CLOSURE
Ralph is out walking the dogs when he meets Claire. He decides to stop and help as he sees that she has a problem. Her car is blocking the road, on a sharp corner, and that it creates a hazard. His two dogs are soon tied up by their long leads at the church gates, and he ensures they cannot break free.
'I think you could use some help,' he says in as friendly a tone as he can muster on drawing near.
The two of them argued some while back after they had begun to form a bond that seemed unlikely, given their different backgrounds and status in the village, and their relationship had never recovered. Neither had made any effort to correct what began as a misunderstanding and became a major incident between them. It wouldn't be something to lose any sleep over, except living in a small village can soon blow things out of all proportion if slights are allowed to fester.
'I've got a flat tyre and it's going to keep me from getting on with my plans for the day,' Claire sniffs and glances at him with that haughty look on her lightly made-up face and that he knows so well. Her lips were drawn thinner through her irritation at having to explain the problem, to him of all people.
Ralph soon sees that it's the kerb's side front wheel. 'If you pull back onto your driveway, I could fix it for you. It shouldn't take long and then you'll be on your way.'
'Really, you'll do that?'
'Yes, really. You're in a hurry, so I'll change the wheel and do that as quickly as I can. I'll fix the fix that you're in.'
Claire laughs softly at the awful joke and her look upon him softens. Ralph's deliberately taken in what she's wearing; a plaited skirt, a silky white blouse and a cream, light wool, cardigan. 'Okay, thanks, Ralph.'
As she parks the car, some make of four-by-four that Claire does not need but is a status symbol that her kind sets great store by, he collects the dogs.
Ralph sees her hesitate as Claire takes in that he has them with him. 'You're in a rush so I can't take them home and then get back here. I'll tie them up against a post and get on.'
Claire sighs. 'Okay, leave them with me. I'll put them in my garden over there, behind the wall.'
'I do remember the place, Claire, from church fetes and the rest of it when they were held here. You have the land to do that, after all.'
'Yes, I know all about that,' she says, testily, and meets again his look upon her. They're two people with no longer commitment, and still, they managed to fall out. 'Perhaps we can...?'
'Yes, perhaps we can start over?' He has held out a hand, but Claire chooses to put the car keys in his palm instead.
'You'll need them to unlock the bar holding the spare in place and the tools that go with it and that you'll need.'
She is nothing but direct in her dealings with him again, but there's no denying that he's taken a fancy to her and how Claire is dressed.
'Sure, fine. It shouldn't take long and you can get on your way. 'I'll knock on the back door when I'm finished, shall I?'
'Yes, do that.'
Claire walks to the pass door that is set in the high garden wall and turns to look his way. She meets Ralph's glance and thinks how crazy it's been to have fallen out with the man who is slender-faced, almost hollow-cheeked, and with his greying hair and that white stubble beard making him look so studiously rebellious. She's heard others call him 'a bit of a maverick' with his unpredictable moods. She had once known him for his considerate and chatty ways and as a man not likely to force himself on anyone, not even to flirt or to try it on.
But, Ralph Atherton certainly wasn't gay. At the village barn dances, he had always been studiously polite and considerate with all the women that he danced with and their men were seen to be too busy, playing boules or drinking from the beer on tap, to spend much time on whirls and reels.
It had been on one such night that they'd fallen out. Silly and childish it had all been for her to have thought that she'd had a claim on him and her alone.
She would go out and see how he was getting on in a while. She would also check if her meeting could be deferred for a few days, as she wasn't in the mood to race off after this bad start to her day. She now realised that something else had also to be salvaged from it: her relationship with Ralph.
♥
Ralph worked on it quickly, now that he had found the driver's handbook and discovered the jacking-up points. He had toiled for a while with the all-but-useless wheel spanner but had managed to loosen all the wheel-fixing nuts before jacking up the vehicle.
It had been something of a doddle, and it had broken the ice with Claire; she the slender-faced woman with her penetrating look and flyaway blonde-grey hair, parted in the middle and that she never could quite control, purposefully or not. It lent her a more youthful grace; her trim and shapely figure studiously kept by weekly exercise classes in the village hall and attendance at the local stables, where she kept the last of her hunters that was now too old to go chasing and hunting. Instead, she still hacked over the bridleways that wound their way through the countryside around the village.
Life was too short to perpetuate their differences. After fitting the spare wheel and tightening all the wheel nuts, he realised that it was also a time to make amends and make up and then to live on somehow.
♥
Ralph knocked on the door even though Claire caught sight of him through the kitchen window. He noticed how she'd brushed out her hair, the light from the low winter sun still picking out the blonde strands. He was suddenly captivated by the look of Claire's eyes upon him, having quite forgotten this about the woman; how her gaze upon you could either intimidate or captivate.
'Sorted,' he said, calmly, and held out the keys to her. 'It's a 'get you home wheel' that I've put on, so you'd best get the usual road tyre fixed as soon as possible. You could have it done when you go out as you planned. I've been as quick as possible, so I hope the puncture hasn't delayed you too long?'
Claire drew near and took the keys from him, brushing her fingers over his outstretched hand for an instant. She met his gaze upon her, pouting her lightly rouged lips as she did so.
