“I like long stories.”
What can I tell her? Remember that scandal last autumn, Alice Trapper the husband steeling blonde, yeah, that was me. I came here and lied to you all and took advantage of your goodwill and generosity.
“Do we need another bottle?” She starts to get up.
“No, no. I’ll talk, I’ll talk.” I put my hands up in mock surrender.
She sits back down with a laugh. “I wasn’t trying to threaten you with elegant ladies’ wine.”
I draw in a deep breath and hold it, screwing my courage. Then pull up my phone and google ‘Alice Trapper adultery.’ The first result up isThe Expresswith a lurid headline and pictures. I hand the phone to Laura.
To give her time to read, I grab the milk and go upstairs to check on Malinara who is due a feed and change. When I eventually come back, with her in my arms. Laura has cleared up the lunch things.
She looks up when I come into the kitchen. “Would you like to go out for a walk? It’s a lovely day.”
And she’s right. The sun is bright and warm, the last heatwave has passed and the air is surprisingly fresh. We put Malinara into her pram and set off. She leads me away from the village towards one of the many apple orchards.
On the way we talk, and I fill in the rest of the story the papers would not have known.
“So, you were the scapegoat?” She says at last.
“With my agreement. I wasn’t a victim; it was just the best solution.”
“And she’s…” Laura glances at Malinara. “His?”
I nod again, placing a kiss on my daughter’s head. She has that baby smell which is the closest thing to perfection I have ever known.
Eventually, we find a nice, grassy meadow under the trees and Laura lays a towel on the ground so I can put Malinara on it and allow her to kick her legs in the air a bit. Laura picks some pink sea-daisies and tucks them into the side of the pram.
“I could do with a tan.” I look up at the July sun.
“We still have three months of summer. Autumn doesn’t come until late October here.” She flops down on the grass rolls up her trouser legs and removes her shoes to sink her bare feet into the grass. And if this weren’t enough, she whips off her top and lies back in nothing but her jeans and a dark blue bralette.
It would take much more wine for me to do that, especially with breastfeeding making me even more booby than usual. But I undo a few buttons on my shirt and allow the sun to warm my skin. Three months till autumn. It was autumn when I first came here. Did I really use to hate this island? Yes. Brandon and I used to make jokes about it. It’s hard to believe this now, sitting in the warm breeze with the sound of water in the stream nearby, the rustle of leaves in the trees, and the buzz of some insect somewhere.
“Lessa?”
I’m miles away when Laura’s voice calls me back. She props herself up on her elbows. “Have you allowed yourself to grieve?”
“For what?”
“For yourself,” she says with emphasis. “I get the impression you don’t pay any attention to your feelings. As if you avoid things you can’t do much about.”
“Feelings are just feelings. They come, they go. Successful people do what has to be done regardless of how theyfeel.”
“Not in this case.” She moves to sit cross-legged in front of me. “Don’t underestimate what you’ve been through, it’s traumatic by any standard. You lost an entire way of life.” Her gaze slides away from me briefly as if chasing a memory. “Believe me, I know what it’s like. And that’s not counting the pregnancy.”
I glance at Malinara and brush away bits of grass the breeze blew over her blanket. “I managed.”
“You know what your biggest problem is?”
I wait.
“It’s that you’re a very strong woman.”
I laugh. “Yes, because you are such a feeble ferret yourself, starting a new business, rescuing a failing factory and forty refugees.”
She pulls up a dandelion and throws it at me. “And fell in love with a man who had sworn off relationships, don’t forget.”
