Page 3 of The Second Ending
Just like her.
She pushed the door open and stumbled inside, closing it behind her with her hip. She dropped the key into the small bowl on the table by the entrance and then walked the two steps needed to drop her satchel onto the threadbare couch. Kicking off her shoes, she followed the path of her satchel and soon lay, half-sprawled, across the old piece of furniture.
She hardly noticed the imperfections now. She’d been renting this space, the first floor of a house north of the Danforth, for a while, and she was used to its less-than-terrific condition. The couch had been new once, but that was long before she got it from a friend who was clearing out some old furniture. The upholstery could do with replacing, even though the frame and style were good. Likewise, the paint that should have seen a fresh coat three or four years ago, and the curtains that hadn’t been in fashion for three decades and that clashedwith the couch. But they, too, had been free, and she hadn’t had the financial resources to refuse them.
Fine, that had been eight years ago, and she could scrape together enough money now to give the place a facelift, but what was the point? No one came over, and she was past caring.
There were, really, only two things she cared about anymore. One was her job. Taking all those legal aid cases was not a ticket to fame and fortune, but helping vulnerable people who had almost no hope left gave her life meaning, and she put far more hours into her clients’ cases than her salary reflected.
The second was her music. She lived for her choir, that one bright spot of joy and colour in an otherwise drab existence. Every Thursday night between September and June, the Eglinton Echoes met to rehearse whatever repertoire was on the next concert, and every Thursday night, Ashleigh was there to sing her heart out. It was the one time she allowed her spirit its freedom, unchaining it from the box where she usually kept it locked away. Nice and safe, safe from being hurt.
She loved music and always had. She had taken piano lessons as a kid, had played the oboe in her high school band, and had been convinced by an enthusiastic music teacher to join the choir. The first time she opened her mouth, the music teacher’s jaw had dropped, and Ashleigh found herself auditioning for a rather exclusive vocal coach whom the music teacher knew. Because Ashleigh Lynch could sing.
Under her instructor’s guidance, her pretty voice grew rich and beautiful, and her range expanded until she could hit all but the highest notes that were left to the coloraturas, as well as a good stretch of alto territory. Her timbre was best suited for soprano or high mezzo, and that was where she focused her musical energy.
Her father had narrowed his eyes in distrust, but indulged her. “Foolish business, this music stuff. Useless waste of time.But it doesn’t hurt anyone, so fine. Trust you to make such an odd choice.” That had been his opinion, until it came time for Ashleigh to go to university.
Ashleigh wanted to study music. Walter Lynch had refused.
“Absolutely not. I’m paying for it, and I won’t agree to a useless degree like that. You’ve got a brain, child, and you’ll use it, or you won’t see a penny from me. You always make the most foolish decisions. If you can’t choose properly for yourself, I’ll do it for you.” He had planted himself in front of the dining room table, feet apart, fists on his hips, jaw thrust forward.
She’d been seventeen then, a whole lifetime ago, and she’d been easily swayed.
Her mother was no better.
“Really, Ashleigh, you need to think more than a year ahead. You’re a smart girl. Look at your grades, all through school. High honours, all the way. You don’t want to throw that away on something like music. That’s not a career. You did so well in your school’s debating club, you’d be a terrific lawyer. Let’s look at all the options open to people with law degrees. You can still sing at home, you know. Or do what Penelope did,” referring to her older sister, who had married a rich man right out of high school. “She’s already on the board of the cricket club, and they want her at the Maple Leaf Women’s Society as well.”
Society mom. Definitely not Ashleigh’s choice, but acceptable to her socialite parents.
Ashleigh had tried to stand her ground, but she couldn’t completely defeat the forces against her. In the end, they agreed to a minor in music, so she could keep singing with the university choir, and a major in sociology, with an eye to law school. Only that would satisfy her parents’ idea of what was acceptable.
“And I’ll even keep paying for your singing teacher,” her father had announced, a consolation prize for someone who had lost the war. It would have to do.
That was the first time her family had crushed her dreams.
Still, law had been a good choice for her. She’d excelled at her classes and passed her exams with ease, and discovered that, all stereotypes aside, there was a great deal of good she could do in her profession. It wasn’t all money laundering and overcharging clients, but instead, it was a way to help people out of bad situations. Whether that meant supporting a small business owner in a lease dispute or advocating for a new immigrant with little English when his employer decided not to pay him, she found she went to bed each night with the sense of having made a difference in someone’s life.
Law had also engendered in her a passion for helping others, something that had not been part of her rather pampered childhood. Her father was, as she joked, a poor trust-fund baby. The family once had quite a lot of money. Some forward-thinking grandfather had put it all into reasonable investments, and the interest was enough to live on more than comfortably.
One of those investments had been a house in Rosedale, where Ashleigh’s father had lived since he was a baby. Living there, in that most prestigious part of town, an enclave of old money and new sports cars, Walter Lynch could consider himself part of Toronto’s elite. He was certainly well-connected, having been to the right schools and having made the right contacts, and if his wealth didn’t quite extend to summer homes in the south of France, it was enough to keep up appearances without having to resort to actually having to work.
Because Walter Lynch, for all his insistence that his daughter train for a suitable career, had never worked a day in his life. Ashleigh suspected her parents would be quite horrified at whatshe really did with the precious law degree they had insisted so vehemently that she achieve.
Ashleigh sighed as she glanced around her slightly tatty flat once more. Oh, her father would have a fit if he saw it. Her sister would drag her to the nearest real estate agent in seconds, and her mother would smile in her absentminded way and say, “It’s not very fancy, is it, dear? Wouldn’t you prefer something nicer?” As if wishing would make it so.
She had, once, had something nicer, back eight years ago, when her life was full of promise and when the future looked wonderful. When she was still with Marcus.
Seeing him again today had disturbed all the ghosts, bringing long-buried memories flooding back. Her mind replaced the faded paint and worn furniture with the sweet place they had shared for not nearly long enough. She recalled the butter-yellow walls, the deep burgundy curtains, the lovely long couch that one of his friends had found for them, the comfortable chair, the elegant dining room table…
Did he still have them? Or had he burned everything after she’d walked out?
She let out another deep sigh. Probably, by the anger he had vented then, and by the hard expression he’d borne today when he had seen her for the first time since their awful break-up, he’d burned them, then burned the ashes, and then buried them. Like her heart.
Because that was the second time her family had destroyed her dreams.
Ashleigh savedand closed the file she’d been working on and blew out a breath of relief. There was still a lot to do on this case,but her client was safe, for now at least. This was one of the legal aid cases she often accepted, almost all domestic abuse cases. The woman in question had, after far too long, finally taken her children and left her abusive partner, and at the suggestion of the shelter where they now stayed, had agreed to press charges against him.
There had, of course, been the expected backlash of threats and intimidation, but the woman’s medical records were damning, and Ashleigh was pretty confident. The partner talked a lot of bluster, but he seemed like the sort of bully who was really a coward, and the restraining order against him would probably do its job. She had also just secured a longer-term place for her client to stay, far from where her ex was known to stalk around looking for her. The woman’s kids would enrol at school in this new area in a couple of weeks, a fresh beginning for everyone. There was still a lot to do, but it was an excellent start.
