When Love Knocks Twice (A Contemporary Love Story)

When Love Knocks Twice

G I Tulloch

Copyright 2015

The right of G I Tulloch to be identified as the author of this work is
asserted.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters and incidents are
the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual
events or persons, living or dead is coincidental.

All rights reserved.(XV) No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means without the prior consent of the author.

Wednesday,
June 15th

Gail
came out into the garden at seven o'clock in the morning, dressed in shorts and an old tee-shirt, to do some
tidying before it got too hot. Emily, her daughter, was always critical of her old
tee-shirts but had to concede that her mother still had the legs to
carry a pair of shorts in style.

She
tucked stray strands of her long dark hair behind an ear with a
gloved hand, while wielding the secateurs at some hawthorn hedge that
was getting out of control. Observing the growing pile of dead wood
behind her, she contemplated having a bonfire that evening. It would
be too hot, but there was something about the smell of wood smoke
that lifted the spirits. Why was that?

She
loved her house and the garden, and she loved the memories they held,
but despite that she was also aware that she needed a change of
scenery. She hadn't had a holiday for the last two years. Were there
some friends she could prevail upon to give her a bed? Holidays were
always a problem as she hated going away on her own, and there were
times when taking the grandchildren was just too much for her.

She
stopped for a moment to ease the slight ache in her back, taking off
the gloves to let her hands cool down. She took a gulp of tea from
her first mug of the day at the garden table, still in the shade of
the house at that early hour.

After
an hour and a half, with the hawthorn hedge looking a little more
under control, she went in to the house for some breakfast. Some
reheated croissants and coffee later, she noticed that the washing
machine had finished, so set to, hanging the washing out on the line.
She couldn't bring herself to use the tumble drier when sunshine was
free.

It
was only when she had finished, wash basket under her arm, did she
stop and look around her. Is this it, she thought, not for the first
time. Is this what my life consists of now? Day to day maintenance of
life. In truth, she knew it wasn't, because there were other
interests she was involved in that gave her diversion. But for a
moment she longed for some excitement, a break from the everyday.

She
looked at her watch. Time to get on, some things wouldn't wait.

Tom
stopped for a moment and gazed across the road at the house that had
been his home thirty five years ago, the sandstone façade
glowing slightly in the summer sun. He was please to note that the
garage was still standing, the garage he had helped his father build
all those years ago. The garden was tidy, the boundary wall newly
rendered, the top-stones still showing the rusted stumps of the iron
railings that had been removed during the Second World War,
presumably to become part of some warship. His father's prized roses
had gone, replaced by some perennial bush that he couldn't recognise.

He
suddenly realised that he had been standing staring for some time,
and belatedly became aware that it might look odd, or even
suspicious. He strolled on towards the newer end of the road where
the houses had been build in the nineteen sixties, providing endless
amusement for small boys intrigued by the mysteries of building
sites. He recalled his mates during the firework season, wrapping
Bangers in clods of mud, lighting the fuse and hurling them into the
air, trying to get the timing right so that the mid air explosion
resulted in a rain of soggy earth pattering to the ground.

He
walked up through the field, noting that today's youngsters obviously
still played impromptu football matches there. He could see the holes
where stout sticks had been culled from the adjacent woodland to make
goalposts, and it was into this woodland that he ventured now,
recalling the magic of the place for him as a boy. The trees to be
climbed, the tree that was turned into a flying bomber plane as he
and his mates played out imaginary games.

In
autumn when the leaves dropped from the trees, carpeting the packed
earth, they would clear tracks, create racing circuits and race each
other on their bikes. When they wanted to, there was always plenty of
firewood for the fires they lit, roasting potatoes in the ashes, more
often than not leaving them in too long, until they were as much
charcoal as the ash itself.

He
noticed a clearing deeper in the woods that hadn't been there in his
day. Then, it had been a ruined farmhouse, overgrown and roofless, a
magnet for small boys and a nightmare for worried mothers. Rumours
and stories circulated of an old man who lived there, and who would
chase small boys. Nothing was ever said of what he would do if he
caught one. Tom smiled. The man had never existed but it was an
effective way of keeping small boys away from the dangers of falling
stonework.

And
now it was gone, a victim of modern health and safety no doubt. He
was pleased to note however, that the woodland was still as wild as
it ever had been. Thankfully no one had decided to tidy it up,
manicure it, and tie a ribbon around it. Standing there he could
still visualise them playing in the dirt.

He
wondered for a moment where they all were now. Were some like him
dispersed to the far ends of the country whilst others had married
and settled down locally? He wished for a moment that in some
telepathic way he could reach out into the ether and see them now,
unrecognisable from the small boys he remembered. And the girls.
There had always been some girls in the gang of junior school kids,
in the minority generally, but joining in some of the less rowdy
activities they got up to.

Gail
pottered around the kitchen, finishing up last night's dishes, those
that didn't go in the dishwasher that is. Not that there were that
many dishes for just one. She finished wiping down the surfaces,
trying to recall all the things that she needed to remember. She had
never been in the habit of writing lists despite her husband's best
efforts, but still her mind got into a spin trying to keep everything
in her brain. She had to go down to the church, it was her turn on
the rota to arrange the flowers for Sunday. She needed to get some
shopping to top up fresh vegetables. She needed to tidy the place,
because the kids were coming round this afternoon, and the
grand-kids.

Kids,
she thought, Emily was twenty six now, living in her own flat,
completely independent, and loving it. Jeremy was almost thirty,
married with two lovely little ones. They were hardly kids any more,
but they would always be hers, and she was content that they would
always need her, to a greater or lesser degree as circumstances
demanded. Yes, she was content. Her only regret was that her husband
Gordon wasn’t there to be content with her.

Four
years it had been since the cancer had finally claimed him. They had
fought hard, there had been remission and there had been treatments,
but finally his body had given up. There had been hard goodbyes as he
had slipped deeper into a coma under the increasing effects of the
morphine, and then he had finally succumbed and the tears could
start.

She
wiped away a tear now, tucked behind the ear some of her long dark
hair that had strayed, and rinsed out the cloth before turning and
catching sight of herself in the mirror. Must remember to brush my
hair before I go out, she thought, and change the blouse, it's got a
gravy stain down it.

Tom
was brought back to the present by some kids on bikes, cycling down
the road that bounded the wood, shouting and calling to each other.
Some things never change, he thought. He turned and headed through
the wood, his way lit by the dappled sunlight filtering through the
tree canopy. In less time than he remembered it taking as a child, he
came to the end of the woodland by the edge of the field that led
down to the small lake.

The
island in the middle of the lake looked unchanged, still occupied by
nesting swans by the look of it. He remembered exceptionally cold
winters when the lake froze hard, the ice thick enough to walk on
safely, when ice-skates came out of the depths of the cupboard and
were dusted off, only to find that they didn't fit any more. In
summer, small boys would fish and never catch anything. He was never
very sure whether it was due to the soggy bread they would use as
bait, or whether there weren't actually any fish to be caught anyway.
It hadn't been his activity of choice. He didn't have the patience
for it.

The
lakeside had been tidied up, he noticed, a neat asphalt path running
around its circumference. Fallen trees that had met their doom in the
great storm of nineteen sixty eight, and had lain for years growing
skirts of weeds and wild flowers around their fallen trunks, they had
all gone, no doubt sawn up and used for some council landscaping
somewhere.

It
was at that point he began to wonder whether his journey had been a
good idea, this return to his roots.

Gail
stood at the foot of her bed, putting on a fresh red blouse. She
liked that blouse, red suited her she thought, for the umpteenth
time, glad that her hair was still dark enough to contrast against
it. She pulled the bed covers up over the king sized bed, patting
down the side of the bed that had been Gordon's side. The bed was far
too big for her. It was like sleeping on a vast platform, but she
would not be able to part with it, too many memories were wrapped up
in it.

Contemplating
the past brought her to the present with a jolt that for some reason
caused her to contemplate the future. At the age of sixty one there
definitely was a future, she decided, but was it just a continuation
of her present? And here she had to confess that her life had become
somewhat mundane. The children and the grandchildren were the
mainstay of her life, playing a little tennis, and doing the church
flowers, her only other diversions.

Did
she want to become a glorified babysitter as she grew old, or did she
still want to accomplish something more? She had to admit that life
had become very same-y of late, very routine, and, yes, very boring.

The
thought appalled her. Boring? Yes, boring, but she was far to young
to be bored, wasn't she, and she certainly didn't want to be that for
the rest of her life? What was it she used to tell the children when
they claimed that they were bored? If you're bored then it's only
because you haven't found something interesting to do, so go and find
it. Perhaps she needed to follow her own advice.

She
ran the hair brush through her hair, taking her time. She had plenty
of that, she thought.

Tom
had turned sixty the previous June, two months after the death of his
wife, an horrendous, traumatic time, the unexpected heart attack, the
knock at the door, the world falling apart in an instant. He had
stood impassively watching all his assumptions of life drift away,
having to embrace loneliness after thirty years of happy marriage.

It
had been the children, both grown, both married, who had chivvied him
to get out there and get active again. Have a holiday they said, take
a road trip suggested one. And so here he was, back in the place of
his youth, trying to recognise the old place, unprepared for the
scale of change that had inevitably taken place. And, truth be told,
he wasn't sure why he was there or what he expected. The drive north
had been longer than he remembered but he had enjoyed it
nevertheless, as he had always enjoyed driving, especially the long
drives to strange places.

Except
this wasn't a strange place, or was it? He was confused, he admitted,
by the familiar things looking different from his memories. Had it
actually changed or was his memory defective? Or had he just grown
up, evolving a different set of eyes to see things through? What was
it they called it? He racked his brain. A paradigm, that was it. His
paradigm had changed from that of a youth to that of the grey-haired
brigade.

Did
he want to go back? Perhaps, but then again perhaps not, and in any
case he was where he was and as yet no one had come up with a way of
turning back time. But would he, if they had? As he gazed out over
the lake, shading his eyes against the sun, he decided the jury was
out.

He
had some great memories of his childhood, but also tucked away were
the troubles of pubescent youth that he hadn't been immune to. He
shuddered slightly at some memory, but then quickly acknowledged that
nothing in his life he regretted. It had been largely a happy and
satisfying one with a good marriage and a great family life, and
whilst it brought warm memories to him it also reminded him of what
he had been robbed of the previous April, and a shadow passed across
his mind.