Under an Amber Sky: A Gripping Emotional Page Turner You Won’t Be Able to Put Down. Rose Alexander

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СКАЧАТЬ that she would shrivel up like a desiccated leaf in autumn.

      ***

      Back in her married home in London, she had spent days sitting, staring at the rain, contemplating how different the drops looked slamming against the huge panes of her London sashes rather than the small ones of her childhood home’s casements. They seemed bitter and angry, in a way she had never noticed before, hitting the glass and running evilly downwards until they met the wooden surround and accumulated in vicious pools. She had imagined the water eating away at the paint, the elements always trying to destroy what was manmade and protective.

      Determined to rescue her, Anna had descended bearing homemade fish pie and the green olive soap that Sophie loved. Anna had also dealt with the flood caused by the blocked washing machine filter that Sophie knew existed but didn’t know how to fix because she had always let Matt take care of such things and, before that, it had been her father who had dealt with everything. Because of the constant availability of male help, she had allowed herself to become totally useless and dependent, possessing no practical skills whatsoever.

      ‘Good thing you live on the ground floor,’ was all Anna had said as she got down on hands and knees to clear the filter and mop up the water, Tomasz occupied with digging the soil out of the yucca plant pot and Sophie looking dazedly on. Anna had always lived alone, manless, and so she knew how to do useful things. Sophie would have envied her, if she had had the will or energy.

      When she’d finished, Anna had shown Sophie the culprits: two five-pence pieces, a paperclip, and half a metal popper. Sophie picked up the popper. It was black and bore the brand name of Matt’s favourite make of cycling clothing. Just seeing the familiar logo had caused all the pain and grief and disbelief and shock to rise up inside Sophie once more. Anna soothed and patted and rocked her until the weeping had ended, and then ran her a bath and helped her in. Sophie had known that her hair was rank and that she smelt, but had not cared enough to do anything about it. As if she were a child, Anna had washed her hair for her.

      The next day, she had returned and taken Sophie’s passport and bankcard hostage, telling her she’d found cheap flights to Montenegro and they were going on holiday.

      ‘Monte-where?’ Sophie had replied, not really focusing on what Anna was saying. Let her take charge; what was it to her where she went? And then, ‘I think the Caribbean’s a bit too far, isn’t it? I don’t like long plane journeys.’

      ‘It’s not the Caribbean, you dozy cow.’ Anna had laughed, with characteristic brusqueness. ‘It’s Europe, between Croatia and Albania, opposite Italy. You’ll love it.’

      A few clicks on the laptop later, it had all been booked.

      ***

      And now here they were. Sophie looked out of the car window again. They had left the bay behind, passed through the tunnel under the mountain, and were heading towards the peninsula. The slopes behind them were purple in the heat haze, the sky above huge and blue. Wild gorse exploded in bursts of hopeful yellow among the browning vegetation of late summer. She reflected on Anna’s question.

      ‘Yes, I’m glad I came,’ she said, finally responding. She turned to her best friend, steady hands firm on the wheel, always so confident and assured, always so certain. So unlike Sophie, who was more often than not filled with doubt until impulsion overcame her and she did something spur-of-the moment and perhaps unwise.

      Like the time she’d vacillated for months about changing her hairstyle and tried to get Matt to give his opinion, which he never would because he said she was beautiful whatever her hair looked like, and then on an impulse she’d had it dip-dyed, badly. She’d hated it and Matt had too, although he wouldn’t say as much. The kids at school had teased her about it relentlessly and she’d ended up crying so much that Matt had paid for her to go to a really expensive salon and have it cut into a bob, removing all traces of blonde from her chestnut tresses. She simply couldn’t cope without people like Anna. And Matt.

      She gave Anna a gentle, grateful pat on the knee. So many people had patted her since Matt’s death – her knee, leg, back, shoulder, arm – sometimes tentatively, quickly withdrawing their hands as if death might be infectious, sometimes with overfamiliarity or a boisterousness that made Sophie cringe. It felt good to be the patter rather than the pattee for a change.

      ‘Thank you for thinking of it and sorting it out. I needed to get away from … To get away for a bit.’

      It occurred to her that, fleetingly, whilst absorbed in viewing the house, the grief that she had been imbued with since the day of Matt’s death, that felt so much like fear – shaky, shivery, insidious – had been absent. The beautiful old stone house, with its perfect setting on the frontline to the sea and its captivating views over the expanse of the bay, had driven away her pain, if only momentarily.

      Silently contemplating this, she started as something soft and wet landed in her hair, accompanied by a cry of ‘Gophie’ from the back seat. It was toddler Tomasz’s best approximation of her name and clearly designed, like the flying missile, to get her attention. Instinctively, she put her hand to her head to retrieve the object. It was a soggy, half-chewed cheese stick.

      ‘Thank you so much, Tomasz,’ Sophie said as she showed it to Anna.

      A giggle erupted from behind them. Both adults started to laugh and once she’d started Sophie found she couldn’t stop. They were still laughing when they pulled up at the beach ten minutes later.

      As they got out of the car, the heat was even more intense than earlier, the sun burning high in the sky. Sophie lifted her face towards it and shut her eyes, relishing the sensation of its rays upon the skin that she knew was pallid and grey from lack of fresh air, good food, exercise, and happiness. Perhaps the sun, here where it shone with such brilliance from dawn to dusk, would sear the loss of Matt out of her soul, enough to begin to live again.

Chapter 3

      Watching Tomasz play in the sand, building rudimentary approximations of castles, running to the sea and clumsily filling his bucket then slopping most of the water out on the way back, Sophie envied him his childhood innocence, his unsullied experience of nothing but love and happiness. She wished she could step backwards into her own carefree past.

      Pulling her phone out of her bag, she forced herself to confront her new worst fear: the consequence of Matt’s untimely and tragic death that she had so far ignored. Keeping a careful eye on the little boy whilst Anna snoozed – she was up so early every morning with him – Sophie opened the email on her phone and read it, properly read it, for the first time.

      It was from the solicitor, laying out the details of her finances. Despite a generous death-in-service payment from Matt’s employers, her expenses, mainly comprising their enormous mortgage payments, were far beyond what she could possibly maintain on her teacher’s salary. Everything had been built on the fat pay packet of Matt’s job as a lawyer. They had taken out life insurance when they first bought the flat but had let it lapse; they were both young, fit, and healthy, neither had ever smoked, they exercised regularly, ate well, drank little – why waste the money?

      Sophie had preferred to spend it on doing up the flat rather than hand it over to some multinational corporation that would most likely never have to pay out. Home was a sanctuary to Sophie, the place where her world was centred, just as Matt had been the person around whom it had revolved. Now, that home to which she had devoted so much of her time, love, and energy, to which she would return after a tough day in the classroom only to take up a brush and spend a few hours painting a wall or tiling a floor, СКАЧАТЬ