I’ll Weave a Song for You

By Sandra Leavesley

She holds the verse in the palm of her hand and tells a story she died in.
 
When Megan dies, she leaves a promise with her twin Emily: ‘I’ll weave a song for you…it may take a while, but I’ll come back to you Em, somehow’. Her song threads a tapestry, spinning through a mosaic of memories and weaving into the present day, touching the lives of Alice and Jon. 
 
The Café by the Oak is in the heart of Crayshead, a Cornish seaside town with a sleepy tortoise, a vocal parrot, and a dog named Wellington. Emily is charmed by Alice, an old lady with secrets hidden behind the walls of a convent. Jon’s life lacks purpose. After taking up a new teaching post he feels settled enough to begin unravelling his past, but when he finds something he isn’t looking for it causes him to question everything.
 
Emily seeks comfort in her art, reflecting on her childhood, and helping Jon pursue his past. And as Alice slowly reveals her secret, Emily breathes life into a painting on canvas… Can Megan weave a song without leaving them all with a sense of betrayal?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Sep 9, 2022
• ISBN: 9781803139838

Sandra Leavesley

Sandra Leavesley has had a varied career that has offered her the perspective to write on interesting concepts. After moving from the NHS and medical industry to sign language teaching/interpreting, she now teaches yoga and looks after a city memorial museum garden. Sandra has two children and lives in Hampshire with her husband, Peter, and their 17-year-old rescue cat named Widget.

Book preview

Contents

Sunday

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-one

Twenty-two

Twenty-three

Twenty-four

Twenty-five

Twenty-six

Twenty-seven

Twenty-Eight

Twenty-nine

Thirty

Thirty-one

Thirty-two

Thirty-three

Thirty-four

Thirty-five

Thirty-six

Thirty-seven

Thirty-eight

Thirty-nine

Forty

Forty-one

Forty-two

Forty-three

Firty-four

Forty-five

Forty-six

Forty-seven

Forty-eight

Forty-nine

Fifty

Fifty-one

Fifty-two

Fifty-three

The Last Verse

A Note from the Author

Sunday

I’m walking but I’m not moving. My legs feel like lead, my bones ache, my skin burns and my body trembles with fear. I’m so frightened, I can hardly breathe.

Rocks tumble through my ears and I cringe at the noise. The hiss of fire is intense as wind licks flames around me and I cough and splutter from inhaling smouldering embers. I prise open my eyes and cry out at the charred landscape stretched before me. There surely is no life in this dark and desolate place, yet I am here. Pain sears through my body and I fall to my knees, drop my head and sob uncontrollably.

He lifts me without effort and confidently treads over this scorched terrain. I try to speak but find no words, and I’m too weak to think or move, so I close my eyes and surrender. The wind becomes calmer, cooler, and I sense we are standing on the very edge of a vast open space.

And we wait…

I can no longer fully open my eyes, but my body feels lighter and my pain has eased. He climbs steadily, higher still, and a calming energy moves with us. We slow down on even ground and I imagine hills and meadows beyond and feel grateful for the presence of light. He gently lowers me, stays with me, holds me. I yield to this feeling of love and comfort and the cool, soft earth beneath me, and I stretch out. Fresh air softens my breath and I find my tears flowing with the sound of a river. I’m left alone but I’m aware of His presence. Loneliness has no place here.

I sense the sweet abundance of the Earth; I feel the movement of stars; the pull of the sun and the moon turn the tide. Music surrounds me – I hear birds and choirs and orchestras harmonise and the sound is divine and fills me with joy. No boundaries hold me; I now understand all that there is. Peace is here.

And I become the song…

One

Emily Ingram liked her name. And she considered her twin’s name a perfect fit: Emily and Megan were like two pieces of a jigsaw that slotted neatly into place. True to the meaning of her name, Megan was fun to be around, and she had a gift for making people laugh – even the most serious crowd would lighten up with the sound of her laughter. But Emily often wondered whether circumstances might have turned out differently had she been given her twin’s name, for some say names have an influence on our destiny. She would never know.

No one would have guessed they were twins, for even as children there were obvious differences, although both girls grew to be equally attractive. Emily, with her light golden waves and blue almond-shaped eyes and Megan, the smaller twin, gifted with green eyes and brown curls rolling down her back. From an early age they embraced their talents. In English class, Emily would draw; in art class, Megan would write. In maths, Emily would tap her toes to the count of ten while Megan would rap out her six times table. They balanced each other perfectly.

By the time they had reached their early twenties, Emily’s talent for painting had developed to the point where galleries were asking to display her work. She had grown into a quiet, reflective character, complementing her twin’s comical and carefree attitude to life, although Megan’s writing suggested a layer of true depth. The unique lyrical pitch to her poetry never ceased to amaze Emily, and her singing harmonised. Her talent for variation appeared endless; from rhyming-scheme-rap to soft blues to opera, Megan’s voice was rich and powerful. Her interpretation of Handel’s Messiah oratorio was something else – she would close her eyes, raise her hand as the music reached a crescendo and slowly lower again as the notes spilled down the scale. Her tone was deep, her focus steady. It was always a composed and moving scene.

*

Today was Saturday and Emily wanted to paint with the same passion she had felt at dawn when she ran in fields with the sun on her face. But later, as she wandered near the canal, clouds rolled in and stole her sunshine and she knew her brushes would remain dry. A dreary Manchester waterway did not reflect the mood she wished to create in her latest painting; far better to wait for a brighter tomorrow. She eyed the jam doughnuts on the kitchen worktop and offered them a smiley shrug, anticipating other little luxuries she would delight in throughout the day while feeling virtuous about putting a few things in neat piles. She was determined her Saturday wouldn’t turn into one of those boring chore days.

She cranked up the volume on her radio and climbed the stairs two at a time to collect washing she had ignored all week. She paused on the landing, unable to understand the sudden disquiet she felt when she saw Megan’s journal lying on the floor just inside her bedroom door. The book was open where a bookmark had been placed, and Emily felt some strong magnetic force urging her to take a peek. Should she? Her twin often shared snippets of writing, but her journal was personal and rarely did she share the content. Emily knew she would be crossing a boundary, but she couldn’t help herself. The last few weeks Megan had been acting strangely, often staring into space, and she wasn’t finding humour in instances even Emily found amusing.

Emily sat cross-legged on the carpet, picked up the leather-bound book and read the last entry Megan had written. She read it twice, for the content was intense.

‘Emily, what are you doing up there?’

‘Coming!’

Emily placed the journal back on the floor, taking care to leave the page open as she had found it. She sat for a moment taking in what she had just read and found herself shaking. To anyone else this prose recalled a dream, a fantasy, but Emily knew her twin well and these words held a hidden truth. Megan’s name was written within every line.

She swallowed hard, scooped up the washing and closed the door behind her.

The days continued relatively normally: Emily rising at first light and out running along the banks of a canal as the sun rose, when most residents were still tucked under duvets. She would relish a hot and cold shower afterwards and look forward to spending most days at her easel painting or visiting art galleries, while more recently, Megan slept in late, eventually surfacing to eat a large bowlful of her favourite porridge, which she claimed gave her double the brain energy to write and teach singing lessons. In the evenings, the girls would take turns to cook and occasionally invite friends to share food, stories and laughter. Life moved at a steady pace.

Until one Monday morning their lives were turned upside down when Megan received some pathology results. Emily’s paintings were left without colour, while Megan’s writing became lines without rhyme or reason, and her singing reflected seasons of change.

*

‘It’s boring, Em.’ Megan fidgeted with a cushion behind her back as she sat on a red plastic chair, a cannula connecting a drip to her hand, a bowl at her feet.

Emily watched the steady drip of solution disappearing down the tube into a protruding vein. Two other women sat in the same room, both connected to machines. One woman stared at a novel: Broken. The younger woman gazed outside the window at a world she wished was hers.

Megan wore a blue scarf tied around her bald head. Emily’s scarf was white, printed with daisies.

‘You don’t have to wear that, Em.’ Megan pulled Emily’s scarf down over her eyes and chuckled.

‘We’re twins, Meg, remember? I want to share this time with you.’ Emily had pointed out to the nurse that it was her twin having chemo after the nurse had started to lead Emily towards the drip.

Megan called the solution her gin fix. ‘Goes to my head,’ she said. The gin was the most poisonous fix Emily had ever encountered. Megan liked real gin, not the throw-up kind.

Over those months of chemotherapy, Megan had battled. She fought the pain and struggled in directions Emily could never follow. They completed numerous crossword puzzles together in the hope of finding answers, told impossible stories, exhausted every age-old joke. They played Scrabble, searching for words they may have missed. When Megan felt beaten, she moved to a bed.

‘Tired?’ Emily sat by her side.

‘Yeah. Had another dream last night. Not as real as the one I had the other Sunday, which seemed to last such a long time, like it was really happening. I can remember it all so clearly, written it down in my journal word for word. I’ll tell you about it sometime, although maybe not. It’s a bit hard to explain and you’d probably find it weird and freak out. Other people’s dreams are boring anyway. But now I need sleep…’

Emily remembered the day she had picked up the book she should have left alone, and the fear she had felt after reading Megan’s writing returned, for the significance of her words now dawned. And her twin never lied.

Summer promised them time.

They talked and reminisced of childhood days. They walked through fields of buttercups and cows and had picnics with ice cream and jelly and ate fish and chips in paper. They laughed at life. And they cried.

Autumn stole summer’s promises.

‘I can’t let go, Em. I’m okay with what’s going to happen, been through it in my head so many times, and yet I daren’t let go.’ She held onto Emily’s hand. ‘I hold on because we’ve shared everything, from bubble baths to snowball fights, new terms and teenage crushes and first jobs. We’ve lived it and breathed it together. But it’s time, Em. I have to leave you. I want to get away from this…’ The strength of her resolve showed in her clenched fists.

She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘It hurts, Em, I’m just…’ And her tears fell.

‘No – Meg – please. No. There has to be another way. We haven’t explored all the options…’

But Emily heard her twin’s thoughts and suddenly everything felt clear. She realised Megan had lingered for a totally unselfish reason, anticipating how it would feel for the person left behind – the person you have spent your whole life with. Even before birth.

‘I can see beyond this, Em. It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.’ Her green eyes studied Emily and a silence settled with her words…

‘I’ll weave a song for you,’ Megan said. ‘It may take a while for me to compose, but I’ll come back to you, Em. Somehow.’

Emily elbowed her. ‘I know your stories, Meg, they have many threads. You’ll lose me.’

Megan smiled – a smile that would stay with Emily for the rest of her life – a smile that chased the sun until the days grew dark and Megan became as pale as stonewashed walls. Emily longed for vibrant shades of autumn to revive the twin she loved, but leaves spun down to earth with slow and subtle grace. And waited.

*

Megan was twenty-eight when she died. It was autumn 2006. Last year.

How do you describe losing a half of you? For Emily, it was like grief spreading through an amputated limb. Every thread of raw nerve attached itself to the dull ache of memory.

It was a dry, crisp day when she closed her eyes for the last time, the kind of day that once poured rays of sunlight down onto two young girls running through fields of gold. A melancholy graced the air as Emily ran down dusty lanes amongst the earth’s brown stubble, energy draining from her body. And with each step, she felt Megan’s words hovering on her breath, falling into the soft echoes of her mind.

‘I’ll weave a song for you…’

Two

Emily had to move. Memories quickly became her tormenters, lurking around dank canals and viaducts and down dark alleyways in the suburbs of Manchester. A place she used to find joy, fulfilment and lightness, a place she once called home, had suddenly become alien to her. The only place that kept her sane was a new café and bakery around the corner from her home. This place had no memories, and Emily would sit drinking tea with her brain in neutral watching the world go by without her.

She yearned for a sign from Megan, anything to dismiss the desolate feeling of finality. She would light a candle: ‘Meg, if you’re here, flicker the candle – make a sound, tell me you’re with me.’ But the flame remained steady, the skies clouded, and the wind whispered grief. Her home echoed a longing for the presence it once knew. It seemed that within a short space of time even her friends had moved on with their lives. Without Megan, there was no road ahead and she found decisions difficult, ticking all the boxes of I don’t know.

But one day when she was out running by the canal she had an uncanny whiff of salty sea air, and the following day screaming seagulls flew overhead. Her mind wandered to holidays as a child and this memory of happier days stayed with her, nudging her daily, until she finally found the courage to search for a home by the sea. She felt drawn to the southwest, for reasons she couldn’t understand. Moving south would be a big step to take, for she had lived in the Manchester area the whole of her life, sharing a family home for the most part until leaving university, when she had set up home on her own and Megan had moved in with her boyfriend. But six months later, they were back living together – socialising with each other’s friends and colleagues but giving themselves space when needed. It worked.

Emily knew that now was the right time to make a change in her life. Work was easy to take with her and she had no qualms about finding galleries interested in taking her art. She could even continue to keep her links with the clients she had built over the years in the north. All she had to do was find a place to live, which was easier said than done from a distance, but she didn’t fancy the long drive down to the southwest to look around. Since her decision to move, she was eager to make this change happen fast.

She registered with estate agents in the area and found there was plenty of rented accommodation. One place that stood out from the rest was a little terraced house nestled by the sea in the small town of Crayshead in Cornwall. She went to a large bookshop, bought a map of the area and found the town wasn’t far from St Ives, a place she had read was full of art galleries. Had she been to St Ives? She remembered a couple of family holidays down on the west coast where she and Megan held hands walking down little cobbled streets with whitewashed houses, and she recalled a café with tablecloths and low ceilings serving warm scones, tea and, more importantly for children, gingerbread biscuits.

However, living in a place was totally different to taking a holiday. New territory felt scary, but Emily went along with her gut feelings, for she had nothing else to lose. Anyway, Megan had always said that the seaside draws people out of themselves, and with this in mind, she started gathering information about the area from various sources and slowly began to feel more comfortable about moving. She signed a tenancy agreement for a year, which could be extended, and even the thought of a warmer climate brought a smile to Emily’s face.

She stacked her belongings in a hired van, the most important items in her life by her side on the passenger seat – brushes, paints, dance shoes and a small box of treasured memories – and drove towards the southwest coast in the hope of painting a different picture. She wasn’t leaving Megan behind, she decided, for she was right by her side, urging her to move on. And as she stopped for a break and sipped a flask of hot tea, she promised herself that one of her first tasks would be to seek out a café in Crayshead where she could drink good tea.

As she turned onto B-roads, the scenery changed to countryside where farmyard barns, quaint cottages and village stores added character to the landscape, and before long an expanse of green and the sea in the distance offered her a dazzling view. Her excitement mounted. Perhaps looking out on a wider horizon may make it easier for Emily not to look back.

Three

Three years later, Crayshead, Cornwall

There’s an oak tree by a coffee shop.

I’ll meet you there…

Compose a symphony of thought for you.

The song I will share.

Reach further into her eyes…

Trace the contours of her face.

There is a name –

Look again.

Emily turned to the far corner of the café, where a parrot perched in a cage.

‘Kooky! Kooky!’ A bird with colourful plumage peered through the bars, seeking further prompts from folk seated around tables. But today everyone had their own agenda. Defeated, it padded sideways along the bar to the far corner of the cage, nodding its head up and down while muttering insults to itself, eventually settling down to preen its feathers.

Sipping tea, Emily focused on a line of people standing at the counter wearing an assortment of jackets, coats and scarves – colours as lively as the parrot’s feathers. The last in the queue was a small man, hunched over slightly, perhaps younger than his posture suggested. Carla was waiting to serve him. She wore her hair in plaits today, falling forward to her shoulders and secured at the ends with little pink bobbles. Dark-rimmed glasses added character to her youth.

Emily reflected on her own appearance; on the clothes she’d chosen for her dance class earlier that morning. She wore navy leggings and a long woolly grey cardigan thrown over a snug white T-shirt. She lifted her hand and pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. Crossing her legs, she shuffled into the worn seat of a wooden chair. She felt okay today. Surprisingly okay.

‘So, what would you like today, Hans?’ Carla spoke slowly.

‘Er? I’m good, thank you. Coffee with cream, please. Oh, and a cookie,’ he shouted.

‘Kooky, Kooky, Peanut Kooky!’ came a raucous screech. Everyone looked towards the cage, where the parrot was frantically bopping along the bars.

A child shouted, ‘Peanuts.’

The man looked confused, keeping his gaze on Carla as she poured his coffee.

‘No, dear, you know I’m allergic to peanuts. I just want a plain cookie, please.’ He revealed an accent that Emily couldn’t decipher.

‘Yes, love.’ Carla emphasised her words, then turned with her back to her audience as she tried to suppress laughter.

The parrot was keen to sell the goods. ‘Kooky, Peanut Kooky!’

Emily stifled a giggle. She noticed a young guy at a nearby table looking into his coffee, chuckling and shaking his head. People raised their voices and a liveliness echoed around the room.

Emily had lived in the town of Crayshead for almost three years now, but the café had opened only five months ago and already appeared to be thriving. Colin, the owner, offered a cosy atmosphere, and friendly staff greeted everyone. His pet parrot added character. But the parrot had an identity crisis. All-American Colin had named him Kooky, but his Swedish ex-wife had insisted on Peanut. Emily thought the couple totally compatible. She liked peanut cookies.

This wasn’t just any old café. It was Emily’s favourite haunt when she needed to unwind, study form for her art, or meet a friend for a catch-up. The wooden sign above the door, The Café by the Oak, was in recognition of the well-loved oak tree in this corner square. For countless years, passers-by had glanced towards this ancient living statue as it continued to guard its territory in this quaint seaside town. Last year, as a warm autumn approached and the café doors opened to its first customers, the wise oak offered dappled light from the sun’s rays. People collected in the square under its shade, sitting around tables and sharing stories, the old oak storing their secrets in its rings of time.

The air today reflected the lasting chill of a long winter. A few brave folk sat outside with fingerless gloves hugging mugs of steaming drinks. The less inspired were snug inside, where tables and chairs decked an L-shaped room and each table held a bunch of seasonal flowers in a jam jar. Today, snowdrops bowed their heads to lingering winter berries. In the corner near the parrot was a low, red, plastic table with four chairs. Crayons and colouring books decorated the table, waiting for small creative hands to explore.

The café served the finest of coffee and loose-leaf tea, including Emily’s favourite: Ceylon. She lowered her head and inhaled the intense coppery bouquet. Music heightened her pleasure; she frequently noticed a quirky nautical theme running through the speakers. Today, she heard the soulful tones of Corinne Bailey Rae singing The Sea. Early in a morning or towards dusk, a selection of soft blues or jazz would accompany the hum of voices, although when Carla arrived for work she often moved to the rhythm of up-beat radio waves while swirling hot milk with the art of a barista pro.

Emily’s eyes travelled to an assortment of black and white maritime pictures hung on the walls, but there was one picture to Emily’s right where the artist hadn’t followed a nautical theme:

A girl sits with an open leather-bound book in her lap. The delicate lace of her pale peach dress possibly threads a link to her past. Her hair sweeps up from her neck and strands fall softly around the subtle glow of her cheeks. Her eyes embrace a young girl’s dreams and she appears to be looking directly at the artist, and there’s a spark – a glimmer of expectancy at discovering the impression she has made. Not only had the artist offered minute detail of the young girl’s appearance, but they had also interpreted an intriguing character.

Emily thought there was much sentiment hidden in this painting. She had become so accustomed to the girl’s presence that she felt a friendship had formed over the last few months. She had named the picture The Girl with No Name. She looked down into the residue of tea leaves settling at the bottom of her cup in a pattern of indiscernible shapes, giving nothing away.

She turned to face the door as a woman brought in with her a blast of cold air, spiralling behind her the last stubborn leaves of winter. A warmth returned and merged with the hum of voices. Taking her time, the woman walked towards the counter. She was tall and her movements presented confidence and purpose. Her blue woollen coat was nipped neatly at the waist, flaring out below her calves. Her beige court shoes held dainty feet, and Emily began to invent the paths she might have walked over the years. With her back to Emily, the woman’s shoulders moved in a sweet gesture of greeting towards Carla. Emily heard a quiet voice.

‘Hello, dear, I’ll have a coffee with hot milk, please, and a shortbread.’

She looked for money in her worn leather purse, handed Carla the coins then turned and nodded a greeting towards the deaf man with his humble cookie. This lady was obviously a regular customer. Emily noticed her thick hair, which fell softly around her face and her face was beautiful. Her lips were not so much full as wide. Her top lip sensuously heart-shaped, emphasised by a touch of rose-coloured lipstick. The skin of her face and neck was thin, revealing her senior years, but didn’t detract from her beauty. With a string of pearls sitting quietly around her neck, she presented grace and poise.

The music changed. Emily looked to the speaker in the corner as an empty memory floated towards her. The woman walked to the next table, her hands steadying her cup, and Emily noticed raised veins tapering down from her wrists to her fingers. The artist in Emily wondered about the gifts those hands had given to work, the embrace of a family, a home she had nurtured, tears she had wiped.

As the woman sat, she looked up and smiled. Emily’s acknowledgement seemed inadequate to convey the richness of feeling she had touched. She shivered into a myriad of emotions – a deep sadness, a transient fear, a wave of longing. She had a vague sense of Megan’s presence. This was the closest she’d felt to her twin since she had died. And in that moment, hope felt real. Her heart rate quickened, merging with the rhythm of the music, familiar yet too far to reach. Another echo of memory unbalanced her, and she gripped the sides of her table…

She walked towards the counter, thinking perhaps Carla might know the name of the song. The music followed her, surrounded her and trapped her next to the woman’s table, until she was forced to place her hand down to steady herself. The woman looked up, her eyes like shining emeralds, her lips like rose-bloom. But her pearls reflected tears.

‘Hi – I’m – Emily.’

‘Hello, dear. Alice. Alice Reynolds.’ Her voice pure, her demeanour calm.

A perfume of roses, sweet yet subtle, drifted warmth towards Emily. She turned and watched Carla serve a customer while trying to capture memories around the tune. She needed fresh air. Gathering her belongings, she wished Alice a good day and subconsciously glanced at the picture of The Girl with No Name before she left.

Outside, the wind had dropped and there was a softness to Emily’s focus as she strolled down to the beach, where the waves barely whispered and