Sibilant whisperings
Greeted me
For it was I
Who stole their glee
The gathering
Looked upon me
As the architect
Of their misery
They could barely
Keep their hate inside
At this wedding
Without a bride
It was all my doing
With my petty jealousy
And with it in me
I had made her flee
Happiness was the harbinger
Of my doom
Happy laughter echoed
In every joyful room
But we were too happy
That was our crime
The God’s couldn’t bear
To see us happy all the time
So they sent the angels
To take you from my side
They took your life
And left me dead inside
Sadness envelops me
As I kneel by your grave
I try to keep back the tears
I try my hardest to be brave
But they come anyway
My grief is unconfined
My dear sweet angel,
Resides with others of her kind
I curse the selfish Gods
For their spiteful jealousy
And pray to them also
To come soon and take me
Downshire is a relatively small English county but
like a pocket battleship it packs a lot in, a short but beautiful coastline, a
channel port, the Ancient forests of Dancingdean and Pepperstock, the craggy
ridges and manmade lakes of the
Pepperstock Hills National Park, the rolling hills of the Downshire Downs, the
beautiful Finchbottom Vale and farm land as far as the eye can see from the
Trotwood’s and the Grace’s in the south to the home of the Downshire Light
infantry, Nettlefield, and their affluent neighbour’s, Roespring and Tipton in
the North but it’s in leafy Shallowfield where our story takes place but it
actually begins in the fringes of the busy town of Finchbottom in the village
of Lower Gracewood on the other side of the Finchbottom Vale which nestles comfortably between the Ancient
Dancingdean Forest to the south and the rolling Pepperstock Hills in the north,
those who are lucky enough to live there think of it as the rose between two
thorns.
And it was in the Vale where Kevin Bush was born and
raised in quiet
and unexciting village near Finchbottom called Lower Gracewood and for the
first 17 years of his life the Vale was his playground until the family moved.
The Vale was once a great wetland that centuries earlier stretched
from Mornington in the East to Childean in the west and from Shallowfield in
the south to Purplemere in the north.
But over the many centuries the vast majority had been drained for agriculture,
a feat achieved largely by the efforts of the famous Mornington Mills, of which
only three had survived to the present day and even those were no longer
functional and were in various states of repair.
There were only three small bodies of water left in the Vale now one
in Mornington, one in Childean and third was in Purplemere,
But the most
magnificent body of water in Downshire was Teardrop Lake.
Which was
where Kevin, an 18 year old callow youth, first laid eyes on Rosie Byrne.
He had been living in Shallowfield for six months and as
winter gave way to spring he had just begun to discover the treasures of
Teardrop Lake and the surrounding Woodland.
It was the spring of what was to become the long hot
summer of 1976, the summer against which every subsequent one has been
compared.
He was up at
one of his favourite places, up above the northern perimeter road in a patch of
meadow in front of the row of derelict woodman’s cottages where the view of the lake was
quite spectacular.
The lake was shaped like a teardrop, hence its name, and surrounded by
ancient woodland of the Dancingdean Forrest.
It wasn’t a huge body of water, just over two miles long and almost a
mile at its widest point.
But it would shrink considerably during the summer drought.
It was as beautiful and unspoilt a place as he had ever seen which, was
the reason he loved it so much.
And as he sat there admiring the view he couldn’t imagine a more
beautiful sight and then Rosie strolled into view.
She was stunning and way out of his league of course he
knew that right from the outset, he guesstimated her be four or five years
older than him for a start and she was drop dead gorgeous into the bargain,
with jet black hair, stunning green eyes and great figure.
But as she hadn’t seen him in the meadow he figured there
was no harm in looking, so he did, until she and her dogs disappeared from
view.
Shallowfield’s
fortunes had always relied largely upon forestry and agriculture for its
survival.
In the post
war years with rationing and a shortage of work a lot of people moved away, to
Abbottsford, Abbeyvale and beyond and it only barely survived.
And the
community around Teardrop Lake fared even worse.
Only a few
of the houses around the Lake were thriving, a lot of the houses had been
rented out and those that hadn’t were in a poor state of repair, some too such
an extent they were little more than ruins.
But by the
1970s things were beginning to change, thanks mainly to tourism and an increase
in leisure time.
More
importantly these people had money in their pockets.
This trend
was reflected by the fact that the derelict Shallowfield Lodge, which had been
inherited by a young couple from Lincolnshire, Rob and Sheryl Brown, was being
turned into a hotel.
Its
completion formerly marked the rebirth of Teardrop Lake and by extension,
Shallowfield.
It was as a result of the resurgence of Shallowfield that prompted Kevin
Bush’s parents to leave Lower Gracewood and move to pastures new.
They also had aspirations for their son to become the first member of
their families to go to University which he was set to do in September of 1976.
Having finished college nothing would have given him greater pleasure
than to spend the summer on the lake frittering away his time, however that was
not to be because he needed to earn some money.
Teardrop Lake and the surrounding woodland was privately owned and
divided into twelve parcels each with one significant dwelling on it, although
there were a number of cottages dotted around the woodland as well, some in use
and some were not and some were near to collapse.
Only a few
of the houses around the Lake were thriving, a lot of the houses had been
rented out and those that hadn’t were in a poor state of repair, some too such
an extent they were little more than ruins.
Things were
changing though, there was a new optimism in the area and only two years earlier
the Shallowfield Lodge Hotel Opened and it was the Hotel that provided him with
a summer job and more opportunities to see Rosie.
Although he
didn’t get to see her as much as he would have liked as she worked in the bar
and restaurant and he was more of a general dog’s body.
When he was
working inside the Hotel he was sometimes rewarded with the occasional glimpse
of the lovely Rosie and on a few of those he was blessed with a smile.
But apart
from seeing Miss Byrne working at the Hotel it also afforded him the
opportunity to get out on the water in one of the Hotels Dinghies.
And that was
how things would have continued for the summer had he not been invited to a house party at the home
of the friend of a friend in Forestdean, but not being a fan of House parties
he was inclined to say no.
Kevin Bush
was invited to a house party at the home of the friend of a friend in Forestdean, he wasn’t
going to go at first, house parties weren’t really his kind of thing, but he
allowed himself to be persuaded and as it turned out he was glad that he had
changed his mind because one of the other guests was Rosie Byrne and he thought
she was gorgeous but at the same time even more out of his league than ever.
He had only seen her either in her work clothes of short black skirt and crisp white blouse or walking
her dogs around the lake in more practical garb but in her party clothes she
was indescribably gorgeous.
All he could
do was look at her with awe because there was no way she was going to give him
a second look.
Rosie was four years older than him for a start and drop
dead gorgeous into the bargain, with jet black hair, stunning green eyes a
great figure, and he figured that there was no harm in him looking, so he did,
at every opportunity.
However after a couple of beers he got brave and started
to flirt with her and he was really chuffed that she flirted back, though Kevin
actually thought she was just being a really good sport.
They kept up the mutual flirtation for a while and then Rosie
asked for a refill of her glass so Kevin reluctantly went off to the kitchen.
He thought it was probably just a ruse to get rid of him
because she had tired of the flirtatious converse but he didn’t mind, after all
it had only been a bit of fun.
However much to his surprise and delight, not only had
she not done a runner while he was in the kitchen, she was actually waiting for
him in the hall and steered him expertly into the utility room and planted a hot
wet kiss on his mouth.
After a few moments their mouths parted long enough for him
to put the drinks down and get a short sentence out.
“I thought we were only flirting”
“You have a lot to learn about women” she said closing in
on him again.
“Perhaps you could teach me then” he suggested
“Ok” she replied and leant her face towards him and gently touched her lips
against his.
“A little more I think” he said
“You’d like me to teach you some more?” she asked smiling.
“Oh yes” He replied and wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close to him
then their lips met again and their mouths opened on contact.
He had never had a French kiss before and he desperately
hoped she wouldn’t notice.
She pulled herself away from his over enthusiastic
efforts and looked into his eyes and smiled.
“You're not a bad kisser” she said kindly
“You're obviously a good teacher” he told her
Her lesson in the art of kissing kept them in the
cupboard for 20 minutes and when they emerged from the cupboard the party had
rather taken off during their absence, Rosie announced she needed to spend a
penny and he watched her walk away.
He was amazed that Rosie Byrne had kissed him!
Apart from the occasional smile he hadn’t realized that
she had even noticed him, but it transpired that she looked at him in the same
lustful way that he looked at her.
But he began to doubt the evidence of that when her trip
to the bathroom appeared to have been contrived so that they would go
their separate ways and as the party was by then in full
swing their paths didn’t cross again, even though he searched high and low.
After midnight Kevin left the party, which was still
going strong, to catch the last train home to Shallowfield.
As he walked towards the station, Kevin was reliving his
encounter in the cupboard with Rosie and repeatedly pinched himself in case it
were a dream.
He hadn’t walked more than one hundred yards along the
road when a car pulled up to the curb in front of him.
“Hey lover” Rosie called as he passed alongside the car
“Do you want a lift?”
“Thanks” he said as he got in the car and Rosie drove
away
“So where did you get to?” she asked
“I was going to ask you the same thing” he replied
“Well I got delayed because of the queue for the toilet”
she said rolling her eyes “and when I finally got my turn and returned to the
cupboard you were gone”
“Well I went to look for you” he said
“I thought you’d gone because you didn’t like my kissing”
she said
“Oh you can rest assured on that point” he said
“Good answer” Rosie said
When they got into Shallowfield she drove passed the end
of his road.
“I live the other way” he pointed out
“We’re not going to your house” she replied
“Where are we going then?”
“Just wait and see” she replied mysteriously
“Oh”
She continued driving and took the lane which led to
Teardrop Lake, she then drove passed the Hotel where they both worked and
followed the northern perimeter road and parked beside a patch of meadow in front of a row of derelict
woodman’s cottages.
It was his
favourite place on the Lake where the view of the lake was so spectacular
although before that night he hadn’t seen it in the moonlight, it was also the
place where he had first seen Rosie as she walked her dogs, and where he often
watched her in secret.
Kevin turned and looked at her and she was smiling,
apparently it wasn’t as secret as he believed.
Because Rosie knew that Kevin watched her walk by
from the safety of the meadow, she thought it was quite appropriate that was
where the next kissing lesson should take place on a picnic blanket she had
packed in the car for just that occasion.
What Kevin hadn’t realised was that she had set her
cap very firmly at him and it was her that made sure he was invited to the
party in the first place so that she could get close to him.
It hadn’t been her intention to get him in the
cupboard and snog him that was improvisation on her part because he hadn’t
taken the hint and asked her out.
They made many more visits to the meadow that
summer until he went off to Abbotsford University.
There were a lot of tears before he left amidst the
promises that it was not the end of them and each of them doubted the resolve
of the other.
But it was not the end, it proved to be instead a
test of their mettle which they passed with flying colours.
She would spend one weekend per month visiting him
in Abbottsford and he would visit Shallowfield once a month as well and at the
end of his third year they were married and remained so for 40 years until her
death.
If only you were here
So I didn’t miss you
If only you were here
So I could kiss you
If only I had been
Granted three wishes
Then I would wish you here
And cover you in kisses
She told me that she loved me
And I didn't know how to react
I’m afraid to say I love her
I want to keep my heart intact
Is it time to let down my guard?
Should I tell her how I feel?
What if she is false or insincere
My heart may never heal
Should I expose my feelings?
Even though I feel insecure
But if I keep my feelings secret
Or wait until I am certain sure
I risk undermining her love
Blemishing it at its very start
And I could lose her love forever
And that would break my heart
It was to a
very successful organization that Staff Nurse Dani Carew joined on a bitter
cold January morning along with another new nurse named Patricia Clerembeax.
It was four
years to the day after Dr Claire Lutchford nee Andrews, took over the
Shallowfield Surgery and in that short time she and her business partner Olivia
Shenton had transformed it into the Dancingdean Heath Centre, which had
continued to grow in stature which necessitated the expansion of staff numbers.
However while things had been going well for Claire and
Olivia in the four years they had been running the Dancingdean Heath Center in
Shallowfield, it had been quite a different story in those four years for Dani,
she had had a succession of loser boyfriends and had decided she was better off
on her own.
The final straw came when she overheard her then Doctor boyfriend
bragging about their sex life to a group of colleagues which was when she applied for a new job.
She was a Staff nurse at the Royal Downshire Hospital in
Purplemere and moving to Shallowfield to work in a Health Centre was as
everyone told her a step down, but she didn’t care she desperately needed a new
start.
It was just before Christmas
when Dani moved into Flat 4, of East Cliff Lodge, overlooking the picturesque
Teardrop Lake.
The view of the water from her flat was spectacular with its distinctive
teardrop shape which gave the lake its name, surrounded by the ancient woodland
of the Dancingdean Forest.
It was a modest body of water as lakes go, just over two miles long and
almost a mile at its widest point, it really was a thing of beauty and was both
idyllic and peaceful.
There was little or no noise
pollution and although the lake was used there were no speed boats or jet skis
only rowing boats, canoes, dinghies and skiffs.
Fortunately Dani
was not the only new starter at the health centre or the only newbie to the
area.
Patricia
Clerembeax who was the new palliative care nurse, moved into number 2 a couple
of days before her.
Both Dani’s
and Patricia’s moves had been purely out of choice because they were looking
for a change and not like many in their profession who had moves forced upon them
due to cost cutting measures.
As they both
moved in before Christmas and weren’t due to start work until the New Year and
as they were neighbours the two new girls gravitated towards each other and
became firm friends.
Chantelle Grimwood, who lived in
number 1, also worked at the health centre, as a Doctor and she and her husband
Richard volunteered to show the new girls around and help them get their
bearings and settle in.
They were
both dreading that first Christmas in a new place without anyone to cuddle up
to, and they thought that all that time on their own would drive them crazy.
But they
needn’t have worried for a second as Chantelle soon introduced them around to
all the mad people they would be working with and they had so many invitations
throughout December that they didn’t have a minute to think about being lonely,
even in the quieter moments because they were too exhausted.
After a very
enjoyable first Christmas in her new home Dani was really pleased that she wasn’t starting
the new job on her own and she knew Patricia felt the same way.
They both slotted right in at the Heath Centre and they soon found that
the rest of the staff were just as friendly as the ones they had already met were.
Dani loved
her job from the first moment she walked through the doors and she loved living
on the Lake even more.
Her New Year’s Resolution was to adopt a healthier approach to life and
walked a circuit of the lake every morning except on the weekends, on Saturdays
she split her time between housework and exploring the forest as well as any
one of a
number of places of interest, two Folly’s, a Watch tower, Olwen’s Chapel, a waterfall, brooks,
streams, a 16th Century Bridge and lovers leap, and Sundays after she’d
attended church in the morning she watched old films on TV in the afternoon,
after all she was 30 by then and couldn’t handle too much excitement.
Apart from
enjoying the Lake and its environs she was fast becoming a regular part of
Church life in Shallowfield and could often be heard in full voice in the
church choir.
Dani Carew
was a very pretty woman with honey coloured hair, she was five feet five inches
tall, trim and well-toned and she was originally from Purplemere but she was a
very girlie girl.
She had just
turned thirty and had resigned herself to the fact that now she had reached
that milestone she was never going meet anyone better than the losers she
managed to attract while she was in her prime.
Apart from needing to be shown the inner workings of the practice, the
processes and procedures, Dani also needed a guided tour of the area.
District nursing being part of her remit after all, so she needed to
familiarise herself with the district.
First of all she bought herself an ordinance survey map of the
Finchbottom Vale, between the Dancingdean
forest and the Pepperstock Hills, which encompassed her territory.
The problem was that she couldn’t read a map, or even fold or unfold
one.
She didn’t have a satnav in the car which would have helped to get her
from A to B but that wasn’t an option so she had to think of another way to map
out the district in her head.
Fortunately the other newbie Patricia
Clerembeax suggested they get together, it was obvious really because they were both
equally clueless about the area so between them they could get their baring’s
enough to avoid any major faux pas.
They were both based at the Health Centre for the first two months and it
took that long driving around in their spare time to crack it enough for them
to be let loose on an unsuspecting Finchbottom Vale.
The district
nursing team had a number of regular home visit, terminally ill or housebound
patients or those recuperating after surgery and they soon built up a good
rapport with them.
As Dani’s
background was as a Staff Nurse on a surgical ward in Royal Downshire Hospital she
found going out and about in the community very liberating.
She enjoyed
her time in the Health Centre well enough handling the clinics and such like
but Dani
really liked being a district nurse and
in her first six months at the Dancingdean Health Centre she became a valuable
member on the team.
When she was
first put on the visitors list, one of Dani’s first patients was 31 year old Richard Lambert, a
cancer survivor.
Richard
lived alone in the small country village of Shallowfield and he turned out to
be one of her favourite patients on her visiting rounds but he was also more of
a challenging one.
Richard Lambert had survived his cancer but in spite
of having had the brain tumour successfully removed and after all the following
treatment leading to him subsequently being given the all clear, he was
clinically depressed.
Having been
assigned to the Lamberts, she began from the first day to try and bring him out
of his self but it was to no avail.
What Dani didn’t know was that the reason for his
depression was that he had been left impotent since the surgery and as a result
he never left the house.
His wife Sarah was as supportive as she could have
been but she had confided to Dani very early on that she was close to breaking
point.
With Richard
unable to leave home Sarah was the breadwinner which she did without complaint,
but there were days when she didn’t want to go home and those days became more
and more frequent until she finally gave up and left him and moved to Abbeyvale.
So for two
months he was completely on his own so she spent longer with him each
successive visit and he looked forward to her visits more and more.
Dani tried to
make the most of her visits and lift his spirits but all she actually achieved
was to make the fatal mistake of falling for him.
It was the
first time she had let her guard down since she left Purplemere where Dani had had a succession
of loser boyfriends and had decided she was better off on her own.
The final straw came when she overheard her then Doctor boyfriend
bragging about their sex life to a group of colleagues and now she was doing it again, but she hoped not
with another loser.
But there was
no future in a relationship in which one of the parties refused to leave the
house but she was clueless as to how she could rectify the situation.
She was
fairly sure that he was attracted to her, she had caught him looking at her
legs and bum enough times, but that might not be enough.
However by the
end of June a decision made at the heath centre forced her hand.
On Friday
morning when Dani reported for work at the Health Centre she was told that
Richard Lambert was being taken off her list and that day would be her last.
“Who’s
taking over?” she asked
“No one” she
was told “We’ve done all we can for him, there are plenty of patients who actually
want our help”
As she drove
to his house she decided it was time for decisive action.
It was mid-afternoon
when Dani opened the back door and walked in the house.
“Hello” she
called
“In the
lounge” Richard called back
“Ah there
you are” Dani said
“Hi” Richard
said laying on the sofa watching something mind numbing on the TV
“Budge over”
She said and sat on the edge of the sofa beside him
“I have
news”
“What news?”
he asked
“Today is my
last visit”
“What?” he
said with alarm
“They think
you’re a lost cause” she said
“And what do
you think?” he asked quietly
“I disagree”
she said and leant in and kissed him slowly and deliberately.
It took him
by surprise but he soon got the message and by the end of the kiss he certainly
wasn’t impotent, not that Dani was aware of that.
But she was
aware of his level of participation in the kissing so she stood up and said
“It’s going
to be a nice day tomorrow, so if you want any more of that you’ll need to meet
me at Shoe Buckle Falls at noon”
“But…” he
began as she reached the door “don’t go”
“Tomorrow at
noon” she called back “Don’t be late”
She was up
early on Saturday morning and finished her housework so she had time to get
herself ready and make the best of herself, Dani was a very pretty woman with
honey coloured hair, and she looked at her reflection, all five feet five
inches of a trim and well-toned girlie girl in a summer dress, nodded her
acceptance of what she saw and then she headed towards Shoe Buckle Falls, so named, so
legend had it, after a 17th century fugitive Cavalier who was
pursued into the forest by parliamentarian soldiers but disappeared in the
vicinity of the falls and all they ever found of him was his shoe buckle.
The falls were not grand or spectacular but they were nice enough.
The water tumbled and spilled over the rocks, gathering briefly in deep
pools and then tumbling down again to the next pool.
It was dark beneath the ancient trees and refreshingly cool as the misty
spray settled on her.
Dani sat and soaked her feet in one of the deepest pools.
She sat
there for ten minutes and began to feel very foolish
“Why on
earth would he come” she tough to herself “it was only one kiss, your good, but
you’re not that good”
She took her
feet from the water and dried them before slipping her footwear back on and
stood up to go home and watch an old movie.
“Hello” a
voice said and startled her
“Mission
accomplished” she said as she turned around and saw Richard standing there.
