‘Do you ever foresee us making our relationship more committed?’ she insisted.

‘I don’t discount it,’ he answered carefully, as she was clearly intent on making him lay all his cards on the table. ‘We’ve had a great relationship and, if you’re asking me to be honest, then I’m happy as we are.’

She turned to face him. ‘Clancy says women shouldn’t be defined by the love of a man, but I’m going to ask you. Do you love me? And yes or no are the only acceptable answers.’

Aaron tried to get a grip on the conversation, which felt as out of control as a kite in a hurricane. He hated upsetting Gen but that familiar prickle of resentment at being made to feel the bad guy was there too. He made his voice gentle. ‘Backing me into a corner isn’t going to help this situation.’

Slowly, her blonde hair lifting on the evening breeze, Genevieve upended the wine bottle over her glass, watching it fill almost to the brim. ‘So that’s a no then.’

‘I didn’t say that!’ He’d never asked himself whether he loved Genevieve, or any past girlfriends. He’d never wanted to settle down before he was thirty and then, when he was exactly that age, what happened to Lee had made him wary. Lee had given his whole heart to Alice and she’d ripped it up and tossed it over her shoulder as she shook the dust of Nelson’s Bar from her feet.

Genevieve went on as if he hadn’t spoken. ‘I feel as if you’ve been playing me along.’

Once more, he was taken aback. ‘I didn’t realise we had different expectations, that’s all.’

‘I’m thirty-four. It didn’t occur to you that I’d want children?’ Her eyes were huge with unshed tears.

He decided there was no right answer to that because it had, in fact, been in the back of his mind, but not in a positive way. ‘I’m sorry you’re upset,’ he said.

‘So am I,’ she responded slowly. ‘I deserve more than a man who neither loves me nor sees a future with me.’ Tears began to leak from the corners of her eyes. ‘I obviously feel more than you and I don’t want to spoil the memories of what we’ve had for the last year. Let’s not bicker or blame. Let’s part as friends, both of us free of unrealistic expectations.’ Then, as Aaron sat, stunned into silence, she gave a half-laugh, half-sob. ‘I think you should go now, before I make a bigger idiot of myself than I already have.’

‘Are you sure this is what you want?’ he asked, rising uncertainly to his feet. Genevieve just looked away and shooed him with a wave of her hand. Aaron had little choice but to click his fingers to Nelson and leave for home, his thoughts circling madly.

How had he just gone from being cautious about his relationship moving too fast to it exploding in his face?

And … how much did he mind?

Chapter Seven

To: Clancy Moss

From: William Martin

21 May

Dear Clancy,

Just writing to confirm that the company will continue paying you dividends – in the short term – and I’ve today paid what we agreed as rent for your half of the apartment. I’d like to think these financial arrangements are interim. When the dust’s settled we’ll be able to put lasting proposals to you. You’ll probably know more about what you want the future to look like by then too.

Is it possible for you to tell one of us you’re OK? If you feel the need for a complete communication break then we’ll try to understand but we’re concerned. I hope you can take that in the spirit it’s meant.

Will hadn’t signed the email. Clancy supposed he hadn’t known how. Kisses were no longer appropriate and Kind regards plain odd when a few short months ago they’d been deciding the menu for their wedding breakfast. In those days, the apartment had been the settled home she’d waited all her life for. Will was her forever man.

She sat back and sighed, the noise and bustle of a busy Hunstanton café surrounding her. Dilys and Ernie, who’d leapt at the opportunity of grabbing a lift into ‘Hunny’, were running errands while Clancy emailed her parents to update them on the past weeks, though the remote village in Namibia where Brenda and Gerry Moss were working was almost as technology-deprived as Nelson’s Bar. There, all communications were via satellite and easily affected by weather.

Luckily, Clancy’s superpower had always been not needing parental support.

As she’d tried to make good her intention to throw herself into her new life, the week had sped by without her moving out of the village and into a signal or Wi-Fi area. She hadn’t liked to press Aaron about using his satellite broadband, especially when it wasn’t for Roundhouse Row matters. Instead, she’d readied the rentals for occupation, including mowing lawns and tidying borders, and found her feet with the paperwork side of her caretaking duties. She’d also cooked more than she’d had time for in London, and a couple of times invited Dilys and Ernie to share the results.

But now she felt guilty, especially when she thought of those texts from Asila and Tracey, which she’d ignored. She replied to Will quickly, noting his comments on financial arrangements. Then she began another message.

To: Asila Memon, Jon Montagu, Tracey Murland, William Martin

From: Clancy Moss

25 May

Just to let you know I’m OK. I didn’t deliberately blank your texts/emails but I’m staying somewhere that doesn’t have mobile signal or broadband.

She thought of the years they’d worked together from the first idea, which had been Monty’s, making enthusiastic plans over takeaways at kitchen tables, beginning with rented equipment in a tiny enterprise zone, building their client list and their reputation and eventually moving to the offices in Islington. Until Will got caught with his pants down she’d considered it her life. After reflecting on their years as friends as well as colleagues she added, Hope you’re all OK.

Then she began a new email.

To: Alice Nettles

From: Clancy Moss

25 May

Subject: Nelson’s Bar

Alice, just to update you:

Clancy spent twenty minutes explaining how she’d come to move into the Roundhouse.

Then she rounded off:

As I’ve been looking after things for you I didn’t think you’d object, but I thought I’d tell you I’m here. Are you still in the US? Are you having fun? Send me a lovely long catch-up. I haven’t even seen you on Insta lately.

It’s funny being in Nelson’s Bar without you, living in the Roundhouse where you used to live with Lee, but it’s a sweet village.

After adding love and kisses, she shut down and went off to stow her laptop in the car and shop for readymade curtains, thinking of Alice and wondering if her travelling days would ever end. Funny how they’d become the antithesis of each other. Alice had spent her early years in England but had developed itchy feet. Clancy, with travel-bug parents, had been relieved to come to the UK and put down roots, roots that had eventually come to mean Will and IsVid. She wondered what she’d find to replace them.

It was late afternoon by the time she drove Dilys and Ernie back to Nelson’s Bar, thinking how odd it was they lived apart when they seemed to get on. Then Ernie told Dilys she was very wrinkly and she snapped at him to shut up, and she thought maybe they knew what they were doing after all. As they came into the village, they passed a tall figure walking a big dog and Ernie and Dilys broke off their argument to exclaim, ‘There’s Aaron!’

Clancy drove carefully around the pair while Ernie and Dilys waved out of the car windows.

As she parked outside the Roundhouse, Dilys said, ‘It’s the village meeting at De Silva House later. Are you coming, Clancy?’

Clancy pressed the button that opened the boot so they could access their shopping. ‘I don’t think so.’ She didn’t know anything about the meeting but it didn’t sound appealing.

Dilys pulled herself out of the car. ‘Official village matters are dealt with by the Village Committee through Parish Meetings, but this is a village meeting, which is sort of unofficial.’

Clancy shook her head as she opened her door and hopped out with more agility than Dilys. She’d done pro bono work with a rural charity and had heard enough about the intricacies of Parish Councils, Village Councils and Parish Meetings to feel them best avoided – and that was without considering her prospective welcome at De Silva House. ‘I don’t think I’d have anything to contribute.’

‘You would!’ Dilys cried, sounding disappointed. ‘It’s about improving the village. I want to get internet and you know about it.’

‘No more than many people who’ve used the internet on a regular basis,’ Clancy replied firmly. ‘We’d better get our shopping in. Come for coffee tomorrow and you can tell me about the meeting then.’

‘What good’s that?’ Dilys, instead of taking her bags from Clancy, planted her fists on her hips. Then her face brightened as she looked over Clancy’s shoulder. ‘Aaron! Come and tell Clancy about the village meeting.’

Clancy turned to see Aaron bearing down on them, Nelson with his ears back and tail wagging. Aaron glanced at Clancy.

‘Do you want to come to the meeting?’ he asked in much the way he might have said: ‘Do you want to eat worms?’ Stubble darkened his jaw as if he hadn’t shaved for a couple of days.

‘No,’ answered Clancy obligingly, though nettled at his tone, which she assumed sprang from the fact that the meeting would take place in his parents’ home. It was as if someone had arranged for her to be permanently in the wrong. Will began an affair with Renée; Clancy was asked to leave IsVid. Alice did a runner on her wedding day? Clancy should be kept at arm’s length.

Dilys seemed unaware of the undercurrents. ‘We need the internet. We need to be able to order groceries to come to our houses, and do our banking without having to go into Hunny.’ She clapped Clancy on the shoulder. ‘This girl, she knows all about it. She should tell everyone.’

Aaron looked anywhere but at Clancy. ‘Um … you could always give the information to me to be shared with the meeting.’

It was so obvious he hoped Clancy would go for that option that she nodded. ‘OK. As it happens, I have a little understanding of the problem of connectivity in rural areas because I once worked with a rural charity client.’ She drew a breath and delivered a rapid stream of facts about the need for affordable, fast broadband for working from home, networking, advertising, education and socialising. ‘Unfortunately, the commercial reality is that big providers are not necessarily interested in small communities,’ she ended. ‘Good luck.’

Then she deposited Dilys and Ernie’s shopping on their respective doorsteps; returned for her own bags, offered the three still standing in the lane a goodbye smile and sailed indoors.

It was after a couple of hours of hanging curtains that Clancy realised she was short of curtain hooks. Knowing she’d bought plenty, she trotted out to check her car boot. Sure enough, two packs had found their way into a corner and she had to move to the offside of the vehicle and stretch in to reclaim them.

She’d just straightened up when a white van rounded the bend and came flying up the lane, forcing her to leap out of its way. She dropped the packs in the dust in her fright. As she retrieved them, muttering under her breath, she heard the sound of the van halting and a door opening and closing.

‘Sorry,’ came a male voice. ‘I took the bend too quickly.’

Clancy met the man’s awkward gaze with a sense of shock.

‘Clancy,’ he murmured, when she remained speechless, ‘I thought it was you.’

His hair was lighter and straighter than Aaron’s and his face less animated but Clancy knew him too. She looked into his eyes – also lighter than Aaron’s – and was shocked. He looked so weary, and more like five years older than his brother than two years younger. ‘Hello, Lee. I’m glad to see you.’ She would have been gladder to see him with the boyish grin he used to wear.

His smile looked to be an effort. ‘But perhaps not at such speed? I’m late for a thing at my parents’ house but I didn’t mean to mow you down.’

‘Don’t worry, you missed.’

An awkward pause, Clancy absorbing the fact that she’d said she was glad to see Lee but he hadn’t returned the compliment. In fact, he was regarding her in the way a child might regard a spoonful of medicine – unpleasant but unavoidable.

She decided to try a gentle tackle on the elephant in the lane. ‘I hope me being around doesn’t bring back bad memories. I just … needed somewhere to go.’

He looked struck as he digested this. ‘I suppose I did the same.’ Then he patted her shoulder awkwardly, returned to his vehicle and drove away.

She returned to the Roundhouse thinking sombrely that life just beat some people up. She’d continue to fight against becoming one of them.

The summer sky had taken on a navy blue hue between box hedges and chalk cottages when Aaron arrived, unannounced, at Clancy’s door, Nelson sporting a doggy grin, at his side.

‘Got a minute to chat?’ Aaron asked, by way of greeting.

Conscious that he owned half the building she was living in and so, presumably, didn’t really need to ask, she decided to be civilised and invite him in for coffee. ‘Good meeting?’ she asked politely, as she took down mugs. They’d been Alice’s and were plain white with Royal Doulton on the bottom. Alice was nothing if not aspirational.

Aaron had helped himself to a seat at the kitchen table, dark eyes on her as she tried to remember how to work her new coffee machine. ‘I suppose so,’ he answered. ‘The usual stuff: the school in Thornham closed in the eighties – that always gets an airing – so we need young couples to stay in the village and increase the population. We should have a village hall but no one knows how to come up with the money. Kaz at the B&B wants more tourism and is worried about the future of the business. Obviously, wanting Roundhouse Row to be as full as possible, I agreed with her, not least because the B&B is in our literature as somewhere our guests might get a meal, but some villagers huffed and puffed about not wanting Nelson’s Bar “overrun with tourists”.’

‘Three holiday rentals and one B&B won’t attract enough tourists to “overrun” will they?’ In view of her current occupation, Clancy felt an affinity with Kaz and Oli. Kaz had seemed very nice if – understandably, it seemed – a little preoccupied with business.

‘Unlikely,’ Aaron agreed drily. ‘And those same people want the B&B there when they fancy lunch on the lawn or somewhere local for friends and relatives to stay. Ernie says the B&B needs a bigger bar so more than five people can get in at a time – nobody disagreed with that one. And, as you knew she would, Dilys took the position that Nelson’s Bar needs the internet and Ernie boomed out that the internet’s full of viruses and crooks.’

The coffee machine hissed and began to emit the unmistakeable coffee-is-nigh fragrance. Clancy gave him the first cup – with a splash in a saucer for Nelson – and popped in a coffee pod for the second. ‘The B&B seems a big part of the village.’

He gave a short laugh. ‘It would certainly be a worry if it came under threat. I had a chat with Kaz and Oli afterwards, trying to remember all the points about rural communities that you’d fired at me. Anyway,’ he went on, before she could ask more, ‘I’ve come to apologise. And explain.’ He’d propped his chin on his fist.

‘Go on then,’ she said, intrigued. The second coffee ready, she scooped it up and joined him at the table.

He ran a fingertip moodily around the rim of his mug. ‘I’m not impressed with myself. I deliberately made you feel unwelcome to go to the meeting.’

‘I got that.’

He closed his eyes for a moment. ‘Which makes it worse. I’m sure it felt personal but, really, it wasn’t.’

‘It was because of Lee,’ she supplied.

The dark eyes flicked open, looking wary. ‘Yes. You probably think I’m way exceeding my protectiveness but—’

‘I’ve seen him,’ she put in, remembering the fragility in Lee’s eyes. ‘He stopped to say hello.’ She told Aaron about the meeting, adding, ‘I couldn’t get over the change in him. He looks a genuinely troubled soul. I have to admit that at first I was stung that you so obviously wanted to keep me away from De Silva House and impatient if Lee was still rotting inside about what Alice did, but he looks so … beaten.’

Aaron’s shoulders relaxed a notch. ‘Thank you for saying that but it proves how misguided I was to try and protect him, when he chose to meet the issue head-on.’ He inhaled the steam of his coffee before taking an appreciative swig. ‘I’m guilty of excessive big-brotherliness – but I don’t think you have siblings, do you?’

‘I’m an only child,’ Clancy agreed slowly, ‘but did you know that because our mothers are identical twins, the DNA profiles of Alice and me are more like half-sisters than cousins?’

He lowered his coffee cup, looking struck. ‘Maybe Lee told me that once. Does it make a difference?’

‘I think so. I feel closer to her than my few cousins on Dad’s side, which allows me a glimmer of insight into why your family closes ranks around Lee.’ Clancy still had to push aside a pinprick of hurt though. ‘It’s more about Lee than it is about me.’

‘Yeah.’ But he was frowning again. ‘But you’re just as entitled to a safe haven.’

‘Oh.’ The pinprick of hurt blossomed suddenly into warmth. ‘Thank you.’ Feeling in charity with him, she broke out a packet of chocolate Hobnobs, which led to more coffee making as neither of them really had enough of the first cup left to allow dunking. Nelson jumped up hopefully when he heard the packet rustle but lay down again with a sigh when none of the bounty came his way.

Clancy resumed her seat and tried a less contentious subject. ‘I saw Genevieve at the B&B. It sounds as if her insurance company are playing ball OK. She’s moving into the B&B soon, isn’t she?’

He shrugged. ‘Think so.’ He dunked a Hobnob and popped it into his mouth whole. After he’d chewed and swallowed he added, ‘She ended things between us.’

‘Oh!’ Clancy paused. So much for less contentious subjects. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Thanks,’ he said moodily. ‘I think we were moving through the relationship at different speeds, but there’s something about being dumped, isn’t there?’

‘Yes.’ Her stomach gave the familiar lurch when she thought of Will. Will and Renée. ‘And when it’s a nice person who does the dumping, you wonder what that says about you.’

His gaze flew to her face and he cursed under his breath. ‘Sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t mean to—’

‘It’s OK.’ She buried her face in her coffee mug. Moving away from everything she knew had provided lots of distractions. Will had moved on in a brutally permanent way and so must she.

Aaron selected another Hobnob. ‘Actually, Genevieve quoted you. Something about women not being defined by men.’

‘I did say that, but I was talking about myself, not her.’ She began to add something about his love life being none of her business, but then stuttered to a halt when the memory of their kiss in the garden flashed into her mind. That had been a tiny bit of his love life, and it had certainly been her business. Did he ever think of that when he was at De Silva House? Ever look at the nook just beyond the garden arbour …? ‘I hope nothing I said influenced her decision,’ she ended.

Something flickered in his eyes, as if he were reading her mind. After a pause, he said, ‘I don’t think so. I was feeling that Genevieve was trying to manoeuvre me into asking her to move in. I didn’t want that – or not yet, anyway. When you came up with the B&B information, it got me out of that situation and apparently I let my relief show.’

Clancy’s face heated up. ‘If I interfered, it was totally unwittingly—’

He waved her words aside. ‘I’m not blaming you. Gen began demanding answers and I handled it badly. I was honest, I suppose, but not particularly gentle. She asked me if I loved her and I sort of became paralysed. So she ended things. I hate that me not wanting to commit definitely – or indefinitely – caused her pain but I can’t force feelings I don’t have.’ He dunked another biscuit.

Clancy froze. His words had jolted her heart into an uncomfortable rhythm. ‘You feel bad because you can’t care for her as much as she wants you to?’ she clarified.

‘Basically.’ He popped the biscuit into his mouth.

She felt clammy. ‘Why should you share your home with someone if you don’t want to?’

He nodded as he swallowed. ‘That’s it. I live alone because I like it that way.’

A sigh slipped out from somewhere deep within her heart. ‘That must be how Will felt too. Have you got someone else?’ She was probably getting all up in his business even voicing the question but he was being pretty open with her.

His hand froze over the biscuit packet, his black eyebrows up in his hairline. ‘No! I haven’t cheated.’

‘That’s a significant difference.’ Now Aaron had provided the key to the puzzle she felt compelled to share what it unlocked. ‘Will does love someone else. Her name’s Renée. He’s loved her for years but she married a friend of his so he presumed it was hopeless. Then she came back into his life as an employee of an IsVid client. She was single again and his old feelings flooded back.’ She stopped to ease the tightness in her throat with a gulp of coffee. ‘He didn’t know how to tell me … so he kept quiet. I thought it was from malice but what if he couldn’t tell me out of affection? I found out about Renée in a particularly horrible way, but he couldn’t help how he felt about her and he couldn’t help how he felt about me.’ She suddenly realised that Aaron had abandoned the biscuits in favour of holding her hand.