Up With the Larks Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Prologue

  November

  December

  January

  February

  March

  April

  May

  June

  July

  August

  September

  October

  November

  December

  UP WITH THE LARKS

  UP WITH THE LARKS

  STARTING AGAIN IN CORNWALL

  Tessa Hainsworth

  This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author's and publisher's rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  ISBN 9781409050568

  Version 1.0

  www.randomhouse.co.uk

  Published by Preface 2009

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Copyright © Tessa Hainsworth, 2009

  Tessa Hainsworth has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  This electronic book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

  First published in Great Britain in 2009 by

  Preface Publishing

  1 Queen Anne's Gate

  London SW1H 9BT

  An imprint of The Random House Group Limited

  www.rbooks.co.uk

  www.prefacepublishing.co.uk

  Addreses for companies within The Random House Group Limited can be found at www.randomhouse.co.uk

  The Random House Group Limited Reg. No. 954009

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN: 9781409050568

  Version 1.0

  To the magical charms of Cornwall

  which has seduced many a heart into staying . . .

  To my dearest Richard, Tom and Georgie

  will all my love and to my amazingly

  supportive friends and family

  and

  To Nigel, Jules, Jacki, Adrian, Jeremy

  and all their families

  Acknowledgements

  To the beginning of an amazing journey – I owe special thanks to Karen Hayes without whom this book would never have seen the light of day. Huge thanks also to my agent Jane Turnbull, to Brian Perman and to the great team at Preface Books.

  Two books have been a valuable source of background information on Cornish history, legend and landscape: Lawrence O'Toole's The Roseland and Daphne du Maurier's Vanishing Cornwall.

  The names of places and people featured in the book have been changed to protect their privacy.

  Prologue

  I'm having my lunch break on the estuary in Creek, a tiny Cornish village tucked away between a rolling hillside and the sea. The tide is out and I'm perched on an old sea wall nibbling on a homemade pasty given to me by one of my 'customers'.

  It is winter now, a glorious December. It's nearly the Solstice and yet the low sun gives enough warmth for me to sit outside and bask in it. The seabirds are basking too, scuttling along the wet sand and chirping at each other as merry as spring. They hop and preen amongst the few old rowboats and the clumps of seaweed, looking at me now and again with inquiring eyes, for I'm the only person here in this secluded haven. The sky is as blue and cloudless as any summer day, and the water beyond the estuary is as green as shamrocks.

  I finish my pasty and brush away the crumbs. The smell of sea, the lap of waves, the sound of gulls, lulls me into a half-doze, and I forget that I'm not on some idyllic holiday but actually at work. And I can't believe my luck. After all the upheavals, the false beginnings, the struggle not to give up, I'm exactly where I want to be. This time, it feels permanent.

  Picking up my bag, I saunter over to my van parked by the sea wall. It's the red van of the Royal Mail and yes, I'm the driver, the one who delivers the post.

  I'm a postwoman for the Royal Mail in Cornwall and a year into the job, it still feels like a dream.

  It's not even two years since I lived and worked in London – and abroad – in a high-powered exciting job with a lifestyle many people would die for. But the stresses of juggling family and work, of too much to do and not enough time to do it in, was taking its toll and tearing our family apart.

  It had to change, and it did, finally. What none of us were prepared for were the near-disastrous consequences of that change.

  I'm thinking about the past as I get into the postal van, of how I got from there – that glitzy glamorous life – to here: dressed in a Royal Mail uniform and on my way to deliver the post to the next tranquil seaside hamlet.

  As I drive along the narrow curving lanes, catching glimpses of the December sun glinting on the sea beyond green fields and grazing sheep, feeling contentment and joy ooze out of my pores like rich Cornish clotted cream, I remember the beginning – the weirdness of that first day. That surreal feeling that I'd walked into another life, an alien life that I thought then would forever remain strange and alarming.

  November

  My first day as a postwoman for the Royal Mail and the first shock is the odour. Male sweat – the sorting room reeks of it – not rancid nor unclean, just ordinary bloke secretions, with all that testosterone crammed together in one room. I feel as though I'm in the wrong story, the one about warriors and adventures and manly prowess; a story that begins far too early, before dawn.

  I turn to Susie, the postwoman who is showing me around the huge warehouse of the mail room. 'Are we the only women?' I ask, watching the riot of navy and red clad figures rushing about sorting the masses of post.

  She shakes her head. 'No, but we're a minority. And let's face it, bird, in these uniforms, we don't look much different from the men. Hard to tell us apart, to be honest.'

  I look down at my clothes: baggy dark blue trousers, far too big for me. Dr Martens boots, unflattering red shirt, shapeless navy fleece, all with the bright red Royal Mail insignia. Waterproof jacket as big as a tent, but necessary for the icy deluge lashing Truro on this early November morning. It isn't that warm in here either, which is probably just as well. The strong masculine air is overpowering enough now; goodness knows what it will be like on a hot summer's day.

  I take a deep breath. It's like being locked up with the England rugby team after a tough first half.

  'You OK?' Susie says. 'Anything wrong?'

  'No, fine . . . It's just that . . .' I trail off. Susie gives me an odd look, half suspicious, half scornful. 'Not got cold feet, have you?'

  She isn't talking about the weather, or about the cold floor, where about 50 to 70 men, and very few women, are gathering their post from the sorting boxes. It looks like something between a strange choreographed dance and complete confusion and chaos.

  She is waiting for an answer.

  My reply is flippant. 'Not just cold feet – freezing. I should have worn thicker socks with these boots.'

  She gives me the look my pathetic attempt at humour deserves. I try to seem at ease. 'It's just . . . just a bit different, that's all. From
my last job.'

  I think of my work over the last twenty years, travelling all over the world for The Body Shop, an international cosmetics company, latterly as its UK Marketing Manager.

  As I take another deep breath and inhale the earthy odour, that male smell mixed with cardboard, metal, paper, print and damp, I remember other rooms, just as busy where the scent was of the sweetest perfumes, lemongrass and lavender, mimosa and magnolia, fruity and flowery fragrances that permeated my clothes and stayed with me day and night. Delicate rose bath oils, moisturizers and night creams of myrrh and frankincense, shampoos and rinses of tea tree and aloe vera.

  I look around at this warehouse which reminds me of an aeroplane hangar. The huge rubber doors at the end are flapping like the wings of menacing ravens as the post deliverers come in to collect their stash and go back out with it loaded on huge trolleys.

  My last place of work was a lush boutique office, designer decorated and scented with discreet but expensive aromatherapy oils.

  Susie, normally an attractive healthy Cornish woman, looks stark and yellow at 4.30 in the morning under the rows and rows of overhead neon strip lighting and I'm sure I look just as bleak in the harsh glare. My colleagues at The Body Shop were all fashionably smart and stylish, trendy hair and bodies pampered with our products.

  Susie is still looking at me, her face unreadable. 'I'm fine,' I repeat. 'It's just a bit different, that's all.'

  She nods. I can almost see her thinking, This one won't last a week. But all she says is, 'OK, let's get to work.'

  'Right,' I say, with more bravado than conviction in my voice.

  She plunges into the scrum, nodding to me to join her in the noise and confusion.

  'Let's get to work,' I echo, and follow her into my new job and my new life.

  The journey that led me to that Royal Mail sorting office had begun the year before, during that slump that happens sometimes over the Christmas holidays when the kids are in bed, the fussing and feasting nearly over, and the parents, exhausted, overfed and over-indulged, collapse in a heap in front of the telly.

  That's exactly what Ben and I were doing. It had been a hectic day, with our six-year-old son Will and four-and-a-half-year-old daughter Amy running riot with new toys and over-excitement. Now, however, they were in bed and we were settling down to watch a Jack Nicholson film, As Good As It Gets. I don't remember much of the movie now, but the title changed our lives.

  Is this as good as it gets? I kept repeating to myself. To this day I haven't a clue what the film was about, but those few words in the title wouldn't leave me alone. Ben was half asleep, half snuggling me as we sprawled about on the sofa trying not to spill the glasses of Sancerre we were sipping. Gradually he began focusing on the movie, but instead of doing the same, I couldn't concentrate. The title kept repeating itself like a mantra.

  Why? I wondered aloud. Ben, by now totally engrossed in the film, nudged me to shush but the noises in my head wouldn't keep quiet. Why does that title bother me?

  There seemed to be no rational answer. Ben and I had everything, or so it seemed. We were in love and we had two gorgeous children. We also had a satisfactory working arrangement: I had the executive job which brought in the money, and Ben, a professional but out of work actor, was doing a brilliant job as house-husband, in charge of cooking and all the other aspects of keeping home and family together.

  I'd just completed a successful Christmas Campaign for The Body Shop, with a massive budget. The twenty years I'd been in the job had been tremendously satisfying and adventurous, challenging and creative, too. In the past years I'd set up a £1.9 million visitors' centre for the firm; I'd met numerous stars and celebrities and even royalty, including Princess Diana and Prince Charles on separate occasions. I had been with Anita and Gordon Roddick, the founders of the company, since the earlier days and I loved being part of such an exciting and unique enterprise, for The Body Shop was at the forefront of the move towards more natural cosmetics.

  It was exhilarating. I went all over the world organizing conferences for as many as 500 delegates, many of whom were well-known, respected, inspiring, as our company was the first to advocate fair practices in cosmetic testing as well as introducing organic and ethical ingredients in the product. When the company set up franchises in America, I had the opportunity of living in New York City for nearly a year, creating their Communication Office linking new franchises in the USA and the UK. I had loved my job, passionately.

  But . . . but? What was the but? And why in my mind was I using the past tense when I listed the things I loved about my job?

  I must have spoken aloud again, for Ben filled my wine glass, thinking I'd asked him for more. I murmured a thanks and snuggled up to him, determined to shut out the crazy voices in my head and concentrate on the film.

  Is this really as good as it gets? The question wouldn't go away. Over the next few weeks it pecked at me like a great carnivorous bird, preying on my stressed mind, my unexercised, unhealthy, exhausted body.

  My work had changed considerably since the earlier headier years. The company had expanded far beyond anyone's expectation, and in the past few years I'd found it more stressful than inspiring. Though I was often in London where most of my job was based, we lived in a faceless commuter neighbourhood on the outskirts of the city in a house that often seemed less a home than a hotel where I crashed out after meetings, conferences and business entertaining. When I wasn't travelling, I came home some nights well after the kids were in bed, shattered after the day's commuting. Getting to and from work was a nightmare of crowded trains that arrived late, tube lines closed, buses missed and taxis that never came. I hardly saw my kids, hardly saw Ben. I went from one extreme to the other, either revved up from the stresses of the job, or totally limp and exhausted.

  'You've got to take it easier,' Ben said.

  'I can't,' I snapped. 'I've got about six people after my job as it is.'

  There was nothing to say to that, so we'd moved onto the children. 'By the way,' Ben said, 'the kids' school play is next week, remember?'

  'Oh no, I nearly forgot.' I felt terrible.

  'Amy needs a unicorn's horn, and Will wants to be a hedgehog. We've got to get the costumes together by Friday.'

  It was Wednesday and I had to be in Brighton the next day. I was supposed to be entertaining people from Sydney the following week and would miss the play anyway. But when Ben reassured me that he'd already made the costumes and that I wasn't to worry, I felt even worse.

  Ben comforted me. 'Never mind, love, it can't be helped. That's the way things are at the moment.'

  He spoke quietly and I noticed the pensive look on his face. It reminded me that he too had had to accept the fact that life hadn't worked out as smoothly and perfectly as we'd hoped, when we both agreed to our working arrangement. I knew he missed the theatre, and acting. He was a good actor, and passionate about his profession, but had accepted that at this point in our lives, he couldn't pursue his career with the steely dedication required.

  Though he didn't talk much about it these days, I knew that being a house-husband in the commuter belt of London wasn't the best substitute for the life he'd dreamed of.

  Missing the school play was a kind of catalyst, I think, looking back on it now. I'd always missed not having enough time to be with the children, but now it worried me night and day. I had to leave for work early and some days came home so late I never saw them at all. After that first round of tears over the unicorn and hedgehog costumes, I realized that lately I had been doing a lot of crying, like the evening I got home to find Amy and Will distressed and disgruntled. They'd gone to school in their uniforms only to realize it was a special non-uniform day and all their mates were in jeans and trendy tops, while my two darlings were trussed up in their uniforms.

  A small thing, perhaps – but not to them. Nor to me either, for I was the one who'd opened the note for the parents one morning on the way to work and forgotten to tell Ben or the c
hildren. I felt I'd failed them yet again.

  Seeing their sad little faces, I once again felt the tears rolling down my face. It had been a bad day anyway; I'd had to fire a single mum against my will and I was crying for her too. Will and Amy, still feeling mortified at being the only children in school not in cool trendy clothes, decided to join me, and we were all bawling when Ben came in from the kitchen to say that dinner was ready.

  'Oh God,' he said as he witnessed the sorry scene in front of him. 'Not again!'

  'You're not very bloody sympathetic.'

  'Tessa, I've been sympathizing with the kids ever since they got back from school in tears. Now let's all calm down and eat, OK?'

  I wasn't hungry, and said so. He asked what was the point of cooking something special as he might as well have cooked fish fingers if only Will and Amy were going to eat.

  We argued. Luckily the children had left the room by then – or unluckily I suppose, because we never argued around them. In fact we used to never argue at all. What was happening to us?

  From that day, we seemed to go from bad to horrific. The children had a rash of illnesses, nothing serious but enough to keep them from school. Enough to keep Ben frazzled, and me tearful yet again because I couldn't be home with them. I couldn't concentrate at work for my focus was on home not the job. I came back tired and miserable, not much good to either Ben or the children.

  And Ben was having a hard time too. We'd hoped that somehow we could share the work out, that I'd be able to ease my hours while he took on some acting roles, but it never worked out that way. My job entailed total commitment and long hours. Ben had just turned down, through necessity, a chance for a part in a short rep run from a director he knew. There was no way he could have taken it, but it left him restless and fidgety.

  For weeks I brooded. The crying didn't stop, either – in the mornings, kissing Will and Amy a hurried good-bye, hoping I'd see them for that brief hour before they went to bed; in the evenings when I got home too late to see them awake. I cried even more when I left the country, spending long hours pacing the departure lounge in Heathrow or Gatwick wishing I were home with my family. This wasn't like me, these tears. I can't do Supermum any more, I thought, in the heaving throng on the train, the tube, in the London streets. I felt hemmed in and claustrophobic. I got angry at myself for being depressed and then I got depressed for being angry.