I nod. ‘Ollie’s brought her around here a couple of times.’
Joe hesitates. ‘You’ve mentioned you have two kids.’
‘Yes.’ I look at him. ‘Lexie was younger than Ollie.’ I swallow the lump in my throat. ‘She died – just over a year ago.’
Joe looks shocked. ‘I’m so sorry, Edie. I shouldn’t have asked.’
I shake my head. ‘It’s fine. I don’t want to stop talking about her.’ But I can’t stop the tears streaming down my face.
He reaches across the table and takes hold of one of my hands. ‘It isn’t fine.’ There is such kindness in his voice as he says it. ‘You’ve lost your child. How can it be?’
Even when death is expected, it arrives with a shock that resonates; completely rocks our world. When it’s a loss that feels unnatural to us, it’s worse. But we’ve learned to place such emphasis on the length of a life. It’s what medical science strives for at every turn, what we’re programmed to believe we deserve. What we too easily feel cheated of, when perhaps what’s more important is the meaning of a life.
‘Don’t you ever lose heart?’ I remember asking you once, after a harrowing day at a slaughterhouse vigil.
‘That would be caving into my ego.’ Your eyes were distant. ‘There are days I feel so much pain, my soul hurts. But I know if I can hold on, it makes me stronger.’
Your life was about so much more than what you achieved, Lexie. It was about how you lived, the way you changed others. Are still changing them. You reached more people in twenty-five years than I have in twice as many.
But we do that, don’t we? Leave our footsteps in the hearts of those we love. I know you changed me, Lexie. Are a part of who I am now. But it doesn’t stop there; you’ll be a part of the person I’m becoming.
It’s as though change is in the ether, filtering into the essence of everything around me. On Monday, Lucy and I pack up the last bits of our old workshop. I feel a pang as we close its door for the last time behind us, before moving into Mary’s old stable. The same afternoon, I receive a call from an estate agent, saying he has several people who want to view the house.
I text Ryan to remind him to pick up his stuff, then put my energy into setting up our workshop. Later that afternoon, Mary comes out with a tray of tea and cake.
‘You’re an angel,’ I say to her. ‘But this is the wrong way around. It’s me who’s supposed to be looking after you.’
‘I’m rather enjoying myself,’ she says. Since offering the stables to me and Lucy, I’ve noticed a lightness about her I haven’t seen before. But she’s spent a long time living alone; and now, at the time she needs them most, her generosity of heart has brought people into her life.
Our workshop takes shape and after giving the windows another clean, light comes flooding in. When we take a break, I show Lucy around the gardens. ‘I’ve started, but there’s so much more that needs cutting back,’ I say. ‘I think we should plan to use it for our Christmas decorations.’ I pause. ‘It would be nice, wouldn’t it? If we decorated Mary’s house?’
‘It would look wonderful.’ Lucy pauses. ‘Edie?’ she says. ‘I’m so pleased this is working out for you.’
‘Thank you.’ I smile at my friend. ‘I can’t help thinking how lucky we were – to meet Mary. After everything that’s followed, it feels as though it was meant to be.’
It’s been a while since I could imagine decorating a home for Christmas. But for a while, I stopped trusting life to work out. It was too much of a battle, for so long. But just as I start to feel like I can breathe again, I get a call from Ryan.
‘Did you pick up your stuff?’ I ask.
‘From the house? I forgot.’ He sounds distracted.
‘Please do it,’ I say.
‘I have other things on my mind,’ he says. ‘I went to the doctor, Edie.’
When he hesitates, I have a bad feeling. ‘What about?’
‘I’m sick,’ he says.
Resentment fills me. Ryan’s done this before, in an attempt to persuade me to go back to him. ‘Really?’ I say, less than sympathetically. ‘Ryan, if this is more of your manipulation tactics, I’m not falling for it.’
‘It’s not – I promise you.’ There’s a note of desperation in his voice. ‘I’m really sorry to ask, but there isn’t anyone else. Is there any chance you could come over?’
It goes against everything I’ve tried to leave behind; is an invasion of this new life I’m building. It’s an outrageous request in so many ways. But he’s right about one thing.
He doesn’t have anyone else.
21
