Page 42 of The Little Island Flower Stall
Bella did as she was asked, and Celestine set about wiping each book.
‘Can I look?’ Bella asked, reaching for one of the clean ones.
‘Yes, of course,’ Celestine replied vaguely.
Bella pulled the top book from the pile and opened it. This one seemed to contain more recent photos – at least they were all in colour. She didn’t know many of the people in them so assumed they were either distant family members she couldn’t remember or friends and neighbours she’d never met. With a cursory interest in each page, she worked quickly through the album and then put it back on the table before taking the next one from the stack. This one contained more of the same. Terrible as it made her feel, Bella wasn’t really interested in any of this, even though it was telling her a lot about Celestine’s life. She didn’t feel any connection to any of these people, save their connection to her great-aunt.
‘Oh, here’s some of you,’ Celestine said, handing a book she’d just wiped over to Bella, opened at the page.
Bella smiled at the collection of images. They were all taken on the same day by the looks of things, featuring her parents sitting in the garden of Villa Rosa, a grumpy-looking Uncle Roland by their side, and Bella herself as a toddler on her mother’s lap. Bella had seen versions of this scene in her parents’ collection, but they were taken from different angles and had Celestine in them with her dad missing, so she’d assumed he’d taken those ones. It was lovely to see these with her dad in there, Celestine’s absence from them suggesting she’d taken these.
‘You were a bonny little thing,’ Celestine said.
‘You mean I was fat…?’
Celestine smiled as she started to wipe down the next album. ‘I’d never say that, but you did love your food.’
‘Still do,’ Bella said. ‘But I have to watch what I pack away these days.’
‘Rubbish,’ Celestine said. ‘You have nothing to worry about – you look lovely.’
‘It’s a shame Sean doesn’t agree with you.’
‘Well…the less said about that man the better. I never took to him, you know. I would never have said anything about it, of course, but I had my reservations even from the handful of times I met him.’
‘Feel free to let rip now – there’s nothing you can say that will upset me where he’s concerned – he’s done a decent job of that all by himself. He’s put me off men for good.’
Celestine looked up from her dusting and raised her eyebrows. ‘What about your new gentleman friend?’
‘Rory?’ Bella flushed. She’d almost forgotten she’d told her aunt about him. ‘We’re friends, nothing else. I’ve only just met him.’
‘But you had dinner together.’
‘Not inthatway. We just happened to get talking, both fancied the museum, and then we both wanted to eat afterwards so we grabbed something. It was just a casual meal.’
‘If you say so.’
‘Aunt Celestine,’ Bella began with a wry smile, ‘you’re surely not saying that men and women can’t be friends without there being something more to it? I’d have thought you more enlightened than that.’
‘Then why did you blush when I mentioned him?’ Bella’s mouth dropped open, and Celestine started to chuckle. ‘I’m afraid you dug your own hole there.’
Bella reached for another album and opened it up. It contained photos that were obviously older than all the ones she’d seen so far. ‘Who’s this?’ she asked, holding it up to show Celestine a sepia print of a woman in a stiff dress sitting on a high-backed chair with a basket of flowers at her feet. It looked as if it might have been taken in a studio set of some kind.
‘That’s my mother. That was the last photo I have of her – she died shortly afterwards.’
‘When was that?’
‘1940.’
‘The year the island was occupied by the Germans?’ Bella frowned at the photo and tried to imagine her great-aunt, not only under the jackboot of an invading army but also still in mourning for her mum, but she couldn’t. It was surely too much pain and turmoil for anyone to come through unscathed. It was no wonder her aunt chose not to talk about those years.
‘Yes.’
‘So your dad had to look after you?’
‘He had too much to do for that. I did what I could around the house to help him and kept myself busy. I had my little brother – your grandfather – to think of too. There was only me to look after him.’
‘How old were you then?’
