Page 31 of Forgive Me Not
‘I had hoped he’d donate tins of dog food. I guess it might be harder work than I thought to get donations from the villagers. Still…’ Her voice brightened. ‘Foxglove Farm has more than enough spare strawberries and early potatoes. Plus spring onions, tomatoes, peas and cucumbers. Mum’s got a recipe book somewhere, specifically using the fruit and vegetables grown at the farm – she hand-wrote it herself. All that’s left to do is ask Andrea.’
Stig burst out laughing.
Emma plucked a daisy growing between cracks in the pavement. ‘I know. Talk about leaving the most important thing until last. I’ve no idea if she’ll agree. Or if any of the villagers will help. No one can forget what I used to be like, and why should they?’
Although she’d rather Mum had recalled every sordid detail than forgotten to the extent she had.
‘Iknow I’m different now, but they can’t see that yet. I thought coming back would mean a happy end to a challenging year.’ She shook her head. ‘What an idiot.’
‘Then perhaps you need to adjust your idea of happiness,’ Stig said, and raised an eyebrow. ‘To most people my life looks pitiful, but I’m no longer under stress. I have the Duchess. I’m answerable to no one but myself.’
‘So you’re happy?’
‘My life’s bloody hard most of the time – you know that – but if you offered me my old job back tomorrow, I wouldn’t take it. And what exactly is happiness? Having a bit of peace, perhaps that’s a better goal.’ Stig put down his book. ‘My dad has his own painting and decorating business – said he always wanted something better for me. But you know what? He and Mum have a good life. They aren’t in debt. Go on holiday once a year. They live in a terraced house, but the neighbours are like family.’ He shrugged. ‘You’re sober now. Maybe anything else is a bonus. Don’t give up on Healdbury, Emma. I’ve only been here a short while, but can see it’s got heart.’
‘Despite Ted and the others who don’t want you here?’
‘All the businesses have adverts in their windows for each other’s goods. I got chatting to the baker yesterday. He stopped to give me some change. Apparently everyone’s pulling together to try to survive in the face of the big supermarket that’s taken so much business. He said not to take locals’ hostility personally. Most of it was probably because profits are so low and they’re worried about anything that might make the village look less attractive to people with money in their pockets. Apparently Ted’s whole family is finding it hard to cope. The grandkids are living with him and his wife whilst their widowed computer-consultant dad travels the country doing better-paid contract work. At the moment, his income is the only thing keeping the cheese shop afloat.’
‘By the looks of it, Phil’s shop is definitely in trouble too. No wonder he was in a sharp mood.’
‘The baker told me Phil is on the brink of bankruptcy – of losing everything. And his wife left him for another man.’
‘What?Poor Phil. I can’t believe it. He and Sheila seemed made for each other when I was working for them. I never thought those two would break up.’
‘Apparently he’s desperate to find a lodger; he’s been trying for weeks.’ Stig squeezed her arm. ‘It must be tough coming back, but remember, it’s not just about people giving you a second chance – it’s about you giving them one back. Everyone is fighting their own battles. You know that.’
Emma mulled his words over as she made her way up Broadgrass Hill and back to Foxglove Farm. He was right. She needed to think more about the other person’s situation. She rubbed her elbow as it brushed against a nettle. Seeking forgiveness was harder than she’d ever imagined, and the lack of it stung. But perhaps the real sting came from her realising she’d had a sense of entitlement.
Her ears felt hot as she looked back over the last few weeks and how she’d arm-wrestled her way back into her family’s life, with little thought for them. How she’d forced her way back into the village without considering the problems her old neighbours might be facing.
She was still fiddling with the daisy, and gazed now at its bowed head. It could never get its old roots back, but placing it in water might give it a second life. She and her family had cut ties two and a half years ago, but perhaps there was a way of taking the relationships in a new, different direction.
She gathered pace as an idea took shape. It would involve bracing herself to talk to Phil again – and then to Bligh and Andrea.
Chapter 11
Emma sat on the bench in front of the weeping willow tree, Gail next to her. They both wore large sunhats. Gail was flicking through a small fabric sample book. Emma had tried to buy it from the local curtain shop, thinking it might please her seamstress mum, but when they’d heard it was for Gail, they wouldn’t take payment. Andrea had grudgingly said it was a good idea. It made a change from fiddling with chocolate wrappers. Gail loved sweet treats yet clothes hung off her as if she’d gone shopping alone and bought the wrong sizes.
‘Emma would like this,’ she said, having stopped at a square of material for children’s curtains patterned with pigs.
‘Your daughter? You remember her?’ Emma’s pulse danced.
‘She used to beg her sister to paint the pigs. A little devil she was for giving them biscuits.’ A cloud passed across her face.
‘And now…?’
She continued flicking through.
The not knowing whether Gail knew who she was was hurting less. Seedlings of something – acceptance, perhaps – had sprouted inside her. An understanding that this was how it was. She had to deal with life on its own terms – as it was now, disconnected from the past.
She glanced at her watch. She’d asked Andrea and Bligh to meet her here during their lunch break. Ahead of her grazed two sheep, with their new lamb, and some goats. She stood up and walked to the fence. One of the goats ran over. She tickled its head. Straightening up, she squinted in the sunshine. Yesterday she’d positioned several upturned crates and big logs in the field. The goats were agile, and it was as if their hooves were made of Velcro as they mounted and clung to any surface or angle.
She looked up and saw her sister and Bligh approaching from the distance. When they neared, she gestured for them to sit down next to Gail.
Andrea glugged water from a plastic bottle and wiped her mouth. ‘What’s so important that I have to give up my break?’
When they were little, the girls often shared a bottle of water when helping Mum plant or harvest. Some children might have baulked at drinking out of the same container, but the two sisters didn’t worry.
