Page 2 of And Then There Was You

What was I thinking? I might find a home for it, but I couldn’t ever play it. I’ve tried, in the years since the piano I remember from my past was taken away from my childhood home. But it’s as if waves of pain wash in between my fingers and the keys, sending them scurrying back for safety.

Tears well, despite my willing them not to.

I just thought . . . I hoped . . . this time might be different.

Seth gives my shoulders a squeeze, his other hand tapping the piano’s lid. He doesn’t like seeing anyone upset, especially not a woman and definitely not me. The tapping becomes impatient, the squeeze just a little tight.

‘I’m okay . . .’ I begin.

‘No!’ he exclaims, sniggering tipsily when his word echoes around the darkened street. ‘Hang on – it won’t get in the front door, but I reckon we could squeeze it in there . . .’

He’s grinning at the side gate, half-hidden by the tangle of honeysuckle and ivy that blurs the line between my building and Seth’s shop. It leads down the side of the café to a covered courtyard at the back.

The courtyard! Of course!

‘We could make it a Play Me piano!’

‘Yes!’ Seth replies, the idea blossoming between us. ‘And paint it!’

‘Yes! With bright colours or waves, or . . .’

‘. . . Flowers! Like the Surprise Song piano!’

I stare back at him, but he’s unrepentant.

‘What? I’m just a happy little Swiftie. The Eras Tour was magic . . . And you could bring the magic here – with this . . .’ He pats the piano. ‘So let’s get this baby to its new home.’

It takes several anxious attempts to coax the piano through the gateway and round the side of the café, the final two stone steps up to the covered courtyard almost scuppering its journey.

But we make it, with only the smallest of scrapes along the bottom of the wood.

Delighted and out of breath from the effort, we wheel the piano between the café tables to a space against the far wall. Task thus completed, we collapse beside it.

‘I’m going to think this was a tequila-induced fever dream tomorrow,’ Seth says.

‘I’m not sure it isn’t.’ I lean my head against his shoulder. ‘Cheers for indulging me, dude.’

‘Pleasure, bird.’ He reaches over and ruffles my hair. ‘You know, you could always get someone in to play it when you open for bistro nights . . .’

I don’t hide my groan. ‘Not this again . . .’

‘No – hear me out, yeah? Where’s the place all our mates come to get away from the emmets in the summer?’

Emmet . An old Cornish word for ant, and local people’s favourite not-so-charming term for the tourists on whose business we all depend.

It’s a local joke, the ant thing, and I can see what they mean about the summer tourists who swarm about wherever they like, with little thought for whose livelihoods they’re trampling over.

At times it can feel like Cornwall is laid siege to every summer.

But the truth is, we need them. All of us do.

‘The Leopard,’ I say, knowing full well this is merely a deflection and unlikely to deter him.

‘Giss on! The only folk drinking in The Leopard are incomers pretendin’ to be local. Everyone we know comes here – for the last hour of the day. And they’d hang around longer, too, if you didn’t turf ’em out at six.’

‘I can’t afford to do evenings . . .’

‘Four hours extra, just a few nights a week,’ he insists. ‘They’d flock here – you know they would. And if someone was playin’ this old girl . . . You’d be quids in.’

I don’t want him to make a good point, but he does.

Truth is, I’ve been considering it for a while.

I’d need extra staff for the night service, and a limited menu to keep costs down.

Probably a bring-your-own-bottle policy, too, as the café isn’t licensed.

It’s a ton of work, but plenty of other businesses in town have late-opening hours during the summer.

‘I need to think about it,’ I begin.

But that’s enough for Seth. He jumps up and twirls me around, narrowly missing chairs and tables, until the effects of his enthusiastic night drinking catch up with him and he stops, breathless and dizzy.

‘Bleddy hell, I need to be home.’

Still giggling, I lead him back along the side passage to the street. ‘Thanks for tonight.’

‘It was a good ’un. Weird as, but good.’ He grins tipsily. ‘And this, dear maid, is where I leave you.’ He exacts a wobbly bow that, on the street cobbles, is very brave indeed.

‘Will you be okay to get up the hill?’ I ask.

He dismisses my question with an overblown wave of his hand. ‘No problem, s’just a stagger . . .’ His big loony grin makes me smile.

‘Right, nighty-night, then.’ I cup my hands around his face and plant a kiss on his forehead. ‘Take care.’

‘Don’t I always?’ He chuckles, backing away and bumping into a lamppost. ‘Oops, ’scuse me, Lampy.’

Raising a hand in farewell, he heads back up the street towards home.

I watch until he disappears from view, then head back to the covered courtyard.

The piano is there.

Old. Battered in places. Scuffed in others.

But wonderful.

And mine .

It’s way past midnight, and I’m due to get up at five-thirty. Tiredness battles with elation, calling me to bed. But as I open the door to head inside, I sneak one last look back.

Possibility sparkles in the air, like the strings of fairy lights illuminating the courtyard. I love how it feels.

‘Night, piano,’ I whisper, the thrill of it carrying me all the way to bed.