The Year of Taking Chances

by Lucy Diamond

  A million feelings tore through her as she watched him saying something to the old ladies that made them smile, then helped a young mum bump her buggy down from the bus – not a small undertaking, when you needed a stick for support yourself. Old feelings of fondness slowly unfurled inside her. He was a good person, really. Just like his son. But where would they go from here? Would anything have changed?

  The bus drove away with a belch of smoke from the exhaust, and she crawled the car along after it, pulling up beside Spencer and unrolling the passenger window. She leaned over and caught his eye. ‘Hey.’

  A whole rush of feelings flickered across his face as he saw her – surprise, happiness, nerves. ‘Hey,’ he said quietly.

  She swallowed, unable to tell much from his expression. ‘Want a lift?’

  He held her gaze and she remembered for a fleeting moment how she’d looked at him on their wedding day. For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health. I do. I do.

  I still do, she thought. I want this to work. But he’s got to want that too. We can’t go on as we were.

  ‘Great,’ he said. ‘Thanks.’

  She put the handbrake on instinctively, about to jump out and help him then stopped herself, remembering his pride. He’d made it all the way to Newcastle and back under his own steam, after all. If he wanted to stop being treated as an invalid, then that was progress at least.

  He winced as he lowered himself into the seat, hauling the stick and a small rucksack in after him. There were dark shadows under his eyes, and he looked crumpled and tired after the long journey, but she thought she could detect a new determination about him, too, an energy that she hadn’t seen in a long while.

  ‘So,’ she said, a lump in her throat. Now that he was here, she wasn’t sure what to say any more. She wanted to lean against him and breathe in the scent of his skin again, to hold him and be held right back. But did he feel the same? ‘You came back,’ she said after a moment.

  ‘I did.’ He cleared his throat, not looking at her. ‘Thanks for the letter . . . ’ He broke off and stared out of the window. ‘It was the most beautiful thing I have ever read in my life.’

  ‘Oh, Spencer.’ She could have cried with relief. Had she actually got through to him at last?

  ‘I’m serious. It made me realize exactly what I stood to lose.’ He folded his hands in his lap. ‘I’m sorry, Gem. I’ve been such a dick recently, I kind of lost the plot for a while. I just felt so angry all the time. So bloody useless. I couldn’t bear it.’

  She twisted her wedding ring around her finger, unsure how to reply.

  ‘I know I took it out on you and the kids – the people I care about most in the world.’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t know how you put up with me. I wouldn’t have blamed you if you’d chucked me out the house.’

  Karen would have chucked him out, Gemma thought to herself. She’d have shown him the door – injury or no injury. But Gemma was not her mother. Her love went deeper. She reached over and took Spencer’s hand in hers. ‘How’s your back?’ she asked. ‘Have you been okay? You didn’t take your painkillers with you.’

  He shifted in the passenger seat and she could see his discomfort and exhaustion. ‘It’s all right. I went along to see Jonny’s doctor, had a good chat. She gave me some painkillers and sorted me out. I’m just a bit stiff, after sitting down for so long.’

  There was a time when one or both of them might have made a joke about him being ‘a bit stiff’, but the atmosphere was too fraught for jokes. ‘Right,’ she said.

  Neither of them spoke for a few seconds. ‘Are the kids okay?’ he asked eventually.

  Good question. ‘They’re fine,’ she replied. It wasn’t the right moment to start telling him about Will’s fight and Darcey’s tears and her mum’s surprise visit. ‘They’re great,’ she added with more conviction. ‘Dying to seeing you again. Darcey’s going to absolutely shriek with joy, she’s missed you so much. We all have.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Why did you go, Spencer? Why did you just take off like that?’

  He stared down at his lap. ‘Everything seemed so bleak,’ he said after a moment. ‘I was this useless fucking cripple . . . and all of a sudden you were this businesswoman flying high. I couldn’t handle it any more.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘I don’t want to sound melodramatic, but I just couldn’t see the point of going on. I thought: I’ll get in the car, drive to the middle of nowhere and gas myself. You know, pipe on the exhaust – job done.’ He shook his head, eyes far away. ‘But then I thought of the kids, and you, and I couldn’t bring myself to do it.’

  ‘Oh, Spencer,’ she said again helplessly, not able to bear the haunted expression on his face.

  ‘I went a bit mad, Gem. Didn’t know what to do with myself. Drove and drove, unable to think straight. Didn’t know where I was going. For the first time in my life it was like I had no future, no clear road ahead.’

  Gemma squeezed his hand, not trusting herself to speak.

  ‘I was so sick of it,’ he went on. ‘I didn’t feel like a man any more. My body wasn’t working the way it used to, my head was killing me the whole time. I just . . . didn’t know how to go on.’

  ‘I wish you’d talked to me,’ she said in a small voice. ‘I wish you’d told me you were feeling like this.’

  He nodded, his head still bowed. ‘I know. And I really am sorry. I know I haven’t been easy to live with. When I think of what I said to you . . . ’

  She could tell the memory genuinely pained him. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said.

  ‘It does matter! If anyone else dared speak to you like that, I’d bloody swing for them. I’m ashamed of myself,’ he said gruffly. ‘I let you down. And when I read your letter and remembered just how lovely and kind and gorgeous you are . . . ’ He shook his head. ‘I couldn’t believe I’d nearly let you go.

  ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘It’s not fine, Gemma. I’ve been an arsehole. But talking to the doctor helped. She reckoned it might be this Concussion Syndrome thing, too, and gave me some antidepressants to see if they help. I won’t be like this forever.’

  ‘Of course you won’t,’ she said.

  ‘I do feel a bit better already, you know. Jonny forced me out to get some fresh air . . . ‘

  ‘Yes, I heard. Playing golf, wasn’t it?’

  He had the grace to look sheepish. ‘Yeah. Quite enjoyed it actually. So that was good. And then Jonny kept banging on at me to man up and go home to my amazing wife and children, before I blew it all.’

  Gemma had to hide her smirk on hearing this. Thank you, Jonny. ‘The man’s got a point,’ she replied.

  ‘And then your letter just confirmed everything,’ he said. ‘So here I am.’ He twisted awkwardly to face her. ‘And I’ll make it up to you, I swear. I’ll go to physio and stay on the antidepressants to stop me being such a miserable bastard. I’ve sold the car to tide us over with money, and I’ll help more around the house while you’re out being Super-Businesswoman. Seriously! What? Why are you doing that?’

  Gemma was leaning forward, squinting through the windscreen. ‘Just searching for a pig flying through the air,’ she teased, then turned and kissed him. It was one of the best and sweetest kisses of her entire life. ‘Thank you,’ she said, then put the car into first gear. ‘Let’s go home.’

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  It was the first weekend of April, and Larkmead had never looked more glorious, thought Saffron as she and Max drove into the village. There was blossom on the apple trees, the magnolias were in full bloom and the sunlight shone golden on the old stone cottages. She parked the hired van outside Baker’s Cottage just as the baby gave two energetic kicks in her belly. We’re home.

  ‘Yes,’ she murmured, as Max jumped down from the passenger side. ‘This is it, kiddo. Our home for the next six months. Aren’t we the lucky ones?’

  She was nearly twenty weeks pregnant now and feeling lots of movement from the wriggly little pe
rson inside. She put her hand on her belly, loving the ripples and jumps she could feel. ‘I think the baby’s dancing,’ she called to Max, clambering out of the driver’s seat.

  ‘Let’s hope for his or her sake that my excellent dance-floor genes have been passed on,’ Max replied, moonwalking to the back of the van.

  Saffron snorted with laughter. She loved having Max in her life again. To think they might have slipped past each other, lost each other because of one unposted letter. Look at him now sliding his feet backwards, arms held robotically, as if he was the long-lost brother of Michael Jackson. ‘It would be a devastating blow to humanity if the moonwalking gene stopped at you, my love,’ she said solemnly and fished in her jeans pocket for the door keys she’d just picked up from Bernie. Her door keys, as of today – well, for the next six months, anyway.

  That morning she, Max and her parents had packed up her London flat and she’d waved a thankful goodbye to the neighbourhood kebab shops and litter, the yellow police signs and the traffic. She was renting the cottage until the autumn, and after that . . . Well, it was too early to say. By that time, she’d be a different person – a mother – and she would have to make some big decisions about where to live, and who she wanted to be with. Right now she was buying herself six months of breathing space in a pretty country cottage with two really good friends nearby, her parents half an hour away and miles of open countryside and fresh air on her doorstep. Everything else could be figured out further down the line.

  The cottage looked different as they walked up the garden path. The frontage had been given a fresh coat of white paint, and Saffron could see through the window that someone – she could guess who – had added colourful poppy-patterned curtains. Apparently Bunty had had a word with Bernie about the state of the cottage – several words, knowing Bunty – insisting that it wasn’t fit for a mother-to-be and her baby. And, bless him, he’d been convinced to redecorate throughout, even clearing out some of the ancient furniture to make way for Saffron’s bits and pieces.

  She smiled at Max as she slid the key into the lock. ‘Shall we?’

  ‘If I wasn’t carrying this ton-weight of paperback books I’d carry you over the threshold myself,’ he said and twisted his head down to kiss her. ‘Both of you.’

  ‘You so wouldn’t,’ she laughed, feeling deliciously swoony from the effects of his kiss. She could kiss that luscious mouth for Britain, given half a chance. Olympic Kissing Team? Yep, she’d be on that, no problem.

  Light fell into the cream-painted hall as she pushed open the door, and the baby twisted and somersaulted again, her tiny watery acrobat. Here we are. This is the first house you’ll ever live in, baby. ‘Come on in,’ she said. ‘Home, sweet home.’

  The cottage already felt a different place – pristine and bright, with pretty new cushions on the sofa (Gemma again, she bet) and a neat basket of wood stacked by the hearth. She could see through the back window that the garden was full of spring flowers, and there was a wooden bench under a trailing honeysuckle. She could already envisage sunny afternoons out there with a book and her feet up, maybe a barbecue for their new friends . . .

  ‘Looks like a good fairy’s been round,’ Max said, as they went into the kitchen. There was a vase of red tulips on the table alongside a white cardboard bakery box containing lemon-drizzle cake, with further investigations revealing a slab of Cheddar and some smoked salmon, fresh orange juice, butter and milk in the fridge. A note propped against the vase said: Family day out in Southwold! Will drop round this evening when we’re back. Love from Gemma and Spencer x.

  ‘Is Gemma the dressmaker?’ Max asked, breaking open a packet of cookies he’d spotted behind the bread. ‘I like her already.’

  ‘She’s great,’ Saffron replied, taking a cookie from the packet. Dressmaker, neighbour, friend, newest client . . . It was going to be fun working together for the next few months.

  Hourglass Designs was going from strength to strength: a solid list of customers, with many more clamouring for appointments. Such was the demand that Gemma had now roped in Gwen, Caitlin’s elderly neighbour, as an extra machinist, so that they could keep up with demand. Gwen had spent her entire working life at the knicker factory in Ipswich and was nimble-fingered and competent, by all accounts. She was also prone to bringing in home-made cake to work, which nobody was ever going to complain about.

  Help had come from another unlikely source, too: Gemma’s husband Spencer. Although he was still recovering from his accident and unable to return to building work just yet, he’d taken it upon himself to pitch in with the Hourglass business: negotiating better deals with fabric suppliers and the courier firm, in the way he’d always done when working with timber yards and builders’ merchants in the past. He would hobble down to school to pick up Darcey, if Gemma was in the middle of something, and had even taken to cooking the occasional family dinner as well. ‘He’s systematically wrecking all our pans,’ Gemma had grumbled down the phone to Saffron, ‘and you’ve never seen so much washing up in your life – he seems to challenge himself to use every single utensil in the house. Not that I’m complaining, though. I wouldn’t dare.’

  Meanwhile, Caitlin had changed her mind about selling White Gables and moving out of Larkmead, and was now officially on board as the Hourglass Designs web and tech expert. Gemma had asked Saffron if they could formalize their working relationship too, with a contract and a proper fee structure. So, along with Bunty, this made a mighty total of two new clients on Saffron’s roster at McKay-Flint PR.

  McKay-Flint PR? Oh yes. Yet another excellent development. After Saffron had returned to London the week before, she had met her friend Kate – the McKay of the organization – for lunch in a King’s Cross gastropub, and over plates of beer-battered haddock and triple-cooked chips, Kate had made a proposition: that the two of them form their own PR agency together. No more Charlotte bossing them around, no more clients they didn’t like, no more unsociable hours and feeling guilty for dashing away to doctor’s appointments or children’s nativity plays. ‘We’ll be our own bosses, with a hand-picked selection of clients we actually care about, working from our own kitchen tables, with the occasional high-powered executive lunch like this one,’ Kate said. ‘I’m deadly serious about wanting to make a go of it. What do you reckon?’

  ‘I reckon it’s a bloody fantastic idea,’ Saffron replied at once. ‘An absolute no-brainer. Between us, we’ve got a ton of experience and loads of great contacts.’ She grinned. ‘I think this deserves a celebratory pudding, at the very least.’

  Over a slab of gooey treacle sponge each, they thrashed out a few plans. Kate was already working for a couple of big-name TV stars and a friend of hers, whose first novel was being made into a film. Saffron was going to stick with Bunty and Gemma for the time being, but would be on hand to pick up small, discreet jobs when necessary and chat regularly for brainstorming and strategizing.

  ‘So are we agreed then? Shall we do this?’ Kate asked, as the waiter brought them a latte each and the bill.

  Saffron held up her mug. ‘Here’s to us, and the best new PR agency on the block,’ she said. ‘In it to win it.’

  ‘In it to win it,’ Kate echoed, clinking her mug against Saffron’s.

  And so Baker’s Cottage was to become not only Saffron’s temporary new home, but also a sister-hub of McKay-Flint PR. Why not? It would be fun to work with Kate, under their own steam, and although that meant no official maternity leave as such, Saffron planned to work around the baby when he or she arrived, in a way that her job at Phoenix PR would never have allowed. Now freed from her previous contract, Bunty had already booked herself in for an inaugural client meeting the following Tuesday. ‘And then Bernie’s going to whisk me away for a few days at the seaside,’ she said happily down the phone. ‘Hashtag Bunternie – what do you think? We could be the new Brangelina.’

  ‘Mmm, inspired,’ Saffron said politely, although if Bunty noticed any doubt in her voice, she was too busy le
aping ahead to a new stroke of brilliance to care very much.

  ‘Idea alert! Maybe we could pitch for a new TV show starring me moving to the countryside, too. Town Mouse, Country Mouse sort of thing. It could be hilaire!’

  ‘Mouse? Bunty, nobody’s ever going to call you a mouse,’ Saffron pointed out. ‘Country Fox, more like. Country Vixen.’

  ‘Country Vixen, yes, I love it!’ A hoot of laughter came down the line. ‘Wait, I’ve thought of something even better. City Chick, Country Buntkin. Buntkin – do you get it? Like Bumpkin, but with my name in! I think we’re onto something here, Saff, I really do.’

  Yes, Bunty was certainly going to keep her busy for the foreseeable future, that was for sure, although this wasn’t such a bad thing any more. Ever since Saffron had let rip with a few home truths, the two of them had forged a new and better understanding, one with mutual respect. No more dogsitting Teddy, the perfumed Pomeranian. No more impromptu visitations or orders barked down the phone. Moreover Bunty had twice appeared very publicly in Gemma’s dresses now, winning reams of gushing coverage. When your clients started giving each other such helpful leg-ups, you knew you were onto a winner.

  ‘Cooee! Saff, we’re here! What a sweet little place this is!’

  Ah, and there was the cavalry – her mum and dad – on cue as promised, to help unload the van. ‘Hello, welcome; you made it,’ she said, hurrying to meet them in the hallway. ‘Come in, come in! What do you think?’

  While Saffron’s mum was exclaiming about the prettiness of the cottage, and what a lovely garden and, goodness, wasn’t it going to be heaven living here, she was green with envy, her dad hauled in her desk and set it up in the second bedroom. Then he and Max heaved in the bed and wardrobe and the suitcases of clothes . . . and gradually her new home began to take shape.

  She watched Max making her mum laugh one minute, and then patiently going along with her dad’s orders about the best way to get the bed up the narrow cottage stairs the next, and felt the baby kick and twist and turn, looping somersaults inside her, almost as if agreeing.