Page 43 of A Part of Me and You
When a fifteen-year-old girl bounds into your shop, begging you to take her horse-riding because her dying mother is too tired, or too allergic, or too whatever to join her, what on earth are you supposed to say? I can’t exactly say no to that, can I, no matter how much it petrifies me to even think about it?
‘Didn’t your mum say she wanted you to go out on the boat today?’ I ask Rosie, whose face is perfectly made up just as mine was yesterday. She looks the least likely person I have ever seen to go horse-riding, with makeup like that plastered on her face.
‘She was meant to but they can’t take us today and all we’ve done all day is walk the beach! I’ve never walked so much in my entire life.’
‘Does she know you’re here?’ I ask her. I look at the clock. It’s just after four and I have only had two customers today so I suppose I could shut up shop early. It’s a beautiful day outside and I tend to find that on those days, most tourists and locals like to flock to the sea rather than the shops, not that I blame them.
‘She warned me under no circumstances to come here and ask you,’ says Rosie, ‘but to be honest, I can’t sit in that cottage for any longer watching daytime TV or trying to get phone signal when it just isn’t happening. So, what do you think? Horse-riding? Me and you? Date?’
She fingers through the rails of clothing as she talks to me, her head tilted to the side as she chews gum and again I get that awful flashback feeling to when I was her age, so innocent to the way my world was about to be tipped upside down around me, never to be the same again.
‘Well, you aren’t going to go horse-riding in those clothes?’ I say to her, taking in her long loose sweater, shorts and flip flops. ‘You’d better go home and get changed.’
She almost jumps out of her skin with excitement.
‘So, we can go then? O-M-G you are like the coolest person ever! I actually love you right now! Thank you!’
‘Meet me back here at five,’ I tell her. ‘I need to make a phone call to make it happen but it shouldn’t be a problem. Deal?’
‘Deal, total deal!’ she says, and she bounds out of the shop into the sunshine and I smile from the tips of my toes at the joy such a simple gesture has given her. That poor little girl. The happier she can be over the next few weeks, the better.
But before I can make that happen, I have to face another of my own fears. I have to step out of my comfort zone and reach out to the people of Killara who I have hidden from for so long; but as much as it frightens me, I don’t think for a second that they will let me down.
Matt calls me when I am coming out of the shower, back at the house where I have laid out my jodhpurs and a t-shirt on the bed.
‘You’re going where?’ he asks, and just like Rosie, the joy in his voice is tangible.
‘I’m going horse-riding on the beach,’ I tell him and I can’t help but smile in return. ‘I know, I know, don’t die of shock. I am actually doing something that doesn’t involve my work or you or this house or the dog.’
‘Wow,’ he says to me ‘I am seriously, seriously over the moon with that! Fantastic! Amazing, Shell!’
He lets out a noise of celebration that sounds a bit like a ‘woo hoo’ and I tell him to calm down already. It’s not really that big a deal. Okay, it is, but still.
‘Who are these people?’ he asks me. ‘Where do I send them some champagne and flowers for making my wife do something fun at last? At last! Lunch yesterday, horse riding today?’
I sit on the edge of the bed and check the clock radio on my bedside locker and realize I only have ten minutes to get back to the shop and meet Rosie.
‘I’ll explain all to you later,’ I say to him. ‘It’s a long story and I really have to rush but it’ll be worth the wait. I’ve to meet Rosie at five and it’s almost that already.’
‘Ah Shell, you said that to me last night when you were too tired to talk,’ he says and I feel so bad for not taking time to explain. ‘Are they old friends of yours? Your long-lost family? Who?’
‘It’s all good,’ I say to him, trying to put on my socks as I cradle the phone under my ear. ‘I mean it, it’s worth waiting on to hear the full story and you will never believe it. I’ll call you straight after and fill you in. You are going to love it.’
‘Alright, alright go and have some fun,’ he tells me. ‘And send some pics. I need to see the evidence of this, okay?’
I put the phone on loudspeaker and drop it on the bed as I squeeze into my jodhpurs. It has been a long time and thank goodness I haven’t put on any weight. If anything, they’re a bit loose on me but that’s exactly what I expected.
‘Did you have a good day?’ I ask him. ‘How’s France?’
‘I’ll tell you all about that later too,’ he replies. ‘Now go quickly before you’re stood up. I am so freaking happy right now. I love you Shell.’
I gulp as he says those words that he has been so patient with, waiting all the time for me to say it back to him but I can’t know or feel if I love anyone when I don’t even love myself anymore. I may be taking very tiny baby steps right now but I’ve a long way to go and I don’t want to lie to him by saying it just for the sake of it. I want to learn to love him again like he deserves to be loved and I won’t say it until I know that that’s absolutely true. I want to feel it.
‘I know you do,’ I tell him. ‘I’ll call you later and I’ll send you some evidence. Enjoy dinner with Bert! Tell him I said hi!’
The slight pause illustrates his disappointment and I want to kick myself for being so cold and so honest. I can’t say ‘I love you’ back, I just can’t. I try to but the words stick in my throat. I can’t say it until I know I really mean it from my very core and although I am starting to finally ‘feel’ again, I still have quite a bit to go.
‘I’ll tell Bert you said hi,’ Matt says to me. ‘Have fun, babe. You deserve it more than anyone I know.’
