AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘True,’ he admitted.
‘I think it’d be too isolated for me,’ she said. ‘Though I guess for you it’d be like being in your lab.’
He smiled. ‘I’m not that isolated in my lab. Apart from the fact that I work as a team, I have to go to way too many meetings during the week.’
He parked the car and they walked down the track to the lighthouse; it turned out they were among the first to queue for the tour and were let up with the first batch of holidaymakers.
‘It’s barer than I expected,’ Abigail whispered when they were inside. ‘Obviously this bit must’ve been for storage because the lighthouse keeper had a cottage next door.’
There were colourful displays around the walls, with old photographs of the lighthouse and former lighthouse keepers, but when Brad looked up there was nothing between them and the very top floor of the lighthouse.
Their group followed the guide up the narrow stone steps that clung to the walls in a spiral, first of all up to a room full of maps, which showed all the shipping hazards in the area and the locations of other lighthouses nearby.
‘When the lighthouse was first built here, it took three keepers to run. And they had to be really good friends because they worked together and lived together for months at a time. It wasn’t so bad here on the mainland, but in somewhere like the Needles Rock on the Isle of Wight it meant living in a tiny room, with no running water or heating.’
Brad looked at Abigail, who grimaced at the thought of it.
Then they climbed up the steep ladder to the lamp itself; from the top, there were amazing views over the cornfields and the sea.
Brad was fascinated by the fact that the light was only five hundred watts but was visible eighteen miles out to sea, thanks to the angles of the glass slats around the lamp. But, as the guide talked, he thought about how much his dad would’ve loved this, and a wave of sheer misery and loss hit him. It felt like a wall slamming into him and he was barely able to pay attention to what the guide was telling them about how the lamps worked in the early days and what the keepers had to do, from lighting and checking the lights to keeping records of the weather and any shipwrecks.
* * *
Abigail frowned. Brad had gone very quiet and it was as if all the sunlight had been sucked from his face.
Something was definitely wrong. Was this something to do with his ‘unfinished business’?
Would he talk to her about it? Or would he block her off again?
She had to concentrate on going backwards down the steep ladder from the top, and going down the spiral steps was definitely more scary than going up them, but as they walked to the car she took his hand and squeezed it. ‘Are you OK?’
‘Sure.’
But his tone was flat. Years ago, she would’ve left it. Now, she called him on it. ‘You don’t look OK or sound OK.’
He sighed. ‘I was thinking about Dad. He would’ve loved this, all the stuff about boats in olden times. I could’ve brought him here and taken him out for a pub lunch or something afterwards.’
‘I know. It’s a shame you never got to do it.’ She turned to face him and splayed her hand over his heart. ‘But your memories of him are still right here and you’ll never lose them—and you can still share this with him in your head.’ She added quietly, ‘And today you’ve shared it with me.’
‘I know. Sorry. I’m not good company right now.’ He grimaced. ‘Do you want me to take you home?’
At least he was talking to her. ‘No, let’s go for a walk somewhere. It will clear your head.’
He was quiet all the way as they drove inland to a patch of woodland. He was quiet, too, when they walked hand in hand through the trees, and she didn’t push him to talk.
Eventually, he sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t want to bring you down with my mood, but I don’t want to shut you out either.’
Relief flooded through her. He wasn’t going to close himself off again. ‘It’s fine,’ she said lightly. ‘Everyone has good and bad days.’
‘Do you get bad days?’
She had when they’d first split up; she’d managed to pull herself out of it, but it had taken her a while. And she’d really needed the support of her parents and her best friend—support she guessed Brad either hadn’t had or, more likely, had refused. Support she should have given him instead of letting him down. ‘Yes. Obviously both my parents are still here, so it’s not the same thing that you went through, but I’m only human. I get days where just about everything seems to be wrong.’
