A Season for Second Chances(72)

Chapter 57



Annie woke up on Sunday morning heartache-heavy. It was the anniversary of her parents’ deaths. They had died exactly a year apart to the day. When her mum had died, her dad had simply wound down, like a clock ticking slowly down to a stop. Last year, she had almost worked through the anniversary. She had been halfway through checking the dates on the fridge foods in the chiller when she’d remembered and felt horribly guilty. It had happened like that other years too. Once she’d been doing the school run and the realization had sucker-punched the breath right out of her. But this year she had woken knowing exactly what day it was.

She lay in bed thinking about them. The grief had become less raw as the years they had now been absent from her life slowly caught up with the years she’d had with them. Today she really felt it, perhaps because she would have liked to ask for their advice and blessing on this huge life change she had undertaken. She had no other family; she had the boys, of course, but she was hardly going to burden them with her worries and regrets. Tiggs padded up to the pillow and meowed mournfully in Annie’s face for her breakfast.

“All right,” said Annie, shaking herself mentally as she clambered out of bed. “Sometimes I think you’re more piggy than puss,” she said to the cat, but Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle was already leading the way to the kitchen with her tail in the air.



* * *



—

Annie spent some time sitting on the beach, throwing pebbles into the surf and enjoying the satisfying plop sound as they disappeared beneath the waves. The sky was a pale gray cashmere; the weather seemed less antagonistic today, which suited Annie’s reflective mood. Her parents had been so proud when she’d qualified as a chef; they’d worried that getting pregnant would ruin her chances of a career, and had it not been for their steadfast support, it might have. Annie wished they could see her now; she wondered what they would make of her life. Though she was sure they would support her decisions. There didn’t seem to be a cutoff point for missing one’s parents. Were they watching over her? She liked to think so. On days like these, it was easy to believe that they were.

Her calm reverie was shattered by a voice calling her name across the deserted stretch of beach.

“I know today is always a hard one for you,” said Max, following her through the gate.

“Yes, well. It is what it is,” said Annie.

“I thought you might like some company.”

“Not really,” said Annie. “But thank you for thinking of me.”

“I found some old photograph albums. I thought we could go through them together. Maybe sort out how to split them. You can have first dibs.” He smiled uncertainly at her.

Annie sighed exaggeratedly. “Would you like a cup of tea?” she asked. She didn’t have the energy to fight him today.

And so it was that Annie and Max spent the rest of Sunday afternoon flicking through old photographs and—to Annie’s surprise—laughing over shared memories.

The last of the daylight evaporated and lamps were switched on. In among the holiday snaps and obligatory baby-bath-time photographs were pictures of her parents: smiling in their garden, playing with the boys, out at restaurants to celebrate various wedding anniversaries . . . The years rolled back through the yellowing edges of the albums, and soon they were looking at grainy photographs taken on disposable cameras, of Annie showing off a gigantic baby bump while Max pointed at it grinning, Annie and Max pre–baby bump, down the pub, in the park, at the prom.

“God, you looked hot in that prom dress,” said Max.

“It was practically sprayed on.” Annie laughed. “I didn’t think my dad was going to let me leave the house!”

“Whose house did we go to for the after-party?”

“Mandy Shaw’s.”

“Mandy Shaw! Crikey, I wander whatever happened to her?”

“She’s a head teacher in Milton Keynes.”

“Blimey. Do you remember the spare room? Under the coats?”

“Worrying that any moment someone would come in and catch us,” said Annie.

Max’s laugh was soft and low; Annie felt the danger but pushed it aside.

“I don’t remember you being all that worried,” he said quietly, just close enough to her ear for her to feel his breath on her neck.

Annie quickly picked up another black shiny paper envelope and began to sift through the photographs. Pictures of them kissing; blurry selfies, in the days before mobile phones, when you clicked and hoped for the best.

“I’ll never forget that night,” whispered Max, taking the pictures from her and letting them drop to the floor, his voice low and loaded with determination, and Annie was suddenly too tired to resist the inevitable.

Fuck it! she thought. It’s only sex, it doesn’t mean anything. She needed to feel something other than sad today. And then they were kissing; not in photographs but on her sofa, in the sitting room of Saltwater Nook—desperate kisses among the evidence of their shared lives, their former selves frozen in time, staring out through sepia tones. Annie wriggled out of her jeans, and Max pulled his top off; she arched her body toward his. The heat of his hands on her skin, his fingers remembering her secrets, their bodies melding easily together in collaborative muscle memory.