Welcome to Rosie Hopkins' Sweet Shop of Dreams
Page 105

‘Get out the way!’ she screamed at him. The bicycle made almost no noise on the tarmacked road. ‘MOVE!’
He tried to move aside but he was too late, and she saw his eyes widen as she remembered, at the very last minute, to jam on the brakes. Then, gracelessly, she felt herself, as if in the stretched-out timing of a dream, fly over the handlebars and crash headlong into his arms. They both fell flat, the stick clattering to the ground, and found themselves, caught in each other’s arms, squelching deep into the soft, forgiving mud at the side of the track, love hearts scattered all around.
At first they stared at each other, shocked and appalled. Then, almost inexorably, Stephen and then Rosie started to laugh. And finally, filthy with mud and wet with newly falling rain and fuelled by adrenalin and happiness, they kissed once again, as hungrily and as passionately as the young of the village had kissed each other by the side of the harvest fields, witnessed only by cows, and owls, and deep-swooping birds, for hundreds and hundreds of years.
CODA
The snow had fallen so thickly the cottage looked like something out of a Christmas tree advert, the day they loaded up the Land Rover – Stephen’s this time, not Moray’s. Stephen and Moray had grudgingly made up, Stephen admitting it was hard to see his contemporary fit and well and swanning about when there was so much need in Africa; Moray sniffing loudly and saying he was probably also jealous of his good looks and how much everybody liked him, but Stephen had ignored that.
They had packed all of Lilian’s photos, her cushions and as many of her dresses as Rosie could get in the car.
‘Why will I need those?’ Lilian had said, not displeased.
‘Because there’ll be a different social occasion every night,’ Rosie had said. ‘You’ll be tea-danced off your feet.’
Lilian sniffed.
‘Not with my hips.’
‘Don’t be daft, they’ve all got dicky hips. They play the music at thirty-three and a third. And you’ll be by far the best-looking woman there.’
‘Well, I can’t deny that,’ said Lilian. She was full of nerves about moving from the only home she’d ever known. But in a funny kind of way, she was excited too; excited to be doing something new, trying something different. The idea of room service and games nights and someone to play Scrabble with … well, she couldn’t deny it sounded interesting. Although the presence of Ida Delia made her slightly nervous, although Ida Delia would have forgotten her long ago, gone doolally or something.
But the best news of all was Rosie. That Rosie would still be near – that she could visit the shop whenever she chose; come to the cottage or pick up the phone; that this was going to happen without ruining Rosie’s life; that Rosie wanted to do this – made her feel safe and content inside.
Rosie looked at her, sitting like a queen with a blanket over her knees in the front seat. Stephen was driving. She still couldn’t believe it. That he was there, and that he was hers. The last few weeks had been a blur. Gerard had been unimaginably decent; mind you, when she’d gone to see him his shirts were perfectly ironed and his hair had been cut.
‘Yolande likes me to look my best,’ he’d said when she mentioned it. ‘She loves doing all that stuff.’
He looked even more well-fed, if that were possible, but undoubtedly, in Rosie’s eyes, happier. Gleeful, in fact. She was slightly sad – she was human after all – that after all those years it had been somebody else, but she couldn’t deny it was right.
‘I’m so glad,’ she said. ‘And your mum likes her?’
‘She loves her,’ said Gerard. ‘Well, there are a few things she doesn’t do quite right, but I’m sure Mum will sort her out.’
Rosie smiled to herself. Finally Gerard’s mum had someone to spar with. She must be delighted. Rosie had given them the most enormous box of chocolates, which made Gerard light up with glee, just like a little boy, and she’d thanked him profusely for his cheque. Yolande had a lovely three-bed house on a nice estate, with a little patch of garden. It was perfect for them, although Rosie couldn’t help but look at the tiny square of green scrub and what it had cost, compared to her wide open spaces and vast country vistas. How could they bear it? How had she borne it for so long? Then she realised that she was going native and smiled to herself.
‘Thank you,’ she said to Gerard from the bottom of her heart.
He shrugged. ‘Mum said it was the right thing to do.’
‘It was,’ said Rosie. ‘Even though I didn’t deserve it. Thank you.’
And they hugged, tentatively and awkwardly.
‘And if you’re ever in …’
‘The wilds of rural Derbyshire? I know, I know.’
‘There’s a big box of sugar mice with your name on it.’
Gerard smiled. ‘I’ll remember that.’
She had had to tear herself away from Stephen to look after Lilian. It had been a struggle. Thankfully Tina had agreed to take on longer hours in the shop, but even so, Rosie found it incredibly difficult to leave Stephen’s old cast-iron bed in the high, pale bedroom in Peak House, with its view of nothing but sheep all the way down the valley, the clouds so near it was as if you could touch them. As the winter gales and rain blew in from the hills they felt as close and elemental as the weather.
But life had to be planned; work had to be done; arrangements had to be made. Tearing themselves away every day made their reunions more urgent, so they had a perverse pleasure all of their own. But inch by inch, things started to take shape. The deeds were signed over in front of a sweet, quiet notary. Lilian insisted on giving power of attorney to Rosie. (Angie, from Sydney, was utterly bemused by the entire business, but took it in her stride.) Rosie was on the point of looking for a tenant, without wanting to be too obvious about it, when Stephen, with his head in her lap in front of the fire one evening, talked about how he was getting sick of Peak House, and his mother needed it back to rent as a holiday cottage before she went bust again. He’d been thinking for a while of moving to the hustle and bustle of the village, he said, and Rosie had teased him and asked about London.
‘I hate London,’ mused Stephen. ‘I was only moving there because everyone here thought I was a dingwad. Correction: you thought I was a dingwad.’
‘Yes, but I never said I don’t like dingwads. Anyway, you’d have been a dingwad in London too. Just a posh one.’