Chapter Twenty Four

Nan

Molly didn't come out of her room for the best part of two days when she got back. They'd have been lying if they had said they weren't surprised to see her back, she'd all but moved in to the James' house and hadn't really been back since. She turned up on the doorstep with her suitcase, pale as a ghost under her tan and ran straight up the stairs to bed. Jet lag she said.

Fed up with Dave and Belinda speculating, she went up to the bedroom after tea on the second day to find out what on Earth had gone. Apparently no one else was going to do it. She marched into the bedroom, not bothering to knock and lung the curtains open and opened a window.

Molly sat up, shielding her eyes from the sunlight with a wince.

"Are you going to tell me what happened?" Nan asked, staring at her expectantly.

Molly flopped back down on the bed.

"Your mother thinks you've got Ebola or something, and Dave just keeps going on about why this is why he won't go holiday because it obviously makes you ill."

Molly laid there, staring up at the bunk bed above her.

"Molly?" Nan tried again when she still didn't speak.

"I quit." Molly said quietly.

"Why?"

"Why do you think?" She still didn't look at her. The rigid set of her jaw showed just how hard she was trying not to cry.

For someone who had just spent the best part of two weeks on a beach in Mauritius she looked absolutely awful. Her eyes were red rimmed and her skin blotchy. Her hair all stuck up on one side and she looked as though she'd not slept for years. The worst part was how sad she looked.

"You really think he's going to go through with it?" Nan asked, sitting down on the side of the bed.

Molly swallowed, then nodded as though it was physically painful to do.

"Oh shit, Mol. I'm really sorry." Nan answered, not really sure what to say.

"What do I do Nan?" Molly whispered.

"I'm not really sure there's anything you can do." She sighed. "All that stuff you planned, all the effort. You tried Molly."

"I told him I loved him." Her lip quivered as she spoke. "I told him I love him and he just said it wasn't enough. How am I supposed to live with that?"

She wanted to tell her that it was okay, that in a few years she'd forget all about it. She would've been lying though, after all this was the sort of thing that no one ever really got over. "I don't know Mol." She pulled her into a hug. "I don't know."

She finally emerged the following day and I told Belinda and Dave not to say a word. She'd implied to them it was boy trouble, and Dave had given her a look as if that explained everything. She only hoped it was enough to keep his mouth shut so he didn't upset Molly.

They all sat, making awkward small talk, even the kids played quietly for once. Molly sat in the armchair by the window and stared out at the road. She didn't say a word to any of them. Every now and then when someone spoke to her directly she'd nod, but it was clear to all of them she wasn't actually listening to a word that was being said.

Belinda cooked a special dinner in the hope it might perk Molly up. They could see even before they'd dished it up Molly wasn't going to eat it. She sat and pushed the food around her plate a few times but didn't eat a single mouthful. Belinda made some comment about how nice it was to have her back home again, and that she'd been thinking about going to back to work and maybe things were finally on the up for them all.

With no warning Molly burst into tears. The kind of loud noisy tears that shook her entire body. The noise broke through the silence around the table like a knife as everyone stared at her.

"Molly, what's wrong?" Belinda seemed to regain the use of her legs after a second and shot round the table to hug them.

They all sat there and listened in horror as Molly told them exactly what had happened. The roast chicken went cold and the gravy congealed, not that any of them could've eaten it. Hearing it all over again made her feel sick to her stomach, she'd been so convinced that Molly could convince him otherwise it had never even occurred to her what might happen if she couldn't change his mind.

Even Dave shook his head in disbelief as Molly told them what had happened at the airport. Belinda was crying as much as Molly. "You poor thing." She kept saying, over and over again as she hugged her daughter. "I can't believe you did all this on your own. All we got was a postcard about scuba diving. We thought you were on some amazing holiday!"

"Nan knew." Molly admitted. "I told her when I first found out, she helped me plan it all."

Dave turned and glared at her as if she'd committed some awful crime by keeping a secret from him. She had to bite her tongue to stop herself from remind him that he wasn't exactly the parent of the year, and if he hadn't have been quite so awful Molly might've talked to him.

"You came up with all the ideas Mol." She said in the end, everyone seemed to be looking at her as if they were waiting for her to say something.

"Yeah, well. Some ideas they turned out to be." Molly mumbled into her Mum's shoulder.

"You did everything you could love." Belinda tried to comfort her.

"And I failed."

"I don't think you failed." Dave chipped in. They all stared at him like he'd grown another head. "Just hear me out. I've met him, and even from that short time I could tell he's the sort of person who once he's got an idea in his head you're not going to change his mind. A bit like you Mol."

"I can't believe his parents!" Belinda cut in, saving them all from having to listen to Dave. "I can't believe they're going to let their own son kill himself. What kind of monsters are they?"

"They're normal people Mum." Molly sighed. "They just don't know what else to do."

"Well not putting him on a plane to Switzerland would probably be a good start! If I were them I'd be fighting until my dying breath!"

"Even if he'd already tried to kill himself?" Molly whispered. "In really awful ways."

"He's ill. He's depressed and they shouldn't be letting him do something that he'll-" Belinda didn't finish the sentence, the silence around the room made it clear they were all thinking the same thing. He wouldn't regret it because he wasn't going to be there. "That woman must be heartless. And they got our poor Molly involved in all this too! You'd think she'd know right from wrong, what being a magistrate and that. I've got a good mind to go over there right now and bring him back here."

Molly opened her mouth to speak, then caught sight of the date on the calendar. "There's no point. They've already gone." She whispered. "It's tomorrow. The thirteenth of August is tomorrow."

Molly did nothing that last day. She didn't eat, she didn't sleep. She just stayed sat in that armchair staring out of the window as the rain fell. She drank the cup of tea that Belinda placed in front of her every half hour or so, but none of them dared try to talk to her. What were they supposed to say?

Dave and Belinda seemed to be avoiding being in the same room, she couldn't blame them- it was painful to watch. She just sat next to her, the news playing quietly in the background and watched her.

"What if I made a mistake?" Molly asked suddenly, turning to look at her.

"What do you mean?" She looked around for Dave or Belinda, anyone so she didn't have to try and deal with this on her own.

"What if I should've gone with him?"

"But you said you couldn't." She reminded her.

"I know. But I can't bare this sitting here and not knowing what's happening either!" Her lip quivered. "I can't bare the fact that I never got to say goodbye."

"I could take you to the airport? Try and get you a flight?" She suggested. The last thing she wanted was for Molly to go over there and have to watch this happen in front of her. It was the kind of thing that would haunt her for the rest of her life, but she also knew that not saying goodbye to him would do exactly the same.

"It's too late." She shook her head, looking back out of the window. "I'd never get there in time. There's only two hours left… until it stops for the day. I looked it up online. Something to do with the officials, they don't like to…. certify… things out of office hours."

She didn't know what to say to her granddaughter. She couldn't imagine what she was feeling, sitting there with no way of knowing what was happening. She had never loved a man like Molly seemed to love Charles.

And then the phone rang.

Molly sat there, just staring at it as it vibrated on the arm of the chair.

"It's Mrs James." Molly looked at her in horror.

"Well answer it then!" She told her.

Molly still sat there staring at the phone as though it might explode if she touched it. "What if she's ringing me to tell me he's done it?"

"You won't know unless you answer it and we can't sit here for days wondering." She picked the phone up and shoved it into Molly's hand. "Just talk to her." Then she left the room to give her some privacy.

The phone call seemed to last a lifetime as she stood in the kitchen with Dave and Belinda. All they could hear was the occasional 'yes' from Molly, and it was very difficult to work out what was actually going on. They all jumped out of their skin when Molly opened the door to the kitchen.

"Well?" She asked. He couldn't have done it, Molly looked far to calm for that.

"She asked me- begged me- to go to Switzerland. She's bought me a ticket for the last flight tonight."