‘I think I can do better than that. You can set the table if you like and I’ll pour us wine. Everything is in the drawers under the table.’
Clara opened the drawers and set out the placemats and cutlery. ‘The way you use the space in amazing. Did you buy it ready-built or make from scratch?’
Henry opened a bottle of red wine and sniffed the inside of the neck. ‘It’s not a prestige wine but it’s drinkable.’
‘I wouldn’t know the difference anyway,’ said Clara with a shrug.
‘We bought the van as a basic model but Naomi and I made it our own with the bathroom, the extra cupboards and drawers and Pansy’s little space above ours. We tried to make it like a home.’
Clara accepted the wine that he handed her. ‘You both did an amazing job,’ she said. ‘It’s my dream space really, just not on wheels.’
‘Well, your little cottage is going to be amazing.’ He smiled. ‘I can see what it will look like when I stand back. It’s going to be something special.’
Clara sighed. ‘I hope so. I have no idea what I’m doing actually, so I’m hoping it works out.’
Henry sat opposite her. ‘So why this cottage and why Merryknowe?’
Clara turned the glass by the stem on the wooden table and then looked up at him.
‘I got drunk and bought the place as a massive F-you to my ex who was cheating with my ex-best-friend.’
Henry was shocked. ‘Oh God, that’s awful. What a huge betrayal by both of them.’
‘Yes, it was… is. And it was a week after my mum died when I found out, and that was also terrible because Mum and I had always hoped one day that one of us would get this dream of the country cottage. Mum had a tough life, and I really wanted this for her and for me. I wanted to share this with her.’
Clara’s face clouded with memories of her recent loss. Henry put his hand on hers as he saw a tear fall onto the table.
‘I am really sorry about both those awful events in your life, deeply sorry. Life certainly isn’t fair, is it?’
Clara looked up at him. ‘It is what it is. I don’t think there is such a thing as fair. I think people are just selfish and they don’t think about what they do to others. That’s what upsets me the most. My ex, my ex-friend, Rachel’s mother, my…’
She stopped speaking and Henry wondered who the other name was that she swallowed instead of saying aloud.
‘Do you speak to the ex or your friend now?’ he asked.
‘Nope.’
‘Then tell me about your mum,’ he said, trying to redirect the energy away from those who hurt her so badly.
Clara laughed. ‘My mum was the bravest woman I have ever known. And she was the most direct and straight up person I have known, which is where I get it from, I suppose. I’m not really one to hide from what I’m feeling.’
Henry looked at her closely. ‘Really?’
‘What?’ Clara put her wine glass down.
‘Before, you nearly said a name and stopped yourself…’ He immediately regretted his words. Clara looked angry or upset or both.
‘I don’t know you, so why would I share that with you?’
‘I was about to share my chicken stew,’ he joked, wishing he hadn’t mentioned it.
But Clara wasn’t laughing. He had touched a nerve and he wished he hadn’t.
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that; your life is your life, and I overstepped. I guess I thought we were sharing.’
Clara looked at him, holding his stare.
‘I accept your apology. I need to go to bed now. I’m tired from no sleep and from helping Rachel.’
Henry nodded as Clara stood up.
‘Goodnight, Pansy,’ she called out.
Pansy popped her head out from behind the curtain that was around her bed.
‘Goodnight, Clara. Thank you for my fairy things.’
Clara nodded at Henry. ‘Night then.’
‘Goodnight, Clara’ he said, feeling sad but unsure why. Clara shut the door to the van and he could hear her walking to the cottage.
He hoped she didn’t take the setting up of the bed the wrong way. He hadn’t touched anything besides the bed frame. He sat in the van wondering what she thought and wondering why he felt the sudden and intense need to kiss her when he hadn’t had that need since Naomi. He also wondered whose name had she avoided saying aloud when it clearly was such a big trigger for her.
16
Clara stormed inside and stomped up the narrow staircase to her bedroom. Throwing open the door and turning on the light, she closed her eyes and groaned. Oh God, she thought. The bed, the little table, the roses. Damn you, Henry Garnett. You might be the perfect man and I just was rude and didn’t thank you for offering me dinner and had a tantrum because I couldn’t be honest about myself.
Clara sat on the edge of the bed, enjoying the fact it was no longer on the floor, and picked up the teacup of roses. She examined the perfect buds and open flowers and inhaled the heady scent of the sweetness of summer tickling her nose.
She needed to apologise but Clara wasn’t very good at apologies. Her mum had told her it was her cross to bear and she would have to learn how to offer them or she’d spend the rest of her life learning until she grew up. Clara had ignored her. Besides, saying sorry didn’t fix the unfixable in life. Sometimes things happened that couldn’t be forgiven, like Piles and Judas.
Clara left unfinished business because she wouldn’t or couldn’t say sorry. She left friendships, she left jobs and she left home with apologies floating round her, waiting to be delivered, but there was something about Henry that made her think she didn’t want to leave him without one or thinking less of her. Perhaps she was growing up.
She thought about Judas and Piles. She
