The Key of My Heart Chapter 16

Chapter 16 I began to see why Jasper had warned us about the place being pretty basic. But the views from the windows were fabulous! And the house was remote enough to be peaceful. “Hey, nice bathroom,” Amber said, having gone in search of it rather urgently. The bedroom Amber and I would be sharing was nothing to write home about, but the beds, mattresses and bedding were brand new, so I figured we could cope. “I’m sorry it’s a bit rough and ready,” Jasper said. “I haven’t had the place long – I had the bathrooms put in, and the kitchen updated a bit, but I wanted to work on it myself as well: make it properly mine.” In a way, the funny, shabby house broke the ice for us all. Jasper became quite animated, showing us round, pointing out the patch of dandelions that was going to be the vegetable garden. “How come you know so much about growing things?”
“I’ve been living and working on a farm for the last fifteen years!”
“Oh! So that’s what Amber was on about when she said Magnus Culmen had called you and Pete hayseeds?”
Jasper threw back his head and laughed. “Like we cared!” “Tell me about Pete and his family.” Through the window, I could see Amber, who’d obviously found the bookcase and lost herself in a book. I wasn’t ready to talk about me or Amber yet. The more he told me about Pete’s family, the more I liked the sound of them. It seemed they had been just what Jasper had needed. Neither of us could quite get our heads round what had happened all those years ago. For ages we’d both been believing a lie. We kept off the subject: instead, Jasper took me round the rest of the house, and told me about his plans for extending it, adding on a recording studio, but mostly making a home of it. We’d both agreed that really the weekend was about Amber, having a chance to get to know Jasper. So after she’d recovered a bit from the journey, Jasper got her to play for him, and sing as well. All her shyness and nervousness vanished once she was holding her guitar. Then Jasper got one of his guitars out and began to show her how to do some alternative fingerings – and then they both began playing together, just for the fun of it. Once I was sure neither of them were paying me any attention, I crept in and sat down and listened with pleasure to them both. The fridge and cupboards were well-stocked with food, and I started making a salad for us. Jasper stopped playing to watch me.
“You handle that knife like a pro,” he said, admiringly.
“I should – I’ve been working in a kitchen for the last fifteen years,” I said, laughing. And the light-hearted comment somehow helped me open up and tell him about my life since we parted. The salad was great – partly because I’m a more than decent cook now, and partly because the ingredients were so fresh.
“Straight from Pete’s mum’s vegetable garden,” Jasper said. “That’s why I want one of my own here. I’ve got used to this standard of food.” And somehow or another Amber and I ended up volunteering to help him weed and dig the patch and help plant the seeds he’d brought with him. We finished planting just as the sun was setting. It had been a good day on the whole, I thought, and it had worked well for Amber. As we were going to bed that night she said, “I’m glad we came. Is it okay for you?” and I smiled and hugged her and told her it was fine for me too.
But as I lay there, listening to the sound of the country side, I found myself thinking about how much Jasper had changed. Most of the changes I liked, but he did look more forbidding, less approachable that the Jasper I remembered. I woke early the next morning, long before Elf and Amber were awake, and lay there for a while, thinking about Elf and how much she had changed. She had a confidence about her that had obviously come from making a success of her life, and I almost envied her that confidence. She still had the same sweetness about her that I’d liked right from the start, but she was no longer the lost and waif-like girl I’d met in the park all those years ago.
After a while, I gave up on trying to get back to sleep and went downstairs to start making breakfast for us all instead. I was just flipping a pancake in the pan when Elf came into the room softly behind me.
“I remember your pancakes.” She sat down at the table and looked round the room, but her eyes were gazing into the past. “They were the best thing I’d ever tasted.” Then she became practical again.
“Amber’s going to sleep for another couple of hours yet – she’s out for the count after yesterday. We’ve got a bit of time on our own. What are we going to do about her? What do you want?”
“That depends on what Amber wants.” I was glad my back was to Elf, but wished I’d put my shades on so that she couldn’t read my feelings in my eyes. When she’d said ‘What are we going to do?’ my heart had turned over in my chest.
“Let’s eat first, and then go outside and talk a bit more.” “The view from here is fantastic!”
“I know. I really want to make the most of it when I extend the house. But I don’t want to spoil its character either – so I’ve been planning it out carefully. I want a proper home, not a showcase. Somewhere like Pete’s house – it’s big, yes, but it’s got a lovely family feel to it.”
And now I really wanted Amber to feel a part of this home. I was beginning to realise that more and more. “Jasper – a lot of what happens next is going to depend on what Amber wants. But what do you want? We can’t sort this out unless we’re honest with each other.”
My heart did that painful thing again. This was one of the things I’d loved about Elf all those years ago – the courage with which she’d faced difficulties. And that hadn’t changed.
“I think Amber’s wonderful. I think you’ve done a fantastic job bringing her up and she’s a huge credit to you. I really want to get to know her better.” “After the audition, I drove her back to Laura’s and we talked quite a lot on the way. And the more we talked, the more I liked her. And then, playing the guitar with her yesterday…Elf, it was like we understood each other. Does that make sense?”
“Yes. I could tell, watching the two of you. She’s got a lot of you in her – and she looks like you too! Only not so forbidding.” “Do I really look that fierce?”
“The hair, the beard, the shades – yes, a bit.” I felt like she wanted to say more, but she fell silent.
“So what do you want, Elf? You matter too.”
“I think,” she said after a long pause, “that I want Amber to be whole. To be all of herself. And a lot of herself is you. I want Amber to be able to get to know you. And I think she wants that, so how are we going to do it?” “I’d like it to be here if we can manage it,” I said thoughtfully. “Amber seems to like it, and it’s my home, not somewhere anonymous. Would you be willing to come here with her whenever we can all meet – if Amber wants that?”
Her face lit up. “Yes, definitely! I want Amber to get to know you, not your rock-star lifestyle.”
I laughed at her. “Pete and I aren’t going to play those games. We’re both farm boys at heart. And my mother would be down on me like a ton of bricks if I tried anything like that.” When Amber was up and suitably fed, we asked her what she’d like. I told her I really wanted to get to know her better, and she smiled from ear to ear.
“Will you teach me more guitar stuff? And coming here would be great. But,” with a quick glance at Elf, “can we afford for you to take time off work?”
I was going to offer to cover Elf’s wages, but she smiled back at Amber before I could speak. “We’ve got savings Amber. And this is important.”
They didn’t need my help. That was hard to take. As we ate dinner that night, Amber made us laugh with a highly coloured account of the audition and Deedee’s catty comments about clothes. Then she wanted to know when she could tell Laura about me: one of the things we’d agreed on during that car ride back to Laura’s was not to mention me for a while.
“Tell me more about Laura,” I said.
So she told me all about Laura and her dad and her mum’s illness, and how they were so short of money now, and how that made Laura very easy to be friends with.
“So what does her father do?”
“Apart from being a greenstone fan since whenever? He was business manager or something like that for a local firm, but when Laura’s mum became ill, he had to give up his job to cope at home at first. Now he does temping work. But they can all keep secrets – please, can I tell her yet?”
We talked about it for quite a while, but in the end both Elf and I thought that we should wait a bit longer, and Amber saw our point.
“Once we go public on this, everything will change for you. Let’s wait a little while longer, until we know each other better still.” And so Elf and Amber came to stay whenever all three of us could be there together. Amber missed some school, and Elf missed some shifts at work, and I left a huge amount of work for Pete to do. He was the only other person who was in on the secret. Elf let me pay their travelling expenses, but nothing more.
The more I saw of Amber, the more I could tell she was my daughter. We shared more than just music: we laughed at the same jokes, and after a few visits found ourselves saying things like “Key change!” at the same time when we were listening to something together. We all worked together on the garden, and looked at the final plans for the house extension together.
The more I saw of Elf, the more I realised all the things I’d loved about her when she was seventeen were still there. And I loved then again. But I had no idea how she felt about me.