‘Martha? You okay?’
‘Yes, I’m fine,’ a voice said from the side of her, and April shrieked and jumped, the box flipping into Martha’s arms like an excited lap dog. ‘Ah!’ She grabbed the box excitedly, putting it down onto the coffee table and ripping into it with gusto, using a craft knife she pulled from her multi-pocketed apron. ‘Finally!’
Reaching into her grey loose bun, Martha pulled out a pencil and started rooting through the box, pulling out a delivery note and frantically ticking off each item.
‘Martha, have you eaten?’ Looking at her and the chalet, it appeared that the woman had done nothing but paint. Over every surface there were pencil drawings, discarded cups, plates with little bits of cheese and bread crusts sitting discarded, brushes of every size and shape sitting in various pots and crevices all around the space.
‘Yes, I ate yesterday.’ She pointed in the vague direction of a plate, frowning when she saw the beginnings of mould forming on the top of a little rind of Edam. ‘Well, maybe not yesterday.’ She waved her arms, reaching for April’s hand and yanking her through the chalet to the back room.
‘Look,’ she said as they reached the entrance to the back bedroom. ‘Tell me what you think,’ she said, pushing April forward with a nervous grimace. April, still focusing on the fact that the place looked like a hellhole, gently opened the door.
Martha had been painting all right; she had seemingly done little else. Judging by the pile of canvases, all wrapped in cloth, which were leaning against the far wall, she was well and truly free of her block. Lifting the cover from the first one in the pile, April saw a painting of Lizard Point, a couple silhouetted against the setting sun. The colours brushed onto the canvas made the sunset come to life. April looked closer at the couple, who were standing, holding hands and looking out to sea. It reminded her of Cillian, and she wondered if they would ever get to that point. They were there already in some ways.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she said to Martha, who had returned to the frame she was working on. ‘Are you okay though?’ She didn’t want to mention the box, but to be honest, when she wasn’t working or spending time with Cillian, the letters were how she spent her time. The love and longing she read in those letters had told her exactly what kind of woman Martha was, and she couldn’t help but want to help. She’d been doing her research, through the letters, but even now, she was scared to make a move. She didn’t want the fragile calm they were all enjoying to break. They’d come so far. She didn’t want to ruin everything and end up with everyone being alone again. It’s why keeping Cillian secret was so important. She had to protect it as long as she could. ‘I’m still reading them.’
Martha stopped, turning to her and giving April her full attention for once.
‘And what do you think?’
April looked back at the paintings, pulling out the next one, which was a landscape of the chalets. The new colours were on there; even the bogey hut was captured in perfectly coloured brush strokes.
‘I think that you should find him and take these pieces to the gallery. They would love them, I’m sure.’
‘Well, easy to say for a hard woman who packed up her life and came here all alone. Started again. I can’t do that. Drink?’
April said yes to coffee, following Martha through to the kitchen. ‘I didn’t do that, Martha, I ran. I sold everything I owned, I took my late mother’s ashes, and my bits and pieces, and I ran. I ran here, and it worked out. Almost. Why don’t you get your life back, instead of hiding out here?’
Martha was filling mugs from a coffee maker on the side, and April took the offering gratefully. The two women stood at the counter, adding sugar and milk to their brews. ‘I’m trying, but … I’m scared. I don’t know where he is. I know he didn’t die in service. I kept a check on that much but since …’ She sighed, taking a deep swig of her strong coffee. ‘He probably married and forgot all about me. God knows it’s what I should have done. The guilt since Charlie passed, I don’t like it.’ She looked at April with watery eyes, her pale skin not touched by the sun of late, but by the secrets of her past. It was now or never, she realised. Martha needed to know. Hopefully, the answers would be something that she wanted to hear.
‘Get dressed,’ she said forcefully. ‘Martha, get dressed. We are going to pick five pieces from these and take them down to the gallery. Cillian will help us if you like.’ She could tell from Martha’s worried face that putting her prized and rare paintings in the back of her old Volvo was just not going to cut it somehow. ‘I’ll call him now.’
Martha was biting the skin around her thumbnail, staring into space.
‘Martha? Martha?’ She didn’t answer, and April worried that she might have broken one of her favourite residents. Not that she would ever tell her that. ‘Martha!’
‘What!’ Martha came to, looking at her as though she was the one acting strangely. ‘I’m trying to think what to wear!’
***
‘Hello?’
Cillian’s van phone kicked in, his ringing mobile phone cutting through his early morning radio sing-a-long. He’d just dropped an extremely excited pre-schooler off for the day, and he found himself eager to get back to the chalet park, and to April. He wanted to explain why he was odd earlier. She didn’t deserve him lying to her. They needed to talk.
‘Cillian!’ April’s happy voice sang out in the cab of the van, and
