Page 43 of Where Do We Go From Here?
Erik translates this request and argues valiantly in Wendy’s favour, but at the end when he hangs up the phone, he’s shaking his head and looking glum. ‘Until the car is assessed, I’m afraid there will be no other car.’
‘Ugh!’ Wendy exclaims. ‘I somehow knew that was going to happen.’
‘If you want to rent another car, maybe from another company, I can take you.’
‘I need to think about that a bit first,’ Wendy tells him. ‘It costs an absolute fortune. I mean, that one cost me a fortune, but if you’re doing it day by day it’s much worse. And I wouldn’t know for how long, would I? So I can’t even sign a long-term contract… So I don’t know.’
‘Yes,’ Erik says. ‘Of course. Well, if you need me to take you, send Florence a message.’ And then suddenly he’s standing, pulling on his coat and rather hurriedly leaving. There’s a distinct whiff of ‘enough of your problems’ suddenly floating in the air.
Once he’s gone Wendy goes around the cabin unplugging appliances with the exception of the refrigerator and her Kindle charger. And then she pours herself a glass of wine and hurls herself on the sofa in despair.
After a few sips, she reaches for her phone.
She has a text message from Jill telling her she’s back in Maidstone and another from Harry asking if she’s up for a ‘chat’.
‘No,’ she mutters putting the phone back down again. ‘No, I’m not up for a bloody chat, Harry.’
EIGHT
ISOLATION
She eats pasta with cheese and opens a bottle of superbly fruity Fitou. Outside, the weather is shockingly cold but sunny, if a little hazy. The snow still isn’t melting, though. It’s just becoming ever more compact and slippery as it slowly morphs to ice.
Indoors, with the fire stoked, she is warm and also a little hazy under the combined effects of tiredness, warmth and wine.
She tries to read but her mind is refusing to focus so that every time she reaches the bottom of the screen she realises that she hasn’t taken in a single word and has to go back to the top again. Eventually she puts the device aside and turns around on the sofa so that she’s facing out towards the view.
She’s relieved that Jill has left, she decides. She can be quiet and thoughtful and reflect on her life now, which after all was the whole point of coming here. But she’s lonely, too. She misses Jill’s upbeat company. And she’s a bit disappointed that Jill hasn’t called.Out of sight is out of mind, she thinks. Then,she’s probably just sick to death of me.
She’s stranded here now, as well. No car! She hadn’t expected that particular plot twist. It’s going to become a realproblem soon. Her supplies will probably last for a few days, but after that she’ll absolutely have to get to a shop.
She thinks about going for a walk, but the compacted snow, when she tests it, is like a skating rink and after a minute of Laurel and Hardy slip and slither she abandons the idea. It’s almost impossible to stand up, let alone walk, and a broken leg would be an almost biblical final straw. So no. She’s going to be stuck inside until it melts. But she can do this. She knows she can. After all, during Covid she spent months alone in Jill’s little studio.
So why did she want to come here? Wasn’t the deprivation of the past few years enough for her? Perhaps she really is losing her mind.
Her phone pings with a text message from Fiona.
R U OK? Dad says you’re not answering texts.
She will phone her daughter shortly. It will be good to hear her voice. But first she needs to decide not only how she is, but also how she’s going to spin it. How does she want to appear?
So number one first: how is she? She consciously scans her body.
She’s exhausted, actually, which seems silly, but there you are. And a bit lonely. And stressed. Her chest is tight – breathing feels like a challenge – which probably means she’s very stressed.
Plus – and this is most likely the main one – she’s feeling bored, which is even sillier. If she’s exhausted because the last few days with Jill have been full on, and she’s stressed because she has so much shit to deal with, then a rest, doing nothing, is precisely what the doctor would order.
When did she lose the ability to do nothing and relax? she wonders. When did doing nothing come to automatically equal boredom? It’s an interesting thought, really, and one that says quite a lot about her life.
But she is at least now asking herself these philosophicalquestions, so perhaps this whole ‘retreat’ thing is working after all.
Yes, she decides. Philosophical. Fiona will love that.
‘Mum!’ Fiona says, the second she answers. ‘We’ve been worried.’
Wendy thinks (but does not say),Two text messages in ten days doesn’t make you look particularly worried.
‘But why, sweetheart?’ she says, instead. ‘Everything’s fine.’
