She exhales quietly. “I still don’t understand why you left.”
Mum always said I carried my grandmother’s colouring.
“Caribbean sun doesn’t fade easily,” she’d tell me, smoothing my hair when I was small, like she could press inheritance deeper into my skin.
Dad used to joke that I’d inherited Britain and Jamaica in equal parts. Weather-wise and temperament-wise.
I smile faintly, even though she can’t see it.
“London is your happy place not mine,” I reply stubbornly.
The city had been everything. Loud. Fast. Endless. The kind of place that convinced you if you stopped moving, even briefly, you’d be left behind. I didn’t leave because I failed there. I left because I wanted to know who I was without the noise. Because Emma deserved a life where she wasn’t constantly overwhelmed. Because I wanted something slower. Something that belonged to me.
And now it does.
We chat a little longer—Mum telling me all the gossip about the neighbours—and then we hang up the way we always do, neither of us entirely satisfied but both trying.
I finish securing the arrangements in the van, fastening the straps Alex installed after one unfortunate incident involving sudden braking and an airborne vase that neither Emma nor I have emotionally recovered from.
The drive to the nursing home is short. The road curves gently out of Fellside, past stone walls and early autumn trees just beginning to surrender to the season. It’s raining, but softly. Not enough to discourage anyone determined to be somewhere.
The first time I came here, it had felt like any other delivery. I’d carried the flowers inside, exchanged polite greetings, and placed colour into rooms that otherwise existed in shades of beige and memory.
And then I’d seen him.
Phil hadn’t noticed me. He’d been in the garden, walking beside his grandfather’s wheelchair, his head bent slightly as the older man spoke. Not pretending to listen. Actually listening. His pace matched the slower rhythm beside him without impatience or distraction. He wasn’t checking his phone. He wasn’t rushing. He wasn’t performing goodness for an audience.
He was simply there.
Present in a way most people forget how to be.
It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t grand.
It was steady.
And it had unsettled me more than any grand gesture ever could.
After that, I started spending more time on these deliveries than I normally would. Not just dropping off flowers,but staying. Talking to residents. Rearranging arrangements. Giving the blooms the kind of attention Mum always insisted they deserved.
I told myself it was because it mattered.
Which was true.
I told myself it had nothing to do with Phil.
Which was less true.
Liam greets me at reception with his usual warmth.
“Christina,” he says, brightening. “You’ve brought sunshine again.”
“I do my best,” I reply.
I move through the now familiar routine. Dining hall first. Then the conservatory.
I push open the glass door to the conservatory and step inside.
I can't help but smile when I find exactly what I'd hoped for.