Читать книгу A Miracle on Hope Street: The most heartwarming Christmas romance of 2018! - Emma Heatherington, Emma Heatherington - Страница 14

When Nora disappears into the busy city, I let out a long sigh and look at my phone. The café is quieter now but I’m not ready to leave just yet. I’ve ten new emails in my inbox since I left the house. Ten more problems to solve or at least advise on, yet I’ve no interest in dealing with any of them and no idea if I’ve the strength to either. A message from the Today boss, Margo, sits in my WhatsApp inbox along with another from a really old date, asking if I’m ready to join him for dinner again anytime soon. No meaning, no depth, no warmth, and I realise that, on my account, no interest. Social media ‘friend requests’ are queued up awaiting response. Smiling faces, happy lives . . . more people I’ve never heard of before who I have to keep up with in an online game of happiness.

I feel tears prick my eyes. I pinch them back and when I open my eyes, Gloria is sitting across from me. She moves Nora’s plate to the side and leans her hands under her chin.

‘Now, missy,’ she says. ‘Are you going to tell me what’s going on in that little head of yours, apart from the obvious? It’s a tough month for you, but you’ve got the eyes of this city on you and I hate to see you look so sad. You’re losing your sparkle, girl, and I can’t just sit around and let that happen!’

‘Please don’t be nice to me, Gloria,’ I say. ‘You know I’ll be a blubbering mess if you show me any sympathy and Nora has already told me I look like crap, so I don’t need to hear it from you too.’

She tilts her head back and lets out her bold, hearty signature laugh.

‘Me oh my, you are just like your daddy!’ she says to me and I raise a smile. ‘He hated me being nice to him too because he was, just like you, so used to be the one helping others out and he didn’t know how to take a little bit of help back for himself.’

‘He really was one in a million,’ I agree and I close my eyes, just for a second, to remember him in his prime. A well-respected, educated man who wore his heart on his sleeve and who touched everyone he came across with his hands-on approach and grassoot ways of looking at issues from all walks of life.

‘He was a problem-solver too,’ she says to me. ‘You solve this city’s problems everyday, yet you seem to be struggling with your own. What’s up?’

We sit in reflective silence for a few seconds.

‘I . . . oh, I dunno, maybe I’m just a bit jaded by it all, you know?’ I blurt out. ‘Nora just said something that hurt me a bit but I’m supersensitive right now and shouldn’t overanalyse it. I’m fine.’

Gloria raises an eyebrow, totally unconvinced.

‘I used to love my life,’ I tell Gloria, ‘and I know that I have very little to complain about compared to many others who have real problems, so what on earth is wrong with me? Why does it feel like it’s not enough? Why do I feel so—’

‘Empty?’ Gloria looks like she has heard it all before.

‘Yes, that’s it. Empty. Like something is missing.’

‘You know, it’s okay not to be okay as the saying goes, Ruth?’ says Gloria, with meaning that comes right from her core. ‘You need to go easier on yourself. Something is missing. Someone is missing, should I say. It’s early days and you’ve lost your biggest fan, the one you leaned on and looked up to and the one you looked after for the past few years. A time to grieve – you’ve heard of that, right?’

‘Yes, I suppose so.’

‘Be your own friend for a change, honey,’ says Gloria. ‘And as for Miss Nora?’

‘Yes?’ I nod.

‘She’s a work colleague, yes?’

‘Yes, she’s a great features writer,’ I tell Gloria. ‘I don’t think she’d give me back the same compliment, though, but she’s going places at work, is Miss Nora.’

I laugh but it’s true. Nora is very competitive and would trample all over me to get into Margo’s ear.

‘She’s not really your friend,’ whispers Gloria, shaking her head.

Her words hit me hard.

‘None of those hangers-on who meet you in here for a coffee here and a bite of lunch there are your true friends,’ she says. ‘You’re worth way more than that, Ruth Ryans, and you know it. You need people in your life who care for that beautiful, fragile heart of yours, not people who just want a slice of the action or to be seen in your company to better themselves. If you had true friends, you might not feel so empty. Or should I say, lonely.’

‘Lonely? But I’m not—’

‘I know, I know. How can you be lonely when your life is so busy?’ says Gloria. ‘You don’t need to be alone to feel lonely, Ruth.’

I get what she is saying, I really do. I just wish I knew how I can feel fulfilled again.

‘Maybe working from home isn’t so good for you right now,’ Gloria suggests, and of course this has also crossed my own mind. ‘Would Margo give you a desk at the Today office again? At least then you’d have some sort of interaction with real people every day. Company.’

I shake my head.

‘I work freelance now for Margo and they’re cramped as it is,’ I explain. ‘Plus I’m saving her a fortune, working from home, and I get a bonus for it. I need that bonus to help towards the house. It’s totally draining me so I’ve put it on the market. I’m selling up and I’m moving on.’

‘Are you serious?’

‘Yes,’ I tell Gloria. ‘It’s big and empty and costs a fortune to heat plus it really needs to be decorated.’

‘Okay . . .’

‘It looks and smells and feels like it’s stuck in a time warp. And it is stuck. Her pictures are everywhere and I sometimes think I can still smell her perfume from all those years ago. Do you think that’s still possible? Plus I keep having that same dream about her calling me to help with the Christmas tree. Do you think I’m going mad? Maybe I am going mad.’

Gloria takes a big deep breath.

‘Sell it then, yes!’ she says to me. ‘Or rent it out to a family who could fill it with the love that it craves? Find somewhere new for you and start afresh. You might just need a fresh start and there’s nothing wrong with that, Ruth.’

I look up sharply.

‘I already have the sign up and it’s online and everything but. . . do you really think I could?’

‘Why not?’ she asks me. ‘Bricks and mortar never made anyone who they are. Find somewhere new if it’s dragging you down. Walk on. Walk away. Your daddy would understand.’

My stomach gurgles at the thought, yet the sense of relief that joins the very idea is something I can’t ignore. I have no need for such a big house and that dream I keep having . . . maybe I could. Maybe I should?

‘Oh, don’t mind me, Gloria,’ I mumble. ‘I’m just a big fat bag of misery these days.’

Gloria swallows hard. ‘You are allowed to be miserable,’ she whispers.

‘I just don’t know if I fit in around here any more,’ I confess. ‘I feel like I’m plugged out from this city; do you get what I’m saying?’

Gloria folds her arms under her generous bust. ‘This will always be your hometown,’ she reminds me. ‘It’s in you, and you are in the heart of this community. People look up to you, they always have. They admire you from afar and they admire you up close – except of course for some of the jealous bitches who cross your path, like Nora. But you can’t dwell on those types. Maybe you just need a little reminder of how special you are and how many people you have helped through your kind words and gentle ways.’

‘I can’t even think in that way right now,’ I admit to Gloria. ‘Maybe I’ll shake out of this soon and get back on track.’

‘It’s okay to be angry and to cry and kick and scream when we have to,’ she says. ‘Don’t you dare bottle it in, baby girl. You can whinge and cry to me anytime you want, do you hear?’

I sniffle and fish a tissue from my jacket pocket to dab my nose.

‘I know I can . . . but what do you think I should do to make things better, apart from selling the house?’ I ask her, feeling like the teenage girl who used to come to her with my problems when I felt my dad was finding it tough and I didn’t want to burden him with my worries on top of his own.

‘You need to find something or someone to give all that love inside you to,’ she says, like it’s the simplest thing in the world. ‘You need real friendship, real love.’

‘If only it was as easy as that,’ I tell her. ‘You know me by now. I don’t do the whole love thing. I can’t.’

‘Yes you can!’ she tells me right back. ‘You and your sister were always special people and I hate to see you looking so low. It’s not the real you. You deserve so much more. I’m not talking necessarily about romantic love, Ruth, but when was the last time you loved someone that wasn’t your dad or your sister?’

Her question stuns me. I don’t know what to say.

‘I dunno,’ I reply with a shrug. ‘Maybe never? And what is love, anyway?’

Gloria looks at me in mock disgust.

‘Ah, come on, girl! How can someone so young and with the world at her feet be so cynical?’ she bellows. ‘What is love? It’s the greatest thing in the world!’

I laugh as Gloria expresses herself with her hands waving in the air.

‘Love is what fills us up inside and what makes us feel like we belong on this planet,’ she says. ‘Love is a sense of purpose. To be in love and to love in return is the best gift you can ever give or receive. I don’t believe you, Ruth Ryans! You are saying you never felt that warm, fuzzy feeling of finding someone who gets you and who you can’t wait to see and with whom you feel like the world just stops when you’re in their company?’

‘I thought that was lust,’ I say with a smirk. ‘I learned very young to be very independent, Gloria, you know that. I don’t know if I’d trust anyone to love me in the way I’d want them to. I’ve been hurt a few times along the way, as well as breaking hearts myself. I can’t do it. I’m just not good at it.’

Gloria’s face changes and she clasps my hand across the table as I stare out the window onto the busy city street.

‘Please don’t be so afraid, Ruth,’ Gloria whispers when I turn back to face her. ‘I’m not being foolish and romantic, but just open your heart to be loved again, please. You deserve it so, so much. You know, I remember when you were very little and you’d come in here and sense that I was having a bad day and you’d always just come out and ask straight up if I was okay. You had always the ability to know when someone was a bit down – and better than that, you knew how to pick them up. You’ve always had so much love to give. You still do.’

I raise a smile. I’m almost thirty-three years old and I don’t even know if I’ve ever been in love before. I’ve never let anyone get even close. How sad is that?

‘I’ll work on it,’ I say and she brightens up again.

‘Tell yourself you deserve it,’ she says. ‘And don’t ever doubt it for one second.’

I would agree wholeheartedly with Gloria that I deserve to love and to be loved, but I know she is just a tad biased when it comes to me and my sister. My dad helped her get her first job in this café and he later helped her get a bank loan to take on the lease by acting as guarantor, then he helped her to promote it by spreading the word amongst his colleagues at the university and his large circle of friends. My father gave Gloria a chance when not many others would, and she has never forgotten it, but she isn’t the only one to have told me I knew how to spot when someone needed some help up if they’re feeling down. I fear I may have lost that a little.

‘I feel like I’m a fake,’ I whisper to Gloria. ‘You know, all this pretending on the outside and feeling so low on the inside. I want to scream and get so much of this feeling of loss and death out of my system and move on. What do I have to do to get to that stage? I really want to just feel like “me” again.’

Gloria leans across to me and I wait for her to come out with some sort of angelic guidance that will help me change my life forever. But her solution for now is a lot simpler.

‘Take one day at a time, don’t put yourself under pressure and it will all come to you,’ she tells me. ‘Now, can I get you one of my new cinnamon lattes with fresh cream to warm you up even more before you go? On the house? My customers who’ve tried it already believe it may just be magic.’

I check the time. I’ve been here almost an hour as it is, but what the heck. It’s snowing outside and I can check my emails on my phone from here, plus, I want to compose myself a little before I venture out into the frosty afternoon to make my way home.

‘A bit of magic would be just lovely please, thanks, Gloria. You’re the kindest.’

‘No, you are my love,’ she says. ‘You’re one of the kindest, most loyal, generous people I know but you’re also a little impatient and you lack in self-belief. Stay true to your own heart and you won’t be feeling like this for much longer. I just know it. People around here need you. Don’t ever forget that.’

Nicholas Taylor

Nicholas Taylor hadn’t played his piano in 242 days.

He knew this because the last day he tinkled the ivories was the day he turned seventy-five which coincided with the day his neighbours reported him to the council for noise pollution, and it was also the day he was issued a summons for harassment for telling the council official in a very non-polite manner where to go.

Nicholas Taylor wasn’t an angry man or a violent man. He was, in fact, a very gentle soul who relied on playing his music as an escape from reality and as a way to get out some of the inner frustrations he felt when he allowed how his life might have turned out differently creep into his weary mind again.

Nicholas had always loved music, as a child growing up in Germany, then Sweden, then England and eventually settling in Ireland where he’d got a job at the Concert Hall which he’d had until his retirement. He had made a fine career out of his music, yet after all that, now he only had his cat to come home to, and as much company as old Boris was these days, Nicholas yearned for someone who would talk back when he shared his stories of music and travel that had taken him all over the world.

‘When you play music, you’ll never feel lonely,’ were the words his late father had told him any time that Nicholas tried to back out of his piano lessons in childhood. As an only child to Dutch parents who both worked in banking and moved around a lot, he often relied on his music for company, and even though it still filled his heart and soul when he sat down and tinkled out a tune, it wasn’t worth it when the walls were like paper and there was a young baby next door who didn’t seem to appreciate his mighty fine talent.

Without music, and without Rosemary, his ex-wife, Nicholas didn’t really know how to spend his days any more. It was too cold at this time of year to even busk outside and if he was being really honest with himself, his health wouldn’t allow it no matter what time of year it was, but the long evenings were suffocating and the radio and Boris were growing a bit tired now when it came to occupying his wandering mind.

He read a lot, which sometimes helped. He read everything he could get his hands on – novels, autobiographies, magazines on art and literature and music of course, newspapers from front to back, both local and national and one of his favourite things to read every week was the column from the Italian Irish lady, Ruth Ryans, who was an intelligent bright spark and who Nicholas followed eagerly, thoroughly enjoying her words of wisdom and her sometimes quick-witted responses.

Nicholas had met Ruth’s father once and he automatically realised where she got her talent and wisdom from. Anthony Ryans was a fine-spoken, highly regarded and well-respected university lecturer who Nicholas had performed for at one of the Concert Hall’s most prestigious events. The Concert Hall days had been the best days of his life, but he wasn’t needed there any more. Everyone he knew had moved on, happy to spend their days in the garden or travelling with their families as they enjoyed their winter years in life.

Nicholas would have loved a garden, but Rosemary had cleaned him out in the divorce proceedings and the most he could afford since then was this tiny, fourth-floor apartment that looked out onto the City Tower and from where he could hear three sets of church bells ring at the same time every hour, on the hour. The baby next door didn’t like that sound either, but Nicholas loved it and he also loved to visit all three churches, keen to watch how each denomination celebrated their different elements of faith. It was his favourite thing to do at Christmas, but after the services he’d have to come back to Boris and the radio and he’d eat a turkey breast fillet, wear a Christmas paper hat and wonder how the hell he’d ended up, after such a colourful, vibrant and wonderful life, in this darn apartment with no one to talk to.

He caught sight of Ruth Ryans’ smiling profile picture from the newspaper that sat beside him on the sofa. Then he made his way to the piano and hovered his fingers over the keys, pretending to play ‘O Holy Night’, his favourite Christmas tune, but only hearing it in his fuzzy old mind that he feared someday soon would let him down too.

Nicholas felt familiar tears roll down his cheeks as his fingers lightly tipped the keys, just enough to let him feel the ivory but not enough to make a sound.

The church bells rang in the distance and the baby cried next door as Nicholas cried too, wondering how he was going to face another Christmas Day with his solitary turkey breast for one, the bleat of the radio and good old boring Boris.

Ruth Ryans caught his eye again. He’d often thought of writing to her to see if she had any solutions to his loneliness and his longing to play his music somewhere once more, but he always thought that someone like her would be way too famous and important to write back.

Wiping his weary eyes, Nicholas sat on his sofa and looked at the email address that stared back at him in black and white.

He pinched his eyes and considered what he might say. Maybe he could give it a try? Maybe she could help? Anything, after all, would be better than this.