Yesterday`s flower by Michelle Tarynne (uplifting book club books .txt) 📕

Was nothing entirely hers?

Erika looked out across the waves. The churning rain had turned the water opaque and dense, cloud and sea merged and would only be perceptible if a boat came over the horizon.

A crimson ship, perhaps, slicing open the horizon like a knife through grapefruit.

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Later, when darkness overcame the view completely, and lights began to shimmy from the few occupied houses below, Erika moved inside. She hoped that the sight of her blank canvases, sketchbook and boxes of neatly assorted paints would make her feel herself again.

Her suitcases remained where she’d left them next to the front door, though split open in her search for a bathing costume. Gripping a handle, she still felt the pull on her shoulder from lugging her belongings on the Tube to Heathrow.

No one had come to wave her off, though some had offered. Even Albert, for goodness sake. But she’d felt humiliated, as if she was running away, and she hadn’t wanted a pom-pom brigade.

What a way to leave.

The rain continued for days and Erika began to wonder why she hadn’t just stayed in

England. It was summer at least with long days and enough sunshine to keep her cheerful, well, more cheerful than this. But then she remembered. Everywhere she went there, she bumped into sympathy. In bucket-loads. She couldn’t bear it. It was just so awfully hard.

Then Sanchia popped by, her Labrador on a leash, and showed her how to put the car in reverse.

‘Grip and pull,’ she said, as the dog pulled against her, ready to leap into the back. ‘Sorry. This mu thinks we’re going for a drive. He loves the wind in his face.’

‘Well then, why don’t we?’ Erika said, proud of her spontaneity.

They decided on Muizenberg.

Uncertain of the car, Erika kept well within the speed limit, travelling over the mountains with Sanchia directing. The dog, who Sanchia had named Desmond ‘after Desmond Tutu’, salivated excitedly, head half-extended out the window despite the rain. His barking combined with the beat of the downpour made conversation almost impossible, but the sudden release from the house and the realisation that she had fully – albeit temporarily – escaped from her life gave Erika the urge to laugh, to just let go. And Sanchia, picking up on her hilarity, began to laugh too.

They travelled along the coast, through Simon’s Town and then Fish Hoek, the main road clogged with construction work, antiques shops and pedestrians taking the gap. Minutes from Muizenberg, Desmond retired to his seat and fell soundly asleep.

Finally able to talk, Sanchia closed the windows.

‘Muizenberg has had its ups and downs. It’s being restored at the moment, but it’s quite a historic place. You know Cecil John Rhodes?’

Erika wracked her brain. ‘The mining guy?’ she guessed.

‘Well, a li le more than that, seeing as Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, was named after him. He spent his later years there. And Rudyard Kipling lived in his co age after he died. Now it’s all about surfing. Beautiful waves, great for beginners. Even in weather like this we’ll see people out on the water.’

Erika looked behind her at the sleeping dog.

‘Have we exhausted him?’ she wondered aloud.

‘Nee wat, he’ll spring to life as soon as he hears the waves.’ ‘You’d think he’d be used to them.’ ‘Who could get used to water like that?’

‘You’re right.’ Erika nodded, looking beyond the parking lot towards the sea. Certainly the colour of the ocean had nothing on the aquamarine allure of Scarborough, but the beach seemed to stretch for miles.

‘How far does it go?’ she asked.

‘The beach? Oh at least thirty, forty kilometres. Don’t ask me in miles. All the way to Gordon’s Bay, I do know that.’

‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen a beach that long. I know it’s raining, but can I get out?’ Sanchia laughed. ‘I don’t think we’ll melt.’

Erika slipped out the Opel, feeling sure that the clouds were becoming lighter, patches

of blue beginning to show in the distance. If they waited a li le, perhaps ...

Hearing the click of Erika’s door, Desmond yawned and opened a chocolate eye. ‘That’s right boy,’ Sanchia crooned, ‘walkies-time.’

Desmond cocked his head, then leapt over the seat and through Sanchia’s door, squeezing his furry body past Erika. Off he scampered over the white sand, skidding to a halt in the shallows, his coat immediately drenched.

‘Shall we?’ asked Erika, grabbing an umbrella as she followed the dog onto the beach.

Sanchia pulled on a hooded jacket.

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘I think we should.’

♥

With a steaming cup of hot chocolate in front of her, Erika tucked her stringy damp hair behind her ears. The umbrella had upended and she’?d given up on it after a few minutes. She and Sanchia were now si ing in a bakery, the smell of yeasty bread wafting towards them as the ovens opened.

Erika’s stomach grumbled. She didn’t know how far she’d walked, but it had taken the best part of an hour. Sanchia had found a piece of driftwood to throw for Desmond and they’d remained fairly close to the parking lot, while Erika had surged on, her eyes on the meandering shoreline ahead.

She looked across the table at Sanchia. Sanchia was kind. People like Sanchia who healed for a living often were. Sanchia didn’t ask questions. And right at this moment, Erika didn’t feel like answering any. By her calculations, Albert’s new baby was due any day over the next two weeks.

♥

‘I don’t know how to tell you this, but I thought I’d be er call. It’s a girl. I bumped into Albert’?s mother outside Argos, heaving a pink travel cot into her boot.’

Silence.

Erika and Camilla Shaw had been close once, but Ashton, protective as ever, would have bristled anyway.

‘Are you there, Erika? Are you still there? Oh, I’m sorry. I’m hugging you across the line.’ ‘I’m here.’

‘Oh God, it was awkward, Erika! I didn’t entirely know where to look. But then I thought, to

hell with it and I walked up to her and said, “The divorce isn’t even through, you do know that don’t

you, Camilla?”’

‘And?’

‘She had the grace to blush. And then she said she wasn’t proud of what her son had done, but this was her granddaughter, and what was she supposed to do?’

And that was just the thing. This wasn’t Albert’s daughter’s fault. It was Albert’s fault. Albert and Rose’s. Any day now Erika’s solicitor would get in touch again, coaxing her through the mechanics. You’re not demanding enough, Erika, don’t buckle. But what did it help to drag her heels? A baby wasn’t exactly reversible. Rose had won. All the money in the world wouldn’t fix that.

She remembered the consternation in her solicitor’s voice.

Every last one.

Albert had never been particularly artistic. Where she was flamboyant (and she was flamboyant once) he was sensible. He could do budgets and balance books. She could decoupage almost anything, paint effect the walls. Albert changed plugs and light bulbs. Erika wrote limericks that made them laugh. He made roast chicken. She made Crêpes Suze e that almost set their curtains alight – twice. He drank wine. She knocked back shooters – the more colourful the be er, though never in front of her mother.

Well, she used to drink shooters.

Over the years they’d begun to rub off on each other. Albert would suggest an exhibition at the Tate Modern; Erika might actually remember to file her credit card slips. But the paintings were hers, and she’d be damned if she let Albert have them. Erika had always told him they’d be the first thing she’d save if their house burnt down.

‘And what about me?’ Albert once asked.

‘You’d help me, of course,’ deliberately misunderstanding him.

Now that their home was burning to feathery ash, she would save whatever she could.

♥

Donald phoned three times in the first week to check on her.

‘You don’t have to worry, Uncle Donald,’ Erika told him. ‘I’m not about to top myself.’ ‘Thank God,’ he replied. ‘Imagine the palaver of ge ing your body back to England on

British Airways.’

‘Oh, don’t bother about that. Just take me back in a li le urn and sca er me somewhere with a spectacular view.’

‘Darling, then I may as well leave you in Scarborough.’ Donald cleared his throat. ‘So has the char come in?’

‘Happiness? She doesn’t exactly live up to her name, does she? Not that I should talk.’ ‘Darling Erika, you’re actually sounding much be er.’

‘The house is spectacular. People have been lovely. I like Madeleine. I like Sanchia. I love Desmond – he appreciates the value of company without conversation.’

‘Who on earth is Desmond?’

‘Sanchia’s dog.’

Donald chuckled. ‘Good girl, making friends. No more wallowing!’ ‘Wallowing? You make me sound like a hippo.’

‘You’re in Africa, aren’t you? But listen, darling, I wanted to ask you: have you noticed how empty the wall in the lounge is?’

‘Actually, no. I spend most of my time on the porch watching the waves.’ ‘You’re being deliberately obtuse, my dear.’ ‘You’re not commissioning me, are you?’

‘You need a project. I can’t have you slothing away, wasting all that talent.’ Donald’s voice took on a business-like tone. ‘I’ve ordered a canvas – it’s being delivered tomorrow with an easel, so make sure you’re around to receive it. You’d never fit it in the Opel. It’s gigantic.’

♥

But even after this short time, Erika was out of practice.

She hadn’t realised she could be quite so good at doing absolutely nothing – she’d never a empted it before; she hadn’?t even opened her paints since she’d arrived. Even as a child, she’d kept busy, and her mother had carried a set of crayons in her handbag for all eventualities: delayed trains, long flights and boring meals in restaurants, which required Erika to sit still. (Never her strong point.)

Unpacking, Erika realised she even loved the sound of her paints. Cadmium Yellow. Pyrrole Orange. Perylene Maroon. Cerulean Blue. It was like stepping into a magical fairyland where all the senses combined so that you could smell a sound or hear a colour. Erika had read something about that – synaethesia, like Kandinsky hearing music as paint splashed to the canvas. What would Crimson Red sound like? Taste like? She’d once bit her lip, two deep grooves from her incisors, bleeding – maybe that was the taste of crimson. Erika had been warned: If you do fall pregnant, you’re going to have to watch those chemicals. Not good for a baby, paint fumes.

But they were good for her. And there was no baby.

Twisting the lids off the tubes, she sniffed luxuriously. How could she have waited so long? She squeezed paint onto her pale e, and one by one the colours curled onto the surface like garden snails, glistening.

She didn’t know what to paint at first. Something cheerful like the David Kuijers she’d seen in a gallery in Hout Bay. But not as humorous; she couldn’t quite manage that yet. Possibly beachy? She plo ed a seascape, but as she was sketching giant strokes across the white, it came to her: light filtering through the clouds onto Muizenberg beach, striking the Victorian-style huts in a warm glow. She exaggerated a bit, and dispensed with accuracy; she would capture the light reflected on