Page 43 of The Bookshop Ladies

The others were happy to chat and paint away, so Fern spent a little time with each of them, none of them under seventy, all of them full of banter and a few questions. Fern set up her own easel next to Lochlainn’s.

She stood behind it for a few moments, steadying her feet beneath her, getting her whole body aligned. Art for her had always been a question of giving herself over to it. She looked at the scene before her. Sharp angles of buildings, sloping roofs, peeling paint in darker corners and a profusion of colour from flower baskets, spilling petunias over their sides, swaying slightly in the breeze.

And then, she was off, lost to it. Her paintbrush finding first the grey for the footpaths, then the blue of the sky, a very special blue, she dabbed and mixed and dabbed again and stroked her brush across the canvas, her whole body moving with it, as if being swayed by a full orchestra. The buildings fell in narrow stripes from the skies, first the chimneys, mismatched like uneven teeth, then the slanting slates, sloping down towards dry eaves. Then the colours, Fern was obliquely aware that at some point, an urban planner must have advised on the house painting and while she’d hardly taken any notice before, now the candy stripes of buildings, sugary pinks, baby blues, sherbet lemons, all bled into each other, so she kept the lines which in reality were distinct, soft and buttery.

‘Oh, my.’ One of the old dears was at her elbow. It was after six thirty, and Fern looked around and noticed that the circle had begun to wilt. Some of the older dears were sitting in the reading chairs and looked as if they had been there a while. One man was snoring loudly.

‘I’m so sorry, I just lost myself in it,’ she apologised, but it was the truth. For a precious time, she had been completely lost to the world in a way that she couldn’t remember being for a very long time.

‘Oh, to have your energy,’ one of the old women said enviously.

‘I don’t know that it’s necessarily a blessing,’ she said, but of course she knew it was. To be able to do something, where you could immerse yourself so fully that you felt a greater force was actually taking care of the work – well, in her opinion, it was the most beautiful thing in the world.

She dutifully admired the other canvases, advising where she was asked. ‘It’s wonderful to see so many different perspectives on the same subject,’ she said and she meant it. ‘I’ve really enjoyed the afternoon.’ And then, before she could stop herself, she said, ‘Same time next week, if anyone fancies it?’

‘That sounds wonderful,’ a sprightly-looking old man in a tracksuit said from behind his easel. He had been painting for years apparently and just enjoyed the freedom it gave him. Fern had a feeling that he might be working on Christmas gifts all year round for relatives and neighbours. More power to him, Fern thought.

‘Shall we have a celebratory coffee before we pack up?’ a tall thin man asked enthusiastically.

‘Yes, let’s,’ Lochlainn said.

‘We can ask Shane to take our order while we tidy up our easels and maybe we can sit outside for a while and enjoy the evening sun.’ Fern realised she would enjoy sitting with the group, just being part of a gang for a little while, feeling normal again.

It was almost eight o’clock by the time they finished up. Fern was starving, but she only realised it as she helped Robyn drag the easy chairs into the shop for the night.

‘Maybe next time we could have dinner afterwards,’ Lochlainn said. He had insisted on helping them.

‘Oh… I…’

‘Don’t worry, my intentions are honourable, I can see you’re married,’ he nodded towards her wedding ring. ‘I just thought it might be nice to have a friend with similar interests. If it makes you uncomfortable, forget I said anything,’ he said easily.

‘Dinner would be great, you’re right, we can’t have too many friends and I don’t have very many artists here to socialise with.’ And she knew now, he indeed was an artist, a very talented one too, even though he had spent a lifetime working in insurance.

‘So, do you come back here every summer or is it just…’

‘My daughter owns the bookshop,’ she said proudly, ‘I grew up here and now, I spend all my spare time here too.’ There was less now than ever to take her away.

‘Next week, so?’ one of the old dears had positioned herself at Fern’s elbow.

‘Yes, next week sounds perfect,’ Fern said and she found herself smiling, because already she was looking forward to it.

29

Joy thought on days like this, she could stay in Ballycove forever. She had found a purpose here that had slipped from her life in Paris after Yves had died. This evening, she was making Albie dinner, looking forward to spending time with him. They had settled on a six month lease for the apartment, today she was grateful for that. She’d built connections in the most unlikely of places, not just with Albie and Robyn, but with others too. Never in a million years would she have imagined herself becoming friends with Fern Turner. After all, this was the woman who had ruthlessly slept with Yves. What could they ever have in common?

She was so wrong about that. It turned out they were more alike than she could have ever expected. Fern just made some silly mistakes when she was too young to realise any different. She wasn’t sorry for sleeping with Yves because it had resulted in Robyn being born, but she clearly regretted being theotherwoman. It had obviously preyed on her conscience that she might have hurt someone else through her thoughtlessness. That meant a lot to Joy.

And then there was Albie. She adored Albie, he’d welcomed her to his family with a kind heart and open arms. He made her feel as if she was part of something she’d never really experienced before, a big happy loving family. Even if she still wasn’t sure what to make of Leo, she could see he loved his family. Over the last few weeks, he’d begun to thaw out, when around her. He even smiled when she caught his eye through the bakery window these days, as if he was pleased that she was living over the shop and paying a much reduced rent than he might have charged if the place was let out for holiday rentals. But, she knew his distrust of her at the beginning was deserved, the fact he seemed to accept her now, made her feel even worse, because she was here under false pretences, when all was said and done.

It was the idea of having to leave Robyn that was the biggest wrench of all. Joy felt that if they’d had a chance to get to know each other properly over the years, they would have been close. Even in the short time she’d been here, their relationship had blossomed into something that was a mix between friendship and stewardship. Joy felt as if she was an unofficial guardian, guiding her ward in making the bookshop successful.

She still had no idea what she was going to do about telling Robyn the truth; she’d simply have to give her the painting. There were others, she was going to hand over a number of other paintings in Yves’s collection to her too. It wouldn’t make up for missing out on Yves, but the sale of any one of them would certainly go some way to keeping the bookshop afloat if winter proved bleak.

Anyway, it seemed more fitting for them to be displayed here in the bookshop in Ballycove where people could enjoy them rather than being locked up in her apartment in Paris. Joy walked across to the other end of the sitting room, sat on the small ottoman that served as a coffee table as well as a footstool and studied the painting that was to be Robyn’s.

It was easier to look at it now, easier to appreciate since she no longer carried that awful weight of dislike and jealousy in her heart. She sighed, a deeply satisfying long breath. It was stunning. She knew she should probably cover it up with the wrapping she had shipped it in, but instead, she thought she would enjoy looking at it again after her dinner with Albie. It was the strangest thing, but she had grown to appreciate the beauty of it even more now that she could see the artist behind the brush. She felt, the more she loved it, the more she would be leaving a little piece of her heart here in Ballycove when she left. She would be sad to go, but how could she stay, once Robyn and Fern realised that she had become part of their world under false pretences?

Tonight, Joy pushed all those details aside. It was too sad to think that her time here would be at an end once she came clean with Robyn and Fern and Albie.

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