‘Look, Del, I don’t know what this is about. We agreed it wasn’t working for us out here and that we’d move home.’
‘We agreed it wasn’t working for us,’ I say.
He breathes out, exasperated. ‘We’re going to miss the ferry if you don’t get a move on. I have to drop the keys with the estate agent before we go.’
I hear the banging of truck doors, the engine starting up. And then a crunching on gravel as it starts to edge forward from under the trees. There’s a beep. Ollie and I step outside. Lexie is at the wheel, sticks an arm out of the window and waves.
‘See you in Blighty!’ calls Mr Broderick, from the other window, and they begin down the drive.
‘They’re leaving! We have to go!’ says Ollie, frustrated and angry. The wind whips up around us.
I could stop the truck, tell them to unpack it, that I’m not leaving. But I watch it go, my old life driving off down the lane.
Call it some kind of mistral madness, early menopause, bereavement, all the things I’m feeling, but suddenly a weight lifts off my shoulders as my past disappears down the lane.
Ollie rants at me some more. But I’m not listening. I’ve never felt more certain of anything. I’m not going back to my old life with him. We’re over. Finally, the cracks are wide open and the ceiling is on the floor. Now all I have to do is work out what kind of ceiling I want to put up. Not the same as before, not that awful, miserable one.
‘We have to go now!’ Ollie says, getting more and more cross.
‘Ollie, I’m not going back with you. Leave me the key. I’ll take it to the estate agent and I’ll let you know my plans.’ I hold out my hand.
‘Do you need a doctor?’ He cocks his head.
Instead of feeling his concern, I feel patronized.
‘No, Ollie.’ I smile. ‘I need what you need … I need not to go back.’
‘You’re being ridiculous! You’re … upset! You’re …’
‘I’m right, Ollie. This is right. You know it. We were just papering over the cracks, coming here. Now give me the key and you go.’
He stares at me and I know he’s not going to argue any more. He’s put up a good show, but I sense that he knows I’m right. He looks at the big ornate key in his hand then slowly, ever so slowly, he passes it to me and swallows, hard.
‘I need to go,’ he says quickly. ‘I need to get the ferry. The removal people are expecting us … me.’
‘You go,’ I say, calmer than I’ve felt in a long time.
‘You’re stressed! It’s just the move, everything else.’
I take a deep breath. There’s a trace of the old Ollie now, the one I married, the one I loved, the one who cared. He pushes his hair off his face and attempts a reassuring smile. ‘It’s your mum, the baby thing. You’ll change your mind, realize this is just madness.’
The baby thing was where life took different directions for us, with me unable to become a mum and losing my own. The Ollie I married left me then.
‘I’m not coming back with you, Ollie.’
‘I’m not staying!’ he retorts. ‘Mad country. Nothing works! Impossible to make a living. I need to get going. Now, I’m giving you one last chance. Are you getting in the car and coming with me?’ He stares at me, challenging me.
I lift my chin and stare back. ‘No,’ I say. ‘I’m not.’
And he throws his hands up into the air. He lets out a huge ‘Phhhhffff!’ of exasperation and stomps to his car. Then he reaches in and pulls out my holdall, with my clothes and wash things in it to tide me over until we’d found a place to live and unpacked. He dumps it furiously on the drive in the dust. I don’t move.
‘Madness!’ he repeats, standing by the door. ‘I mean it! I’m leaving!’ He sounds like a parent threatening a child, unsure whether to go through with it. ‘I won’t be turning back!’ Then when I say nothing he gets into his car, turns on the engine and, with only the swiftest hesitation, shoots off down the drive in a cloud of dust. The last of my old life leaving without me. I watch the car disappear down the lane, then look down to see Ralph sitting at my feet. Well, nearly all of my old life.
‘Looks like it’s just you and me now.’ I bend down and rub his ears. He barks happily. I look at the key and close my hand around it. Like a plaster that’s been ripped off a wound, it hurts, hurts like anything to watch him go but already the pain is easing. I couldn’t go back. But I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do now.
THREE
The next morning I wake with a crick in my neck to the sound of birds singing. Not a whole morning chorus, but each bird being allowed to sing his own part – except the wood pigeon, which wants to sing over everybody else, and the cockerel in the distance heralding a new day. But apart from that, nothing. Silence. The mistral has gone as suddenly as it arrived. Came in, whipped up a storm, caused chaos and left a whole different landscape.
My phone buzzes in my jeans pocket, catapulting me back to reality. I open my eyes: my cheek is against the cool porcelain of the bath where I slept the night. Instead of what I’d thought was a warm blanket over me, Ralph is lying on top of me, for comfort and warmth. I’m suddenly very grateful to the mad bundle of curly fur. I might not have felt quite the same when Ollie brought him home as a gift after my final cycle of IVF had failed. For Ollie it was like a full stop on that part of our lives, but to me it was like he was offering me a baby replacement. To begin with, I couldn’t accept the dog into my life, especially when Ollie suggested calling him Eddie – one of my favourite baby names had been Edward. Ollie was clearly trying to do something kind – he was kind. He would often do really thoughtful things, like making a drink for me after a hard day, driving me into town to meet up with my friends on a night out, and he always remembered birthdays and anniversaries.
The puppy became Ralph because I would never have called a little boy Ralph. I knew a Ralph once, a long time ago, before I met Ollie. He’d been funny and adoring, not in the least bit reliable, and loved every person he met. It seemed a very suitable name for the bundle that had just landed in my life. Ralph slept with us from the first night, and as he grew and spread, sleeping right across the bed, so did the distance between us with every day that passed.
Ollie threw himself into the idea of France, freelancing from home. I carried on working but now had a dog in my life that needed feeding, walking and apologizing for when he ran off in the park and covered passers-by with muddy pawprints as he threw himself at them. Ralph became another thing on my to-do list. But now here he was, keeping me warm as I lay in the empty bath. Last night, I went from relieved at the decision to cut the cord with Ollie to wondering what the hell I’d done in letting him drive off without me. Eventually, exhausted, I had curled up in a tight ball, my back to the bathroom wall, arms over my head, and wondered if he had been right. What on earth was I doing alone in an empty house, when all my belongings and my husband of ten years were on their way back to the UK? Would I regret this? Was my decision another symptom of my early menopause?
My mind started to replay everything about our relationship, from how we met to how I’d ended up sleeping in the bath in an empty old farmhouse in the south of France.