I can hear her clonking about upstairs, her tottering heels tapping on the wood floor. I’ll ring Bill as soon as she’s gone. I can’t cope with her. She’s too colourful. Too brash. Too loud. She never stops talking and I know from just one meeting that I won’t be able to turn her volume down to a manageable level. She has to go.
I’ve only thrown a few things in the drawers when I run out of energy and lie on the bed. I’ve a headache coming. A regular occurrence these days. Sometimes it feels as if I have too many thoughts in my brain and too little space in which to hold them. They clang against the inside of my skull, fighting for space, pressing against the back of my eyes ready to burst out in a shower of pain. I have some tablets, somewhere, but I feel too weighted down to get up and find them. Closing my eyes, I try to block out the tippy-tappy of Marilyn’s heels and tune into the soothing sounds of the seaside instead.
I’ve just got my breathing under control and my eyes are feeling heavy when Marilyn switches on the vacuum. Believe me, Bill’s boat doesn’t need hoovering. There’s not a speck of dust anywhere. She can only be a minute – five at the most. I’ll grit my teeth until she’s done. While she crashes and bashes about, I work on deepening my breath and, just when I think I might be starting to achieve a trance-like state, Marilyn starts to sing over the sound of the cleaner. ‘Jolene’. It’s not what I want to hear at the best of times and certainly not now.
With an exasperated tut, I reach for my handbag and pull out my earphones. I plug them into my iPhone and flick to the most soothing music I can find, but it’s no good, I’m still competing with Marilyn who’s joyfully murdering Dolly Parton. Giving up with the earphones, I lie there grinding my molars as she moves on to ‘Islands in the Stream’ at full blast, hitting almost one note in three. Then, when I think I’m about to turn into a screaming banshee, the hoover falls silent and so does Marilyn. I let out a relieved sigh and try to relax my clenched jaw.
A few moments later, she shouts. ‘See you at the same time tomorrow, sweetheart! I’ve left my phone number in case you want me to pick anything up on my way in! Just give me a tinkle. Byeeeeeeeee!’
Then the front door bangs and the boat, as sturdy as it is, shudders.
I let out a long, wavering breath. ‘Bloody hell. What a whirlwind.’ I have to ring Bill and get him to cancel her. I can’t handle anyone so vibrant, so full of life, so happy.
Then I feel sorry for myself and I cry because I never know what else to do.
Chapter Five
When I’ve pulled myself together again and have dozed for a bit, I make my way back onto the main deck and curl up on the sofa in the living room with a soft blanket tucked round my knees. I’m perpetually cold, as if all the blood has stopped moving round my body.
Turning on my phone, I see that there are seventeen messages, only one of them from Bill.
I delete all the others, then call Bill back. ‘Hello, bro.’
‘You got there all right then,’ he says. ‘I was just beginning to wonder.’
‘I’d have called as soon as I got here, but I’ve been talking to Marilyn,’ I tell him. ‘Or rather she’s been talking to me.’
‘Ah. Forgot to tell you about Marilyn. She’s great, isn’t she? Chatty.’
‘Very.’ I hope he hears the disapproval in my tone. ‘I don’t need babysitting, Bill. I don’t need “chatty”. I need quiet. Preferably silence.’ I hug my knees to me. ‘I’m perfectly fine.’
‘You’re not,’ he points out. ‘Otherwise, you’d be here at work with me doing the hotel refit presentation that I’m currently putting together.’
Guilt tugs at my heartstrings. ‘Have I left you completely in the lurch?’ Bill has been so good to me that I don’t like to think of him having to take up the slack while I’m away licking my wounds.
‘Of course you have. But that’s fine. I understand and I want you to take this time to regroup. Stay there as long as you need. As soon as you’re ready to get back on your game, I’ll be waiting.’
‘You’re too good to me.’ Just talking to my brother makes me come over all teary again. ‘No other employer would put up with me running away.’
‘I’m your brother first, employer second. All I want is for you to be happy again.’
‘At the moment, I can’t see that ever happening.’
‘You never know what’s around the corner,’ Bill says. ‘Good or bad. It’s still early days.’
That’s what everyone says. That’s what I don’t want to hear any more.
‘Relax, kick back,’ Bill continues. ‘Do whatever you need to do.’
‘I love you,’ I tell him. ‘What would I do without you?’
‘Let’s never find out.’ Then he hesitates before saying, ‘Have you heard from Chris?’
‘He’s left a ton of messages, but I don’t want to speak to him.’
‘You’ll have to at some point.’
Bill’s right, as usual. ‘But not yet.’
‘He’s called me too, but I haven’t replied either.’
‘You won’t tell him where I am?’
‘Of course not. He’ll get a piece of my mind when I speak to him.’
‘Save your breath.’ Chris only hears what he wants to.
‘He is bang out of order,’ Bill says, crossly.
‘I know that, you know that,’ I placate. ‘I’m not sure Chris will have the same view.’
I hear someone else speak in the background then Bill says, ‘Sorry but I have to rush off, Jodie. Anything else I can do for you, before I go?’
‘Cancel Marilyn,’ I beg.
‘No. She’s adorable. You’ll get used to her. I want her to keep an eye on you.’
I tut at him as if we’re children again. ‘She’s not adorable. She’s annoying.’
‘Give her a chance,’ my brother pleads. ‘For me.’
Bill has always looked after me. He’s been the best big brother I could have ever had. He’s been my protector, my champion. Yet even Bill couldn’t shield me from what happened.
‘I’m not going to be necking a bottle of voddy every day,’ I assure him.
‘Good to hear.’ Then some tapping of keys in the background. ‘I don’t want to go, but I have to shoot,’ Bill says. ‘Meeting in five.’
‘What?’
‘The big eco-hotel project. First face-to-face. It’s inching forward.’
I’m glad to hear there’s some movement. We pitched to do the interior design for a fabulous new project of an eco-hotel set on the very edge of the New Forest. It looks amazing. This one has been on the back burner for a long time as securing the planning permission has been a long, drawn-out process. ‘That’s something I really want to work on.’
‘Better get your shit together pretty smartish then,’ he teases.
‘I love you,’ I say again. ‘Thanks for this.’
‘How do you like the boat? Cool, eh?’