Page 102 of Always Beth
‘I’m going to get going then. If you could take Dick whilst I’m gone—’
‘Might as well, what’s one more day after nine months?’
He sighs, resting his hand on the cottage door, turning back and smiling at me gently.
‘What now?’ I snap.
‘Who the fuck still uses cheques, Beth?’
ChapterTwenty-Eight
Beth
Who the fuck still uses cheques, Beth?
I cram the last of the wax melts into the package in front of me and proceed to mummify it in Scotch tape. The fact that all my candle customers have paid me via PayPal since day one doesn’t even come into it. If I want to write a cheque out, I’ll write a bloody cheque out.
‘How many wax melts does this company order?’ I cry as I the shunt the box with my foot towards the door.
They’ll be in for a rude awakening when I shut up shop next month. My blog’s finally gaining traction online and I feel confident enough to start putting myself out there for some freelance work. Hopefully I can work from home, wherever that ends up being, at least with James’ money, or should I say my money, I’ll have enough to put her into decent childcare.
With Lorena tucked carefully under my arm, I open the door to the cottage to be greeted by David wandering along the path. I haven’t seen him once since the birth, in fact every time he delivered the mail, James always seemed to be there waiting as if by some strange coincidence, ready to warn him off with an intense stare.
‘Hi, Beth,’ he says tentatively.
‘Don’t worry, you’re safe, it’s just us.’ I laugh.
He passes my mail and smiles down at Lorena. ‘She’s beautiful.’
‘Thank you, she is, isn’t she.’
Glancing down at the boxes and packages, he nods towards his van. ‘I’ll take those today.’
‘Is this special treatment because I’ve had a baby, because before you made me take them myself?’ I laugh.
He starts piling them up on top of one another and pauses, taking a step back to look at me. ‘I’m happy to help, you’re on your own right now.’ I hesitate for a second, wondering how much he knows. ‘Oh, I saw James leaving yesterday, packing up his car. I guessed he was moving some things in here but I see that’s not the case.’
Packing?That sounds permanent. He said a few weeks.‘Packing, like a lot?’
He shrugs and picks up the big box of wax melts. ‘I don’t know, Beth, I wouldn’t like to say.’ He laughs as he looks at the name and address.
‘What?’ I ask coyly.
‘Oh nothing. I should get going, need to get these off today for you.’
Reaching out, I stop him mid-turn, he definitely knows more than he’s letting on.
‘The address, you recognised it, didn’t you? I’ve been sending them parcels for months, do you know them?’
‘It’s err not a business, Beth, or at least I don’t think it is. This is a PO Box delivery service, we’ll forward this on to someone’s home.’
‘Well why wouldn’t they just order it to their home?’
‘To keep their identity hidden.’ With one final raise of his eyebrows, he turns and disappears out of sight.
Back in the cottage, I lay Lorena in her bassinet and plop myself in front of my laptop.
JET… I angrily tap the address into Google. A million results appear. This will never help me. Nothing. If this isn’t a business, it must be someone’s initials. They’ve ordered multiple boxes of wax melts every month for almost a year. I exhale heavily as I flick through the pile of paperwork next to my laptop, which I either need to shred or file. I still as my hand stops on Lorena’s birth certificate. We left it right until the last minute to register her, things were particularly strained that day and we hardly uttered a word to one another in the registry office. My fingers trace over the name in front of me:James Edward Taylor.I look across to Lorena asleep in her bassinet, then quickly down at the dogs who’ve congregated around my feet.I don’t fucking believe it. It can’t be. He wouldn’t. Who am I kidding, of course he would. Not only did he pay my legal fees, he’s been feeding me money via mass wax melt orders. He’s unbelievable.
