Page 48 of Sunrise By the Sea

He sighed.

‘Very far.’

‘You’re done,’ she said, having finished the rest of the job in silence, wondering what on earth the woman was like, what had happened that had made his friends send him a bar to hide himself at the foot of a country he wasn’t even from. No wonder he didn’t want to get his hair cut in the village.

When he finally sprang up, shaking off the hair down below into the dirt of the unpaved road, he realised he didn’t have a mirror.

‘Well?’

Marisa smiled. She was quite proud of her handiwork. Now, his hair softly and lightly covered his head, one stray here or there but mostly just a gentle covering, with a longer quiff on front. He pulled his hand through it distractedly.

‘It’s lovely,’ she said, then bit her lip. ‘Well. I hope you like it.’

‘Perhaps I will not be frightenink all the children,’ he said.

‘I don’t think they’re frightened really,’ said Marisa. ‘You’re not that frightening a person. When you get to know you.’

There was an odd moment there as his face looked sad suddenly; his eyes far away.

‘Well. I am glad you are thinkink that.’

Chapter Twenty-seven

Anita was pleased, of course she was. But she had seen this before; the teacher-pleasers who rushed ahead with their books, who thought they were doing perfectly, and then hit a wall at the first setback. She hoped Marisa wouldn’t be like this but she couldn’t be sure.

After all, Marisa couldn’t live like this for ever, with a next-door neighbour with a bottomless drinks cabinet and a computer grandmother, Anita said, rather sternly.

Then she had paused and said, as World War Three appeared to be breaking out above her head briefly, that it did in fact actually sound rather nice and then she remembered herself and ordered Marisa to go for a walk up and down the street.

And Marisa was going to – when she could hear Alexei was safely ensconced with a student; when it was a lovely day, which it was, and she could go out and turn right, up towards the cliff edge, not back down towards the village, on the unmade road, so she wasn’t going to run into anyone and she could stay close to the centre of the road so it would be perfectly safe and she was not going to panic and if she did, she would only be two steps away from the house. So. She was not going to panic. If she thought she was going to have a panic attack she could head back to the house. She was going to do it. She was.

And then the phone rang.

It was just the office but somehow – the way you just know sometimes – she just knew. As if the timbre of the ring was somehow different; ominous, like a tolling bell. She didn’t believe people could be psychic but there was something about that ring, like the ring she’d got when her grandfather had died, when things were about to go badly wrong.

Nazreen’s voice was so kind.

‘Marisa, I have to give you the heads up.’

Marisa didn’t say anything. Her insides froze.

‘I’m having to make changes to the office – savings. And, we love you, you know that. But for an administrator, you’re really expensive.’

Marisa nodded, unable to speak.

Of course she knew it was true. A registrar who couldn’t go out and perform weddings and deal face to face with the public was absolutely no use at all to anyone. She had always known this. It was just now it was coming home to roost.

Marisa had a huge lump in her throat suddenly and couldn’t swallow or speak.

As if hearing what she was thinking, Nazreen continued, ‘Obviously we can speak to HR if you feel you need signed off?’

‘No,’ Marisa managed to choke out finally. ‘No. it’s fine . . .’

‘I have to drop you down two grades and put you part time,’ said Nazreen. ‘Unless . . .’

‘I know.’

For a second, Nazreen couldn’t hold the professional facade together.

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