“What is it?”
He drains the rest of his drink and stands up. “People are looking for you too.”
I don’t say anymore, just sip my drink and watch as he leaves, my unnamed finder who knows more than anyone yet doesn’t care. I don’t have chance to ask who is looking for me, but it doesn’t matter.
He wouldn’t tell me anyway.
* * *
I escape London the day after, packing a weekend bag into my car and head south to Tintagel and my mother. At three in the morning, the traffic is non-existent and the motorways clear, even of the perpetual rain.
My mother is waiting for me when I pull up at the side of her little cottage. There’s no central heating, just old original fires and woolly jumpers, with slippers to save feet from the slate floors.
“Isaac.” She says my name and it feels like I’m who I should be, not the three-piece suited politician who courts power like a lover.
“Mum.” She smells of the brine of the sea and I know she’s already been outside, probably by the sea and the reason she’ll never leave this place.
“It’s been too long.”
And it has. I follow her through to the room I had all the way through my childhood, the bed made up with old sheets that are soft through the amount of times they’ve been washed and will smell of the softener and the fire. I know underneath the quilt, there will be a hot water bottle and I’m suddenly exhausted.
“Sleep, Isaac. We’ll talk in the morning. Your sister will be here then too.”
I manage to wash the grime of the journey off my face and strip to my underwear, tumbling into the bed and I’m a child again, wrapped in a cocoon where there is no tarnished crown and my only concern is mastering the waves, not my two lovers and where one of them is. If he can be found.
I don’t dream. When I wake, soft light falls through the window and I can hear the waves. The scent of bread baking wafts through the cottage and I find my mother in the kitchen, baking cakes, probably for Ivy who has the sweetest tooth.
“Your board’s waiting for you.” She doesn’t even look up. “And the waves are good. Beach is busy.”
I kiss the top of her head and she smacks my arm as I try to pinch a macaroon.
“Be gone. Eat breakfast on the way.”
I change into my wetsuit, thankful that the winter here is mild compared to that by the loch. Food is off the table, as I’m too desperate to get into the sea, to lose myself in the waves, mastering them.
The beach is busy like my mother said, people having come to surf or watch the surfers. There’s a group of young women, wrapped up in coats and scarves and they’re watching one surfer in particular, an American I recognise. I don’t pay them too much attention, instead jogging into the sea and feeling that first hit of cold as I lose myself in the water.
I’m out there two or three hours, my concentration solely on the ocean and the feel of riding on top of it, becoming a master of its power, means I think of nothing else. By the time I leave the water, carrying my Firefly surfboard behind me, I’m the sort of exhausted you only get through being physical and it feels good. The burn reminds me that I’m alive and that I’m more than a suited accessory to men who have more power than they should.
The cottage is warm and cosy when I get back, and I imagine bringing Blair back here, maybe Ben and how I’d explain that to my mother. She’s known for some time that my attraction to people doesn’t run straight and she’s never questioned it, just reminded me to be safe and careful with people’s hearts. I’ve never worried about that before, with the exception of the odd person when I was younger, who fell too fast and too hard.
“Shower. Then eat.” She pushes me towards the bathroom, with its ancient claw foot bath and shower with the same pressure as a heavy rainstorm.
I wash, dry off, find sweats and a hoodie from my luggage and pull them on, hearing my sister’s voice ringing through the small home. This was the first time she’d been back since she’d had to flee, her ex demanding revenge and the pirate she’d fallen for having to lie low after a mission went wrong.
Nate is there with her, his arm around her shoulders, her head resting against him and she looks happy. My sister glows.
When she sees me, her smile widens.
“You haven’t brought Blair!”
I shake my head. “Not sure she’d be able to get away. Not sure this cottage would…” I stop my words because I can feel my mother’s stare.
“Tell me about this Blair.” She looks at me with a pointed gaze. “She’s a princess, isn’t she? That sounds so old-fashioned.”
“She’d rather not be,” Ivy says. “She’d prefer to be riding a horse or outdoors than wearing any sort of crown. She’ll be queen someday soon.”
My mother’s eyes haven’t left me. “And you’re seeing her, Isaac?”
