Sixteen Horses by Greg Buchanan (readict TXT) 📕

The lonely parted, and all around, an emptiness blossomed in the air.

I once asked a question: would you rather be careless or cruel?

But there was a secret, wasn’t there? There was a choice beyond choice.

A wonderful thing was happening.

I found myself dancing, that night.

I found myself.

CHAPTER EIGHTY

They had parked up by the wreckage of the old pier.

The wooden boards ran one hundred feet out into the sea. It had not collapsed, not yet.

‘I went on holiday here when I was little.’ Cooper blinked. The wind turbines twisted the skyline, far away. ‘Isn’t that strange? I was here and didn’t even know. My mum told me. Phoned me yesterday.’

‘How was it?’

‘The pier hadn’t burned down yet. We—’

‘I meant the phone call with your mum. How was it?’

‘It was fine,’ she said, dismissive.

He nodded, and she went on.

‘We were on holiday, anyway, the last time I came here. We threw balls at coconuts, ate doughnuts, tried to avoid seagulls. It looks different now, I suppose, but I don’t know how well it was doing, even then. The arcades, for instance . . . a sight like that when I was ten would have been magical. I would have loved it, I think.’

‘I can’t imagine you’ll come back again,’ Alec said, quietly. ‘Not after this stay.’

She smiled, but her green eyes didn’t. ‘Why not? Tons of excitement for all the family.’

He looked at her, and there was a moment.

Alec’s voice grew lighter. ‘I never got to know anyone here. George, maybe – maybe he was a friend, I don’t know. Harry, a bit, but never as well. And then there’s . . . there’s you.’

Still, she said nothing.

‘I saw you, the night before you came to Well Farm. In the pub. I was thinking of speaking to you, but . . .’

Cooper stared at him. ‘Why were you going to speak to me?’

He looked back at the water.

Neither spoke for a little while.

‘Rebecca’s lying, of course,’ he said, and Cooper nodded.

‘What did she mean? When she said you’d talked to Grace – did you?’

There was a pause. ‘I don’t know what she meant. But it’s interesting, isn’t it? She claims she hasn’t spoken to her mother for a year, then seems to know about her messages. It doesn’t fit.’

‘Nothing fits,’ Cooper said, turning back to the sea. He almost thought she was annoyed at him for a moment. ‘Everyone who could help us is dead or lying or gone. This case, it—’

‘Sun’s going down.’

She scowled. ‘And I don’t like how much you interrupt me.’

‘You’re just tired, that’s all. I’m really not interrupting you.’

She scratched her neck.

‘Go back to your hotel,’ he said. ‘I’ll hang around a bit, go to the shops before they shut.’

‘How will you get back? What are you—’

‘Need to get Christmas presents,’ he said. ‘For when Si’s home.’

She said nothing.

‘For you too.’ He winked. Later he would cringe when he was alone, wondering why he’d winked. She just smiled at him though, strangely, differently.

They said goodbye.

CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE

Something in Alec preferred the cold to the heat – the way it felt in his lungs, the way it brushed his face – and with the sun, both things were bearable, in perfect balance. The breeze had started to slow.

In the usual teeming square, only three stalls were set up. Seagulls looked for food and found little. Soon they would starve, and many would fly away forever.

All your old favourites. ICE CREAM, TEN FLAVOURS.

PAPA TEA.

SHOE & KEY REPAIR. WHILE YOU WAIT.

AMERICAN CHIP SALON.

All were closed. It did not even cross Alec’s mind that some of them might be closed indefinitely.

The military surplus stall was still there. The angry man that had run it was no longer angry. He smiled as if it was Christmas morning itself.

The streets were mixed with slush and grit in case of ice. It was hard to tell the two things apart.

An empty motor scooter stood, abandoned, by the only open coffee van.

Alec went on to the Local. Maybe he’d find something there.

Inside, only one checkout was open. A stranger cried near the frozen food. Alec did not know whether to say anything, whether to do anything.

‘Chcę iść do domu,’ she whispered to her phone. ‘Proszę . . .’

Alec found a chocolate bear in the sweet section, a tiny Christmas bell around its golden wrapping. This would make a start. He bought a bottle of whisky too, a good one. Cooper had bad taste. They could drink it together.

He went to the checkout, and paid, and left.

The trees stood against the clear blue sky all around.

Alec looked ahead, thinking of Cooper, reassessing her, wondering what his son might think of her in turn when they met. Wondering if they’d get along.

Wondering if, after all this, she might somehow stay here.

She made him smile.

Seagulls perched on top of paint-flaked facades and black iron lamp-posts. Neon logos screamed. Empty amusement arcades blared. It was all for no one, no one at all.

Cooper went out for a run before the day ended, pulling on her purple university hoodie, the big white letters of the Royal Veterinary College on the front below a crest. Animals danced around a picture of a crown.

The air was cold and dry.

She headed back along the seafront, past empty sands, beneath a crimson moon. The tides moved, back and forth, back and forth.

She passed through the park. The trees were lovely that belated autumn day. The leaves had fallen like fire, rapidly, in the false starts and strange beginnings of new winter. They lay in heaps upon the path and beside it. She passed a couple of dog walkers, but no one else. Small greetings in the new dark, even as the sun shone above the dense overgrowth. People said hello, but only their dogs meant it.

She was already sweating through her green top, despite the crisp chill air. Her purple hoodie hid it all. Thank God for the RVC. She’d been happy enough in her time there. Most of her friends had been American, on the international programme,