Page 9 of Moonlight Kisses at Willow Tree Hall

‘That’s great, Dad.’

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I try, Lily. I really do.’ He looked downcast. ‘Folks haven’t got as much money to spread around so they’re not paying so much for my stuff at the minute.’

‘I know.’

‘I try and do my bit for the family. Your mother works so hard. She’s even taken on extra shifts.’ Her dad’s bottom lip wobbled.

Lily couldn’t bear to see him upset and leapt up to wrap her arms around her dad.

‘If only she didn’t have to work at the bloody supermarket,’ he muttered into her shoulder. ‘She trained to be a chef. That’s what she enjoys doing. It’s all my fault,’ he said, his voice almost a whisper now. ‘I should be out there earning.’

‘It’s not your fault, Dad,’ Lily told him, squeezing him harder now. ‘Look, don’t get upset. It’s my first night home.’

‘You’re a good girl,’ he said, pulling back to give her a teary smile. ‘Tell you what I did win last week. A lovely bottle of gin. Maybe you could mix us up one of your fancy cocktails later.’

‘That sounds like a plan,’ said Lily. ‘In the meantime, you go and watch your quiz show. I’ll bring you and Grandad a cup of tea.’

‘Thanks, love.’

She watched as he slowly manoeuvred himself up from the table and onto his crutches. Richard Harper had once been a vibrant, energetic man and a skilled carpenter. The car accident had changed everything. She could still remember a time when her dad was able to work. When he could drive. When he laughed. When he wanted to leave the house…

But the accident fourteen years ago had not only robbed him of the lower part of his right leg but also his life, it felt. Of all their lives, in fact. Nothing had been the same since.

Lily turned to look at the garden. It was a beautiful summer’s evening and, for a second, she allowed herself the whisper of a memory of a similar night, many years previously. The sound of the river bubbling nearby. The long grass tickling her bare legs. And Jack, holding her close and kissing her.

She abruptly turned away as other, more painful memories threatened to materialise as well.

She had blamed Jack for such a long time but, ultimately, the fault of the accident would always remain with Lily. And she carried the guilt with her each and every day.

4

Lily woke up in bed with a start, wondering briefly where she was. Then the pale pink walls of her parents’ box room slowly came into view and she remembered she was living back at home.

Lying in bed, she turned her head. The room hadn’t changed at all from when she had been a teenager. A dumping ground for all and sundry, now also filled with her own boxes and suitcases.

Lily grabbed her phone, as she had done every morning for the past two weeks, hoping to see many text messages or emails offering her employment or even from Mark to say what a horrible mistake he had made and how he desperately wanted to marry her. But her inboxes were empty.

She automatically opened up the Notes folder next. She loved lists. They were her life. Everything went down on one and she had separate lists for her job as well as her social life and even her next food shop. She had even made a list to remind her what to pack when she had left her rental flat the previous day.

Then there was the list entitled Life. This one had marriage, children, all listed by the appropriate age she should be when each life event happened. She was now twenty-nine and had succeeded in none of her wishes. She didn’t know why she kept the list when it was obvious that she had failed at it.

She quickly dismissed it from the screen and brought up another. These were her work goals. Promotion. More money. Small flat. Perhaps even enough saved up for a deposit to buy her own place. Again, a big fat zero achieved, with no happy ticks alongside the list. And definitely no money, either, in any of her accounts. She had one month’s worth of wages to live on and that was it.

She bit her lip. It was all a disaster. Not knowing what else to do, she slowly got up. Smacking her elbow against the wall as she shuffled around the tiny space, she briefly wished she was in her old bedroom, which was a good size. But that was her grandad’s now. The box room would have to suffice.

She wandered downstairs in her pyjamas and found the family in the kitchen having eaten breakfast already.

‘Are you going up to Willow Tree Hall today, Grandad?’ asked Lily, making herself a large coffee. ‘I’ve got nothing on until later this morning when I’m meeting Megan, so I can always drop you up there, if you’d like.’

Bert shook his head. ‘Got to sort out a few bits in the shed first, so I’ll cycle up there this morning. But thanks, love.’

The wedding ring on his finger glinted as he drained his mug of tea.

Her grandmother, a stern woman, had passed away five years previously. Lily’s main memory of her was as a somewhat distant woman who had never smiled.

Her grandad could be as equally stern as his late wife had been. But on the quiet, when he thought nobody was looking, he had secretly handed her toffees and sweeties when she was younger. Sometimes, it would even be a bunch of cut flowers from the allotment. But mostly it was vegetables from the large walled garden that he tended at Willow Tree Hall.

It was only the previous year at the age of seventy-two that he had finally admitted he was struggling to live on his own and had moved in with his son and daughter-in-law.