Page 19 of Take Me Away

I grit my teeth. The morning I saw the Daily Mail outside the post office, the headline had hit me, a sucker punch straight to my sternum.

Isla Quinn and Marcus Vale.

I remembered shaking his hand. He’d said he was going to make her a star.

And he did.

But at what cost?

‘Kit,’ Jude murmurs, nudging me with his elbow and zoning me back in to Maisie’s nattering. He flickers a frown at my expression, then grins back into his pint, tipping liquid into his mouth.

Luckily Maisie’s on a roll now. Nothing short of a blackout’s going to stop her.

‘Lily says she’s dating that man from the movie, you know the one, Dad, the one with⁠—’

‘Fascinating,’ I say again, taking another long drink and wondering if there’s a way to climb inside the pint glass and disappear.

Nina Ellis squeezes into a gap next to us at the bar, hair scraped into a loose knot, the smell of coffee and vanilla still clinging to her even though the café’s been closed for hours. I glance around for Peter – her bloke, and our local lifeboat crewman turned pub philosopher – but he’s not with her tonight. That’s unusual. Where one of them is, the other’s usually not far behind. I make a mental note to check in with him tomorrow. See if he needs an extra hand on the boat this week.

‘I feel sorry for her, honestly,’ Nina says, catching the thread of conversation. ‘With everything they’re saying in the press about her keeping quiet all those years. Like she’s to blame. Wasn’t she only just out of her teens when she made her first movie? Who exactly would have believed her back then?’

Something shifts low in my gut.

‘It’s not fair,’ Nina adds, stirring her G & T. ‘They act like she let women down when she probably couldn’t even find a way to protect herself.’

‘Blokes are shits,’ Frankie calls from across the room. ‘Present company excluded. Mostly.’

‘Language,’ I mutter automatically, shooting a glance at Maisie – who’s doing an excellent job of pretending not to listen while storing every syllable for later discussion. She’s got her innocent face on. The one she pulls out when she doesn’t want me to censor the grown-up talk. It’s terrifying how good she’s getting at it.

Maybe if Jessica were still here, we wouldn’t be in the pub tonight. Maisie would be upstairs with a book, pretending to sleep, while Jess and I shared a bottle of mid-priced red in the kitchen, her cold feet tucked under my thigh. But Jess isn’t here. She hasn’t been here for two years.

And we are at the pub.

‘She came by the shack, you know,’ Bill says, puffed up. ‘Day she arrived. Had a cod bap. Extra vinegar, just like the old days.’

‘We’ve heard,’ Jude says. ‘Multiple times, mate.’

‘Proper star,’ Frankie nods. ‘But no airs and graces. Not like some of ’em on telly.’

‘She’s just a person,’ I mutter, tension prickling at the back of my neck. ‘Like the rest of us.’ My voice comes out sharper than intended. ‘Can we talk about something else?’

Nina gives me a look but lets it slide, tucking her legs up on the bench and sipping her drink. Around us, the conversation shifts – back to boats, the weather, the new paint job on the Mary Jane. The usual noise. But my brain’s snagged on her words.

Those headlines – they’ve been gnawing at me.

The timeline of it all. The things Isla was going through … right after we broke up. After she left Sea Salt Bay. After I stood in the rain like a proper idiot and told her to chase her dreams.

What if her dreams were nightmares?

And then there’s the guilt. The quiet, creeping kind.

Because while she was getting cornered by predators in dressing rooms and told to shut up or lose everything, I was here. Falling in love with Jessica. Getting married. Having Maisie. Learning how to hold a baby without panicking. Laughing. Loving.

Isla Quinn never came back, but then I didn’t follow her either. Didn’t tell her that I saw her film. That I was proud of her.

Peter saw one of her early films years ago. Told me straight after: ‘She’s good, mate. Really good. You okay with that?’ That’s Peter – says what needs saying, nothing more.

I shrugged. Said I didn’t care.