Summer at Little Beach Street Bakery
Page 86

Polly felt his heart beating up against hers. He was hurting her ribs, crushing her like that. She couldn’t have cared less.
‘Jesus,’ Huckle was saying, over and over again. ‘Jesus! I can’t let you out of my sight for a second!’
He pulled away and noticed her face.
‘Okay. A couple of months.’
She shook her head and nestled back into him.
‘I’m so sorry, I’m sorry. I know you only went for me, for us. I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time about it. I’m sorry I put you through all that.’
‘Are you kidding?’ said Huckle. ‘I’m such an idiot, Polly. SUCH an idiot. I don’t know what I was thinking. Nothing is worth being apart from you. Nothing.’
‘Not even Nan the Van?’
‘Oh yes, I need to speak to you about that,’ said Huckle, and Polly rolled her eyes and said all in good time, but first of all, please, could they go home?
Polly ran the big copper bath as full as she could, steam filling the little bathroom, emptying the cistern. She hurled in all the posh smellies, and they shed their clothes and got into the bath together, and gently, carefully, Huckle washed her all over, and exclaimed at her ribs, and shampooed her hair while she told him the whole story from the beginning, and he listened open-mouthed to all of it and told her how brave she’d been. And as she told it, Polly began to feel its burden, the weight of what she’d been through, lift and lessen a bit, although she did cry at the part when they brought the boy in without his mother, and Huckle shushed her and felt privileged to have heard the story for the first time, even though over the next few weeks she’d be made to repeat it absolutely everywhere as the family went to the papers about their amazing rescue. Which was, Patrick later pointed out, the second stupid thing they had done, because of course the papers totally eviscerated them for going out in weather like that, and they got named Britain’s worst parents and the entire thing was a massive scandal. Anyway, the papers dug up the picture of Polly looking mad and depressed and staring out to sea and used it loads of times, which was a bit tedious until everything died down and she could stop explaining that actually it was Selina who’d done all the really hard work; she’d just been carrying the light.
Huckle carefully combed out her hair, until they were both warm and clean and comfortable again, then carried her up the stairs and, as gently as he could, showed her how pleased he was to see her, which Polly was unsurprised to find made her feel even better than she had before; as if all her fears and worries had simply been swept away.
And then they slept, both of them, through the sun of the afternoon, until a policeman appeared to write down everything that had happened. They both felt sheepish about letting everyone else clear up the detritus, so after that, they grabbed bin bags in the late-afternoon golden haze and went down to the beach to help pick up the driftwood and the general rubbish. It was impossible to even believe what conditions had been like the previous evening.
Every step they took, people came up to them asking after them both, delighted to see Huckle again, ready to tell him once more what it had been like. Only Polly knew what Huckle himself had been through; how brave he had been too, in more ways than one. As he was regaled with tales that he listened to as politely as he always did – which is to say, very – she would move in close and gently squeeze his hand, and he would squeeze hers back, and they wouldn’t have to say anything at all, except every so often Huckle would check his phone and sigh, and Polly would give him a worried look.
Finally, at around 6 p.m., it came. The low ring. Huckle looked at Polly and she looked at him.
‘If you have to go back,’ she’d said, and he’d simply shaken his head and said no, never, and she’d said what about Clemmie, and Huckle had said they’d cross that bridge when they came to it.
They held hands as he answered the phone.
‘Hello?’
There was a long pause. Finally, Dubose’s voice, so similar to Huckle’s, spoke.
‘Hey, bro.’
There was another long silence. Then Dubose went on.
‘I can’t… Man, I’m going to be a dad.’
There was a long chat after that, and amends made, and promises too – which Huckle didn’t think would be kept, but Polly maybe did; and extreme protestations of gratitude at how Huckle had turned the farm around, which Huckle absolutely deserved.
‘It was the paperwork getting me down, man,’ said Dubose. ‘I couldn’t get on top of it, I just panicked.’
‘Mmm,’ said Huckle. They were on speakerphone.
‘Could you… say goodbye to that sweet chick? Tell her I didn’t mean it.’
Polly nodded.
‘I will,’ she lied. She intended never to mention Dubose to Selina ever again.
The rest of Mount Polbearne turned in early that night, but Polly, overwhelmed, and Huckle, jet-lagged, sat on the harbour wall with their fish and chips, kicking their heels, gazing out at the beautiful pink and gold sunset. It was like a different world.
‘I wondered,’ said Huckle. ‘I wondered, what with the storm and everything… I wondered if you would be thinking…’
They were watching the seagulls circle overhead, the noisy pests conscious that there were chips in the area. Polly read his mind.
‘If Neil would come back? Like he did before?’
She reached for another chip and shook her head.
‘No,’ she said. ‘No. I’ve accepted it. I know you thought I never would, but I have. Puffins aren’t pets. They aren’t meant to live with us. It was hard, but it was the right thing to do.’
‘Do you really believe that, though?’ said Huckle. ‘Truly?’
Polly nodded. Her eyes were suddenly filled with tears.
‘It doesn’t mean I didn’t love him,’ she insisted.
‘Oh, I know that.’
‘It’s only because I loved him… really loved him, that I could give him up. Do the right thing.’
She sighed, toying with her little wooden fork. ‘God, it sucks being grown-up sometimes. I’m sorry if I… if I took my sadness about Neil out on you. You didn’t deserve that. I was just so lonely.’
‘That’s okay,’ said Huckle. ‘I was lonely too. Incredibly lonely.’
‘I know,’ said Polly. ‘It’s just, every time we spoke, you were…’