Page 51 of Coming Home to Winter Island
‘It lifts your heart to see the yellow flowers over the heath and moorland. It was everywhere when he was born that cold February morning, here at home. The gorse always reminds me of the day we became a family.’
‘Gorse? Is gorse something you use in the gin?’ I ask, suddenly excited.
‘Of course! The flowers brighten even the darkest of winter days here on the island.’ He chuckles. ‘They say that if the gorse is out of bloom, kissing is out of season! In other words, you can only kiss your beloved when the gorse is in bloom, which is great news, as the gorse is nearly always in bloom!’ As his laugh dies down, his eyes fill with memories once more, ‘It’s always there, the gorse, bringing colour to the island.’
I look at Lachlan and he smiles back at me. So, ingredient number two: gorse. The record comes to an end and I get up and select another one from this amazing collection. Songs from my growing-up. Music from the greats. I’m not sure when I’ve felt happier.
‘And then of course you have the wild juniper.’ Hector is on a roll, and our smiles grow even wider. ‘Gin isn’t gin without juniper. It’s the only stipulation. Otherwise it would just be flavoured vodka!’ He laughs. ‘And the fact that it’s wild is what makes it unique to the island. All the best wild juniper is down by the pine forest and the moorland on the other side of the burn, and then over on the dunes and the cliffs on the far side of the island. But you have to be careful not to get swept away by the wind. Nearly had me off my feet once!’ He smiles at the memory. ‘Always pick them before the frost gets to them, autumn time.’
‘Autumn?!’ I say.
‘And then dry them, or freeze them,’ he continues. ‘Got stacks in the cupboard in the distillery.’ Suddenly all his cupboard-emptying seems to make more sense. ‘But everyone knows you need juniper. That’s not one of the five special ingredients. Rosehips! That’s one! From the hedgerows on the lane around the island. Loved walking the dogs and picking the hips. Used to have four dogs, y’know. Gave one to my son.’
And I remember only too well the black Lab I grew up with when I was young.
‘And the others...no, can’t remember what happened to the others.’ He shakes his head, then sinks back into his chair and sips at his tea, spilling drops down his front that he doesn’t seem to notice. He looks tired, but very content, and soon drifts off. I stand and take the mug from his hands and pull one of the tartan blankets on the arm of the chair over him. The dogs raise their heads, then lower them again, as contented as their owner.
Lachlan takes the tray of tea things back to the kitchen.
‘So it really was the music that unlocked his memories,’ he says when he returns to the living room. ‘Just goes to show what I know about that stuff!’ He smiles, and something in me suddenly ignites, like one of the flames from the fire. A new track starts on the record player and Hector suddenly opens his eyes again.
‘Did I tell you about the pine forest where I proposed to Mairead? Kept me waiting for ages, she did!’
We both smile and I go to turn off the record player.
‘I think he’s exhausted,’ Lachlan says. ‘Maybe try some more tomorrow. How do you fancy coming down and introducing yourself to Aggie?’
‘Aggie?’
‘The gin still. Named after Hector’s mother, I believe, a fearsome type!’ His face lights up. ‘And we’ll see if we can find those juniper berries. Hector will sleep for a while now. Tomorrow we’ll go and find the gorse and rosehips.’
‘And the other ingredients,’ I say excitedly.
‘And the other ingredients.’ He nods and smiles as if placating an excited child, and my heart flips over with joy. Simple as that. The joy of just living in the here and now. I push any thoughts of my time here coming to an end out of my head.
Chapter Twenty-nine
The sky outside my window is bright orange, almost red. A long line of it along the horizon, beneath a line of cloud with shafts of red and yellow breaking through like beams of light. It illuminates the other islands in the distance and the rocky shoreline around the bay. It’s like there’s a fire burning all around me. It’s beautiful, and I can’t wait to get out and see it from the shoreline.
I pull on my trainers. They’re no longer brand new, waiting to be broken in at the vocal retreat. Now they’re covered in mud and, frankly, moulded to my feet, and possibly a bit whiffy too from where I’ve been out running every day now for just over the past three weeks.
Life has fallen into a pattern. I run, Lachlan goes out to see Aggie, the still, and works on trial batches of the gin. There have been tasting sessions too, where we’ve written notes and tried to think what might be missing. Then we work our way through the record collection, sitting with Hector, looking through old photographs and listening to stories of his life and my father’s here on the island. The days out fishing, the winter when the snow came, the big storm that knocked out the electrics at Hogmanay, the parties they threw in the house. And I don’t know when I’ve smiled and laughed as much as I have in these last few weeks, or eaten as well, or slept as well. We’ve also been checking the crowdfunding page. There’s a bit of interest. Not enough, though, and we really need to find a way to get some more. Time is beginning to run out.
I tie the trainers tightly, then put on my scarf and hat, no longer worried about my appearance, and grateful for their warmth. It might look glorious out there, but I’ve learnt one thing: however it looks, it will be bracing. But although the cold will hurt, it will make me feel like I can take on anything. And today, we need to try to work out the last of the ingredients. We have just over a week left now before the tea party and our crowdfunding deadline, and to get the deposit together for Hector’s place at the care home. And although it was great that Hector remembered the first three of the special ingredients, since then, he’s been on a loop, like a broken record, recalling the same memories and the same ingredients each time we put on music and start talking. The stories about him and Mairead getting engaged. The day my dad was born. The day they nearly lost the house and business but he went out walking and saw all the juniper berries on the heath and by the dunes and the gin saved them from going under...and then, nothing. He doesn’t seem to go any further. Why my dad left and never came back. Why I never knew this place or him. Why we can’t find the last two ingredients! We can’t seem to move forward at all. We’re stuck. I don’t think we’re going to do it, and I have no idea what to do if we don’t.
Annoyingly, Lachlan doesn’t seem that fazed. ‘Take your time. It’ll happen,’ he tells Hector, but I’m not sure it will, and part of me still thinks he doesn’t sense the urgency here. But I do have to leave and go back to my life, back to Joe. And Hector needs to go into the care home, because once I’m gone, it will be only Lachlan looking after him again, and he needs to move on too. Whatever happened between him and Isla, he clearly isn’t comfortable around her and Gordan. Getting this gin recipe matters, for everyone’s future. Without it, I may never make it to the healing retreat, Lachlan can’t leave the island and get away from his past, and Hector...well, what will happen to Hector if we can’t afford the nursing home? Where will he go?
I run downstairs and outside and nearly get swept off my feet by the vicious wind. It’s almost as if it wants to knock me off course, send me retreating inside. But I won’t.
I put my best foot forward, and once again am nearly blown over. I take my usual route, down to the edge of the bay and up the hill to the outcrop of rocks to say good morning to the seals. But even they’re not out today as the waves crash against the rocks, sending up arcs of salty white spray. The wind stinging my cheeks, I turn away and run towards the heath, where we found gorse for the gin, and on to the pine forest and the craggy mountains and the dunes where the juniper grows and the sea eagles nest. Every bit of this landscape is there in the gin, I think. What are we missing? They have to be here, the last two ingredients!
My feet pound the road, following the burn across the island, full to bursting, bubbling and tumbling as the rain starts to set in and I splash through puddles. I run up through the forest, remembering my treetop climb, and on to the cliffs, where I stop and drag in air whilst looking down at the white horses galloping into battle on the stony shore. A gust of wind suddenly flings itself at me, nearly knocking me off my feet. I feel my lungs filling with fresh, crisp air, making me feel light as a feather on my feet, lifted by the winds as I turn for home.
Home?! Where did that come from? Home is still a dingy flat that I haven’t seen in nearly four weeks, and where my poinsettia will most definitely have wilted. Winter Island can never be called home, I tell myself. We have to make the gin so we can sell it and get as much money as we can for Hector and his nursing home.
I wonder what this place is like in the spring. But I’ll be gone by then. Candlemas marks the start of spring. A new beginning for us all. Maybe I’ll come back, I tell myself. Come back and visit later in the year.What, when Hector’s dead and buried?I can hear Lachlan’s voice in my head and shake it off. My thoughts are as dark and brooding as the sky around me. Somehow right now I can’t imagine not seeing Hector again...or Lachlan for that matter, I realise. I can’t imagine not seeing Lachlan.
I throw myself in through the front door of the house.
