“I think Mum would have loved all this.” Maggie smiled as she surveyed the packed church.
“Though not, perhaps, as much as Perdita does,” Simone added archly, just as the woman in question threw her arms toward the heavens and began to wail “Why?” while Rene looked on in appalled silence.
Heavenly-Stargazer Rosehip made it to the church just in time for the organ to strike up and the congregation to pipe down. For the first time in many years, all three North sisters were under the same roof, a fact which did not go unnoticed by the residents of Rowan Thorp.
Doreen turned to the woman dressed as Carmen Miranda to her left and said, “Can you feel it? That prickle in the air? Mark my words, there’s a storm brewing and it’s coming from the North.” She waggled her eyebrows at the woman with fruit on her head and pulled out her crochet, chuckling to herself as she did so. “Things are about to get interesting.”
3
Maggie and Joe slipped into an alcove behind the church away from the crowd. Maggie leaned back against the cold stone wall, not caring that the damp was soaking through her clothes. She welcomed the cool, needed something to take her mind off the day.
The service had ended to the sounds of R.E.M.’s “Shiny Happy People” blasting out of the speakers. It wasn’t customary for funeral services in the village church to end with dancing in the aisles, but this hadn’t been a customary funeral. The impromptu Morris dancing troupe in the vestibule had also come as a surprise.
In a few minutes Augustus’s coffin would be carried to his final resting place in the North family plot at the far corner of the graveyard. The mourners spilled out of the side doors of the church and were joined by those who had been standing on Holy Trinity Green.
“How are you holding up?” Joe asked.
“Okay, I think. I’m looking forward to it all being over.”
“At least Star and Simone are keeping away from each other.”
“Those two cat-fighting is the last thing I need.”
“They wouldn’t, would they? Not today.”
“Ah, I forget you haven’t seen them together. Trust me, a little thing like our father’s funeral isn’t enough to keep them from fighting. One sideward glance would kick things off.”
Joe pulled a hip flask out of his inside pocket and held it out to her.
“It’s a little early for me,” she said, looking down at it. Since when does Joe carry a hip flask? Maybe that was the thing that was wrong with him—he was a secret alcoholic. Lord knows she hadn’t been able to find anything else to fault him on, other than his age, but neither of them could help that.
“It’s not booze,” he said.
“What is it, then?”
He smiled that smile that lit something inside her and made her feel much younger than her forty-four years.
“Tea.” He grinned. “Good, strong, hot builders tea.”
Maggie almost snatched the hip flask from him and sighed as she took a long, deep swig. “You are too good.” She smiled as she handed him back the flask.
“Then take me off the market.”
She looked up at him. His face was serious. “What?”
“I realize my timing’s off, and standing in a graveyard in the rain hiding from your family isn’t exactly moonlight and roses, but I am serious about you, Maggie, about us. I don’t want us to be a secret anymore. I know you don’t like me saying it, but I love you and I want everyone to know it. I don’t want to keep hiding.”
She rubbed her face with her hands. “Joe, I can’t do this now.”
“Then when?”
“I don’t know. But not at my dad’s funeral.”
“I’m not asking for a blood sacrifice. I just want to be able to hold your hand in public. I wanted to be able to put my arm around you today to comfort you, without you shrinking away from me. I want us to make plans and get excited about the future, instead of this limbo.”
She would have liked to argue that she would never “shrink away from him,” but he was right, she would. She had self-imposed rules for her and Joe; they were friends with benefits, nothing serious. She was never meant to have fallen for him, but how could she not when he was so thoughtful and funny and kind? He was also six feet three inches of pure outdoorsy man, dirty-blond wavy hair almost down to his shoulders, and four-day beard with just the right amount of scratch when he kissed her collarbone. He ought to work on a cattle ranch or as a surf instructor on the Cornish coast with those looks; he had no business being this sexy in the greengrocer profession.
“Why can’t we stay as we are?” she pleaded.
“Because I don’t want to be your fuck boy.”
“You’re not. You mean a lot to me.”
If she told him the truth—that she was holding back for his benefit—he would only argue with her. He believed he loved her now, but what about down the line when the age gap between them really began to show? What about when he realized that being with her would mean giving up on a family of his own? He would make a wonderful father. What right did she have to deny him that? Her baby days were over. She didn’t want more kids. She had to protect them both from heartbreak down the line. And losing Joe would break her heart, so it was better to never have him at all.
“But not enough for you to be with me in public.” Joe’s expression was one of genuine puzzlement.
“It isn’t you . . .” she started. I am saving you from yourself!
“Yeah, yeah, I know, it’s not me, it’s you.”
“But that’s the truth! Please don’t be cross with me.”
Joe rubbed his hand through his hair and sighed, then pulled her into his arms. “I’m sorry, I’m being a selfish idiot. This isn’t the right time. I didn’t mean to make today even harder for you. I guess I let the whole ‘life is short’ thing overwhelm me.”
Maggie buried her head in his chest. “Funerals can have that effect.” Her voice was muffled by the knitted jumper he wore under his jacket.
“You looked so lost in the church. I wanted to comfort you, my arms were literally aching to hold you, but I knew I couldn’t. Why are we wasting time? We could die tomorrow!”
“Morbid.”
“I don’t want to have regrets. I want to build a life with you.”
“You want to commit to a woman who wears elephant dungarees to a funeral?”
“I wouldn’t be seen dead with a woman who didn’t wear elephant dungarees to a funeral.”
Maggie breathed in the smell of him. He smelled like line-dried washing and fabric softener. Oh god, what was she going to do? Dearest lovely Joe. If only he was ten years older, or she was ten years younger. It couldn’t work. It simply couldn’t. And her brain was too damn full to take on extra complications. Why couldn’t they just stay as they were? She nestled in further, feeling his warmth envelop her.
“There’s such a lot happening at the moment, what with my impending homelessness and unemployment. And dad dying. My world feels like it’s imploding. I just . . .”
“Shhhh,” he soothed, kissing her head. “I’m sorry. Forget I mentioned it. I am here for you, however you need me. No conditions.”
“I don’t deserve you.”