‘Don’t worry.’ Mum smiles kindly and wipes her soily hands on the front of her gardening apron. ‘I’m just glad you’re here. You know your dad’s hardly full of sparkling conversation.’ We chuckle and stroll towards the smallclementine and apricot orchard where the trees are already laden with fruit. ‘Maybe I should have left Charlie at home this time,’ I suggest.
‘D’you think he’d have been okay on his own?’ Mum asks.
‘I’m sure he would. And Kim could have dropped in every couple of days to keep an eye.’
‘That’s true,’ she says as we sit side by side on the old wrought-iron bench.
‘I know I’m ridiculous,’ I add. ‘He doesn’t need anyone keeping an eye, does he? He’s leaving home next year. You know he’s set on doing physics or astronomy—’
‘Yes, love. But you just care about him,’ she says, ever supportive.
‘Hmm. Too much, probably.’
‘There’s no such thing as caring too much,’ Mum insists, and before I can protest that there is – it’s not mothering butsmothering– she adds, ‘It’s funny to think of Remy running around Paris!’
‘Yes, isn’t it? No wonder Charlie’s feeling a bit put out.’ She smiles wryly in recognition of the shift in their friendship. Only nine months older than Charlie, Remy seems to have catapulted into an entirely different life stage involving swapping his scruffy sweatshirts and jeans for designer attire and – the part I still can’t get my head around – going to Pariswith a girl.
An actual girl, in an actual hotel, without adult supervision! Apparently he’d never so much as booked a table at a restaurant before. In fact, until recently he was still scared of cooked carrot and our airing cupboard, which he’d scramble past in case anything should jump out. Now he’s in charge of a hotel keycard with unfettered access to a minibar. I bet no one’s nagging Remy to hydrate.
What’s more, apparently the Paris trip has been paidfor with his earnings from writing a song for a well-known artist. To be accurate, he hadn’t written it specificallyforher, but had sent it to her management company and she’d loved it and recorded it. Remy is a singer-songwriter who’s already supported a couple of successful acts. He’s a lovely boy – charming and hardworking – and has been a regular addition at our dinner table over the years. But over the past few months his life has swerved off in an altogether more thrilling direction.
I can’t help feeling sorry for Charlie being left behind. His only means of earning cash at the moment is his Saturday job at the dusty old newsagent’s in our village, owned by Brenda with the hacking cough and flat-footed stomp. I know he wants to jack it in, but there are precious few part-time jobs where we live and, whenever he’s on the brink, Brenda sends him home with a box of out-of-date Curly Wurlys and he stays on through guilt. Charlie’s never had a girlfriend as far as I know (not that I expect him to tell me anything anymore). And now Remy has Freya, he doesn’t seem to need Charlie very much at all. Maybe, if I were in his situation, I too would be huddled under a dog towel next to a bin.
Later, as Mum pops out to visit a friend, I head indoors to find Dad muttering away in his tiny study. He’s at war with an ancient computer that’s prone to overheating and which sporadically emits a smell of burning dust. I’m terrified the thing will blow up in his face. However, he’s batted off my suggestions that perhaps it’s time to invest in a new one.
‘Nothing wrong with this one,’ he huffs. I leave him jabbing at the keyboard, which appears to be matted with dog hair and jam, and find Minnie stretched out in the shade in the garden.
‘Fancy a walk?’ I ask her. Scrambling up, she pants indelight as I fix on her lead. I wish my son was as happy to hang out with me.
‘I’m taking Minnie up to the pool,’ I call inside to Dad and Charlie in their respective caves. With no response from either, we head out.
As well as its beaches, Corsica is also famous for its natural mountain pools. There’s one fairly close to Mum and Dad’s place that Minnie loves. We all loved it once, as a shady picnic spot, but I can’t imagine Charlie hanging out there with me anytime soon.
The light has turned golden by the time we’ve cut through the forest path and reached the pool, and Minnie wades straight into the clear water. Mum came up with her name as a joke as she’s an enormous shaggy rug of a hound, already fully grown when my parents took her in here as a stray. As I watch her swimming in her stately fashion, any remaining traces of gloom ebb away. Never mind that this is probably the last time Charlie and I will spend a month here together. It’ll be good for him to branch out and do his own thing – like Remy has.
‘Westill have fun, don’t we, Minnie?’I call out to her. With no one else around, the only sound is birdsong in the surrounding woods. I love this island like nowhere else on earth. As well as being my home from home, it’s also been a huge source of inspiration for my work. I create recipe content for magazines and corporate clients, and recently I’ve been commissioned to produce a regular newspaper column entitled ‘A Corsican Kitchen’. Perching on a rock, I breathe in deeply. For now at least, the scents of wild thyme and rosemary have replaced the gusts of resentment from my son.
Minnie reaches the edge of the pool and lollops out. I get up from the rock, primed for her to bound over andspray me as she shakes herself off. But she just stands there, eerily still and looking dazed. ‘Minnie?’ I prompt her. ‘Come here, girl!’ I pat my thighs loudly.
Still she doesn’t come. She seems to wobble a bit, as if disorientated. Then – suddenly – she collapses to the ground. ‘Minnie!’ I shriek. ‘Min, what’s wrong?’
Panic rattles through me as I run to her and crouch at her side. I try to hug her – gently, without moving her – and when she doesn’t respond I cry into her soggy brown fur. I can’t tell if she’s breathing, or even if she’s still alive. ‘Minnie,’ I urge her. ‘Please, girl. Come on …’ I no longer care that those idyllic summers with my son appear to be over. All I want is for Minnie to get up and reassure me that she just had a funny episode, and it’ll turn out to be fine. But she’s just lying there, inert.
I look around, desperately hoping to see a local out walking, or tourists on a hike. ‘Hello?’ I yell. ‘Can anyone help me?’ My French is pretty good but they’re English words that tumble out of my mouth. ‘Something’s happened to my dog!’ I cry out into the forest as a fresh bout of tears fills my eyes. ‘Please, is anybody there?’
I feel sick now, and I’m shaking. How am I going to tell Mum, Dad and Charlie that Minnie died?
‘Hey, I’ll help!’
I look around, wondering at first if I imagined the voice. ‘Hello?’ I cry out.
‘Hang on, just a sec …’ A tall, lean man with short salt-and-pepper hair has appeared at a gap in the trees. He hurries towards us, bobs down at Minnie’s side and moves his hands gently over her body.
‘Is she alive? Please say she is—’
‘She is, yes. What happened?’ He looks up at me briefly.
‘I … I don’t know. She was swimming, she always swims here, nothing like this has ever happened before—’
