Chapter 32

32

SEAGLASS

1987

The last terrible storm at Seaglass was almost twenty years ago. Nana was planning a big launch for her tenth book at her favorite bookshop. We were all invited, but my father was very busy—as usual—and said he might not be able to be there. So when the telephone rang, we all presumed it was him, calling to apologize from whatever corner of the world he was in with his orchestra. But it was a call from the hospital instead, and not about me for a change. My parents were long divorced, but Nancy was still registered as my dad’s next of kin, and he’d been in an accident.

Most people in the UK can remember the great storm of 1987. We’ve all laughed about the BBC weatherman Michael Fish who got the forecast so spectacularly wrong and never lived it down. There’s a fantastic clip of what he said that day: “Apparently a lady rang the BBC and said she heard that there was a hurricane on the way. Well, don’t worry, if you’re watching, there isn’t.” But he was wrong. There was. That October, a hurricane devasted huge parts of the country, and Seaglass nearly disappeared beneath the waves for good. Dad had been on the way to join us to celebrate Nana’s latest children’s book when his car was hit by a falling tree. His visit was meant to be a surprise, but the storm had a bigger one in store.

“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Nancy said when the hospital called. Love always trumps hate when you fear you might lose someone for good. She and Nana left immediately, the book launch was canceled, and Mr. Kennedy came to look after me and my sisters for the night, along with Conor.

One night turned into several. Mr. Kennedy soon ran out of things to do with a house full of children—even though one of them was his own—so when the weather allowed, he encouraged us to spend as much time as possible outside. He taught us about the flowers and plants he and my mother had introduced to Seaglass—the magnolia tree wasn’t much taller than him back then—but our interest and concentration soon started to fade.

“Gardening is boring,” declared Lily, who never liked Conor’s dad. She called him “the narrow man” because he was tall and thin. In some ways I agreed with her assessment. He did look as though life had squeezed him into wearing only narrow thoughts, sweaters, and jeans, almost all of which had pockets and holes. His words were coated in cynicism, even the kind ones, so I could sort of understand why Lily wanted to stay inside and play on her computer.

“Gardening isn’t boring,” said Mr. Kennedy with a strange smile. “One day you might regret spending your life staring at a screen instead of seeing the real world.” Then he told us a story that was unlike anything I’d heard before. “Did you know that spies use plants?”

“Like James Bond?” Conor asked.

His father nodded. “Yes, but in real life. You were all probably too young to remember, but in 1978, a BBC journalist was killed by a poisoned umbrella.”

There was a brief silence while we processed his unfamiliar words.

“An umbrella isn’t a plant,” said Lily.

“Did he open the umbrella indoors?” I asked. “Nana says it’s very bad luck to do that.”

“No, Daisy,” Mr. Kennedy replied. “Someone walked up to him on Waterloo Bridge, pointed the umbrella at his leg, and then the journalist felt a sharp pain.”

“Why did someone want to hurt him?” asked Rose.

“Because he defected to the West.”

“What does defected mean?” Lily asked.

“Cornwall is in the west…” I started to say.

Mr. Kennedy shook his head. “It means that he … decided to change sides.”

“Like when people get divorced?” I asked.

“Yes. I suppose defecting is a bit like divorce, but even more deadly. The journalist became very ill, very quickly. He was taken to hospital, but he died. The point of this story is what was on the tip of that umbrella?”

We all stared at him feeling a little clueless, but then Rose’s hand shot up as though she were in class. “Poison.”

“Yes, but where did the poison come from?” None of us knew the answer to that one. “The poison on the tip of that umbrella was called ricin, and it came from the seeds of a castor bean plant. The castor bean plant isn’t a rare species, or terribly difficult to grow or find. In fact, it can sometimes be found in gardens. Just like this one.”

Mr. Kennedy pointed at the red-and-green plant in my mother’s garden, and there was a collective—and rather dramatic—intake of breath.

“So I hope we can all agree that gardening is not boring,” he said, looking at Lily. “Plants can be the perfect partners in crime. Do you know why?” We all shook our heads again. “Because they’ll never grass. Get it?” His dad jokes were even worse than our father’s. “Don’t forget to wipe your feet and take your shoes off before going inside the house. You know how much your mother hates muddy footprints.”

Later, when we were all back indoors, Mr. Kennedy made himself busy in the kitchen, trying to cook some sort of dinner. We ate a lot of fish fingers, chips, and beans when he was left in charge. As he rummaged about in Nana’s freezer, I heard Rose and Conor whispering about him.

“My dad is really upset about your dad,” Conor said.

“We’re all upset. The doctor Nancy spoke to today said it was serious. Apparently Dad’s car is a write-off and he’s lucky to be alive.”

“My dad isn’t upset about your dad being in the hospital. He’s upset that Nancy rushed to be by his bedside. They’re divorced. They basically defected from each other years ago. She’s supposed to be with my dad now.”

“I don’t think it works like that,” Rose said. “When you love someone, you can’t just turn it off, there isn’t a switch. Even if you hate someone that you once loved, there is still a little bit of love there. Love is like the soil that hate needs in order to grow. I think it’s rare in relationships to have one without the other.”

Sixteen-year-old Rose was ridiculously mature, but I think she might have been born that way. She and Conor were in a relationship of their own. It was almost as though she wanted him to know that she would always love him, even if she hated him one day. Just like our parents. Lily and I watched as Rose held Conor’s hand. I could tell it made Lily feel uncomfortable too.

When Nancy returned two days later, our dad was with her. He needed to rest, and Seaglass was where he wanted to do it. His head was bandaged and he had a broken arm. He could have gone to his London home—a flat in Notting Hill—just like my mother could have gone to hers, but she chose to look after him and he chose to let her. My sisters and I were delighted to have him with us for so long. Rose and Lily even put their feud to one side.

They decided to cook together one night—a meal for the whole family—and chose to use one of Nana’s recipes for spaghetti Bolognese. I wasn’t allowed to help them at all, for reasons I didn’t understand, but I watched from the doorway. When Lily shouted at me for the tenth time to go away, I sulked in the garden. Rose did almost all of the cooking: chopping onions, carrots, garlic, and chilies; adding all the herbs to the meat, tomatoes, and stock. She grated cheese and—because this was one of Nana’s recipes—had a bowl of sprinkles ready to scatter on top. Literally all Lily did was open a packet of dried spaghetti and pour some boiling water over it in a saucepan.

We sat down in our individually painted chairs when dinner was served, but I didn’t take a bite. Instead I just waited. My mother put a fork full of spaghetti in her mouth and spat it out seconds later. My father swallowed his, but then drank an entire glass of water. Nobody took more than one bite. I’d helped with the meal after all, adding a full jar of chili powder and a bottle of hot chili sauce to the spaghetti. Lily blamed Rose, and Rose blamed Lily. I think only Nana guessed that it was me.

Apart from the occasional sibling-shaped squabble, we were happier than we had ever been before. But not everyone was pleased to see the Darker family reunited. It was the beginning of the end for Nancy and Mr. Kennedy. He was furious about the new living arrangements and didn’t hide it well. He stayed away from Seaglass the entire time that my dad was there. Days turned into weeks, and weeks stretched into months. Nancy’s garden was neglected; the flowers faded, wilted, and died. But she barely noticed.

During that time while my dad recovered, we were like a real family again. We spent time together playing board games (Clue was a firm favorite), went for walks along the coast, and watched old movies. Dad—unable to play his beloved piano—completed lots of jigsaw puzzles with just the one hand. And Nana cooked a lot of her “special chicken soup.” It was what she made whenever one of us was ill. The secret ingredient was mashed banana, and the soup was always served with homemade crusty bread slathered in Nutella.

We were a real happy family for a while, and I thought we might stay that way forever. Christmas in 1987 was very much a Darker family affair, and everyone was a little more grateful for what we all had. Not that the sentiment lasted. Gratitude tends to go off quicker than milk in our house.