A Place In France Read online

  “Yes, all sorted,” Roger said, sitting down on the newly revealed space. “But the kids aren’t back yet.”

  “Our daughter and her husband have descended for a few days, and they’ve gone out to lunch in Angouleme,” Felicity said.

  “Yes. They’re in their late twenties, about your age, I should say. So when you come round to dinner tomorrow night it’ll be nice for you and your husband to have some people your own age to talk to, instead of us crusty old farts. Where is your husband, by the way?”

  “Roger! For goodness sake. I haven’t even got around to inviting them yet.”

  “Oh, right then. But now I’ve done if for you. So what do you say? Mary and Alan are coming, too. ”

  He peered over at them, his brown eyes magnified by his glasses.

  He’s right, came the uncharitable thought. Everyone here is so old. Will this end up depressing me?

  She cleared her throat, annoyed with herself for being mean about these kind, warm people, even if he had just made it impossible for her to say no. “Sure. We’d love to, thanks for asking.”

  “Good. When Winter comes, we can get pretty isolated here in Fixard, it’s nice to feel that there are actual, living people around you that you know, even if you don’t see them from one day or week to the next.”

  “I guess so,” Flick said, an unbidden shudder trailing icy fingers down her spine.

  This is what you wanted, remember? Peace and quiet, away from the hustle and bustle of the city.

  “Oh, I just remembered,” Felicity said suddenly, interrupting them. “Have you seen the weather forecast? There’s a storm coming tonight, so make sure you shut your shutters, and prepare yourself for a power-cut – they are a fact of life here, unfortunately.”

  “A storm?” she asked, genuinely surprised. “In June? That’s unusual, surely? I had no idea, we’ve been travelling the past few days and haven’t been online or seen any TV.”

  “Yes, it’s not the norm, but that’s global warming for you, I suppose,” Felicity said, rummaging through her handbag. “And I bought you these, because like I say, there’s bound to be a power-cut.”

  Felicity handed her a packet of long, red candles.

  “Oh. Thank you. You don’t have to give us these, I’m sure we’ve got candles somewhere.”

  “Don’t be silly, it’s nothing.”

  “Okay. Thank you. I guess I don’t know where the candles are – or if we even have any.”

  “How’s your French?” Roger asked. “Me and Felicity are pretty fluent so if you need help setting up your internet and phoneline, we’re happy to help.”

  “Yes, of course we are. But we must warn you, these things take an age in France to do…”

  But Flick wasn’t really listening.

  A storm in June. How strange.

  Felicity jumped to her feet. “Well, I think we’ve more than outstayed our welcome. And that poor husband of yours is upstairs trying to rest, we must be driving him crazy with our chitter-chatter.”

  “Yes, of course,” Roger said, he too getting to his feet. “Is your husband sick?”

  “Migraine. It’s been a tough couple of days.”

  “Yes, I’m sure. Come on, Roger, let’s leave these fine people to it. So we’ll see you both tomorrow night, then? Say, at ours at about seven?”

  “Yes, that sounds lovely, thank you.”

  They said their goodbyes and Flick found herself alone once more. She stood in the middle of the large living space, the oppressive silence of the house wrapping around her.

  Despite the warmth of the day, she was alarmed to discover that her arms had broken out in a rash of goose-bumps as she hugged herself.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  In the absence of Felicity and Roger, she tried to continue with the unpacking, but her heart wasn’t in it. Her head felt groggy and she regretted the whiskey.

  “Sod it,” she muttered, looking at the clock. It was almost three. Maybe, if she made something proper to eat, she could entice Tom out of the bed.

  Thankfully, as basic as it was, the kitchen was fully equipped and they had brought some food with them from England. She located the bacon and eggs in the fridge, noticing that they were running pretty low on supplies.

  We really need to do a shop as soon as Tom gets his lazy arse out of the bed.

  Immediately, she felt guilty for being so unsympathetic to his headache. But headache or not, she needed company, dammit. She really didn’t want to spend their first day in their new house alone.

  When the bacon and eggs were done, she left them in the pan and made a coffee to take up to Tom.

  It was dark up in the bedroom, the shutters closed.

  “Tom?” she said in a loud whisper, hovering in the doorway. “Are you awake?”

  That question quite possibly had to be the most irritating question in the world, but right then she didn’t care. She needed him to wake up, and she needed him to do so now.

  He groaned softly and rolled over onto his side facing away from her, pulling the duvet up to his chin.

  She went to him and sat down on the rapidly deflating airbed, in the ‘C’ shape his body made between his knees and his chest. Ever so gently, she rocked his shoulder.

  “Tom? I brought you coffee.”

  He groaned, louder this time and muttered something that she didn’t catch. A fresh wave of irritation washed over her and she shook him that much harder.

  “Get off,” he slurred, shrugging away from her touch and shuffling backwards on the bed, making both of them rock on the mattress like they were on a dinghy cast out to sea.

  “Tom! It’s the middle of the afternoon. Here, I’ve brought you coffee…”

  Her words were cut dead when he flew upright, his arms flailing, smacking the mug of black coffee out of her hand.

  “Fuck off,” he shouted, shocking her to the core.

  The mug went clattering to the floor, the boiling liquid hitting her square in the chest and torso. She flinched in horror, the sting of the burn not yet registering, temporarily delayed by the shock.

  She stared at him incredulously, her brain momentarily wiped off all emotion and thought. He was sitting upright, his bare chest heaving and his expression blank. The look in his eyes chilled her to the core. He looked so cold, so unlike the Tom that she knew and loved. Even during his breakdown, she had never seen him look like that.

  He looks like a monster.

  Slowly, she became aware of the sting in her flesh as the burn kicked in.

  “You bastard,” she said softly, finding her voice at last.

  To her dismay, Tom just laughed – a low, throaty chuckled that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.

  She got shakily to her feet, almost falling over as she staggered away from him on trembling legs.

  “You bastard,” she said, louder this time. “You complete fucking bastard.”

  Flick had never sworn at her husband, not like this. But then, she reasoned, he had never tipped a mug of boiling water over her before, and then laughed about it.

  “What the fuck has gotten into you?” she shakily asked.

  He just continued to stare at her in that strange, cold, emotionless way, and she got the distinct impression that she wasn’t looking at her husband at all anymore.

  She backed away from the bed, towards the door. Just as her back nudged the wall next to the door, his face seemed to change. It was a visible thing – his whole face seemed to crumple, emotion surging back into his eyes like a light had been turned on in his head.

  “Flick?” he said, his voice strained and high-pitched, like a child’s about to burst into tears. “What’s going on?”

  “What’s going on?” she repeatedly. “Shouldn’t that be my line?”

  “Flick…” he started, but his voice trailed off as if he couldn’t find the words.

  Tears sprang into her eyes and she stepped backwards out into the hallway. “Just leave me alone,” she managed to get o
ut before the tears took hold.

  In the bathroom, she turned on the shower to cold and stepped under the icy spray. Flinching and sucking in a sharp intake of breath as the cold water pelted her skin, she forced herself to stand still and for the water to work its magic.

  Dimly, over the hiss of the shower, she was aware of a knock at the bathroom door. She ignored it and rested her palms against the shower wall, trying to stem the uncontrollable sobbing and the way her body was violently trembling. Her heart was pounding in her chest and nausea clenched in her guts. On some level, she was aware that this was a wild overreaction on her part to what was essentially just a spilled cup of coffee, and a man waking up suddenly with a headache and not knowing what he was doing as he was still half-asleep.

  The knocking at the door grew progressively louder and more assertive. Now Tom was calling out to her, too:

  “Flick! Open the door! Are you hurt? I’m so sorry, I was still asleep, I was having a nightmare. Flick!”

  If he knocks any louder, he’ll break the damn door down.

  With trembling hands, she fumbled with the knob of the shower and opened the cubicle door a crack so that she could better speak and hear.

  “Just give me a moment, okay? I’ve had boiling liquid poured over me and I need to take out the burn. Do you think you can give me five minutes? Please?”

  The knocking and rattling of the door abruptly ceased. “Fine. I’m sorry. I’ll wait for you downstairs.”

  She didn’t bother replying and cranked up the shower once more, forcing herself to relax under the ice-cold spray of the water.

  Ten minutes later, when her flesh was like a block of ice to the touch and her teeth were chattering, she turned off the water. Standing before the mirror above the sink, she grabbed the nearest towel and gently dabbed at the red skin of her chest and stomach.

  Fresh tears prickled her eyes when she saw how red her skin was, but she pushed them back down again.

  No, come on, get a grip. It was an accident.

  Her reflection stared back at her, her eyes as red as the skin of her torso. She looked so pathetic, so scared, and much younger than her thirty-eight years. Her big blue eyes stared back at her, as mournful as a kid’s, and she had never felt so lost and hopeless in her entire life.

  You’re being ridiculous, she told herself. It was an accident, and he was still asleep.

  Not caring that her skin was still wet and that her hair was plastered to her back, she pulled on the flowery dress.

  Time for her to go down and face the music.

  “Baby, I’m so sorry,” Tom said as soon as she entered the downstairs, open-plan living space. “I thought I was still dreaming, I didn’t know what I was doing.”

  During her shower, he had pulled on some clothes, and he was wearing a pair of battered, faded old Levi’s and a white t-shirt that perfectly highlighted his extraordinary physique. When the doctors had said to him that working out was a good way to relieve stress he had taken it much to heart, putting in hours down the gym every week since the breakdown.

  He looked so adorably forlorn standing there, his brown eyes as wide and as sad as a puppy’s. He was genuinely oblivious to his devastating good-looks, and was utterly devoid of ego. It was in moments like that this, when he displayed no inflated sense of self, that her heart melted for him. This was her man, her Tom. She loved him, and would forgive him anything.

  Yet something in her prevented her from crossing the distance between them and allowing him to bundle her up in his strong arms.

  “You really hurt me, Tom. Look at my skin.”

  His face was ashen beneath the tan as he went to her and ever so gently gripped her shoulders. As he looked down at the tender skin of her chest, his eyes sparkled with unshed tears.

  “Jesus, I’m so sorry. It’s no excuse, but my headache is blinding, baby. I was having a nightmare, and I thought I was still dreaming. I lashed out but I didn’t realise it was you sitting there.”

  He looked so genuine, so contrite, how could she do anything but believe him?

  “You hurt me,” she repeated, but she didn’t she push him away when he pulled her against his broad chest. She wasn’t exactly melting into him either, but with every second that passed, she could feel herself relenting and forgiving his atrocious behaviour.

  No. Don’t trust him.

  The thought caught her off-guard, and she stiffened in his arms, wanting desperately to hug him back but not quite being able to bring herself to.

  “Oh, Flick, please forgive me, I’d never do anything deliberate to hurt you, you know that.” Ever so gently, he pulled back from her, still keeping hold of her shoulders so that he could look into her eyes. “You do know that, right?”

  She hesitated for a moment before answering, wanting him to squirm, to suffer. Wanting him to feel as hurt as she had been by his violent betrayal, but of course, that was impossible.

  “Yeah, I do,” she said, and she meant it. She managed a small smile for him. “But what you did was wrong, even if you were sleeping. You lashed out at me, Tom. What you did could be classed as domestic violence.”

  He winced at her words, like she had physically slapped him across the face. Tom was not the type of man to ever raise his hand to a woman, and showed nothing but contempt for those that did.

  “Yeah, I know that. But you have to believe me when I say I was out of my mind.”

  Out of his mind. What if he does it again, but next time does something worse? But will it make it okay because he was out of his mind?

  It was an uncomfortable question, and one that she did not feel like dwelling on right now.

  “So are we going to eat, now? I don’t know about you, but I’m starving,” she said, extracting herself to tend to the forgotten and congealing pan of bacon and eggs.

  “Sure.”

  He began rootling through the cupboards, in search of plates.

  “Sit down, I’ll do it,” she said, taking his hand and leading him to the small kitchen table. “You don’t know where anything is.”

  A guilty look passed over his face, his cheeks briefly colouring and his eyes narrowing.

  “I’ll help as soon as we’ve had something to eat, I promise” he said, bundling her into his arms and bending his head to kiss her. “You smell like booze, have you been drinking?”

  There was no edge to his voice, nothing accusatory, but for some reason, she felt herself blushing. “Oh, the other English neighbours came round from two doors down, that’s all, and they bought some whiskey for us. Felicity and Roger. They’re nice, you’ll like them. In fact, you’ll meet them tomorrow night because we’ve been invited round for dinner.”

  “Oh.”

  He looked like he were about to protest then seemed to think better of it, given his all-too-recent bad behaviour. Instead, he kissed her and let her go so she could prepare the food.

  She dished up, doing her best to ignore the niggling, abstract doubts that assailed her.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Flick had forgiven him, but as they set about the task of unpacking, the atmosphere was strangely subdued. They barely spoke a word to each other as they did their best to put their new home straight. There was still such a lot to do. A great deal of their furniture hadn’t fitted into the trailer, so they had agreed that they were going to hit the brocantes for second-hand furniture, like wardrobes and dressers. They didn’t even have a mattress, hence they were sleeping on the blow-up.

  The task of moving to France suddenly seemed monumental. From out of nowhere, Flick was overcome by exhaustion and an overwhelming sense of defeat. She gave up on the box of books she was unpacking and slumped on the sofa with her head in her hands.

  “Hey, are you okay?” Tom asked, sitting down next to her.

  “I’m just tired, that’s all,” she mumbled into the palms of her hands.

  “It’s gone six, I reckon it’s time to call it a day, what do you say?”

  “But there’s still so mu
ch to do.”

  “Nothing that can’t wait. Let’s crack open the wine, rustle up something to eat and fuck the lot off.”

  She was leaning forward with her head in her hands, and as he spoke he rubbed her back in circular motions. She laughed, but to her surprise the sound was nearer a strangled sob.

  “In fact,” he said, getting to his feet and tugging at her ankles to swivel her around so that she was lying on her back on the sofa, “why don’t you just lie down and relax? Have yourself a nap while I make us something to eat.”

  “But we only had bacon and eggs a few hours ago.”

  “That was ages ago, and I’m a growing lad,” he said, patting his flat stomach. “I’ll just make something light. It is nearly dinnertime.”

  Never argue with a hungry man about dinner, she thought with a tired smile.

  “Fine. Then I’ll help.” she said, but dammit, it felt so good to take the weight off her weary limbs and rest her head against a cushion.

  Her eyelids were as heavy as lead, and she gave in to the irresistible need to close them.

  Just for a second, she told herself…

  As soon as her eyelids had fluttered shut, they instantly snapped open again. The loudest crack of thunder had jolted her fully awake and she sat bolt upright, every nerve-ending inexplicably on full-alert.

  Christ, relax, will you? It’s only the storm coming…

  Just as she thought that, the overhead light blinked out, plunging the room into shadows. She let out a small cry when she heard a clatter and a shout from the kitchen.

  “Shit,” Tom said, hobbling over to her.

  “What did you do?”

  “Got a fright when the lights went out and dropped the saucepan on my toe.”

  “Drama Queen,” she said affectionately, going to him and wrapping her arms around his waist.

  Her words were light, but she found that she was trembling. An entirely misplaced sense of dread squeezed her heart, forcing it to beat faster.