Christmas Every Day Page 23

  Which gave me a bit of stalling time before I confessed. Soon. I would tell him soon.

  The last Friday in June, despite having had no return visit from that charming Environmental Health inspector Darren Smith, I bit the bullet and hired a skip. The pile in front of the house had grown to a towering, festering mess. I’d sold, given away and recycled what I could. That still left a lot of junk that had nowhere to go but landfill.

  Sarah’s mum agreed to manage the café for the morning, and by some strange coincidence Jamie had the day off. Ellen, having ditched her essay on something to do with snipping during labour, which caused my ears to fold in on themselves long before she’d finished explaining, brought Frances to oversee proceedings. Lucille had stopped me at school the day before to say she would have helped, had she not been indispensable at her very important, astronomically successful, marvellously well-paid and teeth-grindingly tedious job.

  I had wondered if Mack might join us, but there was no sign of life from behind the windows. For a brief millisecond I imagined sending them all home and struggling on alone, until I got myself into an idiotic jam like falling in the skip or being crushed beneath an avalanche of toppling rubbish and needing to be rescued by the only person within a two-mile radius.

  Then I remembered I was New Jenny, and Mrs Apple Mack was returning this weekend. I stuck my Sellotaped-together glasses back up my nose and gave my brilliant friends a big grin.

  Working together meant that only a couple of hours later we were sitting in the sunshine toasting the shabby relics of a lifetime poking out from the top of the skip. I hid my sadness as the others mused on Charlotte Meadows and the disbanding of her Hoard.

  Then Jamie remembered he’d brought a box of pastries, and the shadow of the past dissipated in a delicious cloud of icing sugar and flaked almonds.

  ‘You’d better have the last pastry, Jamie. You did more than the rest of us put together,’ Sarah said. ‘No wonder you’re so buff.’

  Jamie sloshed half his tea down his jeans. When Sarah jumped up and started brushing at the wet patch with a cloth, I honestly thought for a moment he was having a stroke.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he garbled, eyes darting everywhere.

  ‘Oh, of course you are, tough guy.’ Sarah draped the cloth over his head and sat back down in her garden chair. Jamie left it there, obscuring his face.

  I pointed at Sarah, trusting he couldn’t see through the cloth. ‘You’re flirting!’ I mouthed, and she shrugged.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I mouthed again.

  ‘Nothing!’ she mouthed back, rolling her eyes. ‘Grow up!’

  I wondered if Jamie had made any progress with handing over the operation of his business. I wondered about Sarah’s conversations with the guy online. I wouldn’t have to wonder for long, I hoped.

  The weekend was spent working on the now much emptier house. To my amazement and delight, the skeleton of a home was emerging from the chaos. I was falling in love. Good solid walls, original fireplaces. The staircase would be beautiful once I’d replaced the broken bannister and stained it. I pictured the kitchen with new cabinets, the dining-room dresser painted duck-egg blue. A real oven. Flowers in a cheery jug on the windowsill.

  And I knew, with absolute conviction, that if Fisher, the Environmental Health Officers or anyone else, were going to take my home they’d have to starve me out first. I had enough furniture to construct a solid barricade, after all. And I’d got used to being hungry in recent months.

  Monday lunchtime, an envelope with the DVLA logo plopped through my door. A reply to the form I’d completed – and long forgotten – about the Mini’s registration. A waste of time and money, since I now knew it was Mrs Mack’s.

  Only now I got to discover her name. Which meant I could spend the rest of the afternoon looking her up on the Internet.

  Which would be a stupid, pathetic and humiliating waste of time.

  I put the envelope in the bin.

  But if Mack shared her surname, I could Internet stalk him. Find out his job. Get some background information in case anyone asked at the wedding. As Ashley so very rightly said – the best lie was one closest to the truth.

  I picked it out of the bin. Tossed it in again. Then took it out, scrumpled it up as hard as I could and shoved it underneath a heap of teabags and an empty tin of tomatoes. I went back into the dining-room and picked up some sandpaper. Gave the table three half-hearted strokes, threw the paper down, ran back into the kitchen and yanked the envelope out of the bin like an addict.

  ‘I’ve paid good money for this information,’ I called up to Mannequin Diana, who was, as usual, judging me from the top of the stairs. ‘I might as well read it. You never know when it might come in useful. What if Mack has a heart attack and I need to give the paramedics his details?’

  Ripping it open, I scanned the form for information.

  Blinked. Shook my head in case adjusting my brain would make the letters rearrange themselves.

  Sat back down at the table.

  Shook my head again, this time in wry acknowledgement at the twists and turns life brought, and the smallness of this crazy world.

  I had only gone and found Hillary West.

  And it looked as though she (sort of) lived next door.

  32

  There was nothing for it. As soon as I was home that evening, I showered, changed, attempted to dry my hair in some sort of style, redid the Sellotape on my glasses, plastered on my cheeriest smile, scooped up the most expensive bottle of wine they’d had at the village shop (nine pounds fifty) and went to say howdy to my new neighbour.

  Hillary West, bestselling author, recluse, enigma, opened the door.

  ‘HI!’ I cried. Coughed. Tried again. ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hello.’ Cool as an apple ice-pop, she looked at me from beneath her fringe.

  ‘I’m Jenny. From next door. I just wanted to say welcome back, and it’s so nice to meet you. Um, here.’ I held out the bottle. ‘Just a little, well, welcome to the neighbourhood, neighbour!’

  After a brief hesitation, she took the bottle. ‘Right. Thanks. I’m relieved to see the front’s cleared.’

  ‘Yes. I hired a skip.’

  ‘That should help with the sale.’

  ‘Yes. I hope so. I mean, I don’t hope you move, like I want rid of you or anything. Not at all! I just, well, hope it for your sake because you hope it.’

  ‘Well.’ She glanced over her shoulder. ‘I’d invite you in for a glass of this, um, wine.’

  ‘Thanks! That’d be lovely.’ I pulled what I hoped was a fun, funny face. ‘Kind of why I brought it, after all!’

  Hillary continued talking over me. ‘BUT I’m snowed under with a deadline. You know how it is. Well, you probably don’t. Hard to imagine the kind of pressure this level of success brings.’

  ‘Oh. Yes. And I completely understand.’ I completely understood that I was now completely humiliated. ‘I did hear your deadline has proven, well…’

  Hillary narrowed her eyes. Let’s go with not mentioning the writer’s block issue upon first meeting bestselling author Hillary West, shall we, Jenny?

  ‘Deadlines! Pah! Who needs ’em? Getting in the way of valuable drinking time!’

  ‘I need them. So, goodbye?’

  ‘I’m a huge fan!’ I yelped as the door closed in my face.

  I spent the rest of the week torn. Entangled in the moral dilemma of this revelation. By Friday’s Christmas Book Club Challenge meeting I felt no closer to making a decision. I had found Hillary West. Would I tell Ashley? Would I tell anyone else? Reasons for keeping quiet were:

  One: Hillary didn’t want to be found.

  Two: Even if she did, no one would want Ashley pestering them.

  Three: Ashley would inevitably drag me into it.

  Four: This would put Hillary in even more of a hurry to move, taking Mack with her.

  Five: Mack would consider it mean and petty for me to blab his wife’s secret. I really, really
didn’t want him thinking me mean and petty.

  The reasons for spilling were:

  One: Ashley was my friend.

  Two: No more Hillary hunts.

  Three: Meeting Hillary might help reduce Ashley’s infatuation, given that she seemed a bit of a rude, patronising cow.

  ‘All right, Jenny?’ Sarah asked as she brought a tray of drinks over. ‘You seem a bit ruffled this evening.’

  Understatement. ‘I’m fine. Just tired.’

  ‘Whatever. You can tell me later.’ She winked, handing out the rhubarb gin and tonics without even looking at them.

  Jamie kicked us off, carefully lifting a selection of cake boxes out of a large paper bag. ‘See what you think. Sarah’ll put any that are good enough on the menu as a July special.’

  ‘These are all good enough,’ Ellen gushed.

  ‘You haven’t tasted them yet,’ Lucille said.

  ‘OW!’ She glared at us all, scooting away from the table and clutching her shin. ‘Someone kicked me!’

  After an awkward silence, Frances muttered, ‘Well, you shouldn’t have been rude. It was only a nudge.’

  ‘I’m going to have a bruise there tomorrow. If you’ve affected my training, then—’

  ‘Then what?’ Frances crowed. ‘Are you going to kick me back?’

  ‘Ladies, stop acting like children and try Jamie’s cakes!’ Ellen said, in her no-nonsense-mum voice.

  In the end, for research purposes, we all had one of each save Lucille, on a strict training diet, and Frances, who only managed a nibble: dainty pink macaroons, gooey chocolate truffle tarts topped with strawberries, crisp spice cookies iced like smiling suns.

  The vote was unanimous, of course. Jamie had better get baking.

  Frances showed us pictures of her balloon ride. ‘It was glorious. As the sun rose I could almost have stepped out of the basket and straight into heaven. But I’m not quite ready yet, so I shouted up some instructions to Big Mike instead.’

  I tried not to sound too apprehensive. ‘Instructions?’

  ‘Well, I told him to put the kettle on. And to let the family know. I’ve been waiting a long time to see them. I’m particularly curious as to whether my sister, Susan, is still so enormously fat.’

  ‘What did the other people in the balloon think about that?’ Ashley asked, eyes wide.

  ‘Well, I don’t know, I didn’t ask them,’ Frances huffed. ‘I’m hardly in a position to waste time worrying what people think.’

  ‘It looks amazing,’ Jamie said. ‘What’s next?’

  ‘Next month, I’m going with Lucille to Tough Muck,’ Frances said. ‘If I can’t race, I can cheer from the sidelines. Have you all sponsored her yet?’

  It turned out Lucille was running for Cancer Research. Frances insisted we all donate before moving on, and somehow in doing that we ended up promising to come and watch. Thank goodness race entries had closed, or who knew what would have happened?

  Ashley went next, recounting the Hillary hunt as I squirmed, a heated debate going back and forth inside my head. She brought out the updated detective’s board, and listed the next prime contenders. I concentrated hard on my sunshine cookie, and said nothing.

  Sarah hadn’t been on any more dates. ‘Not for want of trying. I dunno what to make of it, to be honest. This guy is dead lovely. He’s a trainee chef, so we’ve loads in common, and when he asks me questions he even listens to the answers. He doesn’t make me feel like a stupid girl who had a kid with a dud, works in her nan’s greasy café and spends her evenings watching crap telly.’

  ‘How does he make you feel?’ Ashley breathed.

  ‘He said I was a talented businesswoman.’ Sarah’s eyes filled with tears. ‘And a good mum. So, he makes me feel bloody fantastic.’

  ‘Why are you not dating this man in person?’ Ellen asked.

  ‘Because he won’t meet me. Keeps putting me off. Says he’s working away a lot, and he’s shy.’ Sarah ripped her yellow spotty paper napkin in half. ‘I reckon he might be married.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s…’ Jamie started to say, when his phone started beeping. He looked at the screen, and swore under his breath. ‘Sorry. I have to take this.’ He stood up, throwing a long, despairing look at Sarah, unable to wrench himself away until the phone beeped again. ‘Ah, damn it.’ He sprinted out of the room, phone pressed to his ear.

  All eyes turned back to Sarah.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ I asked.

  ‘I dunno.’ She kept ripping the napkin. ‘Maybe it’s time I told him, it’s now or never. I’m not messing about here. I’ve got enough friends and I’m not wasting much more time chasing a man who can’t – or won’t – see me face to face. For all I know it’s a bunch of twelve-year-old girls having a laugh.’

  Jamie appeared in the doorway. ‘Sorry, guys, something’s come up. I need to have a chat with a very bad man.’

  ‘Bye, Jamie,’ we all chorused. ‘Be careful.’

  ‘Oh, and, Sarah. About that, um, well. Yes. I’ll see you when this job is finished.’ He left, only to poke his head back around the door again five seconds later. ‘I’m glad this guy makes you happy.’ And with that, he disappeared.

  ‘Well, that’s disappointing!’ Frances said.

  ‘Yeah, but at least he got to share his baking first,’ Sarah said.

  ‘That wasn’t what I was referring to,’ Frances said.

  ‘Jenny?’ Ellen asked, giving Frances a meaningful stare.

  ‘I think you all know how my challenge is going.’ I managed a smile. ‘I’ve restored a couple of tables, and have started planting seeds in the vegetable patch. Not much else to say yet.’

  ‘But what about the box?’ Lucille asked. ‘What was in it?’

  ‘Oh, just some of Charlotte’s journals.’ Flushed cheeks betrayed my dismissive tone. I hoped the last squeeze of Zara’s fifty-quid concealer was doing its job. ‘And not interesting ones. Shopping lists and housework mostly.’

  ‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ Ashley said. ‘After all that!’

  ‘Yes. A real shame. Ellen? How’s things in the world of midwifery training?’

  Ellen kindly took the hint. ‘Wet and sticky, thanks to a labouring woman’s waters breaking all over me. My shoes were squelching the rest of the shift…’

  I cycled to the Common the next morning to pick up a quiche for my lunch with Frances. When I got back, Hillary was staring up at the house.

  I didn’t have to ask why.

  Speechless, I climbed off the bike and wheeled it over, gazing at the ugly spray paint scrawled across the brickwork.

  ‘I can’t believe it,’ Hillary said, voice shrill. ‘This is a disaster.’

  I struggled for a few seconds to find the right words. Nope, still couldn’t find ’em.

  ‘I mean, why?’ Hillary said, turning to me. ‘Why do this?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Why would you do this to us today?’ she shrieked. ‘We have a house viewing in forty minutes! We might as well cancel it! It looked better with the scrapheap outside than… this.’

  Okay, words found… maybe not the best ones, but they were flying out anyway. ‘I didn’t do this!’ I shook my head in disgust. ‘Do you think I spray-painted that I’m a bitch on my own house?’

  ‘You want to keep the famous author living next door. Wangle your way in and see what you can get out of it. And if Mack goes you’ll have no one to spy on, will you?’ She screwed up her nose. ‘I’ve seen the way you look at him. What’s your plan, seduce him and sell your story to some sleazy magazine?’

  ‘What on earth are you talking about? I know authors need a good imagination but let’s try to keep a grip on reality, shall we?’ My head was starting to fizz. I put my hands on my hips to stop them accidentally punching a nearby nose. ‘Someone has graffitied our houses with horrible, slanderous things about me, and somehow this becomes all about you? I think the fame’s gone to your head.’

  ‘Well, if you’re so bothe
red then why aren’t you up a ladder cleaning it off?’

  ‘I only just saw it!’

  ‘What, you didn’t see it when you left this morning?’ she spat. ‘A likely story!’

  ‘I’d say it’s pretty likely that I didn’t ride my bike backwards as I left, yes.’

  ‘Well, you’ve seen it now so what are you going to do? You’ve got thirty minutes to sort it or I’m going to sue.’

  I laughed then. ‘You can try.’

  Before she could slap me, and her hand was twitching angrily, Mack drove up. He climbed out of the Mini and proceeded to lift a pressure washer out of the boot.

  ‘Hi, Jenny. I’m really sorry.’ He walked over to give Hillary a kiss, but she reeled back. Just as well, because I thought I saw froth bubbling out of the corners of her mouth.

  ‘I can’t believe you like it here,’ she snapped. ‘Sort it, or I don’t care about your pride, or how much you hate him, we’re accepting that slug of a property developer’s offer!’ And she stalked off.

  Mack stood looking at the ground, hands on his hips.

  ‘You didn’t just buy that today, for this, did you?’ I asked.

  He shrugged, glancing up. ‘I borrowed it off a mate.’

  Taking a huge bottle out of the car, he started pouring it into the pressure washer.

  ‘I didn’t think you had any mates.’

  He wrinkled his brow. ‘I thought you were my mate.’

  ‘I meant apart from me.’ I scuffed one foot against the dirt, then got out my phone and took a bunch of photos while Mack attached a hose to the washer.

  ‘Ready?’ he said, holding the gun like a graffiti cowboy.

  ‘Let me do it. It’s enough that you set it up.’

  He held the gun out of my reach. ‘You’d better get changed first. Wouldn’t want to ruin your clothes.’

  ‘I’m shooting water at a wall. How am I going to ruin my clothes?’

  ‘I don’t know – it should be impossible. But I have an ominous feeling you’ll find a way. Call it a hunch.’