Lovely Little Things in Pretty Beach : A magical feel-good romance book to escape with in summer 2021.

by Polly Babbington

  Lulu strolled along Seafolly Passage, opened her front door, made a huge fuss of Mabel, put her bags on a chair in the kitchen, and washed her hands.

  Slicing off some bread, she spread it thickly with clotted cream, grabbed a jar of jam which was in the parcel from Ollie, and stood by the kitchen window looking out at the garden. As Mabel sat hoping for a piece of the bread at her feet, Lulu thought maybe she should downplay the whole Ollie thing. Nonchalant. Yes, that was it! She could do casual, laid-back, nonplussed. Couldn’t she?

  ‘I can do a casual encounter, can’t I, Mabel? I can navigate my way through that. Easy-peasy. In, out, shake it all about and don’t get too caught up in it all. What do you think?’ Mabel flopped to the floor as Lulu put the last piece of bread and clotted cream in her mouth. Her phone rang as she was washing up her plate and that morning’s breakfast dishes in the sink.

  ‘Hey, Wills. How’s the sunshine and the holiday?’

  ‘Hey. What’s the latest?’ Willow asked.

  ‘Nothing more to report.’

  ‘What? He hasn't replied regarding the dinner!’ Willow exclaimed.

  ‘No. I think I’ve worn the cover out on my phone checking. I've looked that many times.’

  ‘Weird,’ Willow said.

  ‘Maybe he’s changed his mind.’

  ‘Nah. He’s clearly interested. You don’t send a huge box like that when you’re not. No man that I’ve ever known, anyway.’

  Lulu finished off washing the dishes and with the phone still tucked between her shoulder and her ear continued, ‘Anyway. I’ve decided not to dwell on it all. Be cool.’

  ‘Be cool? What do you mean?’

  ‘Yeah, you know, be casual. I read about it during my break at work. Have a casual encounter…’ Lulu said as Willow interrupted.

  ‘You! You have a casual encounter? Oh, I’ve heard it all now. Absolutely priceless!’

  ‘What? I’m capable of that. I can be laid-back, Wills.’

  ‘You? No, Lulu, you are not. You are the woman who coordinates her arm jewellery with her activities. You have shoes in boxes. You have had precisely three relationships in your life if you include that Dillon. Don’t even get me started on that.’

  ‘Wills! I can do a casual encounter. Don’t be so dismissive!’

  ‘You CANNOT!’

  ‘I can. The article had ten steps to follow. Ten steps to keeping it casual. It’s really simple in this day and age.’

  Willow burst out laughing. ‘Yeah, right. Where did you find this article?’

  ‘Online. Good Woman blog or something.’

  ‘Lulu, don't read any more of those. I don’t think it will be good for your health.’

  ‘I’m fine. Yes, so as I said, I’m fine with a casual encounter and I’m not going to keep checking my phone every thirty seconds and analysing every syllable he writes.’

  ‘The marriage to the love of your life turned out to be full of lies and deceit, you’ve moved to a new area, you’re on your own with no support as such, and you’re going to dabble with a casual relationship? No, Lulu, no, just don’t. It really is not a good idea. Remember when you found out about Fenton, I came up and had to spoon feed you rice pudding pumped full of sugar because that’s the only thing you could eat?’

  ‘You said you’d never mention that again! Blimey, Wills.’

  ‘I did say that, true. But you of all people saying you’re not bothered about this is alarming. It’s more than alarming, it's frightening.’

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘What did Lottie say? I bet she wasn’t up for a casual relationship.’

  ‘Lottie has nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Because I bet she told you the same too.’

  Lulu’s phone buzzed with a text coming in as she was about to answer. She brought the phone around in front of her and looked at the screen. Ollie’s name flashed across the top. Putting Willow on loudspeaker Lulu opened the text.

  Sorry for the delay. Signal was terrible at the station there. On my way home now. How about tomorrow night for dinner?

  Lulu read the text as Willow rattled on about protecting oneself when in relationships.

  ‘Willow,’ Lulu said as Willow started to tell Lulu about an old friend who had gone out with someone casually and it had turned into a nightmare. He’d turned out to be a conman who’d scammed her out of thousands of pounds.

  ‘Wills! Stop talking for a minute. He’s just replied.’

  ‘Ahhhh! What does it say?’

  ‘He’s asking if I can go to dinner tomorrow night.’

  ‘Oh. Em. Gee. I can’t take the excitement. Well, can you go?’

  ‘Err, I literally have nothing better to do than watch white paint dry in the hallway. Of course, I can go! What else do you think I have on?’

  ‘This is so exciting! It’s better than an episode of Corrie.’

  ‘Ha!’

  ‘You’re going to have to plaster this all over Facebook. Fenton is going to be green.’

  ‘Wow, Lottie said exactly the same thing! I’m not doing that.’

  ‘You’re kidding, aren’t you? I’d be putting a poster up on a billboard on the tube after what he’s done to you.’

  ‘It’s just a casual dinner, Wills.’

  ‘Oh, you don’t fool me. I’m going to wet myself having to wait until tomorrow night and then the time difference!’

  ‘And I’m the one who can’t keep things low-key?’ Lulu laughed.

  ‘This is just such good news and that pile of poo Fenton can take a running jump. Brilliant. I simply cannot wait to see what happens.’

  Lulu, with a beaming smile on her face, replied, ‘Oh Wills, not nearly as much as me.’

  31

  Lulu, in denim dungarees and a white t-shirt with her hair in a high ponytail, a huge bucket of cleaning products over one arm and a tin of paint over the other passed the jetty at the back of Seafolly House. Stepping onto the narrow lane, she could see cars parking near the kiosks, boats on the way out to sea and a cloudy sky casting a hazy light over the water.

  After the success of the latest candle line at Lovely Little Things, Lulu had consulted her calendar and decided that she had only a couple of windows to up the ante if she wanted her business to grow. The first window was the summer season and tourists, and it was time to act on it.

  Holly, Jessica from the fish and chip shop, and Suntanned Pete, who owned holiday cottages in Pretty Beach, had all mentioned that the influx of people to the little town made business boom. All three of them had noted on different occasions that Lulu would be crazy not to take the bull by the horns, get the kiosk sorted, and use it for Lovely Little Things.

  Lulu had been in total agreement, but had thought quietly to herself that it was easily said but a lot harder to actually get done when you were on your own. She was hardly the proprietor of a thriving business empire with lots of staff at her beck and call. Her post at Lovely Little Things encompassed many roles; chief buyer and merchandiser, shop assistant, accountant, marketing manager, delivery boy, and… cleaner. And all of that was on top of a part-time hotel role and what felt like a full-time DIY career.

  Looking through the weeks on her calendar though, and assessing her progress on Seafolly House, Lulu had decided that a bedroom, kitchen, very nice bath and getting-there garden were good enough for the moment, and that Lovely Little Things was more important. She would put the house on temporary hold and get her teeth into the kiosk with an initial goal of a few weekend ‘pop-up’ events. Depending on how those went, she’d mused the idea of a ‘grand opening’ event whereby the kiosk would be open a couple of days a week when she wasn’t at the hotel.

  Lost in a world of her own and thinking about the kiosk and the training course she was attending via an online portal the following week at work, Lulu didn’t see the woman in front of her until she’d nearly bumped straight into her.

  ‘Dear God, no. Save me. Please,’ Lulu muttered to herself as she looked up, and right there in
front of her was her least favourite person in Pretty Beach and no other than Deirdre Crampleton. Local gossip and known for not being very nice.

  As Lulu took in Deirdre’s overpowering perfume, which hadn’t changed since the eighties, her face grimaced into a half-smile.

  ‘Lovely Lulu! I heard you were back,’ Deirdre exclaimed as she looked Lulu up and down, taking in her work clothes and scraped back hair. ‘Oh, what are you up to then? Not quite the immaculately turned out Lulu from London today? I didn’t even realise it was you in all that, umm, get up.’

  Lulu nodded and forced herself to smile. Nothing, it seemed, had changed with Pretty Beach’s least popular resident.

  ‘What? Are you cleaning now? My, my, you’ve gone down in the world,’ Deirdre said with the kindest smile on her face attempting to soften the blow of the cattiness of the words she was delivering.

  Lulu had no intention of telling Deirdre what she was doing, though it was exceedingly tempting. Deirdre Crampleton would most probably not have put two and two together that the old Hippy Hut kiosk had actually been owned by Lulu’s grandma and therefore was now hers.

  ‘Ahh, no, not quite,’ Lulu replied. ‘How are you, Deirdre? How’s Simon and the business?’

  At the mention of Deirdre’s husband Simon’s second-hand car dealership, Deirdre bristled and spluttered. ‘Doing ever-so well, actually. Anyway, enough of that, we’re off on a cruise to New York next week.’

  Lulu smiled whilst inside, thinking that being stuck on a ship with the Crampletons anywhere in the vicinity would be hell on earth, and replied, ‘How lovely.’

  ‘Oh yes. Of course, we’re on the Queen Mary. Transatlantic and in the most expensive suite. Only the best for me,’ Deirdre said and wrinkled up her face into a look that Lulu supposed was meant to portray humility.

  ‘Well, I must get on,’ Lulu replied.

  ‘Me too. I’m off up to town, actually. I need at least three new evening gowns and none of the shops locally have my size. Obviously, when you’re dining at the captain’s table, you need to be dressed for the occasion.’

  Lulu nodded, not in the slightest bit interested, and Deirdre continued not happy that she hadn’t found out where Lulu was going. ‘So, where are you going with that lot then? A cleaning job at one of the fisherman’s cottages?’

  Lulu decided she would tell Deirdre. That would put a bee in her bonnet. ‘I have a little shop down here.’

  Deirdre’s chin nearly dropped to the floor. ‘Oh, you’re renting one of the kiosks as a shop, are you?’

  ‘Well, yes I am going to eventually have it as a shop, but no, Deirdre, I’m not renting it. I own it along with Seafolly House. You know where that is, don’t you? Right down the end of Seafolly Passage.’

  That had taken the wind right out of Deirdre’s sails, and with that, Lulu stepped to her left, smiled, said goodbye and moved on.

  Ten minutes later, Lulu passed all the other well-kept shops until she got to the one formerly known as The Hippy Hut. The sign was now long gone, the outside was primed, and as Lulu opened the door and walked inside, her previous hard work was showing. The little kiosk, while still mostly graced in hues of purple and lilac, was now prepped and ready for a coat of paint.

  Lulu put her equipment down and stepped into the tiny kitchen. As she looked around and observed the once scruffy back yard, the whole place, now that it had been cleared out and cleaned, looked as if it might just be perfect as the new home for Lovely Little Things.

  32

  The Pavillion! Are you kidding me?

  I know. Hahahahahahaha.

  Blimey, Lulu.

  Go me, eh!

  The waiting list is months for that place.

  Really?

  Err, yeah! You have to shoot someone to get a table, well unless you’re Holly that is.

  I should consider myself to be lucky then?

  Oh yes.

  I’ve got to go. I need to get ready.

  Message me from the Ladies. This is the most excitement I’ve had for years! Love you xx

  OK. Love you, Wills xxx

  Lulu put her phone on the chair by the bath, got in, scrubbed every inch of her body, shaved her legs and underarms, and ten minutes later was rummaging around in a basket on the side full of body oils from Lovely Little Things. Lulu had spent years perfecting the scents for her most coveted body oil. The oils were now one of the shop's most lucrative lines. Lovely Little Potions was a collection of ten body oils curated for different occasions, and tonight Lulu was very much slathering on the one infused with neroli, ylang-ylang, and patchouli and brimming with mica particles for a shimmering glow. Not that she needed help with shimmering. She needed help to breathe.

  Half an hour later, Lulu was ready. Not short of beautiful underwear, she’d bypassed her ugly shapewear and chosen a cream silk bra, matching knickers, and camisole top. Of course, not that she was thinking about anyone witnessing the state of her underwear. Of course not. She’d pulled her shiny blonde hair up into an intricate updo on top of her head and slipped into a favourite bias-cut little black dress. With her long-practised heavy eye makeup and thickly coated lashes, everything had come together.

  Lulu stood in front of the old cracked mirror in the bathroom. Not bad for a woman who had been left on the scrapheap. The dress performed its magic as it always did, making her feel confident and sexy at the same time. The shimmering body oil had illuminated her skin in all the right places and as she slipped her feet into her favourite, extortionately expensive silver sandals and wrapped the slim ties around her ankles, she felt almost like her old self again.

  Was she back? The Lulu who loved dressing up, spending hours choosing her accessories, planning it all from her hair to her perfume. The Lulu who wasn’t sleeping on an air bed, working all hours in old painting clothes, sweeping up rat droppings and crawling around in cupboards. Shimmering, happy Lulu was ready and waiting and raring to go.

  Fifteen minutes later, Lulu walked past Pretty Beach Funicular Railway and smiled to herself, remembering how the woods behind the car park at the top had been the place to go when she was a teenager. All sorts of memories flooded through her head as she walked along.

  As if floating on the beautiful shoes in a cloud of perfume and pampering, Lulu felt that the evening ahead was brimming with good fortune and smiled in anticipation. A very handsome man had delivered her a beautiful gift, was taking her out for dinner, and was interested in her and her life. Things could be worse.

  As Lulu walked along she had felt like one of her grandma’s old-fashioned dolls she had played with when she was young. As if someone had stuck a bronze key into a little gap in her back, turned it until it was tightly wound, and then let her go. She’d spiralled along in a cloud of loveliness, her self-esteem flying, her confidence smiling at her from the horizon.

  Approaching the steps of the Pavillion, a doorman pulled open the door and beamed. ‘Good evening. What a beautiful evening on the bay. Welcome to the Pavillion.’

  Lulu swallowed and smiled back as the man gestured to the reception area where a concierge took her name and led her to a table.

  As she walked through the candlelit restaurant, a pianist on a grand piano played in the corner, the air filled with a soft breeze, and a low hum of chat surrounded her. And suddenly, the self-esteem and confidence that had so effusively filled her ten minutes before rapidly began to feel as if it was seeping away from the top of her head all the way down through her body and out of her beautiful sandals at the bottom.

  Who do I even think I am? Lulu thought as she followed the man and gazed around the restaurant where happy, successful, together, people sat chatting and smiling. People with joyful relationships and lovely lives, not people who had been surrounded by deceit and lies and discarded. Left to get on with it on their own.

  Lulu tried to think of Ava and what she would say. What Ava would advise? She would say, no doubt, to fake it ‘til you make it. And with that in mind, plastered a smile
on her face, blinked her heavily-mascaraed eyelashes and thought that if nothing else, she was going to at least try to enjoy the meal. Once it was over, if she didn’t feel any better, she would make an excuse to get home as quickly as she could.

  Approaching the table, there he was Honey Skin himself, in a button-down shirt and looking, if possible, even better than she remembered. Ollie, seeing her approach, jumped up and as the man pulled back the chair, Ollie put his hand into the small of her back.

  ‘Blimey! Look at you. You look absolutely stunning!’ he exclaimed with wide eyes.

  Lulu had lost the ability to breathe and as if she was registering what he was saying but not quite, she acknowledged the genuine tone of his voice and felt a lump come up in her throat. Lulu gulped and panicked. Oh my god! I’m going to start to cry.

  Lulu moved her head to Ollie’s side as he kissed her on the cheek and then looked down as she looked at the chair and said thank you to the man waiting to tuck her in. Pretending to fiddle with her bag, she swallowed and gathered herself together.

  ‘Lulu, you are so beautiful,’ Ollie smiled and half-whispered across the table as the man came back to the table, offered Lulu champagne and after she’d nodded, started to pour it into a glass.

  With tears in the back of her eyes, Lulu smiled. ‘Thank you.’ And as she noted the look on Ollie’s face it was as if the last year came crashing around her ears. All the hurt, all the disbelief, all the self-doubt, the admonishing that she could have done better, should have done better. All of it seemed to collapse as if defeated as she looked across the table at this lovely man who just simply seemed to like her. How simple was that?

  Oh, and how she liked him. The pool of honey was right there in front of her and as Lulu swallowed and stared, she couldn't quite wait to dive on in.

  33

  Lulu woke up to the sound of the sea and Mabel snoring gently in her bed on the floor beside her. She rolled over in the huge bed and stared at the light dancing in through the white curtains at the window.