Rules for a Successful Book Club (The Book Lovers 2)

by Victoria Connelly

  ‘I hope it will,’ she said.

  Piers nodded. ‘I don’t suppose I can persuade you to come to lunch with me,’ he said.

  Callie shook her head. He didn’t give up easily, did he?

  ‘You can’t,’ she said, ‘but I’d be delighted to have lunch next time I’m in town. With Sara.’

  Piers sighed. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Understood.’

  And Callie really hoped that he did.

  The nightmare was always the same. Polly was running through the house trying to find him. But, as in so many dreams, the house wasn’t quite her house: it had sort of stretched and elongated. The hallway seemed to be half a mile long and the rooms had grown out of all proportion, turning into cold, unfriendly places which echoed eerily when she cried out. On she ran, shouting his name into the empty rooms, searching on and on as panic rose in her chest.

  She would wake up at different points in the dream, but her heart would always be racing.

  Sitting up in bed now, after the same dream had awoken her, she switched on her bedside lamp. She hated waking up in the early hours especially in the winter months when there were still hours and hours of darkness ahead of her and she would feel so helplessly alone.

  She got out of bed, putting her slippers on and wrapping her dressing gown around her. The house was cold now and, more than anything, she wanted the comforting warmth of another human being next to her.

  Leaving her room, she put the light on and tiptoed along the landing, pushing the door open into Archie’s bedroom. He was fast asleep and nothing in the world would make her disturb him, no matter how lonely and insecure she felt. Luckily, it was often just enough to stand there for a few moments and watch him sleeping.

  But, as much as the sight of her sleeping son comforted her, the questions would start too, haunting her and hounding her. How long could she keep the truth from him? When would he start questioning her in earnest about his father and what on earth would she tell him when he did?

  Polly shook her head. These were questions that she wasn’t going to answer tonight and so she walked downstairs to the kitchen where she made herself a cup of tea. She was used to her lonely wanderings around the house at night by now. The cottage was so quiet and, although Dickens would often get up and pad across the floor to give her a friendly nudge, he’d soon return to his basket and Polly would be left to her thoughts. Thoughts such as: Will there ever be an end to this? Why did this happen to me? What am I meant to do? She sighed. These were pointless, unanswerable questions which ate away at her sanity and she had to stop them, but how could she when every moment of her life was full of Sean? His clothes were still in the wardrobe and drawers upstairs, his favourite mug stood unused in the kitchen cupboard and she drove his car every single day. Of course, every time she looked at Archie, Sean looked right back at her. How could she run away from all that?

  She was just finishing her tea when something caught her eye: the brand new copy of Thomas Hardy’s Far From the Madding Crowd which she’d ordered via Josh’s shop. It was the new film tie-in featuring the romantic image of Bathsheba Everdene and Sergeant Troy embracing in a misty woodland. Polly looked at it now, wondering if she’d ever be embraced by a man again or if her time for love had ended with the disappearance of her husband. And then something occurred to her. If she read, she could escape from her relentless thoughts – even if it was just for a few moments. As she’d told the book club, her reading habits had changed since she’d become a wife and mother; her time wasn’t her own anymore.

  ‘But it is in the middle of the night,’ she said to herself now. There was nobody to answer to. The hours stretched ahead of her with no chores to do and nobody to keep an eye on, and how much better it would be to fill those hours with the sublime words of a writer like Thomas Hardy than it would be to dwell on the wretched thoughts in her own head? Sam had chosen a wonderful novel and Polly was really beginning to see why Sam was such a huge fan and, if she wasn’t able to sleep, she might as well do something worthwhile. So she picked up the book, taking it through to the living room where she switched on a lamp and curled up on the sofa, pulling a woollen blanket over her knees, and turning to one of the most beautiful opening sentences ever written.

  “When Farmer Oak smiled, the corners of his mouth spread till they were within an unimportant distance of his ears, his eyes were reduced to chinks, and diverging wrinkles appeared around them, extending upon his countenance like the rays in a rudimentary sketch of the rising sun.”

  How glorious an introduction that was to one of literature’s greatest heroes, Polly thought. And then she thought of the foolishness of the heroine for not being able to see Gabriel Oak’s fine qualities. Of course, if Bathsheba had said yes to Gabriel’s proposal in the early pages, there wouldn’t have been a story to tell, but how frustrating it was for Polly to witness Hardy’s heroine making mistake after mistake. She hadn’t read the book before but she’d seen at least three film and TV adaptations of it, and the heroine still managed to irk her. But wasn’t that part of the comfort of literature too? Wasn’t reading about other people’s mistakes a welcome relief from living your own? To know that countless other people out there – even if they were fictional – were making great fat miserable mistakes was wonderfully reassuring because it meant that you were not alone.

  Polly read. And read. She was quite a fast reader and the hours slipped by as she read of Bathsheba’s rejection of Gabriel Oak and how fate – the great theme which threaded its way through each one of Hardy’s novels – treated Gabriel so cruelly. She read on, watching the fate of the sheep and the hiring fair, and had just met Liddy Smallbury and Mr Boldwood when tiredness overtook her, a great yawn persuading her to put the book down. It was after five in the morning and she now hoped that she could sleep soundly for at least two hours before getting up to start the day properly.

  Switching the living room light off, she walked through to the kitchen to check on Dickens. He was still fast asleep, his front paws twitching as if he was chasing rabbits in his dream.

  Polly headed upstairs, looked in on Archie and then went into her own bedroom, walking across to the window. She looked out into the darkness that enveloped the green and, for one strange, awful moment, thought she saw somebody standing out there by one of the big trees. She blinked and looked again, but couldn’t see anything. Her imagination must have been playing tricks on her, she thought. But, as she got into bed, she couldn’t shake the feeling that somebody was watching the house.

  CHAPTER SİX

  Bryony Nightingale wasn’t her usual buoyant self. Polly watched her younger sister as she stropped around the children’s bookshop she ran, tearing books from the shelves and stuffing new ones in their place without her normal care and attention.

  ‘Bryony!’ Polly cried at last. ‘What on earth is the matter with you?’

  ‘Nothing,’ her sister snapped. ‘Why should anything be the matter when I’ve only been on yet another terrible blind date and wasted an entire evening listening to a total loser telling me about his collection of baked bean cans?’

  ‘Baked bean cans?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Bryony said. ‘I heard all about them. Baked bean cans through the ages, he said. He’s got decades and decades of them. He even plans holidays to countries just so he can bring home a few cans.’

  ‘Does he actually eat them all?’ Polly asked.

  Bryony nodded. ‘Yes. But I don’t even want to think of the implications of all those beans he gets through.’

  ‘I take it you didn’t go home with him?’ Polly said with a grin.

  ‘Of course I didn’t,’ Bryony said, ‘and I’m going to kill Fiona when I see her. What did she think we’d have in common, for pity’s sake?’ Her sister flopped down onto a baby beanbag. ‘Isn’t there a single decent man out there for me? I mean, I’m not asking for perfection. Just somebody who doesn’t make me want to take off at eighty miles an hour in the opposite direction. That would be a start.�
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  ‘What about Colin?’ Polly asked. ‘He likes you and seems pretty normal. He’s cute too.’

  ‘I know,’ Bryony said. ‘But that’s all a bit too easy, isn’t it?’

  Polly frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, I know he likes me and he’s a really nice guy and everything.’

  ‘Then why not go out with him?’

  Bryony sighed. ‘Well, we’re kind of seeing each other but not officially. It wouldn’t be fair on him,’ she said. ‘I don’t think it would work.’

  Polly shook her head. ‘I don’t understand you.’

  Bryony got up from the beanbag and brushed down the long red-and-blue-checked skirt she was wearing. Worn with a large silver metal belt from which hung dozens of little charms, it was a typical Bryony bohemian look that Polly had always secretly envied. Not that it would have suited her. Polly was far more conventional with her straight, clean-cut lines and conservative colours, but there was something wonderfully free about Bryony which she couldn’t help admiring.

  But she wasn’t thinking about clothes now; she was thinking about men. ‘Do you like musicians?’ she asked her.

  ‘What sort of musicians?’ Bryony asked.

  ‘Guitar players.’

  ‘In theory,’ Bryony said. ‘Why?’

  ‘One of my neighbour’s sons has just come home. He’s a music graduate. He’s quite young, but he’s handsome.’

  Bryony cocked her head to one side. ‘How handsome?’

  ‘Oh, you know – tall with that messy artistic sort of hair that musicians seem to have. He’s got a nice smile too.’

  ‘You mean he’s always smiling at you?’ Bryony said.

  ‘He’s a smiley kind of person is what I’m saying.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, he seems decent enough. I could have a word with him if you want.’

  ‘What – tell him you’ve got a hopeless little sister who can’t find a man herself?’

  ‘I wouldn’t phrase it like that,’ Polly said. ‘I’d just say that I’m much better at choosing men for you than you are yourself.’

  Bryony stuck her tongue out at her sister, but quickly rearranged her face into the features of a normal, professional adult when a customer came through the door. They were after the latest young adult dystopian trilogy that was racing up the charts. It was a genre which Polly and Bryony disapproved of. Why such grim stories of children struggling for life in an apocalyptic society were so popular was a complete mystery to the Nightingale sisters.

  ‘They should be reading something romantic and wonderful like I Capture the Castle,’ Bryony said. ‘Actually, I’m going to order some more copies of that and do a window display. “Love Lovely Books” or something.’

  ‘Good idea,’ Polly said, ‘and what about some Madeleine Forrest novels?’

  ‘Brilliant idea,’ Bryony said. ‘Her high school series is really popular and the covers are to die for. They’ll look gorgeous in the window. Just what we need to brighten things up in the winter and, more importantly, they have real heroes in them too. No vampires or werewolves or shape-shifting weirdoes. Just good old-fashioned flesh and blood heroes.’

  Polly immediately got busy with a piece of paper, mapping out her ideas for a window display whilst Bryony ordered the books themselves. One of the great joys of being an independent bookshop was being flexible and being able to make such spontaneous decisions about your stock and how and where you were going to place it.

  ‘I’ve lost count of the number of vampire hero books we’ve sold over the last few years, but I think it’s time that teenage girls realised that there’s more to a hero than a pair of fangs,’ Bryony said.

  Polly laughed. ‘Heroes are a curious business, aren’t they?’ she said. ‘Just think about it for a minute. There’s the abusive Heathcliff who beats his wife and hangs dogs. There’s moody Mr Darcy and Edward Rochester who lies and tries to commit bigamy. It makes me worry about the state of the female mind that we find these men so attractive.’

  ‘Yes, if these are the heroes women wish their real-life partners to be like, then there’s no hope for us really.’

  ‘Poll,’ Bryony said after flipping through the order book by the counter for a moment.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Have you ever thought about dating again?’

  Polly looked up from her sheet of paper. ‘How can I? I’m married.’

  ‘I know, but–’

  ‘But nothing.’

  Bryony chewed her bottom lip. ‘You can’t wait around forever and nobody expects you to, and they wouldn’t judge you if you started dating again.’

  ‘I’m not worrying about people judging me because I’m not going to start dating again, okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ Bryony said.

  Polly checked her watch. ‘Look, I’d better get going.’

  ‘But it’s so early.’

  ‘I’ve got some lessons to plan for my students before I pick Archie up.’ She got her handbag from the stock room.

  ‘Polly! Don’t go like this,’ Bryony said. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’

  ‘You didn’t upset me,’ Polly said, charging straight for the door. ‘I’ve just got to go.’

  ‘Polly?’ Bryony shouted after her, but Polly didn’t stop. She had to get out of there – away from her sister and her probing questions.

  She walked into the market square and stood there as shoppers hurried past her. She didn’t really have any lessons to plan, but she hadn’t been able to cope with Bryony. It hadn’t been the first time Bryony had approached that subject, but it had been the most direct. Little hints had been dropped in the past as to whether Polly was moving on from the idea that Sean would return. Her whole family had lost faith, hadn’t they? Even her mother had recently asked her if she wanted to bring anyone to Campion House for Sunday lunch and she hadn’t meant a girlfriend. No, she thought, she was the only person who hadn’t given up on Sean. Well, there were two other people as well.

  With that thought, she got out her phone and rang the number she’d had programmed in since Sean’s disappearance.

  ‘Alison?’ she said a moment later. ‘Yes, it’s Polly. Good, thanks. No. No news, I’m afraid.’ It was the usual routine. Every time Polly rang her parents-in-law, they’d foolishly hope that it was with news about Sean. ‘He’s well, thank you,’ she said a moment later when Alison Prior asked after Archie. ‘Yes, we’d love to. Tonight would be great. We’ll come round after tea. See you later.’

  Alison and Anthony Prior lived in a large modern house a few miles from Castle Clare. It was in what had once been a small village but was getting larger every year with the building of new properties, and now had a mix of old thatched cottages along the original main road and new houses clustered into cul-de-sacs at each end. The Priors lived in one of the cul-de-sacs. It was called Constable View but Polly didn’t think that John Constable would recognise anything at all if he came back from the afterlife to capture the landscape on canvas.

  ‘Is Granddad going to make me sing again?’ Archie asked from the back seat.

  ‘I doubt it,’ Polly said.

  ‘He made me last time,’ Archie complained.

  ‘He’s very interested in your musical prowess,’ Polly said.

  ‘What’s that mean?’

  ‘It means that he likes to see you doing well.’

  ‘If he likes music so much, why did he give us his piano?’

  ‘It was a wedding present to me and your dad.’

  ‘Can we give it back?’ Archie said.

  ‘No we can’t,’ Polly said. ‘That would be ungrateful and you wouldn’t be able to learn to play it then.’ She caught his eye in the rear view mirror. ‘Oh, I see,’ she said. ‘You’re not giving the piano up, Arch.’

  His mouth set in a firm, narrow line just like his father’s used to when he didn’t get his own way. He was so like Sean sometimes that it hurt.

  Parking on the road outside the Priors’ house, Polly got out of
the car and opened Archie’s door.

  ‘I hate the piano,’ he said. It was about the hundredth time he’d said that since he’d met Jago and Polly was sick and tired of hearing it.

  She let her son ring the bell and the door was opened a moment later by her father-in-law. Anthony Prior was a tall man with the kind of broad shoulders and stern eyebrows which used to make the younger Archie run for cover.

  ‘Hello, Archie boy,’ he said now. ‘Polly.’

  ‘Hello,’ she said with a little smile.

  ‘Hi Granddad,’ Archie said as his grandfather placed a large hand on his shoulder and led him into the hallway.

  Polly and Archie removed their shoes and left them neatly side by side on the front door mat before walking through to the living room. The house was a symphony of white from the painted walls to the wooden furniture and soft furnishings. It was a total nightmare to bring a young grandson to and Dickens the spaniel had been told that he was no longer welcome after he’d brought muddy feet in from the back garden the previous Easter.

  Archie knew the routine and, after removing his shoes, he washed his hands in the white sink in the cloakroom before making his way to the large white sofa where he sat down.

  ‘So then, Archie!’ Anthony bellowed down at his grandson, making him jump. ‘How are the piano lessons going?’

  ‘Okay,’ Archie said in a small voice.

  ‘Playing Beethoven yet, are we?’

  Archie looked at his mum for help.

  ‘No, not yet,’ Polly answered for him.

  ‘I want to play the guitar,’ Archie said. Polly threw him an angry look.

  ‘The guitar?’ Anthony said. ‘No, no, no. You don’t want to play the guitar. Long-haired layabouts play the guitar.’

  Once again, Archie looked to his mum. ‘Jago’s got long hair, hasn’t he? Is he a layabout too?’

  Polly cleared her throat. ‘No, he’s not.’

  ‘Who’s Jago?’ Alison asked, entering the living room from the adjoining kitchen. She was a small woman with a pretty face and a halo of white-blonde hair.