Hamza’s jaw dropped when he opened the front door of his flat. ‘Man, you look terrible!
‘Thanks. You sound exactly like my brother.’ A raindrop slid down Travis’s chin. ‘I had to park two streets away.’
‘That’s London for you. Come in out of the rain.’ Hamza took Travis’s wet jacket and hooked it over the banister in his hallway.
‘Thanks for letting me stay at short notice. You could have said no …’
‘Mate, when you send me a message asking “if I’m in” and you’re over two hundred miles away, then I know it’s important. I’ll get us some food. I don’t know about you but I’m starving.’
Travis tried to relax, while Hamza made a call to his favourite restaurant.
‘I ordered dejaje demhal since it’s your favourite.’
‘My mouth is watering already. Let me pay.’
‘No, it’s my treat, since I left you in the lurch with the gallery,’ Hamza insisted. ‘We’ll eat first then share our woes.’
‘Woes?’ Travis said, dismayed. ‘Is this about Caz?’
Hamza gave a resigned shrug. ‘Might be. Now, eat.’
Funny, but Travis didn’t know how much he needed someone to order him to do the basics: like eat and sleep. Over the past few days, even simple decisions had seemed a struggle. He’d opened the gallery and served a few customers but closed early, feeling exhausted. Freya’s bombshell had shattered him. He’d been expecting her at some point to tell him their arrangement was over, not that she wanted it to continue, and wanted more.
He’d been so braced for disappointment, that he hadn’t considered the alternative and he had no idea how to react. The scars ran deep when you felt you weren’t worthy of love … Travis knew that this applied as much to himself as to Seb.
For now, he did as he was told. He ate. Food was nurture, Hamza had once told him, sharing was caring, showing love and respect for friends and strangers.
There was certainly love in the delicious meal, in the tangy salad of aubergine, onion and lemon and flatbreads, and the dejaje demhal, with its spicy tomato sauce.
He’d had it several times before when he’d lodged with Hamza’s parents. ‘This is sensational though not as good as your mum’s, of course.’
‘Can I record you saying that?’ Hamza said.
‘By all means. I miss it and you can’t get it in Bannerdale. There’s a great Thai restaurant though. Seb keeps dropping in. He’s spending far too much money in there.’
‘Is this because of the roofer you told me about?’
‘He likes Araya but I’m not sure how she feels. I hope he won’t get his heart broken.’
‘Like the two of us?’ Hamza said. ‘The older, wiser ones?’
‘I definitely feel older but not wiser. You tell me about Caz before I unload.’
Having loaded the empty cartons into the bin, they sat on the sofas with bottles of Lucky Saint. Hamza sighed. ‘We’ve agreed to stay just friends. When I got back from the last assignment, she invited me over and we had a talk. To be honest, she started the chat. She told me she was very sorry but she didn’t want to marry me – or anyone – right now. She’d been offered a job at a hospital in Perth and she wanted to take it.’
‘That’s tough. I’m so sorry, mate.’
‘Don’t be. I do love her – as more than a friend but not in the way that you should love someone you’re going to spend the rest of your life with. She made it easy for me. She said she suspected I felt the same way as her.
‘It was hard, it was upsetting. We both cried, because the death of anything that special is painful, but I sensed she was even more relieved than me. We’ve kept in touch since, and we can talk freely.’
‘What about your families?’
‘Dealing with them was harder than breaking off our engagement. My mother was inconsolable. Her mother was angry with both of us but we’ve stayed firm. They’ve had to accept it.’
Travis thought of Freya and Jos’s parents – the fallout the anger and he felt a pang of pity for Jos.
‘I should have been there for you?’
‘You couldn’t have done anything and I could say the same thing. Now, your turn. I’m guessing Freya is the reason you’re here?’
They were on their third non-alcoholic beer by the time Travis had finished talking and Hamza had listened and empathised and asked questions.
‘So I want to trust her. She most definitely is the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with. She always has been – I believe that so strongly, it scares me.’
‘But you can’t believe that this time, her feelings are going to last?’ Hamza offered.
‘Maybe. No, yes. I think so – I’m being a wimp.’
‘This is the man talking who’d get within snogging distance of a grizzly to get a great photo?’
‘That’s not the same, you know it. That’s physical courage – actually, that’s sheer insanity. Dealing with relationships is much harder and riskier.’
‘Remember, this is also the man who took on the care of his family after his father let him down so many times. Who left with nothing to make a life for himself in one of the most competitive professions in the world. Who backed himself and built up his business.’
‘You flatter me. Still easier than believing it’ll work this time.’
Hamza sipped his beer then smiled. ‘Mate, I wish I was in your position. Where the woman I loved more than anything wants to be with me. Caz and I realised we didn’t need each other enough to take the risk. You and Freya do.’
Travis woke with a crick in his neck and a dry mouth, though not from drinking booze.
He and Hamza had sat up until the small hours, talking – he’d like to say they’d set the world to rights but that wouldn’t be accurate. He had, however, unloaded all the ups and downs of his relationship with Freya.
The sound and smell of coffee being made awakened his senses fully and a minute later, Hamza walked into the sitting room.
‘Morning buddy. Happy New Year’s Eve.’
‘Is it? Jeez, I forgot about that. The days have blurred into one since Christmas.’
Travis swung his legs off the couch, gratefully accepting the mug from Hamza. ‘Morning.’ He sipped and winced. ‘God, this could strip bark from the trees if you don’t mind me saying.’
‘It’s Turkish. I thought you needed the caffeine.’
‘Hmm.’ Travis sipped the syrupy liquid and shuddered. ‘It smells better than it tastes.’
‘Thanks for your honesty. Get it down you, then come into the kitchen.’
‘I’ll be bouncing off the walls,’ he said, sipping again. His nose twitched. ‘What’s that great smell?’
‘Shakshuka. It’s my go-to breakfast lately. My Turkish mate got me into that too.’
Over the shakshuka, Travis asked to borrow Hamza’s phone. ‘I left mine behind at the cabin,’ he said.
‘I can’t believe that you were out without your mobile!’
‘I left in a hurry and I wasn’t thinking straight. I’d assumed it was in my coat pocket but obviously not.’
‘Does anyone even know you’re here?’ Hamza asked.
‘No.’
He winced. ‘Don’t you think they should?’
‘I can’t imagine they’d have missed me yet. It’s only been eighteen hours since I left home but I guess I ought to send a message. I, er, suppose it might look odd that the gallery’s closed, although I hadn’t planned to open until tomorrow. I’ll have to say you were home and I decided to nip down to see you.’
Hamza laughed out loud. ‘Nipped to London?’
‘I’ve nipped to the other side of the world, so why not?’
Travis pushed his empty bowl away, having wiped it clean with flatbread. ‘That shakshuka was bloody amazing.’
‘I’m glad you’re happy about something at least.’ Hamza eyed him sternly. ‘Here’s my phone. Make some calls and prepare for people to be pissed off. In my opinion, you deserve it!’
After breakfast, Travis drove home and arrived back at the cabin where he had to once again explain himself to Bree, who’d calmed down from boiling point to simmer. As for Freya, he’d simply sent her a text saying he was sorry that he’d worried Bree and Seb to the point where they’d intruded on her working day.
He’d kept the message as short as possible, and as free of emotion as possible. His talk with Hamza hadn’t solved his problems. He hadn’t expected it too, but once again, his friend had hit the nail on her head: I realised we didn’t need each other enough to take the risk. You and Freya do.
Could Travis risk his heart again?
By the time he’d got back to the cabin and answered a pile of emails and messages from clients, it was dark again, and he still had to check all was well at the gallery. The streets were already busy with people heading to hotels, bars and restaurants. A few fireworks were already going off in the park by the lake. Travis had never felt less like celebrating and planned to go home to the cabin to lick his wounds.
First he had a more important task: checking on Peak Perspectives which lay in darkness too, as if accusing him of neglect. This was the dream he’d worked for much of his life and he’d abandoned it. Whatever else happened, it was his livelihood now.
He inserted the key in the front door lock and pushed open the door and his heart rate rocketed.
A torch beam wavered at the rear and then there was a crash of glass shattering.
Travis flicked on the lights.
‘Dad! What the hell are you doing here?’
Alan Marshall swung round, blinking, surrounded by broken glass.
Boiling with indignation, Travis advanced on him. ‘There’s no cash in here if that’s what you’re looking for. I don’t keep any camera equipment either.’
‘I wasn’t looking for cash or your precious cameras!’
He’d once claimed to Travis that he’d been a decent amateur boxer as a teenager but Travis had added it to the list of myths and fantasies his father had perpetuated. He still looked in shape for a man in his late fifties but prison had inevitably taken its toll, and his face was a map of every lie he’d told and scam he’d pulled. His grey hair had been allowed to grow long and was pulled back in a scraggy ponytail.
Travis snorted in disbelief. ‘Pull the other one. You must have wanted something.’
‘Only to see the gallery. I heard how well you’ve done and I wanted to take a look.’ He took a step towards Travis, his boots crunching on broken glass.
‘In the dark? Why didn’t you come round while the place was open, like everyone else?’
‘I didn’t want to cause a scene or embarrass you.’
‘So you decided to break in? That’s not causing trouble?’
‘I didn’t break in. The glass is from a tumbler I knocked over on my way in. The back door wasn’t even locked.’ He smirked. ‘Your security is lax, son.’
Travis could have kicked himself. He must have left the rear door unlocked when he’d rushed off to Hamza’s. The gallery could have been broken into any time he’d been away. It was a miracle Bree hadn’t noticed when she’d gone searching for him but she’d probably assumed it was all secure and not checked the rear door.
‘I don’t care if you materialised in here like the fecking Ghost of Christmas Past. You weren’t invited and you still aren’t.’ Travis was worried he’d already been to hassle Seb or Bree – or both. Or that he might try it once Travis had sent him packing.
‘That’s not very hospitable, is it?’
‘I’m hospitable to people who are welcome. You aren’t and I’d like you to leave.’
He tutted. ‘When did you get so bitter? You’ve everything you want in life, yet you can’t spare a crumb of kindness for your old man.’
Travis caught a whiff of booze on his dad’s breath.
‘Bitter? I’m not bitter. I’m just sad that you pissed your life away. That you left Mum with the three of us and didn’t give a shit what happened. That you tried to drag me and Seb down to your level. Well, you won’t do that because he’s not you, and neither am I. Now, I’d really like you to leave.’
‘What will you do if I don’t want to?’
‘Call the police.’
‘The police? You are joking? On your own father?’
Travis pulled out his mobile, hoping his father wouldn’t see that his hands were shaking. This confrontation was making him feel sick but he had to make a stand, for his sake and his family’s.
‘Travis!’
Travis spun round to find Freya in the shop, eyes wide with alarm. She was wearing a shimmering dress under a furry coat.
‘I saw the lights on and was worried about—’
His heart sank to his boots. He didn’t want her witnessing this kind of scene but it was too late. She came forward. ‘Mr Marshall?’
‘Mr Marshall.’ He smirked. ‘Now, that’s how to speak to a man. Good evening, Freya. My, you’ve grown a bit.’
‘Dad was just about to leave,’ Travis said, hating the idea of his father being in the same room as Freya or having the opportunity to upset her.
‘Like I said, I came to see if you were OK?’
‘Aww, that’s nice,’ his father sneered. ‘Someone cares about you. How lovely. When’s the wedding? Second time lucky, is it?’
‘What the hell do you mean?’
‘I remember her running off from that church. I wasn’t inside at the time. I heard you crying in your room that night because some kids were taking the piss out of you at school. Remember?’
‘And you came in and laughed at me and told me to man up!’ Travis shouted.
Freya laid her hand on his arm. ‘Travis, don’t let him get to you.’
His father ignored her. ‘I also heard about the second time when she dumped you. Proper messed you up, didn’t she? Your mum let on, though she wished she hadn’t. She tracked me down when Bree was getting married and tried to tell me I should take an interest in the family, you and Seb. She’d heard I was out and hoped I’d turn over a new leaf.’ He laughed. ‘As if life was that simple.
‘Your trouble is that you wear your heart on your sleeve. You need to harden up and stop thinking there’s a happy ending out there. You both look at me as if I’m the devil but you’d know life doesn’t work out …’ His voice faltered. ‘Not if you’d had the upbringing that I had … not if everything you tried turned to shit …’
His father was making excuses. Blaming his own childhood for the way he’d treated his family.
‘Get out,’ Travis said, ‘Or I will call the police, and I don’t want to do that, Dad. Leave.’
His father took a step forward, as if squaring up to him for a fight, then stumbled. He put his hand on Freya’s shoulder. Startled, she overbalanced, almost falling.
‘Get off her!’ Travis lunged forward and grabbed his father’s arm, propelling him towards the door.
‘Hey!’ his dad protested. ‘I didn’t mean to push her, I was only steadying myself. I’m not as young as I was.’
Travis let go of him. ‘Don’t touch her. Leave now, Dad or—’
His father stared him, eyes blazing. ‘Or what?
‘Stop this, both of you,’ Freya ordered.
‘Don’t worry. I’m going.’ He nodded at Freya. ‘Happy New Year, love. Good luck to both of you if you’re planning on your happy ending, cos you won’t get it.’
He marched out of the gallery and slammed the back door.
Travis bolted it behind him and tried to steady his breathing. His father had dredged up his darkest days of his life, the most toxic emotions, the hurt …
Crushing all of it down, he strode back into the gallery where Freya was waiting for him. The urge to throw his arms around her was almost overwhelming. ‘Are you OK? I’m so sorry!’
‘I’m fine, and it wasn’t your fault. He didn’t mean anything. I think he was unsteady on his feet.’
‘He was drunk!’ Travis snapped. ‘Ignore what he said. He’s full of bullshit. Don’t let my bloody dad spoil your evening. I’d forgotten it was New Year’s Eve.’
She took a breath and regained her composure. ‘I was off to the Shoreline. A bunch of us are. Won’t you come with me?’
‘No, I don’t think so. I’d be the spectre at the feast.’
‘I’m not leaving you,’ she declared.
‘You have to go and enjoy yourself. I’ll be fine.’
‘It doesn’t look like it. Come on, you can’t stay here on your own or mope in the cabin. I won’t take no for an answer.’
He nodded. ‘I’ll pop in for a drink. Just one. Let’s get out of here and this time, I’ll make sure I lock the door properly.’
They walked the short distance to the Shoreline Inn, where the firework display had been set up in the beer garden at the edge of the lake. The place was packed with familiar faces including Roxanne, Araya, Mimi and her husband, the local traders, and the vicar. There was no Bree, who he guessed was at home with the kids, or Seb, who’d gone to play a gig at a bar in Windermere.
One drink, he’d vowed, but that turned into several and several trips to the buffet because he hadn’t eaten properly since breakfast. He found himself swept up by the atmosphere, talking to people he hadn’t seen for years and crowding into the beer garden with Freya, her friends and the other partygoers.
In the summer, the lawns would have been carpeted with people enjoying drinks with the view of the fells on the far side of the lake. Tonight, the velvet darkness of the water was punctuated only by the lights of a few yachts moored in the marina. The moon and stars were hidden under a thick blanket of clouds.
Shadowy figures moved by torchlight on the edge of the shore Around him, chatter and excitement rose like the buzzing of bees, more and more people spilling out of the pub and restaurant onto the terrace.
Travis checked his watch. Only a few seconds to go.
‘Ten, nine, eight …’ Jos shouted.
Every voice joined, in with the countdown.
Seven, six, five …
Four, three, two, one!
Cheers rang out and glasses were raised to the sound of rockets fizzing high into the sky then exploding in blinding flashes of white and green. People were hugging and kissing, wishing each other a Happy New Year.
The pops and bangs, explosions went on and on and finally there was one last massive bang that had people shouting in a collective, ‘Ah!’
Then the sky over the lake went dark again, just puffs of smoke yet there was still a frenzy of fireworks going off in the grounds of hotels and houses.
‘What’s that?’ Araya pointed towards the village where there was an orange glow.
‘Looks like a big bonfire.’
‘I don’t think so … It looks more like a house fire to me,’ Freya said. ‘In the middle of the village too. Oh God, I hope not.’
Travis’s stomach clenched tightly. It couldn’t be … and yet his skin turned icy cold. The position of the flames, their location in the village … He had the strangest feeling.
‘Travis?’
He didn’t reply, because he was already running out of the garden and into the street. Running until his lungs burst, desperately hoping that he was wrong but knowing he was right. Even if the gallery wasn’t alight, the shops and flats nearby had to be. Seb’s place could be one of them. Seb would surely still be at the gig? He couldn’t take that chance.
Gasping for breath, he ran up the village street and stopped, feeling the heat on his face. The gallery, with all his work inside it, was on fire.
He stopped for a second, smelling the smoke, tasting bitterness on the air. Orange flames licked at the front door, and the Peak Perspectives sign was blistering in the heat but the roof was intact, so maybe the blaze was contained to the front?
He wanted to go inside. He could get around the back of it – maybe save the printing equipment inside. He had to do something.
He could run down the alley at the side of the building. and round to the back. It was by the side of the shop if he was quick. If he did it now.
Drinkers from the Red Lion were out in the street, watching – spectating while his business burned, some even holding up phones out to film the inferno.
No way would Travis stand by and see his place go up in flames!
Ducking low, he forced himself to brave the heat and reach the alley.
‘Hey mate! What you doing?’
‘He’s nuts!’
Travis was choking on the smoke, but forced himself to press forward, crouching, and spluttering, his nose streaming.
Seb was in front of him, trying to push him back.
‘Let me go! I need to do something!’
‘No!’ Freya had now seized his arm, dragging him back while Seb pushed his chest. Their combined force left him powerless and he could hardly see, his eyes stinging.
A crash cut through the air and glass exploded into the street, at the same time as the three of them ducked to the ground. Flames billowed out of the shop front.
A moment later, he found himself on the tarmac, with Freya and Seb next to him.
‘Oh God, no.’ Travis knelt over Freya. ‘Are you OK?’
‘Yeah … yes …’ she murmured.
‘Me too,’ Seb said and allowed himself to be helped up by Travis. ‘Let’s get the fuck away from the place before we’re all killed.’
Glass crunched under Travis’s feet as he limped away from the gallery with Freya and Seb. Freya was holding his arm so hard it hurt. ‘The fire brigade are coming,’ she said, as sirens wailed above the crack of the flames.
‘I’ve lost everything.’
‘Bro, you haven’t – it’s only stuff – paper and card.’
‘It’s my work!’
‘That can be replaced,’ Freya said.
‘And you can’t.’ Seb hugged him. ‘I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you, bro.’
Before his eyes, everything he’d worked for his whole life was burning to ashes. Tears streamed down his face and he let them flow, let everyone think it was the smoke but it was grief: for the loss of the gallery, for the loss of Freya all those years before and his loss of belief in their future.