‘I want an aroma that will relax me,’ Sally mused, squinting at the small print on a bottle of eucalyptus oil.
‘In that case,’ Pepper said, making for the door, ‘you need lavender. I’ll just pop into the garden and get you some.’
Swerving to avoid a chair that another of her pupils chose that exact moment to push back, Pepper skittered sideways and knocked a large bottle of white spirit onto the floor.
‘Oopsy,’ she trilled, swallowing the seven or so much ruder words that had sprung to mind.
She had just deposited the lavender on the table and was heading inside to get a cloth when her phone started ringing. It was then that Pepper remembered her vow to call her mother when she got back from Spain – a vow she had failed to keep.
‘Mum? Hi. I know, I said I’d call – I’m sorry. It’s just been busy. Work’s been busy.’
‘It’s fine,’ her mother replied, for once with enough buoyancy to sound convincing. ‘I’m just on my way round to you, actually.’
‘But it’s Monday.’ Pepper stopped halfway along her garden path.
‘Yes, I know,’ said her mother. ‘I–– Well, I thought we could go for a walk?’
Her mother wanted to spend extra one-on-one time with her – was choosing to do so?
‘Er, OK.’ Pepper said, unable to mask her surprise. ‘But don’t bother coming all the way here. Shall I meet you by the coastal path, in say ten minutes?’
‘Sorry, everyone,’ Pepper said, addressing the room two minutes later. ‘Something’s come up and I have to pop out. Feel free to stay and finish. You all know what you’re doing, right?’
There was a chorus of nods.
‘Right, when you go, can the last person make sure they shut and lock the studio door behind them? Just leave the keys on the kitchen worktop. And don’t worry about clearing up,’ she added, pausing with one arm through the sleeve of her denim jacket. ‘I’ll clear everything up in no time when I get back.’
She found her mum waiting at the foot of the beach path, sparse grass behind her and the wide, salt-and-pepper spread of stony beach ahead. It felt unusual to be meeting her like this, on a non-designated day and not in a pre-scheduled place, and to make matters even more astonishing, her mother was actually smiling.
‘Have you won the lottery or something?’ Pepper asked as she drew closer. She and her mother rarely hugged and never kissed each other hello, but today her mother extended a hand of greeting.
‘Are we shaking hands now?’ Pepper said bemusedly. ‘Very formal.’
‘Sorry.’ Her mother went to snatch it away, but Pepper caught hold of her and gave the hand a brisk shake.
‘There we go,’ she said lightly. ‘Not weird at all.’
Her mother’s mouth had gone rather lopsided, as if she was trying hard to suppress a grin.
‘I thought that we . . . Oh, never mind. Anyway, shall we?’ She gestured to the path. ‘I thought it might be nice to walk along to Thorpeness, get an ice cream or something?’
Any moment now, Pepper thought. Any moment now I will wake up.
They began by talking about Barcelona, her mother gazing mostly towards the far horizon as Pepper told her about Park Güell, Casa Batllò and La Pedrera, trying her best to explain how it had felt to be surrounded by the work of such an imaginative genius.
‘I’m only vaguely aware of Gaudí,’ her mother confessed. ‘But I always did like mosaics.’
She did?
Pepper was about to reply when they were both distracted by a dog bounding along the path, all long floppy ears and lolling pink tongue. Bethan had begged incessantly for a puppy, had scrawled the word at the top of every birthday and Christmas list she made. Her mother had not been keen on the idea, but Pepper’s dad was more easily persuaded. Bethan would creep onto his lap while he watched the news and curl her fingers around his, promising that she would be a good girl, that she would do all the walking herself, that if he said yes to a puppy, she would never ask for anything else ever again.
If the accident had never happened, her sister would have got her way in the end. Pepper was sure of it.
She began to collect things as they walked – pebbles, feathers, twine, plastic bottles and sweet wrappers – slipping it all into a canvas tote bag she’d slung over one shoulder. It was the kind of thing her fastidiously clean mother would usually screw her nose up at, but today she didn’t comment. She did not say much, in fact, seemingly content to listen as Pepper brought up one safe subject after another – what she planned to wear to Martin and Keira’s wedding, the drama series about corrupt police officers that she’d just discovered and was watching every night, the outdoor watercolour class she hoped to launch soon. When Pepper filled her in on the Vespa tour she and Josephine had taken, and what her friend had said about ‘beautiful beasts’, her mother laughed. Actually laughed. Pepper almost fell off the path in shock.
She ran out of topics just as they reached Thorpeness, but by then, it was clear her mother had a plan of where she wanted to go next.
‘Look,’ she said, as the village green came into view on their left, covered as it always was by waddling ducks and geese. ‘The House in the Clouds is just up ahead – do you remember it from when you were little?’
‘Of course I do.’
She and Bethan had spent so many happy days down on the beach as children, lying on their tummies side by side on the warm stones, gazing up at the distant house and making up stories about the people who lived in it. Pepper could remember teasing Bethan that you could see right across to Belgium from the top floor, and that once upon a time, fairies had been found living at the bottom of the garden.
‘There’s a secret in every room of that house,’ she would tell her. ‘If you stand on the path outside and whisper your secret into the wind, the house will keep it for you.’
‘It reminds me of Bethan,’ Pepper said quietly, testing the subject that so often caused her mother to spiral downwards into abject misery. She saw her take a deep breath.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Bethie always loved it. But I’ve always found it more reminiscent of you.’
‘Me?’
‘You’re the one who’s most like it,’ her mother said. ‘Ever since I can remember, you’ve been walking around with your head in the clouds.’
Where was the sullen tone? Where was the weary, withering look?
‘I try not to do that any more,’ Pepper said, as they turned down the lane that would lead them right to the house. ‘I learnt my lesson.’
Her mother stopped walking and Pepper glanced back.
‘What?’
Her mother said nothing at first, she simply stood and picked listlessly at the bobbles on her over-washed cardigan. She looked less prim and put-together today and had swapped her sensible heels for a pair of plimsolls and put on a floral blouse instead of her standard navy or cream. It made her seem softer somehow, more vulnerable, but with her sharp elbows and hunched shoulders, she reminded Pepper painfully of Josephine.
Sliding her phone out of her pocket, she realised that she’d been alone with her mother for almost an hour now, but for the first time since Pepper had reached adulthood, she had not been starkly aware of every awkward passing minute. She had always thought it was her mum who had driven the wedge between them, but perhaps they had been equally evasive.