Page 55 of For One Moment With You
As boarding commenced, I joined the slow-moving queue, where I had a sudden out-of-body moment that planted me firmly back in England, getting out of bed when Gareth did, cleaning our already clean house, then if I wasn’t working, which I hadn’t been for some while now, going for a walk to Selham railway station. If not every day, most days – and mostly because hardly anyone else ever went there and I liked to be alone.
Except that’s not quite true, is it?Tallulah’s voice popped into my head.
‘Oh, be quiet,’ I said out loud, suddenly self-conscious as a number of faces turned to look at me.
I smiled at the woman just behind me. ‘Lovely day, isn’t it?’ I said overly brightly, realising too late, she probably didn’t understand a word of English, added to which she was probably thinking I was losing it, which, quite possibly, I actually was. Head down, I stayed silent as I shuffled along with the queue until we reached the plane.
After shoving my jacket into an overhead locker, I squeezed myself into the seat I’d been allocated. The middle seat, rather than the aisle or window, which to my mind was the least desirable seat. But on a full flight, I supposed someone had to sit there.
In any case, it wasn’t a long flight. Less than two hours, which would have been fine if it wasn’t for the relentless rap from the earphones to my right, or the loud snores from the man to my left. But these were small annoyances in the grand scheme of things. Sitting back, I pictured the increasing miles between myself and Gareth, a smile spreading slowly across my face.
I was fast getting used to travelling. I mean, even peering past someone else, there was an incredible view from the window. And it was eye-opening. And multicultural: the cities I’d seen, the people and different cultures; languages, too. It was too easy to forget there was a whole big world beyond tiny, sodden little England.
But Lizzie never forgot that. Lizzie’s eye had been firmly on the bigger picture long before cancer came along.
Our lives are so insular, Tilly. Tiny little bubbles we never step outside of. When you look at the rest of the world you wonder, why don’t you?
At the time, I didn’t know what she meant. But then I was one of Lizzie’s insular people, living in my little bubble. More to the point, I was perfectly happy that way until my world fell apart. Happy in a blinkered kind of way… Except, was I really happy? And it’s slightly disconcerting to think of the scale of what had to happen for me to even begin to prise my eyes open.
But it was too much to figure out that morning. After landing in Athens and disembarking, I reclaimed my suitcase and made my way through the busy airport, somehow finding my way outside and onto a train that took me to the port, and another terminal where I waited to board the ferry.
Standing there in the sunshine, I took in the boats and ferries coming and going; the sound of the water. Airports and ferry terminals were prime places for people watching I was discovering, and I studied the other passengers waiting with me, amongst them several young backpackers, which made me think of my boys. A Greek family with three small, excited children. An old man with a white beard and a walking stick. A girl with long brown hair and sad eyes. I found myself wondering what their stories were.
I watched the ferry arrive and dock, then, half an hour later, we were called to start boarding. There was a surge of people as out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the old man struggle to his feet then attempt to pick up his bag. I hesitated then started walking over to help him – old habits die hard. In any case, it was part of my make-up that I couldn’t abide seeing anyone in difficulty. But one of the young backpackers beat me to it, taking the old man’s bag, then his arm before helping him slowly towards the ferry.
See? You’re not the only person who likes helping people, I reminded myself. And it was good to see a nice young man doing something like that. Then I stopped myself. Was it really so unusual? Or was it more about the way I’d chosen to look at the world?
On board, I stood outside on the deck as the ferry pulled away, watching the port fading into the mist behind us, liking that just for a few hours, I was uncontactable. I suddenly realised that the last few days had gone in a blur and that the house would have been valued by now. Just the thought made my heart beat faster. But there was nothing more I could do. While I was away from England that was in Gareth’s hands.
Thinking of Gareth… I got out my phone and reread the text he sent a few days ago.
Gareth
If you’ve gone away, there’s no point in waiting. We may as well put the house on the market. Let me know if you have any objections. By the way, you might have left it tidy. The estate agent said there were bags all over the place.
Not once had he mentioned the boys, but it clearly hadn’t occurred to him to think of them. And up till now, I hadn’t responded. Quietly seething, I typed my reply.
Tilly
It was you who was in such a hurry to get things moving. Honestly, what do you expect? If you bother to go around there, Gareth, you’ll see I’ve left you a note about what to do with everything. You also need to speak to the boys about this. And yes, there are a few bags, but nothing you can’t cope with.
I stopped myself from adding,maybe Olivia would like to help you, seeing as she’s had a hand in this. And it took iron will, but I managed not to. After all, the sun was shining and I was on my way to Crete. Poor Gareth was stuck in gloomy old England, I thought sarcastically, about to become a father again when he still hadn’t got his head around the first time it happened.
And the boys were fine, I reminded myself. As long as that remained the case, I had nothing to worry about.
It wasn’t the shortest of ferry crossings – seven and a half hours to be precise, which was quite a long time to be sitting doing nothing, an experience that was completely alien to me. But having failed to bring a book with me, I gazed through the windows and studied the islands we were passing, taking in the white sand of the beaches dotted with bars and tavernas, the many fishing boats moored a little way out to sea.
As more time passed, I settled in for some serious people watching. There were the seasoned travellers lounging at tables, totally at ease, as if they did this every day. Greek people of various ages, a family speaking what to my untuned ear sounded vaguely like French. Not a single other Brit, I noticed with amusement that was followed by relief that there was no one I felt the need to have the most superficial conversation with, let alone explain myself to. Though it would have been nice to have Elena here, I couldn’t help thinking.
But it meant, in short, I was free to be myself. Which was a whole other thing, because if I wasn’t Tilly the hub any more, who the heck was I?
I was still me, I reminded myself. So Gareth and I were no more; the house would soon be on the market. But honestly, so what? People were funny creatures, I was realising. We took ourselves so seriously – and I should know. After all, I was as guilty as anyone else, constantly worrying about what everyone else thought, weighing myself down with unnecessary stuff. Take the contents of our house that I’d been agonising over. My emotional connection to flipping sofas and a table, for frick’s sake, not to mention the routines and obligations that had come to dominate my life.
It was something of a revelation to realise that far from feeling pointless without them, I was finding their absence positively liberating. But this whole journey had already been filled with revelations, of which my ridiculously oversized suitcase was oddly symbolic; the way I’d lugged it on and off far too many trains. I made a note to self to dramatically reduce the contents once I got to Crete, if not throw it away altogether. You see, it didn’t need to be like this, did it? Being loaded down with clutter I didn’t need. I had a choice.
Talking of obligations, I wondered how my dad was doing. It made me sad, thinking about my dad. I mean, he had so much to be grateful for. But he was intent on living such a small, lonely life, his glass forever half empty. It didn’t occur to him that it could be any different. It was the religion in him, I couldn’t help thinking. That melting pot of guilt and suffering he subscribed to. I couldn’t imagine him embarking on a journey such as I was on.
But we are all different; not everyone wants to leave their life, step into the unknown with the contents of a rather battered and oversized suitcase. The comfort of home is a lot to give up. And I probably wouldn’t have been on that ferry had my marriage not come to an end. Lizzie, I know would have loved my adventure. As would my mum. But what they most would have loved was that I was doing it for me.
