FORTY-SIX
You sit and watch them from the same place you always do.
I spy.
With my little eye.
The grass is flattened where your weight rests. A patch of earth revealed where your feet have kicked back and forth to pass the time. The purple foil of a chocolate bar you ate a week ago glints from where it nestles amid the sandy thatch of vegetation beside you. Seagulls cry mournfully, wheeling high in the sky above you, above the breaking waves and the reach of their salty spray, no more than specks.
The house rises up from the windswept cliffs like a chalk monolith. You imagine somebody, God perhaps, has carved it from a giant block of marble, smooth and white with bold lines and straight edges and expansive sheets of glass that reflect the sea and sky like cinema screens. It stands proud and defiant, alien in this coastal place, a place of weathered cottages, ruined mine shafts and precarious birds’ nests made of dried seaweed and discarded fishing twine. Its heart beats rhythmically. Drums your ears. Deafens you as you watch them shift like wraiths from one room to another, then outside onto the terrace, their clothes and hair ruffled by a playful onshore breeze.
He sits at the iron table. You hold your breath as you watch him swill his drink around a squat glass with facets cut into it which flash as they catch the light. You are certain you can hear the clink of ice cubes even though you know it’s not possible. Your mind is playing tricks. You aren’t close enough to hear ice on glass.
Though, of course, you wish you were.
She adjusts her sunglasses and angles her face towards the sun. Her eyes close like a cat as she luxuriates in the heat. You watch her lower herself backwards onto the sun lounger. She stretches her leg out to kiss the edge of the black-tiled swimming pool. Her skin is tanned and silky. It reminds you of toffee and you briefly imagine touching it with the tip of your tongue to taste its creamy sweetness. You feel the chill as she dips her toe into the water. Gentle ripples spread out through the inky darkness which matches the time-blackened rocks that fringe the coast of Cornwall.
You scan the house. The binoculars press hard against your face. You raise your gaze to the top floor windows. Up to the slate roof patched with a yellow mist of lichen. Down to the huge gunnera leaves which loom over a garden awash with vibrant colours, an oasis on the rugged, salt-spritzed clifftop.
I spy.
You focus the binoculars on him again. Run your eyes along the slope of his shoulder. You study the tilt of his head. The way his fingers seem to caress his glass as he concentrates on the newspaper he reads. His legs are crossed. One ankle resting on one knee. Blue leather shoes – the ones you love – cradle his feet like Cinderella’s slippers.
Something beginning with P.
She moves and steals your attention. Shifts her weight as she stretches her body and arches her back. One arm reaches over her head. Her fingers rest lightly, stroking something invisible. Waves crash on the rocks below you and the scent of brine hangs in the warm dry air. Two adolescent kittiwakes, new feathers pushing through a haze of down, jostle and screech a safe distance away. You watch them for a few moments then return to the terrace.
To her and to him.
To the white-walled house.
‘I spy with my little eye something beginning with P,’ you say under your breath.
The man lifts his drink and sips. The woman runs her hand through her honey-blonde hair.
Perfection.
‘I spy perfection.’
Present Day
I lean against the worktop and watch her. Her hands rest lightly on the table. She stares at me, unmoving, impassive. If I didn’t know her so well it would be unnerving.
There’s a chill in the air and I rub my arms to warm myself. It’s good to see her looking so beautiful, her hair shining, skin flawless and eyes bright. Neither of us speak. The silence isn’t uncomfortable but I know it won’t last. There’s a reason she’s here.
There always is.
I am unable to hold my tongue any longer. ‘Say it then.’
She raises an eyebrow, amused at the sharpness of my tone. ‘I was thinking back.’ Her voice never fails to take me by surprise, soft and melodic, close to singing.
‘To that summer?’
‘Yes.’ Her face is like a millpond, her expression placid and calm. This is misleading, of course. Beneath the veneer lies a tangle of questions and emotions. ‘But my memories are hazy, like half-remembered dreams.’
I turn away from her. Look out of the window. A crack runs diagonally across the glass. Dusty cobwebs are collected in the corners. The paintwork on the frame is peeling and patches of rot caress the edge of the pane. I long to open it. There’s a thick smell of mildew in the kitchen and it’s catching the back of my throat, but I’m not certain fresh air would be enough to get rid of it, so I leave it closed.
Outside the sky is the colour of a ripened bruise. It hangs low and heavy, threatening thunder. Raindrops spatter the window, run downwards in random paths, merging and barrelling as they grow heavier. I close my eyes and hear the distant echo of Edie’s laugh. Remembering her brings with it the smell of seaweed drying in the farthest reach of a spring tide, the tang of salt carried on a summer breeze, the feel of
