However, Frank wasn’t an employee type of guy. There was a restlessness in him; an insatiable urge to throw himself into a thrilling new project. And soon, this father of three was insisting that taking over Sandybanks’ failing ice cream parlour was ‘too good an opportunity to miss’.
‘I know you want to do your own thing,’ I’d reasoned, ‘but it feels too risky, Frank.’
‘Yes, but the rent’s reasonable and the location’s great.’
‘If it’s so great then why does nobody go there?’
‘They will,’ he insisted. ‘I’ll brighten it up and drag it into the twenty-first century. I’ll completely transform it. And we’re at the seaside, Carly!’ His dark eyes beamed excitement and I tried to swallow down my guilt at not sharing his enthusiasm. ‘Who doesn’t want a delicious ice cream at the beach?’
At the time, Frank was working crazy hours as a delivery driver while I was a full-time mum. I could see how passionate he was, and told myself that he deserved this chance if he could secure a loan. Next thing I knew, funds had been raised and there he was, master of a malfunctioning commercial freezer that the previous proprietor – now disappeared, leaving no contact details – had assured him was ‘in perfect working order’. Frank plundered his funds to rent a replacement freezer but still the shop failed. Somehow, this man from southern Portugal hadn’t factored in our long Scottish winters and the fact that ice cream sales dwindle to virtually nothing when the cold weather bites.
Next came a tiny bakery, tucked away down an alleyway, where he planned to wow the west of Scotland with Portuguese custard tarts. ‘Everyoneloves pastéis de nata,’ he’d insisted. ‘It can’t fail.’
Well, yes – maybe in Lisbon or even London, they did. But the craze was a long way from reaching our little corner of Ayrshire (in fact it still hasn’t arrived).
Then there was the food truck project, embarked on with wild enthusiasm one spring. He’d planned to sell sizzling garlicky steak sandwiches – which proved popular – but still he never managed to turn a profit and the venture was dead in the water by the end of the year.I’d feel terrible for Frank, to see his dreams shattered. But then he’d blunder into the next thing, and I was more often furious about the perilous financial position we’d find ourselves in. It wasn’t just the two of us anymore, free as birds. We had three children depending on us. As soon as Ana started nursery I went back to work, doing various office jobs –and I didn’t think it was beneath me, Eddie! Sometimes, I even enjoyed it!Then a decade ago, the library job came up and I leapt at it.
These days Frank works as a mechanic at his mate Dev’s garage. He’d never been a mechanic before, but he can turn his hand to virtually anything, when he puts his mind to it. And somehow we’ve scrambled through. But on this, my first day back at the library after the Christmas break, something hits me hard in the gut.
I stop abruptly on the seafront. Snow is still falling, dusting the birthday cake roundabout like icing sugar.
I’ll be fifty this year. My birthday’s in September – nine months away. My mum died at fifty. My life is speeding by and Eddie will be still lying there, posting Orange Cremes into his mouth. Or maybe it’ll be those hard round toffees that are always left at the end?
That’s me,I think wildly, marching on now, past the bandstand and the faded town map on a big wooden board. In the Quality Street tin I’m the Toffee Penny; the one that cements itself to your teeth. Why do they even put it in? It’s just there to be annoying – like a mother haranguing her son to find a job.
I veer away from the seafront and towards the town centre, passing the fishing tackle shop and the beauty salon. The library is in view now, the jewel of our townwith its turrets and spires and stained-glass windows. A leaky jewel, as it happens, as there’s no money to fix the roof and guttering. Just enough for an array of buckets that we rearrange to catch the ever-changing locations of the drips.
The snow has stopped falling and way above the library, in the sky, a tiny dark speck has appeared. The speck is a plane and it shocks me to realise how much I wish I was on it.
Like all those times I flew out to see Frank, desperate to be together again. When he’d spot me at Faro airport arrivals and we’d fall into each other’s arms.
‘Ahh!’ I’d often hear people exclaim in pleasure at the sight of us. Same in Glasgow, whenever Frank arrived. ‘Love’s young dream!’ I once heard a stranger announce fondly, and we laughed as my cheeks blazed.
‘Wearelove’s young dream. You’re my dream, Carly!’
Now, taking care not to slip on the icy ground, I head for the yellow salt bin at the side of the library. As I grab the shovel and start digging out salt, I replay Eddie, shouting at me yesterday and flouncing upstairs. Later I’d lain awake in bed, worrying about whether I’d handled him in the right way.
‘Just leave him be,’ Frank had said. ‘It’s not worth getting upset about.’
Maybe Frank has the right attitude, I reflect now as I scatter salt rather aggressively around the library’s entrance. Eddie’s a fully fledged adult and if he’s not going to start living his life – well, I damn well am!
Like Mum did, when Dad left her. Working two jobs and seeing her friends and doing wonderful things withme, like baking and making fancy dress costumes, and taking me out to our favourite Italian café. But also never mollycoddling me. And certainly never picking up after me at home. I’d no more have thrown my dinner on the floor than dropped a sweet wrapper in the house.
I’mfartoo soft with Eddie, I decide, as I unlock the library’s heavy main door.
And from now on, things are going to change.
Inside the library, I turn on the lights with the ancient brass switches that make a definiteclunk. I breathe in the aroma of thousands of books, mingling with a tinge of furniture polish and something else – the smell of learning and study and history.
When our three kids were all home it felt as if Kilmory Cottage might burst at the seams. Our home really wasn’t big enough for the five of us. So, as one of the library key holders, I started coming to work early, just to enjoy the calm and quiet and stillness.
The habit stuck, and I still do that now. In fact, Frank probably thinks the library opens at eight-thirty a.m. I make an instant coffee and wander over to the 20p box, where we sell off books that have been removed from the lending shelves. There’s a few novels and a small selection of non-fiction. A book about Clyde shipyards and wildlife guides about seabirds and coastal flora. And something else that I hadn’t noticed before. One of the others must have put it there.
I pick it up and sip my coffee as I examine the cover.The Empty-Nester’s Handbook: Living Your Best Life When the Kids Leave Home.
I can’t help chuckling dryly as my gaze lands on page one.
Let’s celebrate your fabulous second act!
