“We do.”
“There’s nowhere else available.”
“No.”
Silence. Stalemate.
“This is getting us nowhere. I’m going to go shower,” he said.
Felt like I should say,You can’t, it’s my shower, but didn’t. And now he’s in there, using up all the hot water. Am even more hyperaware of him than normal, knowing he’s showering just on the other side of that door.
Things are prickly. Worryingly so. Our alliance is precarious. Without it, there’s the risk he’ll try to oust me and keep the stables and the job for himself, and I’m not in a strong position here. I don’tknowthat he didn’t get the job fair and square. If he starts kicking up trouble with Rosie and Marly, it might be curtains for me, and the very thought of having to head back to the mainland…
Not an option. Ugh, I’m crying again! Am doing so much better, am genuinely happier than I have been insolong, but I’mfeelingso muchstuff. Sad! Guilty! Ashamed! Joyful! Maybe now that I’ve finally started being honest with myself about how I feel, I can’t bloody stop? It’s so annoying—how can I leave the past behind when it keeps sneaking up on me like this? Just want to beCharlie, the Charlie I’m finding here, and mustn’t let this business with Jones get in the way.
But also have nowhere else to stay.
We’re stuck. Am going to ring Rosie. Marly is quite straight-talking, no bullshit—Jones’s sort of person. Think I’ll click better with Rosie, who believes things happen for a reason, an idea that basically got me here.
Very positive conversation with Rosie. She was quite sympathetic to our plight—think she considers the Charlies mix-up to be her fault, which it might be, to be honest. She islovelybut absolutely radiates benevolent incompetence, and I have no other workable theories for how the hell this has happened, aside from Jones being some sort of scheming liar, but if he is one, he does a very good job of pretending not to be.
Anyway, we’re getting a door put on the walk-in wardrobe.
“A door,” Jones said, when we reconvened at the farm shop later.
The plan was for us to give the place a deep clean after closing. I’d turned up in dungarees and rubber gloves; felt irrationally irritated to find him in the same clothes he’d been in for the staff meeting earlier. Jeans, plaid shirt. Just made me feel like he wasn’t taking any of this stuff seriously.
He stared at me across the shop floor with those shadowy gray-blue eyes. This man does not mind a bit of eye contact.
“And as soon as there’s a spare room at the B&B, one of us will get first dibs,” I continued, setting to work on the shop windowsills. Outside the darkening sky was flecked with silver drizzle. “Do you want to scrub the front door?”
“I thought I’d fix up the roof first. Is anyone moving on from the B&B soon?”
“Well, no,” I admitted. It was immensely satisfying to discover a lovely Cotswold green color under the grubbiness covering the paintwork. “Rosie said nobody plans to leave anytime soon. But she said it’s all very casual, and people do come and go a bit…”
“Right. Great. So for now, we’re getting a door.”
“Look, I don’t want to share with you, either. I’m trying to be positive.”
“Yes,” Jones said, and there was thattoneagain. “I can tell.”
He headed out of the shop door, leaving it open behind him. His tendency to walk out midconversation was also extremely irritating.
“Are we done, then, or…”
“No?” he said, from outside. “I’m just getting the ladder.”
I scrubbed harder and raised my voice so he could still hear me.
“You know, if the living situation bothers you and you want to leave, you’re really welcome to.”
“Am I?” he drawled. “Thanks.”
Heard him clanking around outside with the ladder. I peered out of the window I was cleaning. He was carrying a fresh sheet of corrugated iron. Where the hell did he get that from? And when? He’s barely left my sight for the last three days.
“If the walk-in wardrobe doesn’t suit you, I mean,” I pushed, “you don’t have to stay.”
He paused at the window, looking in at me through the rain-stained glass.
