Page 51 of Sunrise By the Sea

Marisa flushed bright red. ‘Um, sometimes I feed my neighbour,’ she said.

‘No wonder takings are down,’ grumbled Polly. ‘You get all your provisions sent in from Italy and now you’re taking my clients.’

Deftly Marisa lined up thecrespelle, lined them with a thin layer of the lightest most beautiful Emilia-Romagna prosciutto that made Polly’s mouth water just to smell it, filled them with a layer of the bechamel, then flipped them and poured more in the top, popping them into the oven to bake. Next door there was some dramatic banging of something which may or may not have been related to William Tell. Polly glanced at her watch.

‘Um . . .’

‘About fifteen minutes?’ said Marisa. ‘Tea?’

Polly smiled gratefully.

I wonder, she thought, as she left finally, collecting the cheerful children. I wonder if I could get that girl to help me cook for the poshos? She wasn’t usually quite so mercenary, but this was something else. She told the children about it. They looked immediately dubious.

‘So it is green,’ said Avery.

‘So it’s not pizza,’ said Daisy.

‘Well, thanks, my market research council,’ said Polly, taking a hand each and letting them swing and bounce off her all the way down the road, blown by the wind behind them and their loud singing, all the way back to the lighthouse.

Chapter Thirty

Marisa had felt so happy to feed Polly: she had forgotten the satisfaction of it. With Alexei she occasionally felt you could boil a shoe for him and he’d wolf it down at speed, but Polly was a baker, a professional, and she’d really, really liked her food. She couldn’t help but feel proud, even when Polly said she could come work for her any time and Marisa had laughed at the impossibility of it.

But she had meant to move forward in her book; she really did.

The next day, however, the weather was utterly filthy. A great wet raincloud had moved in at speed over the Atlantic, and doors were banging and the fishermen’s masts were rattling and everything was blustery and wet.

Marisa could tell the lesson next door was coming to an end; there was a pattern to it, as he induced the pupil to round up, just one last time, make the final cadence, play the final notes with a flourish, play loudly, or fast, or however they wanted, so he could send them off with a ‘well done!’ or a ‘YOU ARE BRILLIANT!’ which is what everyone got when they managed to make it to the end of a piece.

Well. No time like the present then. She stood out on her balcony again, breathed deeply the way the book said. In through the nose, hold, out through the mouth. In through the nose, hold, out through the mouth.

It had rained solidly all night, leaving puddles up and down the muddy unpaved road.

Now, it came down in a steady stream, choppy on the sea, even as a slightly milder breeze came as a reminder that the although it was late spring and flowers and gangling unfurling leaves that opened everywhere insisted that the whole joy of summer was coming – to her, to everyone – the British weather was not always done with you. Birds sheared across the tides, impossibly beautiful, even the hated gulls.

Okay. She was going to do it. She was going to dive in. Run through the raindrops, just for a second. She could do it. Shecould. She ran – literally, ran – across the floor towards the front door. She was going to pull it open and then charge down the steps and she was going to be free, to run just like she used to, like there was nothing in her way, like she was free, and happy and everything in her life was as simple as it was when her grandfather would take her down to the beach and she could go for miles along the sand, splashing in and out of the watery puddles there, knowing the only thing waiting for her out in the whole wide world was a cuddle and a gelato . . .

She had, it quickly dawned on her, massively underestimated a wet Cornish day on an island.

Alexei was waving farewell to his young pupil who was disappearing round the bend in the unpaved road, standing on the steps busying himself with a pile of sheet music. This, however, she only noticed after the shock she got when opening her front door with the balcony door also open. A massive gust blew through the wind tunnel they created, something she had never done before. As Alexei turned to politely say hello and, less politely, wonder what they were having for dinner, seeing as there had been nothing the previous evening, the gust took the pile of papers from out of his hand and sent them dancing all the way up and down the wet street: as high as the roofs above them and straight into puddles; some out to sea.

‘Chy’ort vozmi!’ shouted Alexei suddenly, dashing after them. ‘Get them! GET THEM!’

But the shock had taken the wind out of Marisa’s sails; she stared, open-mouthed, at the scene of dancing manuscript paper and found herself frozen at the top of the steps, just as she had always been. The sandworms had returned. The world was cold, noisy, hostile. Her feet were retreating of their own accord.

Alexei moved nimbly for a big man, and was snatching papers out of the sky, but Marisa could do nothing at all; she was completely paralysed by fear, even as one soared straight through between roofs where their houses met and carried on to the sea. Several came to rest in the deep puddle next to where the drain ran down the hill, caught up in the filthy brown water. The ink on the sheets – she could see even from where she stood that it was not printed, but instead was just handwriting ink – was running off the page even as she looked, and she saw dissolving black blobs that were musical notes, and writing on it, half dissolved; but it was Cyrillic and she couldn’t read it.

‘HELP ME!’

She wanted to. With all her might. But she couldn’t.

When he finally picked up all he could of the ruined manuscript he turned back to her, his expressive face like thunder.

‘Why you not helpink me?’

His face was completely uncomprehending.

‘Look,’ he said, holding up a sheet, the ink running and completely illegible. The water dripped off his nose and down his hair, making him look crosser and sadder than ever.

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