‘I want the same, but I’d swap beer for tea, I think, if it’s in front of the fire.’ She smiled at him. ‘I want that same feeling of satisfaction at a job well done, and I like the idea of sharing chores with someone.’
‘A partnership,’ he surmised.
‘Yes.’ Exactly! ‘A partnership.’
They were silent for a beat as if this new level of openness so in sync was to be savoured.
‘I’ve always worried that I’m not very exciting,’ he confessed finally. ‘I want routine, the ordinary.’
‘I think you’re exciting,’ she whispered.
‘I’m really not. And I don’t want you to be disappointed . . .’ His face coloured.
‘Disappointed?’ She let a small laugh escape.
‘Yes! You’re so accomplished and fabulous and . . .’
‘I could never be disappointed. I think you are . . .’ She struggled to find the words. ‘I think you’re wonderful. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you, not for a second. It’s quite thrown me.’
‘That is such a compliment.’ He turned to face her and they held hands, gazing at each other like lovers. ‘So what is happening here, Marvellous Molly?’
‘I don’t know.’ She lied because she did know, but lacked the confidence to say. This felt like falling, like diving into the joyous abyss that she had been wary of and intrigued by for so long, and now even the thought of it was intoxicating. There was very little doubt about it – she was thoroughly smitten.
‘Can we meet again? In a few weeks? I have a day, possibly two, at the weekend and then I’m afraid I will be away for some time.’ He lifted her fingers to his mouth and kissed them. ‘And I think going away would be a whole lot easier if I could see you before I left.’
‘I would like that very much.’ Her voice was steady in the face of his words, which were so big she thought they might swallow her whole.
‘Happy Christmas, M.’
‘Happy Christmas, Johan.’
Molly walked home in a bit of a daze. Her stomach jumped with pure joy when she recalled that there were plans afoot for her to see him in a few weeks’ time!
‘That you, Molly?’ her mother called from the scullery.
‘Yes, it’s me, Mum!’ she called back. ‘Who else would it be?’ she whispered under her breath as she shucked off her coat and hung it on the coat stand.
‘You’re a little late.’
‘Yes, I met a friend and we went for a walk.’ She smiled again, feeling the warmth in her palm from where his hand had rested before he jumped into the car and waved through the window, which he had rolled down before shouting, ‘I’ll be seeing you!’ as it spirited him away. Molly had thought she might explode. He had remembered their song. They had a song! Despite her dismissive nature when it came to romance, she was being swept along on a wave more powerful than her resistance and she rather liked it.
Her mother appeared in the hallway. ‘What friend?’
Molly refused to let her mum’s sour expression suck the joy from her bones. ‘Oh, a boy – a man, actually – called Johan. He’s the brother of Geertruida; you remember her, of course?’ Geertruida was not easily forgotten.
‘I do indeed.’ Her mother pursed her lips as if her tone alone was not enough to convey her disapproval. ‘I’m conflicted, I must confess,’ her mother sighed. ‘It’s wonderful that you are finally seeing sense and spending time with a potential suitor, but is that Dutch boy really the best of the bunch?’ The way her mother said the word ‘Dutch’ was heavy with connotations too unpleasant for Molly to voice to herself.
‘In fact,’ Molly added brightly, ‘I’m seeing him again in a few weeks. And I’m very much looking forward to spending some time with him.’
‘I see,’ her mother commented, and drew breath, as if she wanted to say more.
Molly, however, scooted past and up the stairs. Not even her mother’s whiff of disapproval or lack of enthusiasm could dull the bubble of happiness that filled her from top to toe.
FOUR
Near Alresford, Hampshire
January 1944
Aged 19
‘You’re going a bit fast!’ Molly giggled, a little thrilled and a little terrified as the car zipped along at pace. She tucked the thick tartan blanket over her legs and placed her hand on her head, loath to lose the silk headsquare knotted beneath her chin, not with such things so hard to come by. Case in point being her woollen stockings,