Chapter 22

There are very few innocent sentences in writing.

David Foster Wallace

Celeste congratulates me again as I get out of the taxi outside my house. She's been nothing but supportive, but I'm not entirely sure she's a hundred per cent convinced I've done the right thing in getting engaged to Charles. I understand her hesitation. I'm only just over my break-up with Steve. I haven't known Charles that long. He's older than me. We're from different worlds. Yet there was a connection between us from the moment I first saw him sitting alone at his table at the White Sands, and it's become stronger with every passing day. I've never felt more sure of anything in my life.

I let myself into the house and make myself a cup of tea. I'm light-headed from champagne and cocktails, and I don't want to appear drunk to my parents. They'll think I said yes because I'm pissed, not because I'm in love. I drink the tea and eat two chocolate Hob Nobs. Then I FaceTime mum's number.

It's mid-afternoon in Napier, and she's sitting at the garden table with a mug in front of her and baby Azaria on her lap. They're both wearing wide-brimmed hats to protect their faces from the sun.

‘Hello, sweetheart,' she says. ‘Happy New Year. Isn't she a dote?' She holds the phone so that I can see my niece more clearly. Mum is right. Azaria is gorgeous, with her dark eyes, perfect button nose and soft rosebud mouth.

‘Cuter than cute,' I say. ‘Happy New Year to you too. Where's Dad?'

‘Helping Adrian in the barn. Well, I say helping. He's probably getting in the way.'

I grin. Dad has a vision of himself as a handyman, but his approach to DIY is patchy at best. After a decent interval of living with his efforts, Mum usually gets ‘a man' in to do a proper job.

‘Everything OK with you?' she asks. ‘Was the party good?'

She'd been pleased to hear I was going to a New Year's Eve party. She always complains that I volunteer to work at the end of December far too often.

‘It was excellent.' My heart is beating more rapidly. ‘And . . . well . . .'

‘What?'

‘I'm starting the new year with a bang.'

‘How?'

I hold up my finger with the opal ring. She looks at it in puzzlement.

‘A gift?'

‘Temporary,' I say. ‘It's an engagement ring. I'm engaged.'

She's silent for so long that I think the screen has frozen. It's only Bo, Adrian and Cori's adorable miniature dachshund, running around behind her that confirms we still have a connection.

Azaria coos at the dog and Mum resettles her on her lap. Only then does she look at the screen and at me. ‘Have you got back with Steve?' she asks. ‘That's not your proper ring.'

‘Not Steve,' I reply. ‘I'm engaged to Charles.'

‘Who the hell is Charles?'

‘I told you about him. The writer I met in the Caribbean.'

‘Charles Miller?' Mum can't keep the shock out of her voice. ‘Charles Miller the author? Are you mad? He's old enough to be your father.'

‘No he's not. And I'm not mad either. I love him.'

‘Izzy. Iseult.' She can't keep the anxiety from her voice. ‘You hardly know the man. You met him on holiday. I don't want to even think that you had a fling with him, but if you did, it was a holiday thing. You can't possibly be serious about marrying him.'

‘Why not?'

‘You were there for a fortnight and you're only back a few weeks. You're on the rebound.'

‘I'm not.'

‘Izzy, please.' Mum sounds really stressed. ‘Please tell me that at least you won't rush into marrying him.'

‘We haven't set a date yet.'

‘He was married before, wasn't he?'

‘Yes. To his agent. She handled his business affairs and they became close and I'm sure they both thought that getting married was a good idea. Clearly it wasn't.'

‘Did he tell you everything about it?'

‘We haven't discussed it much.'

‘You should.'

‘I don't need to. You should have confidence in me to know my own mind, Mum.'

‘I do have confidence in you. Honestly I do. But you're in a vulnerable state. Steve treated you terribly. That'd leave any girl a bit shaken.'

‘I admit I was very shaken, as you put it, over Steve. But that doesn't mean I can't fall in love with someone else.'

‘You deserve someone to love you the way you should be loved,' says Mum. ‘And I truly want to believe that Charles Miller is that man.'

‘He is. I promise you.'

‘Darling, if you're happy, I'm happy. I don't want you to think otherwise.'

‘You do, though.'

‘I'm concerned for you, that's all. You're my only daughter.'

‘Your engaged and very happy only daughter,' I assure her. ‘Trust me, Mum, Charles is a wonderful man. Please don't worry.'

‘Mothers always worry about their children.'

‘Did you worry when I got engaged to Steve?'

She's silent.

‘Did you?' I repeat.

‘I liked Steve,' she says slowly. ‘He was a very attractive man. All the same, a little bit of me thought that perhaps you could've done better.'

‘Mum!'

‘I know, I know.' She sounds harassed. ‘I mean . . .'

‘It doesn't matter.' I put her out of her misery. ‘After all, we split up. And I've done much better now, haven't I? I promise I'm not on the rebound. Please don't worry about me.'

‘If you're happy, I'm happy,' she repeats, this time with more conviction.

‘I'm very, very happy,' I tell her.

‘Well then, lots and lots of love and congratulations.'

‘Will you tell Dad or will I?'

‘I will. It'd take a while to get him from the barn.'

‘That's fine.' I glance at my Gucci watch. ‘I have to be at work in a few hours from now. I'd better get some sleep.'

‘OK.'

‘I'll talk to you again soon. Give Dad a hug from me. And a big kiss to the boys and Azaria.'

‘Take care,' she says. ‘I love you.'

‘I love you too.'

I do love my mum. She's always looked out for me, even if sometimes we see things differently.

But now I'm looking out for myself.

#Engaged #Again

The reaction to my news at work is far more satisfactory. I get a group hug from the team, and all the girls want to try on the opal ring, even though I tell them it's not my real ring.

‘It's so romantic,' says Natasha. ‘I never thought you'd bounce back from Steve like this.'

‘Neither did I,' I say as I replace the ring on my finger. ‘But there you go. When you're not looking for love, you find it.'

‘I'll keep that in mind.' Natasha, who's been through a recent break-up herself, gives me a wry smile.

‘You'll find the right person,' I assure her, even as I remember her saying exactly the same to me when we were in the pub and I was sobbing into a glass of Heineken.

‘In the meantime . . .' She picks up the walkie-talkie that's crackling with Ken's voice. ‘The ship is in. We'd better get down there.'

I pull on my anorak and hi-vis jacket and we hurry out of the building and into one of the cars. It's a long enough trek from the building to the dock, so the cars are essential. I'm checking the foot passengers this evening. We got an alert about one of them, and when he walks through, Ken and I bring him to one side. The other passengers give us curious glances but carry on to collect their baggage. The passenger we've tagged is very relaxed and answers all our questions without any issues. We've no reason to detain him, and as the shuttle bus to the city will be leaving shortly, I tell him he can go.

My day-to-day life is very different to champagne receptions in grand houses, I think. But very soon I'll be living in a grand house myself. I'll have to talk to Charles about redecorating. Gorgeous as it is, I want to feel like Riverside Lodge is our home and not his home with the agent-slash-ex. I'm sure he'll agree.

Minor details, I say to myself as I get back into the car and return to the customs building. The important thing is that I've never been happier in my life.

I'm home by 7.30 and Charles arrives half an hour later. I hear the gate creak open and his footsteps on the path before the security light comes on. I'm at the door before he rings the bell.

‘Eager,' he says as he puts his arms around me and kisses me.

‘Very.' I kiss him back.

The kissing lasts quite some time before we make it to the living room, where he takes off his heavy wool coat.

‘It's bloody freezing out,' he remarks as he drapes it over a chair. ‘This is the coldest winter I can remember.'

‘Ooh!' I smile at him. ‘The opening sentence to Winter's Heartbreak.'

‘You recognise it.' He looks pleased.

‘Of course I do.'

He sits in the armchair nearest the gas fire and holds out his hands to the flames. I tell him that I'll make some tea, and he raises an eyebrow and tells me to take the bottle of wine out of his coat pocket. It's another red I'm not familiar with, and I'm betting it's expensive. Also, there's a cork. I rummage around in the kitchen drawer looking for the corkscrew. I use it so infrequently that it's always hidden beneath other bits and pieces. But eventually I find it and uncork the bottle. I'm quite pleased that I manage to do this efficiently, as I'm so out of practice. I take the IKEA glasses from the cupboard and pour us both a generous measure.

‘I probably should've brought champagne,' says Charles. ‘So we could celebrate again.'

‘I drank too much champagne last night,' I say. ‘And I'm only having one glass of this. My poor liver has been put through the mill these last few weeks.'

‘Mine too,' admits Charles. ‘I'll cut back a bit soon, but not yet. January is far too long a month to survive without a decent glass of wine.'

I nod in agreement and take a sip. It's very good.

‘So.' He settles back. ‘Have you announced the news to your friends and family?'

‘I told my mum,' I reply. ‘She's a bit shocked.'

‘Not surprising,' he says. ‘She'll get used to the idea.'

‘Of course.'

‘It was fun to make it a thing at the party,' he says. ‘There are one or two pieces on social media about it.'

‘Have you suddenly become social media savvy?' I grin.

‘No, but I did check for mentions,' he says. ‘Everyone was very kind, which is nice, and it's good PR for A Caribbean Calypso too.'

‘Tell me you didn't ask me to marry you so people would talk about your book?' I'm not sure if my question is serious or not.

‘Darling Iseult, of course I didn't. I asked you to marry me because I'm madly in love with you and I can't imagine my life without you and I want to grow old with you. Older,' he amends. ‘One of the pieces did mention that you were half my age. Idiots.'

‘Age is just a number,' I remark.

‘They mentioned Ariel, too.' He squirms somewhat uncomfortably on the chair. ‘I thought you might have read the comments.'

‘I don't have time to check social media at work,' I tell him. ‘And I'm not surprised she got a mention. You two have a working relationship and she's very glamorous.'

‘You think she's glamorous?' He looks surprised.

‘Charles! She's beautiful. So stylish and confident.'

‘Ah, well. I'm not sure she'd say that herself.'

I'm pretty sure she would.

‘There's something I need to explain about Ariel and me,' he says.

Despite the warmth of the fire, I feel a sudden chill.

‘It's our divorce,' he says. ‘It's not finalised yet.'

‘What! You told me she was your ex when we were on holiday.'

‘She is my ex,' says Charles. ‘Couldn't be more ex. Just not, well, legally ex.'

‘You asked me to marry you when you're already married?' My heart is pounding.

‘Iseult. Izzy. You know yourself Ariel and I aren't living together. You've stayed in my house. I told you she has an apartment of her own. And we can hardly be less together than me going to the Caribbean without her for six weeks. You must see that.'

Well, true. I'd go ballistic if my husband went to a tropical island without me.

‘It really is a technical thing,' says Charles. He goes on to explain that when they'd got everything together and were ready to send the papers to the courts, a whole heap of deals for him had come up and they'd both been overwhelmed with signing various documents. And that Ariel, as the applicant, had told her solicitor not to bother about it for a while, and Charles himself had put the papers to one side and forgotten about them. And that every so often one or the other would talk about sending them in, but they hadn't done it yet because there didn't seem to be any rush. ‘But now we will,' he says. ‘And given that it's uncontested, it won't take long for it to be finalised, I'm sure.'

I'm trying to come to terms with the fact that Charles is married. He might not be living with Ariel, but he's married to her. And that changes everything.

‘No it doesn't,' he says when I say this. ‘It changes absolutely nothing. Both of us have had relationships since our separation. Nothing serious, certainly on my side. I don't know about hers.'

‘And the ring she wears?'

He looks at me in confusion.

‘On her wedding finger.'

‘It was her wedding ring.'

‘She's still wearing her wedding ring! Even though you're supposed to be getting a divorce.' I'm having to work to keep calm here.

‘From the minute she saw it, she wanted that ring,' he says. ‘It doesn't look like a wedding ring, so it's not really an issue if she wears it. It was a very expensive piece of jewellery, after all.'

I say nothing.

‘Anyhow, we're getting our respective solicitors on the case right away,' he continues. ‘I want nothing more than to marry you. You've got to believe me.'

‘And Ariel?'

‘She's happy to get the divorce over with too. She's certainly not going to throw a spanner in the works. I promise you our relationship is purely professional.'

‘OK,' I say slowly.

‘I love you,' says Charles. ‘I couldn't love you any more than I do.'

‘I love you too,' I tell him, and then I kiss him.

He carries me up to the bedroom, although the stairs are so narrow I bang my head on the wall.

Maybe that's why I see stars when we make love.