And I can’t help it – the tears slide freely down my cheeks now, falling onto the mat beneath me. I am here. I am back on the island I never thought I would see again. Back in the place I once called home. Back among the people I left, and many who have arrived after me. And I feel utterly lost.
The sobs come from deep within my body. I try to stop them but it’s useless now. My body shakes, my legs and arms tense and trembling. But there is a sudden warmth on my right shoulder. Then my left. Then my elbow, my wrist, my ankle. Warmth flows through my whole body like a current. What’s happening?
Opening my eyes, I see the island women crowded around me, each with a palm placed gently on a part of my body. There’s Morag, with a hand wrapped around my left ankle, smiling toothily. And Brenda by my left arm. Tess placing a hand gently on my shin. Sarah by my right shoulder. As I see Alice at my left side I think I understand what they are doing. They are holding me. Even Natalia is here beside me, the whole class of women crouched beside me and touching me gently.
Normally I’d pull back from physical contact like this. I hate it when someone bumps up against me on the tube, even if it’s accidental. But this feels different. My breathing slows. Looking up, I meet the faces of Sarah on my right and Alice on my left. They look down at me with expressions softened with concern. Looking at Sarah I see the ten-year-old girl who used her birthday wish to ask for my happiness.
Easing myself up slowly, the women step back slightly. All except Sarah, who is still crouching down beside me. Do I reach out first or does she? It doesn’t really matter, does it? Because we are hugging each other, arms held tightly.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say into her hair. ‘I’m so sorry.’
I want to tell her more, that I should never have lost touch with her, I should never have let her go. But for now, this is all I can manage.
‘It’s OK,’ Sarah replies, ‘It’s going to be OK.’
Is it? I don’t even know what OK might look like. But I am breathing more calmly now and the tears have stopped at least. Eventually we pull apart and stand up. The other women are up now too, the yoga mats abandoned and the incense burnt out. The hall smells like damp and biscuits again. And I laugh. I don’t know why. But the laughter rises inside me like bubbles. And suddenly the other women are laughing too. It’s as though the class and the tears have released some of the tension that I’d been carrying tightly like a heavy bag I didn’t want to put down, or didn’t realise that I could.
Eventually, after warm goodbyes with the other island women, Alice, Sarah and I are left alone in the hall.
‘Sarah, you should join us for dinner,’ Alice says suddenly. ‘Pick up Ben and the kids on the way. An impromptu dinner party! Molly’s cooking but I’ve got a lasagne in the freezer we can get out too, so there’ll be plenty of food.’
Sarah glances at me and we smile at one another.
‘That would be great,’ she says and as she does so she slips her arm through mine like she used to do whenever we walked side by side, so easily, so gently. Having her beside me feels like climbing into your own bed after being away from home for a very long time.
We walk to the cars together and say goodbye. I’ll see Sarah again shortly but it stills feels a wrench as she lets go of my arm and climbs into her own car to go home and change and collect her family.
As Alice drives us back to the farm I let out a sigh. She doesn’t comment on my earlier tears and it feels like a sort of kindness.
‘Your friends are lovely,’ I tell her.
Her face fills with a smile.
‘Oh, I know, I’m so lucky. It’s one of my favourite things about living on this island. I mean, there are other places we could live but I just couldn’t imagine not living close to my friends.’
I think of Cheryl back in London and the comfort it’s given me over the past five years to know she is just around the corner. But I think too of Sarah and Emma and the other friends from my childhood that I let slip away when I left the island. When I’ve thought of this island over the years I’ve thought mostly of my parents and my unhappy home life. Maybe it made leaving easier to forget the happier memories, those moments in my childhood where the clouds parted and for a moment I felt bathed in the glow of a golden sun. My friends were that for me, once.
Chapter 18
Alice
Molly and Ella are bursting with excitement when they hear that Olive and her family are joining us for dinner. I hope it wasn’t meddling to invite them, it’s just when I saw Sarah and Lorna together after the class I couldn’t help myself. Of course it’s always lovely to have Sarah and her family over but it felt like a chance for them to catch up too.
‘It smells wonderful in here, girls.’
Ella lays the table while Molly stirs a pan on the Rayburn. I open the freezer, pulling out the frozen lasagne that I keep in there for emergencies.
‘I’m sure this won’t be anywhere near as nice as what you’ve cooked, darling,’ I say to Molly, kissing her on the forehead. ‘But I don’t want anyone to go hungry.’
‘No, it’s fine, it’s a good idea, Mum.’
‘I’m just going to take a quick shower,’ says Lorna from the doorway but before she turns away Ella calls her back.
‘Mum,’ she says. ‘A delivery arrived for you while you were out.’
Ella and Molly meet eyes and stifle giggles as they look quickly away again. Ella points at the table where I suddenly spot a jam jar filled with sprigs of heather, a slightly lopsided twine bow tied around the rim of the jar. There’s a note propped up against the jar and Lorna blushes as she reaches for it.
I don’t mean to. I really don’t. But as I turn back from putting the lasagne in the oven my eyes fall on the piece of paper.
