Wedding Bells at Butterfly Cove

Chapter Four

The miles slipped past the window, grey urban sprawl giving way to longer and longer stretches of green fields as the train took them east to west from London to Somerset. It was the same route they used when travelling to stay with their friends in Butterfly Cove, and Aaron wished they were heading further south to that peaceful spot on the coast rather than their actual destination. Luke sat opposite him, head resting against the window, eyes closed as he nodded along to whatever he was listening to through his headphones. A study in relaxation, if you could ignore his fingers drumming against his thigh. Aaron swallowed a sigh. Going home shouldn’t feel like a duty, but he’d dodged every invitation since Christmas. Maybe Cathy would be too busy being the centre of attention to bother with him.

It wasn’t fair. And yes, that made him sound like a whiny little kid instead of a grown man of nearly thirty, but damn it, it wasn’t fair. He loved his dad, adored his brother and would have loved Cathy, too, if she’d let him, but the time for that was long past. He’d settle for friendship; hell, he’d settle for being politely ignored. Anything would be a respite from the smiling barbs and digs. Each time he crossed the threshold of the one place on earth he should feel safe and happy, he swore he wouldn’t rise to the bait. He’d be like Teflon and let it all just slide right off him. Shrug and smile, move past it and let Dad and Luke breathe easier.

His fingers clenched around the small box in his pocket. The sharp corners dug into his skin to the point of pain. He could tell himself a hundred times he didn’t care, that he didn’t need her approval, her affection, but it was a lie. The cost of the gold Pandora charm in the box proved it. How many times would he do this to himself? Memories flashed of homemade cards hidden behind others on the mantelpiece, of flowers purchased with preciously hoarded pocket money left to wilt without water. Then there was the jumper she’d admired in a shop window which somehow ended up with a hole in it the first time she wore it. All easily explained away as silly accidents, but somehow it only ever happened with gifts from Aaron.

A nudge to his foot startled him and he blinked the burn from his eyes. Luke stared at him across the little table between them, a deep furrow between his brows. His headphones were looped around his neck and faint, tinny music echoed from them. ‘You don’t have to keep doing this, you know.’ As much as he loved his mum, Luke was under no illusions about her animosity towards Aaron.

‘Yeah, I do.’

Luke shook his head. ‘You really are a glutton for punishment. Ah, sod that, let’s talk about something else. Are you going to tell Dad about the cottage?’

Ah yes, in just one week’s time he’d be the proud new owner of Honeysuckle Cottage. His offer had been half in jest. He’d assumed, once they’d had a chance to think about it, that Karen and Dave would put the property on the market. Orcombe’s location made it a prime destination for eager weekend commuters looking to escape city life. However, they’d settled for a quick, easy sale instead and, thanks to the miracle of two solicitors who had heeded their clients’ instructions about concluding the deal swiftly, they were in the final stages of exchanging. His investments had been cashed in for the deposit and he was the sole holder of an eye-watering mortgage. The monthly payments were less than his current rent, so it wasn’t like he’d overextended himself. It was just the overall figure that made his knees a bit wobbly.

It had been too good an opportunity to pass up and, if he changed his mind, he could do the place up and put it back on the market. ‘If I get some time alone with him, I will.’

Luke leaned forward to rest his arms on the table. ‘So, you can tell me to mind my own business, but how are you going to afford two places? The rent on my flat is sucking my will to live, along with the bulk of my salary.’

‘I’m giving up the flat.’ Saying it out loud, acknowledging the truth of what he’d been doing over the past few weeks, sent his stomach roiling. It wasn’t only his flat he’d given notice on.

His brother sat back in his seat. ‘You can’t be thinking of commuting from Orcombe every day.’ Aaron stayed silent, watching the thought process play out on Luke’s face. There was a reason he was crap at poker. ‘Oh.’ Luke glanced out of the window and back again. Red splotches sat high on his cheekbones and, when he spoke, there was a thread of anger in his tone. ‘So, when were you going to tell me?’

‘Come on, Spud, don’t be like that. I’ve barely got to grips with this myself.’ Aaron shrugged his shoulders, not liking the guilt weighing on them. Luke was a grown man, they had their own lives. He tugged at the collar of his shirt. ‘Is it me, or is it hot in here?’

Luke had chosen to study and then live in London in direct opposition to his mother’s wishes. There’d been tears and recriminations for weeks and his brother had faced it all with remarkable stoicism. He was the only person immune to Cathy’s attempts at manipulation, and the only one she would forgive anything. And, in his heart, Aaron knew Luke had chosen London to be near him, an open declaration of support and an enormous eff you to his mother. He owed him better than this. ‘I didn’t plan for this to happen, but the cottage was too good an opportunity to pass up, and I’ve been feeling out of sorts for a while.’

His brother scrubbed his face with his hands, like he was trying to erase the anger bubbling. ‘What will you do for work?’

Aaron shrugged. ‘I’ll try and increase my freelance stuff, take a financial advisor’s course to expand my range. It’s a prime area for older people and those looking to retire, and with all the changes the government’s been making to pensions, there’s a market for it. I might even look at mortgage brokering in time. If going independent doesn’t pan out, then I’ll look for an accountancy firm in the area.’ That was his least-preferred choice, but at least his qualifications were transferable to anywhere in the country. Coming home to his own place, setting down some roots and becoming part of a community would be worth almost any price.

Luke chewed his bottom lip as he stared into the middle distance. His thinking-face their dad called it. Aaron grinned as a memory drifted up of Luke sitting at the kitchen table, the exact same expression screwing up his little features, legs swinging back and forth as he tried to puzzle his way through his maths homework. He’d sit there for hours before asking for help, stubborn little sod. A fierce rush of love and pride flooded him. ‘You could do it, too, you know.’ His soft words startled Luke’s vacant stare back into focus.

‘Do what? Have some kind of emotional breakdown and chuck everything I’ve worked for away?’

Aaron laughed. ‘Nah, leave that to Daniel.’ He reached out to cover Luke’s hand with his own, holding his gaze as he let the smile fall from his lips. ‘I’m serious. I’ve never known anyone who works harder than you when you set your mind to it. Think about how much fun we’ve had down at Butterfly Cove. Your designs for the studios are brilliant.’

Luke snorted. ‘I can’t just open my own firm of architects, I don’t have the experience, or the finances, to do it.’

‘So do something different, expand your options same as I’m doing. Project management, design jobs for small tradesmen like Jordy and his dad. Lots of little things to keep busy and build a client base.’

Luke shook his head. ‘This is your adventure, Aaron, not mine. I can’t live in your shadow for ever.’

Is that what he thought he’d been doing? ‘Then don’t. Take your place beside me where you belong.’ His mind raced a mile a minute, building on the possibilities. His voice rose in excitement. ‘Imagine it – Spenser Brothers Limited. You and me against the world, Spud!’

Luke shook his head again, but he couldn’t stop the broad grin lifting the corners of his mouth. ‘You’re off your head.’

‘Probably. You in?’

‘Why the hell not?’

***

Aaron paced the kitchen, checked his watch again and sighed. He hated being late, to the point of irritating friends and acquaintances with his need for punctuality. Those who knew him well often gave him a later meeting time so he didn’t arrive miles before anyone else. Laughter carried from the living room where his dad and Luke were watching a sitcom while they waited. The mistress of the grand entrance, Cathy would be at least another ten minutes. Needing to do something, he grabbed a couple of bottles of beer from the fridge and went to join the others.

Luke took the offered beer, then leant to one side to see the screen when Aaron didn’t move quickly enough. Knowing his reputation as an annoying big brother depended upon it, Aaron stood his ground, taking his time to pop the lids off the remaining two beers and handing the spare to his dad.

‘Shift your arse!’ Luke kicked him none too gently in the shin.

Aaron stayed put. ‘It’s not like you haven’t seen it before.’

‘That’s not the point.’

He bit the inside of his cheek so as not to laugh. They’d slipped into the same banter routine they’d been throwing at each other for the past twenty-odd years. ‘Then what is the point?’

‘Daaad!’ Luke whined, sending them both into gales of laughter.

‘How old are you two?’ Brian Spenser made a fair attempt at his best stern-dad voice before giving up and taking a mouthful of his beer. ‘Sit down, Bumble, you’re making the place look untidy.’ Aaron’s grandmother had knitted him a black-and-yellow-striped jumper when he was a baby. Mum had said it made him look like a bumblebee, and the name had stuck. He was years past such a childish nickname, but he and his dad both clung to it. A shared connection to his mum, of which they had precious few.

Aaron plonked himself down on the sofa next to Luke, still grinning. The silly moment had loosened the tension from his shoulders and he relaxed deeper into the cushion behind him. Cathy was as Cathy did and it was stupid to get wound up over something he would excuse in any of his friends.

An advert break interrupted the sitcom, and his dad got up and crossed the room to lean out into the hallway. ‘Come on, darling. The table was booked for five minutes ago,’ he called up the stairs. The local pub was only a few minutes’ walk down the road and boasted an exceptionally good restaurant. They were regular customers so the landlord wouldn’t give away their booking at least.

‘All right, all right, you don’t have to shout.’ Aaron lifted his head, following her progress through the familiar creaks of the upper floorboards. He could still remember the location of each loose one—one step outside the bathroom, two from his bedroom door. There’d been more than one late night/early morning when he’d tiptoed around them because he was out past his curfew.

His dad stepped back into the centre of the living room, a smile on his face and a brightness in his eye. ‘You look lovely, darling.’

Cathy wafted in on a cloud of her signature perfume and did a little twirl. Aaron had to admit, his dad was right. Still slim and fit from her regular sessions in the gym they’d installed in the spare bedroom, Cathy always made the most of herself. The coffee-coloured silk blouse she wore brought a warmth to her skin and looked good tucked into a pair of slim-legged taupe trousers. Wedged sandals gave her a bit of extra height, something she needed because the three of them topped out at six foot. Her deftly highlighted hair was caught up in some kind of fancy knot at the nape of her neck. Jewellery shone at her ears, throat and wrist.

Brian caught her hand and drew it to his lips in a courtly gesture, and a delicate blush highlighted her cheeks. Whatever issues Aaron and she might have, the love his father and stepmother shared for each was honest and true. His dad held on to Cathy’s hand, turning it left and right with a frown. ‘Where’s your new bead?’

The comment drew Aaron’s attention to the charm bracelet on her wrist, and a familiar icy sensation gripped his stomach. The glittering band around her arm was the one Luke had bought her for Christmas, the one Aaron had spent ages making sure he’d selected the correct style of bead for. Cathy tugged her hand, trying to free it, but Brian refused to let go. She heaved an aggrieved sigh. ‘I don’t know what you’re making a fuss about. I said thank you to Aaron for my gift. It just didn’t match my outfit.’

But the mix of blue, red and silver beads threaded onto the thin band did, apparently. Aaron took a deep swig from his beer to keep the sarcastic snap in his head.

‘Mum.’ Luke sounded exasperated, and not a little angry.

Christ, if he didn’t do something, they’d be having a full-blown argument. Aaron heaved himself up from the deep cushions and stepped to Cathy’s side. Bending his head, he brushed a quick kiss on her cheek. ‘You look great, Cathy. It’s your birthday and you should wear whatever you want.’ He managed to keep his tone light, but anyone who looked at him would be able to see the muscle he could feel ticking in his jaw. Aaron escaped to the kitchen to dump his bottle and gather his cool.

The rest of the evening stretched out before him. Dad and Luke would carry the conversation, expanding it to include Aaron because Cathy would focus almost exclusively on her son and his life. He could picture her reaction to his and Luke’s plans. Wide-eyed shock that Aaron would expect Luke to risk his promising career and fall in with him. She’d tilt her head, and purse her lips as she pleaded with their dad to talk sense into them. His excitement over the future turned sour in his mouth. And just like that, he was done.

Getting upset over the bead was pointless. It was just one more thing in a lifetime of small snubs. It was always his cards to her that somehow ended up at the back of the mantelpiece; the flowers he gave her that drooped and died in a few days. His gifts which lay neglected and forgotten, tucked away in the back of her drawer. She’d always done her duty by him, helped with his homework, nursed him when he was sick, keeping him at arm’s length all the while. The ever-hopeful child within him had never quite given up, though.

Until now.

Cathy would never do more than tolerate his presence, would never fill the void his mum had left in his life. He didn’t know why she couldn’t love him, but it was past time he stopped trying to win her over. He pushed away from the sink, skirting the three of them where they waited in the hallway. Tension hung thick in the air, a strain none of them would be feeling if he wasn’t there. Things between Aaron and Cathy would never be better, so why keep trying when Dad and Luke got caught in the crossfire?

‘I don’t feel too well and I don’t want to spoil dinner, so the three of you should go without me.’

‘Aaron...’ His dad stood in the hallway, hands shoved in his pockets, confusion and sadness on his face.

‘It’s all right, Dad. I’ve been trying to ignore this headache all day, but I think it’s going to be a bad one. I’ll have an early night and we can catch up in the morning.’

He glanced past his dad to Cathy, forcing an empty smile. ‘I don’t mean to be a party pooper. Make sure they spoil you properly, okay?’

She managed a faint look of concern, but it didn’t disguise the flicker of relief in her eyes. ‘Do you need anything before we go?’

‘I’ll grab a couple of tablets and a drink of water.’ Avoiding the suspicious gaze of his brother, Aaron shooed them out with repeated assurances, then closed the door with a sense of finality. After thirty years, it was time to acknowledge the truth. This house wasn’t home any more. It was time to make his own.

Chapter Five

If anyone had asked her two weeks previously, Kiki would’ve told them she was an honest person. She’d never learned the art of lying, even as a self-defence mechanism. If she’d taken to heart the lessons in deceit her mother had demonstrated to her, perhaps things might have turned out differently. But no, Kiki had had to be the one to try and see the best in everyone, to build bridges and mend fences, taking on the blame more often than not in the process. How she’d envied Mia’s determination and Nee’s fiery spirit. When they’d been dishing out backbone, Kiki had somehow stood in the wrong queue.

The change, when it came, was so sudden, so surprising to her given all the times she’d turned the other cheek, she understood what people meant when they talked about reaching ‘breaking point’. Even at his worst, when the words he spat wounded her deeper than the occasional slap or punch, she had assumed Neil loved her. A twisted, ugly kind of love, but love just the same. So, she’d convinced herself that trying a little harder, finding another excuse for him when he had none of his own to give, would nurture their stunted relationship into something beautiful.

But she was like the little pig in the storybook, building her house of love from straw, stacking the fragile stalks into piles to be blown down again and again. Fear, doubt, and not a little jealousy had prevented her from examining why Mia’s relationship with Jamie had been forged in brick and stone, solid enough to stand against everything except the cruelties of fate. She listened instead to the other mothers at the school gate, who moaned about their husbands and convinced herself all relationships had troubles.

Two words.

Two words had been all it took for the scales to fall from her eyes. Two stupid little words. Two precious little words she’d tucked away in her heart the first time Neil had whispered them into the ear of an innocent, lovestruck girl. My Helen. Having been raised on the tales of the Ancient Greek heroes, there was only one Helen. The woman so beautiful that men had burned the world for her. When Neil had likened her to that mythical siren, it had turned her head and won her completely. Two words meant only for her, she’d assumed until she’d read those bloody awful emails and seen the truth—her husband was a liar, his declaration of true love nothing more than a tawdry cliché designed to get her, and God only knew how many other women, into his bed.

And so, for the past two weeks, she’d smiled her way through the frantic preparations for Neil’s trip, washing, ironing and packing his clothes. Not a word of dissent had passed her lips as she collected the lists of books he left her, marking the sections that would most help with his research. It was like the old days, when she’d given up her own studies to help him through his PhD. Only this was no labour of love. Volunteering to help him gave her the perfect excuse to spend precious hours in his study without raising suspicion.

For every piece of information she prepared for him, she squirreled away one of her own. Passwords, account details, balances; all the things she’d been ‘too stupid’ to deal with, according to Neil—she made them her own. For every shirt of his she neatly folded, she packed something belonging to the kids into the boot of her car. Like the little mouse everyone believed her to be, she burrowed and sneaked around, a dull little thing, not worthy of notice. Soon, the little mouse would roar.

Being underestimated by everyone had turned out to be the perfect cover. Clad in her usual tidy uniform of a matching skirt and blouse, hair rolled into a discreet bun at the nape of her neck, she sat on a visitor’s chair in the school office and waited for the head teacher to be free. She clenched her fingers around the handle of the bag resting in her lap to prevent herself from fiddling with the hem of her skirt.

‘She shouldn’t be too much longer.’ The secretary offered an apologetic glance at the clock on the wall as the minute hand clicked loudly to mark quarter past the hour.

All those years of being subjected to her mother’s play-acting were finally paying off. Kiki pictured Vivian supine on the small couch beneath her window, a soft blanket over her legs, and an empty glass resting on the table beside her. ‘Mummy needs her special drink, darling. I’ve got such a terrible pain in my head.’

Kiki gripped her handbag until her knuckles turned white. With hindsight, the catch in her mother’s voice, the flutter of her hand as it gestured to her glass, had been a performance worthy of the stage. To a worried six-year-old girl, though, it had been all too real. Vivian could even cry on demand—nothing too drastic in case it spoiled her delicate complexion, just enough for a few tears to shimmer on her lashes as she whispered, ‘You want to help me, don’t you, Kiki? You want to be a good girl for Mummy.’

Swallowing the bad taste in her mouth, Kiki fixed her mind on her end goal and let her voice drop almost to a whisper. ‘I hope not. We still have so much to put in place.’ She returned the woman’s sympathetic smile with just the right amount of wavering in her own. Vivian at her manipulative best couldn’t beat the performance she’d been laying on since she’d hurried into the office. Angela Baines was a pleasant enough woman, but a notorious gossip—always had been. If you wanted a rumour to race around the playground, a word dropped in her ear was all it took.

Angela had lapped up Kiki’s tale with alacrity. A contemporary of theirs, she remembered the details of Jamie’s death, ‘so young, such a tragedy’. It hadn’t taken much to convince her Mia was struggling to come to terms with it still. Swallowing down the lump of guilt, Kiki had taken her sister’s name in vain, dropping enough vague hints for Angela to fill in the gaps and assume Kiki had no choice but to carry out a mercy dash to the coast before the very worst happened. She could only hope Mrs Wilson was as gullible.

The inner door swung open and Kiki stood. She paused to place a silent hand of thanks on Angela’s shoulder, and to accept the returning pat of sympathy, before following Mrs Wilson into her inner sanctum. Nothing appeared to have changed in the twenty years since she and her sisters had been pupils here. The carefully drawn pictures pinned to the noticeboard were different, but the sentiment behind them struck a chord of memory.

Following Kiki’s gaze, Mrs Wilson cast a glance over her shoulder. ‘I had one of Nee’s drawings up there back in the day. It’s in the cupboard somewhere. Perhaps I should dig it out and boost my retirement savings.’

Kiki allowed herself to smile. She couldn’t image Mrs Wilson cashing in on any of her beloved mementos. ‘You might need to hang on to it for a few more years, but we have great hopes for her. She’s studying in New York, did you hear?’

‘No, I hadn’t. How exciting for her.’ Mrs Wilson sat back and folded her arms. ‘I understand Mia is making a new start for herself.’

Kiki stared down at her lap. Here was the perfect opening she needed, a few choice words and she could conclude her business. Another item ticked off her secret to-do list. So what if she couldn’t look the woman in the eye and lie? Kiki Jackson, the timid little mouse, rarely did eye contact at the best of times. She opened her mouth, then closed it again when the words stuck in her throat. It didn’t seem right, to diminish her sister when she had shown nothing but courage in the face of so much suffering. Maybe there was no need for lies.

‘She is. I need to go and stay with her and, with Neil going overseas for work, I can’t leave the children. I know it’s not long until the holidays, but it can’t wait. A person can only endure so much before they buckle under the weight of things. A person’s life shouldn’t feel like it’s over before they’re thirty, right? It shouldn’t be impossible for a person to ask their family to help them correct a mistake.’ Words spoken from the heart, they could be interpreted by the listener in myriad ways.