that will help me place him. He has the open, buoyant expression of a man completely at ease with himself, slate-blue eyes set in a weather-beaten complexion. He clearly belongs to the area and thinks that I will know who he is, in the taken-for-granted way that everyone here knows where they – and everybody else – fit in.
‘Sorry about your mum,’ he says at last. ‘Is everything okay in the house? I know Bridie’s been in to check a couple of times. But if you need a hand with anything, just let me know.’ He glances past me as he says this. His expression flickers and I sense that his attention has been caught by something behind me. Looking round, I realise it’s the sight of the gin bottle standing next to a half-empty glass. I know what he must be thinking. And at this time in the morning, too. Then I catch sight of the kitchen clock and see it’s later than I thought – nearly ten. But even so . . .
I look back at him defiantly. ‘Yeah, that’s not what it looks like. It’s about as far as I got with supper last night.’
He shrugs. ‘I’m not judging.’
Aye, right. I give it half an hour, tops, before that titbit is fed back to Bridie.
‘Anyway, enjoy the squatties. If you’d like more ever, I’m out most days with the creels. Leave me a message on the jetty.’
I relent a little, realising how ungracious I’ve been. ‘Thanks, really. I’ll enjoy these.’
‘No bother. Well then, be seeing you around.’
I watch as he strides back to a Land Rover parked at the side of the road, whistling a snatch of a tune as he goes. He has the broad shoulders and loping gait that are typical of a fisherman. I recognise the song as it’s the one Mum used to sing so often. He gets in and starts the engine, glancing briefly back towards the cottage and raising a hand in salute as he pulls away.
I tip the flat remnants of last night’s drink into the sink and stow the gin bottle away in a cupboard. Then I stash the bag of squat lobsters into the fridge, and find that I’m humming a verse of the song he was whistling, which is now running on a loop in my head. I even try a few words of the chorus: ‘Will ye gang love . . .’ But I stop when my voice cracks with emotion.
Something stirs in the depths of my memory. Maybe there was something familiar about those slate-blue eyes of his, but I can’t quite place him. I reach to grasp at dim thoughts, but they dart away, just beyond my reach, slippery as fish.
I fill the kettle from the tap and set it on the stove to boil. As I take the old brown teapot down from its place on the shelf, a breaker of grief crashes over me, knocking the breath from my chest. Mum’s voice seems to fill the kitchen around me, singing that same song, and I hug the pot to my heart.
‘Oh dig my grave both lang and deep
Put a bunch o’ roses at my head and feet
And in the middle a turtle dove,
Let the people ken that I died o’ love . . .’
She always had a pot of tea on the go, forever bringing me a mug whether I wanted it or not. But the sight of that old teapot makes me realise that they were never just cups of tea she was giving me. They were some of the punctuation marks that helped make sense of our story together – those little pauses and connections that I took for granted. Those cups of tea were just one of the ways she let me know she loved me, several times a day.
With the words of her song still echoing in my head, I go through to the sitting room and take the photo of my dad off the mantelpiece. His dark eyes are unfathomable, hidden in shadow in the picture, which is the only one I have of him. His name was Alec Mackenzie-Grant, he was in the navy, and he died before I was born. But I know little else about him. When I’d pester Mum to tell me stories of him she always spoke of his kindness, of how he’d loved her and how he would have loved me had he known me. But when I pushed her to