About Three Authors

by Patti Roberts

  Screwing up her nose, she quickly returned the bottle to the shelf. There were various tubs of night creams, day creams, cuticle creams, hand creams, cold cream, rejuvenating creams… How much cream did one woman need?

  Eye cream. Becky picked up the tiny jar, unscrewed the lid and applied some of the cream under her eyelids before returning the jar to the shelf. A perfume bottle tilted back and forth as she knocked it with the back of her hand. She made a mad grab for it, knocking a box off the shelf and into the hand basin instead. She picked the box up. Tampons! Frowning, she stared at the box in mute horror as a terrible thought struck her, punching her in the gut like a giant, iron fist.

  Her period was late… LATE. “Jesus-effing-holy-mother-of-God.” The words spilled out of her mouth like a river of molten lava as the enormity of the situation burned into her pounding skull. Her chest tightened as she tried doing the math in her head, but adding two and two together was proving to be a monumental task.

  She sat down on the edge of the bath, steadying herself on the basin, her bunny rabbit slippers tapping out an SOS on the tiled floor. The last time she’d had sex with Roger had been in St Ives. Drunk sex. The very same weekend that Mandy had fallen pregnant, if Mandy’s calculations in her diary had been correct. What if she was pregnant with Roger’s baby, too?

  She’d thought about having a baby with Roger; they had even talked about it before her mother fell ill, but the thought of it now was akin to being hit by a frigging giant asteroid. Hell, right now she considered throwing herself under a giant asteroid… Good lord, this horrific nightmare was getting worse by the second and could very well be growing arms and legs, head, spine, fingers, toes. A whole frigging baby, a whole little person, for Christ’s sake. She gagged, clutched her stomach fiercely, and then puked into the shiny pink basin. The last thing she needed now was a baby. If she was pregnant, there was no way she wanted to keep it.

  She wanted to talk to her mother. Her mother would know what to do. But she couldn’t.

  She wanted to talk to Mandy. Mandy would make her feel better and tell her everything had just been a terrible mistake, a terrible misunderstanding and that she was so very, very sorry.

  If only that was true.

  She wanted to talk to Roger, tell him she was carrying his baby and that they would just have to put the whole sordid mess behind them and work everything out for the sake of the child. They had their problems, yes, but didn’t everyone? They were just going through a slump in their relationship. They could work out this one little indiscretion, couldn’t they? She had heard lots of stories about couples having this exact same problem, and they had worked it out. Yes, they could work this out, too.

  Like bloody hell they could. She squeezed her eyes shut. “Please, please, please don’t be pregnant.”

  The clock downstairs chimed midnight.

  “Merry fucking Christmas, Becky Jensen. You didn’t see this one coming, did you?”

  But maybe she had known. Maybe she had seen what was coming all along. The betrayal, the lies, the stolen glances, the stinking new cologne. But rather than deal with the elephant in the room, she had chosen to stick her head in the sand like a coward and ignore all the tell-tale signs. It had been easier, more manageable, that way, less painful, less real… Right up until now. Now it was all very fucking real.

  The whole stinking truth had taken on a twisted black form and was now staring her straight in the face, and there was no crater deep enough on the planet for her to crawl into and hide.

  Chapter 5

  The Princess And The Movie Star.

  BECKY JENSEN’S FACEBOOK STATUS: Christmas Day – My first Christmas without Mum. If you know someone who tries to drown their sorrows with booze, you might tell them that sorrows know how to swim.

  “Sit up, dear girl. You look like you could use a coffee, at least,” Uncle Steve said, moving the yellow bucket aside gingerly with his foot and sitting down next to Becky on the sofa. He put two mugs down on the coffee table and picked up the remote control, turning down the volume on the television.

  Becky moaned, wiped a string of saliva off her chin, swung her legs over the side of the sofa and sat up with one eye still closed. “I feel like shite.”

  “You look like shite,” Uncle Steve agreed wholeheartedly, his brow deeply furrowed.

  She glared at him, then looked at the television screen, her shoulders slumped. Emma Thomson was crying in her bedroom with the song “Both Sides Now” playing remorsefully in the background.

  “Love Actually,” Becky murmured. “Mum really loved this movie.”

  “I know,” he said, deep in thought. He put arm an around her shoulders and she fell against his chest, tears running down her cheeks.

  “It’s Christmas Day,” she blurted between sobs. “Mum’s been gone a whole year, and I miss her like it was just yesterday.”

  “Me too, love,” he nodded, his arm still wrapped around her shoulder.

  No matter how many times you’ve experienced it, no matter how old you are, death is never easy for those of us left behind grieving.

  He looked at the bucket and the discarded chocolate box next to the empty vodka bottle. “Looks like you’ve started celebrating Christmas early, if that empty bottle of vodka is any indication.”

  She’d gone back for the vodka after she’d finished the lemonade, not that she could remember emptying the bottle. “Roger. He cheated on me, Uncle Steve.”

  He sighed. “Ahh, I see.” He paused for a moment and scratched his head. “You’ll get over him, Beck.”

  She shook her head, her face distorted by pain.

  “You will, love. And one day you’ll look back on all this and wonder what the hell you ever saw in him.”

  “I caught him banging Mandy in the loo at the Red Lion. If it had happened to anyone else, I’d probably be laughing about it right now.” She looked away, her face crumbling as fresh tears pooled in her eyes.

  “Sod him, Beck. You can do better than the likes of him. Never did like that lad. Always thinking he was better than anyone else. Mandy though, bleeding hell… I never saw that one coming.” He shook his head. “You don’t need either of them, love.”

  “I know you’re right. I know I’ll get over him, eventually, but-” A sob broke free, choking off her words. She took a long breath and started again. “It’s Mandy’s betrayal that I don’t think I’ll ever get over. She was my best friend. I confided in her with everything. Everything. There isn’t anything she doesn’t know about me, and she does this. She could have anyone, and she does this, to me. That’s what hurts the most, crushes me the most. How is a person meant to get over a betrayal like that unscathed?”

  Uncle Steve shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  “I just wanted someone to love me,” she sobbed. “You know, like Dad loved Mum, before that bloody tart Felicity came along and blindsided him.”

  “That’s all any of us ever want, love, even your dad. And by the way, I love you.”

  “And I love you, too, but it isn’t the same thing, is it?”

  He nodded. “No. It isn’t.”

  “I feel like a prize idiot. How could I have not known?”

  “Love is blind,” Uncle Steve offered.

  “That is a complete understatement. I’m so done with men,” Becky said. “And best friends.”

  “Love makes us vulnerable; it makes fools out of us all at one time or another. No one is immune to a broken heart; just look at Lady Di. Even princesses have their hearts trodden on and smashed into a million tiny little pieces.”

  Becky nodded. “And drop dead gorgeous guys, like Robert Pattinson.”

  “Who?”

  “Robert Pattinson. You know, the guy from Twilight.”

  Uncle Steve nodded. “Oh yes. Poor lad. Must have felt like a right tosser, the whole nonsense playing out in the tabloids like that for the whole world to read about. Enough to drive even the best of us into therapy.” They sat in silence for a long moment
, listening to the television.

  “But you know, the thing about romance is,” Thomas Brodie-Sangster’s character, Sam, was saying to his step-dad in Love Actually, “people only get together right at the very end…”

  “From the mouth of babes, ay,” Uncle Steve said, giving Becky a reassuring one-armed hug. “Let’s say you don’t give up on your happy ending just yet, hey?”

  Becky sniffed. “Princess Di never got her happy ending.”

  “No. That is true. No happy ending for our Princess Di.”

  Becky turned to face her uncle. “You think I should try and work it out with Roger?”

  “Good heavens, no. Throw that shite mongrel to the curb. He doesn’t deserve you, love. If he doesn’t know by now how wonderful you are, then he never will. “What I’m saying is, don’t give up on finding the right one just yet, okay? You’re way too young to be so cynical about love.”

  “Like you, you mean?” she said, nudging him with her elbow and giving him a wry smile.

  “That’s different, love. I’m an old man, and anyway, who says I’ve given up? I’m just waiting for the right girl to come along.”

  “You’re not going to say I told you so? About Roger being a complete and utter prat, I mean,” she said, turning her head on Uncle Steve’s shoulder and wiping her nose across his jumper. “I always knew you didn’t like him.”

  “Okay, playing the Devil’s advocate, here. And this comes from an old guy that has screwed up every relationship he’s ever had. But did you ever consider for one moment that maybe catching Roger cheating on you is the best thing that could have happened? That just maybe you dodged a bullet? Imagine if you were, say, ten minutes late. Maybe five years down the track, you’ve got a kid, another one on the way, and you catch him cheating with God knows who. Wouldn’t that be worse?” He held Becky at arm’s length. “My dear girl, you don’t need me to tell you something you already know.” He plucked a handkerchief from his trouser pocket and handed it to her. “Now, blow your nose. This happens to be one of my favourite jumpers - your mother knitted it for me - so I don’t need you wiping your snotty nose all over it. And drink your coffee before it goes cold while I choof off into the kitchen and cook us some bacon and eggs for breakfast.”

  Becky nodded in thanks, then blew her nose.

  “Okay then.” Uncle Steve pushed himself up with his hands. He patted Becky on the top of her head as he walked past to the kitchen. “Chin up, kiddo. This too shall pass. Nice slippers, by the way.”

  “Merry Christmas, Uncle Steve,” Becky said, then blew her nose again.

  Uncle Steve stopped, then turned around. He walked promptly back into the lounge room, and kissed Becky on top of her head. “Merry Christmas to you too, sweetheart. Now drink your coffee then go brush your teeth; your breath smells like the bottom of a bird cage. Oh, and don’t forget to take that bucket with you…” he said, jabbing his finger towards the yellow bucket.

  Becky shrugged, offering up an ‘I’m sorry’ smile, then cupped a hand over her mouth and blew into it. She screwed up her nose. “Gawd, you’re right about the bird cage.” She picked up her mug, taking a mouthful to remedy the birdcage smell in the bottom of her mouth. “Mmmm,” she murmured, leaning back onto the sofa and closing her eyes in satisfaction. “Nothing quite like a good cuppa to start off a rotten day,” she said, mimicking the words she’d heard her mother declare way too many times to count.

  From the kitchen, Uncle Steve looked up from separating rinds of bacon, and smiled at her over his shoulder. “Get your butt in the shower, miss. Breakfast will be ready in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.”

  Twenty minutes later, after bathing, brushing her teeth, and dressed in a pair of old track pants and a pullover with Cindi Lauper telling the world that “Girls just want to have fun”, Becky walked down the stairs, coercing an old pair of Spice Girls knickers out of the crack of her bottom, since she’d forgotten to pack clean underwear in her overnight bag in her speedy getaway. With the knickers dislodged, she sat down opposite her uncle at the kitchen table.

  Smiling, she took the plate he passed her and sat it down on the table. “Thank you. This looks great.” She picked up a piece of toast, dipped it in the soft yoke of the egg and took a bite. “Why did you do it, Uncle Steve? Stay single all these years, I mean. Wasn’t there anyone you ever wanted to marry, spend your life with, and grow old with?” She tucked one leg up under the other and picked up a piece of bacon, popping it into her mouth.

  Uncle Steve sliced through his eggs and bacon with gusto, forking a mouthful into his mouth. He swallowed, then shrugged, all the time looking plaintively at a spot on the kitchen wall while he considered her question.

  After a long moment, he said, “There was a woman, once, a long time ago. I met her here in London. I was in London visiting William and Victoria at the time. She was younger than me and wasn’t ready to settle down into a serious relationship, let alone have kids, and, well, I guess it just wasn’t meant to be. She’d been living in Scotland with her family at the time, and was in London visiting friends for a couple of weeks when we met. I was working for a newspaper in Ireland. She’d just started a new job in Scotland as a sales rep, which meant she’d be doing a lot of travelling. We lost contact for a while, up until recently, that is.” He shrugged again. “Your mother always kept in contact with her, though. She was always writing letters, keeping her up-to-date with everything.” He sighed, put down his fork and rubbed the back of his head, his eyes migrating to the framed family portrait on the wall which was taken when Becky was little. Clasped in her arms was her favourite doll. “There were a couple of women here and there, as you know, but I never found anyone else quite like her.”

  Becky racked her brains, trying to think who it might have been. Had her mother ever mentioned a woman that Uncle Steve had been madly in love with… and still was, if that faraway look in his eyes was anything to go by? Of course, she thought, almost saying it out loud. It had to be Marion, her mother’s friend who was still living in Scotland. Marion had come to London for the funeral, and Uncle Steve had been so happy to see her that they had spent every possible moment together. It had been quite nice, seeing her uncle like that with a woman. It had even made her smile at the time, even though her paralyzing grief consumed her every other moment.

  Becky pushed a piece of bacon around on her plate with her fork. “So that’s the whole story?”

  He shrugged. “Pretty much. After you were born, I got homesick, so I left Ireland and moved back home to London. I landed a good job at “Book Talk Magazine”, worked my way up through the ranks, and now I own the place, so…” He shrugged again. “Everything turned out the way it was supposed to.”

  “Didn’t you ever want kids?” For a moment her throat constricted, remembering her own predicament, the possibility that she could be pregnant. She shuddered, took another sip of her coffee, refusing to give the thought any credence. She would cross that bridge when and if she had to.

  “I didn’t need kids. I always had you.” He picked up his fork and looked up at her, then frowned. “You okay? You look pale. Do you need the bucket?” he asked, half standing to go get it for her.

  She waved her hand. “No. I’m fine, really. Just the booze from last night making me feel a little queasy, that’s all.” She crossed her fingers under the table, hoping that that was all it was.

  Uncle Steve sat back down. “You absolutely sure? You really don’t look that great at all.”

  Becky narrowed her eyes. “Thanks for that.”

  He picked up his fork and stabbed a piece of bacon. “Just telling you the way it is, kiddo.”

  She brushed a stray strand of hair off her face. “Anyway, that’s not the same as having your own, though, is it?”

  “What’s that?” he asked, looking back up at her.

  “Kids. Having your own kids.”

  He shrugged, standing up. “I’ve always considered you the child I never had. And you will always be en
ough for me. Top-up for your coffee?”

  “Sure.” She handed him her mug.

  A moment later, he returned with a fresh mug of coffee and an envelope. “This is for you,” he said, handing it to her. “Merry Christmas.” He leaned down and kissed the top of her head.

  “What’s this? I thought we weren’t doing Christmas gifts this year. You insisted.”

  “I lied. Take it. I think you’ll find it’s just what the doctor ordered, considering the circumstances.”

  Becky thought about her odd encounter with the cigarette-smoking man in the park the night before. Sliding her finger under the seal of the envelope, she pried it open and peeked inside, then drew out the contents. She stared at the paperwork in her hand for a long moment. “Oh. My. God. This is an airline ticket.” She shot to her feet, jumping up and down and wrapping her arms around her uncle’s neck. “Thank you so much. I can’t believe it,” she squealed, then kissed him fervently on both cheeks. “Thank you. Thank you!”

  “You don’t even know where you’re going yet!”

  “It doesn’t matter. Anywhere that isn’t here would be brilliant right now. Present company excluded,” she added quickly.

  Uncle Steve waved her off. “At least take a look before you get too excited; you might hate the idea.”

  She unfolded the ticket to read the details. “Cairns, Australia… Are you freaking kidding me?” She thought about the cigarette man again. Just a coincidence, she told herself.

  “Seven days. Do you think you can handle all that hot weather and glorious sunshine for seven long days? You come home the day after New Year’s Eve.”

  “Hmm, you are right. Let me think about it… Of course I can!” She looked at the ticket again, her hands shaking with enthusiasm. “But where the hell is… Cairns?” she asked, reading the ticket again.