by Jenny Oliver
‘Is it true?’
He laughed. ‘You are very suspicious.’
‘Did you come to see your sister this time?’
‘No, I came to have coffee with you. But I will see my sister. If there’s time.’
Jessica didn’t say anything, just bought some time by sipping her coffee. Then she sat forward gesturing between the two of them and said, ‘I just don’t see how this would work.’
‘Jessica …’
‘What?’
‘The sun is shining. We have half a coffee left. Just relax. Talk.’
‘What about?’
‘What was your meeting about?’
‘It’s a big rebrand we’re doing. For a museum.’
‘Interesting,’ he said, getting comfy in his chair. ‘Tell me about it.’
So she told him about the rebrand. And he asked questions. She told him about working with Dex. About setting Dex up with Bruno’s sister which was impossible because she was happily married with three children. They talked about cappuccino etiquette and Bruno nodded seriously and said, ‘Never after breakfast.’ They talked about the Olympics, Italy, the bar. And they had more coffee. And then they strolled across London, along the Thames, over the river. They popped into the Tate; glanced at some art. Then they passed a pub and Jessica found herself suggesting a beer. When they walked inside she felt Bruno place his hand on the small of her back, not guiding her inside but almost letting her know he was there. And when she got the drinks and turned to the table she found herself glad that it was him sitting there. At no point in the afternoon had she had to think of what to say next or rehearse questions and answers in her head. She had chatted as she chatted to her friends—easily, calmly, wittily.
She looked at him. Short dark hair a bit messed, shoulders so wide they swallowed her up, eyes almost black under hooded lids. Eyes that saw everything, every detail of her, with a look that put her both completely at ease and shockingly on edge. A look she found herself already missing before he’d even gone.
As the sun dimmed outside and the pub began to fill with after-work drinkers it was on the tip of her tongue to suggest dinner. The urge took her completely by surprise but, just as she opened her mouth to ask, Bruno glanced at his watch and said, ‘Time for me to go. I have a plane to catch.’
‘Oh, OK.’ Jessica hid her disappointment behind the relief of not having made the suggestion.
They walked out of the pub together weaving their way through tables, again his hand on her back at the door, again her liking the feel of it.
He paused in the street to glance around for a taxi, pulling his shades on. ‘I’m actually here again in a few weeks,’ he said.
‘To see your sister?’
He laughed. ‘Yes. But actually I have investments here.’
‘You do?’ she said, a touch too much enthusiasm in her voice.
He laughed again. ‘You like that?’
She tried to reclaim her cool. ‘It’s interesting. Something else for you to come over for.’
He smiled. A taxi pulled up next to them. ‘Interesting is good enough for me,’ he said, opening the door.
Then to her surprise he slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her into a crushing great kiss.
She was just getting over the shock, her excited heart thumping like crazy, when he let her go and climbed into the taxi.
‘I’ll call you,’ he said and, about to shut the door, added, ‘and remember, don’t think about it too much. Yes?’
Jessica nodded, still a bit breathless. She glanced round with a half-smile, disbelieving that she had just been kissed so passionately on the pavement in public and enjoyed it.
‘Trust me. I never lose,’ he said.
She nodded.
‘Until next time, Jessica.’
‘Until next time,’ she said, and the taxi drove off in one direction and Jessica walked to the tube in the other, a secret smile playing on her lips all the way.
LIBBY
One year later
‘So how’s it been?’ Miles asked.
‘Crazy!’ Libby replied.
Miles laughed. Then he turned to the woman next to him and said, ‘Libby’s one of those superstar bloggers now.’
‘I am not,’ Libby said, waving a hand for Miles’s new girlfriend Chloe to ignore everything he was saying. ‘It was a teeny weeny press whirlwind that I got caught up in. It was nothing. It was just about people who are “honest” online.’
‘I believe the term is Social Media Realism,’ said Jessica.
Libby shook her head, going over to throw open the outhouse windows because she was starting to get a little hot. The noise of the birds and the hum of the cicadas filled the space in the air. ‘I was just an add on, they had much bigger people than me to focus on.’
Eve leant forward on her bench and said, ‘Libby was in every magazine and newspaper in the UK. It wasn’t that teeny weeny.’
Peter, who was sitting at the bench behind Eve, nodded. ‘Even I read about it and I don’t know about anyone famous.’
‘I’m not famous.’
Chloe nodded, still impressed despite Libby’s protestations.
‘And did everyone see the Hidden Gems sticker on the front door?’ Jessica said from the back. ‘She got into the guide as well.’
‘Congratulations,’ said Miles with a proud grin.
‘Frank came good,’ laughed Libby. ‘I think it was more to do with Giulia in the end, plying him with bowls of spaghetti vongole.’
‘Don’t believe a word of it. They all love Libby, the people who come here,’ Jessica said. ‘I’m always hearing them in the bar chatting about how she rescued their bake and how fabulous their dinner was.’
Miles turned. ‘So you’re here a lot, are you?’
Jessica shrugged, self-consciously pushing a curl behind her ear. ‘A fair bit.’
‘She’s here all the time,’ said Libby, pleased to have the focus moved onto someone else. ‘Like once a month.’
Miles nodded as if he was pleased to hear that. Jessica nodded back. ‘I like it,’ she said. ‘It’s very calming.’
‘She even has her own little desk set up at Bruno’s bar,’ said Libby with a big grin.
Jessica rolled her eyes as if she hadn’t needed everyone to know that.
‘Do you now?’ said Eve, delight shining in her eyes. ‘That sounds cosy.’
‘It’s very cosy,’ said Libby.
‘Very cosy, eh?’ said Eve.
‘OK you can stop now.’ Jessica sighed.
They sniggered.
Jessica leant forward on her bench. ‘And what about you two?’ she said to Eve. ‘How’s the frolicking?’
Peter looked confused, as if he’d just been asked something about their sex life, but Eve laughed. ‘The frolicking is fine. We have scheduled frolicking when we go back to the countryside to visit the chickens who are now living very happily with our old neighbour. And the children are with Peter’s parents. I have no idea what they’re doing but when they get home they will be drinking a lot of Nutribullets to make up for it.’
‘What the hell’s a Nutribullet?’ Jessica asked.
‘It’s a blender,’ said Peter with a sigh; clearly he’d heard far too much about the subject.
‘It’s not just a blender,’ said Eve. ‘You can put the whole apple in stalk and all and it turns it into a drink.’
Jessica snorted. ‘I can see why you need a holiday, Peter.’
Peter chuckled. ‘It’s not that bad. And at least we got rid of the chickens.’
‘Yeah, otherwise Eve would have Nutribullet-ed them,’ Jessica laughed.
Miles’s girlfriend looked a bit shocked.
‘Oh don’t, I still feel really bad about the chickens,’ Eve said. ‘Maisey and Noah were really sad.’
‘They weren’t that sad,’ said Peter. ‘Nothing a trip to the fair didn’t fix.’
‘Yeah, and now we’ve got two bloody goldfish because of that,’
Eve added. ‘It never ends.’
Libby watched Eve as she talked, all wavy blonde hair and toothy smile, lounging back against Peter’s bench. It struck her that she looked like a whole person. Solid. Rather than before when it was almost like her edges were blurry, parts of her almost see-through like a faded photograph.
‘And are you still meditating?’ she heard Jimmy ask Peter.
‘Every day.’ Peter nodded.
Eve rolled her eyes. ‘He still won’t tell me his mantra.’
‘As it should be,’ said Jimmy.
‘How about you?’ Peter asked.
‘Yeah, it’s all good.’ Jimmy nodded, casting a quick glance at Libby before repeating. ‘All good.’
‘You can talk about him, Jimmy, it’s OK,’ Libby said, coming round from behind her bench and leaning against it, wanting at that moment to remove the barrier and bring herself further into the group.
‘Well …’ Jimmy shrugged. ‘It’s fun, you know? Just normal I guess. We’ve got a flat in Camden. It’s what you’d expect I suppose, two blokes together.’
‘And you think you’ll stay there for a while?’ Miles asked.
Jimmy made a face. ‘Yeah, no, maybe. I don’t know. I feel maybe, you know, maybe it’s time …’
‘Don’t say you’re going to say settle down,’ said Jessica, ‘please.’
Jimmy ummed and ahhed. ‘Yeah, maybe, maybe I’m feeling the pull.’
‘Oh my god,’ Jessica laughed. ‘So much for no labels and young-ish, free and single.’
Jimmy conceded a smile at himself. ‘Well, it gets a bit lonely sometimes.’
Libby wondered if Jake felt the same. They’d had the odd text conversation, a few emails to work out how they would split their assets. She was ready to agree to anything as long as she got to keep the hotel but in the end it had all been much more amenable than she’d imagined. She had wondered if Jimmy had had anything to do with that, coming down off the fence in order to make Jake see her side of things. She wasn’t sure but she suspected that was the case.
‘Well you know, Jimmy,’ she said. ‘There’s a lovely girl who comes from Florence with a yoga group at the end of the summer. You’ll have to come back then.’
Jimmy cocked his head as he thought about it, as he looked at Libby with the realisation that this was a gesture to confirm the definiteness of their friendship. ‘I might just do that,’ he said with a smile.
‘Good.’ Libby nodded and went back round behind her bench.
‘So what are we making today?’ Jimmy asked, rolling up his sleeves.
‘Well, I was thinking we should wait for Dex to arrive,’ Libby said, peering out of the open windows of the outhouse. ‘What time does his train get in?’ she asked, checking her watch, thinking that he should be here by now.
Jessica glanced up. ‘Oh, he’s not coming,’ she said. ‘Something came up at work. Sorry, did I not tell you?’
Libby felt like her whole body had just pooled at her feet.
How could Dex not be coming? They’d emailed loads about it.
Now, as she heard that he wouldn’t be there, it suddenly made her realise quite how much she’d been looking forward to him arriving. How when she pictured them all working in the outhouse or sitting on the terrace laughing it was his face that was the clearest, his voice the funniest, his smile the brightest, him that she was sitting next to in the garden as the sun set.
She was unexpectedly crestfallen.
‘Oh,’ she said. Then she nodded. ‘OK. Right.’ She looked down at the floor. Why did it feel like the whole week was suddenly in black and white? She looked out of the window at the blinding sunshine and blue, blue sky. ‘That’s OK. Right. Well, let’s think about what we’re going to make.’ She’d completely forgotten what she had planned and walked over to her bench to take another look at her recipes.
As she was familiarising herself with the lemon panna cotta recipe that she usually knew by heart, the door slid open and Dex walked in, case slung over his shoulder, pale blue shirt rolled up at the sleeves, familiar self-assured glint in his eye. ‘Just when you were starting to worry,’ he said, doing a small bow and dumping his bag on the ground. ‘I made it, safe and sound. The train, I’ll have you know, is a god damn fine mode of transport.’
‘Dex?’ Libby looked up, confused, delighted.
‘Don’t sound so surprised,’ he said with a bemused smile. ‘You knew I was coming.’
‘But Jessica—’ Libby started then stopped and glanced to the back of the room where Jessica was leaning over her bench, her chin resting in her hands, enjoying the scene with a huge smile on her face.
‘But Jessica what?’ asked Dex, wary.
Libby shook her head, unable to believe she’d been so easily duped. So easily read. ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Nothing. Just. I’m glad you’re here,’ she added, suddenly a touch shy.
Dex narrowed his eyes and looked at her for a second, trying to work out what was going on, what he’d missed.
But then the others all came forward to say hello. Eve bounding over for a hug, Jimmy slapping him on the back while Miles proudly introduced Chloe. Dex made all the right comments, said all the right greetings, but all the while Libby could see he was half distracted, glancing over to check that she was still waiting patiently to say hi.
‘All right?’ he said, when they were finally standing opposite each other.
‘All right,’ she said, nervous and excitedly shy.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ he said.
‘That’s no problem at all.’ She shook her head.
In the background the noise of the others chatting seemed to fade away as he bent down to kiss her cheek. She smelt the warmth and the kindness of him. She wanted to somehow tell him something that she couldn’t with everyone around. Something that had been waiting and building and finally seemed real now he’d walked back in the door. So she reached forward, tentatively at first, then with more confidence. And when her palm touched his, Dex was momentarily taken aback. But she laced her fingers tight through his for just a second and, giving his hand the quickest squeeze, whispered, ‘I really am glad to see you.’
‘You are?’ he said, unsure.
‘Yes. Very.’ She nodded, biting down on the start of her smile as she looked up at him and saw a momentary flicker of surprised delight in his eyes.
‘Well I’ll be damned.’
With the sun beaming into the room, the cicadas humming through the open door, Dex strolled over to his bench, a massive grin on his face, and said, ‘Right then, what are we baking? You’d better all watch out because I’ve been practising all year.’
* * * * *
Read on for an extract from THE VINTAGE SUMMER WEDDING by Jenny Oliver.
Chapter One
They arrived in the dark in a heatwave. As Anna stepped out of the car, all she could smell was roses. An omen of thick, heavy scent. A potent reminder of a well-buried past. She remembered being knocked off-kilter by a huge vase of them at the Opera House once – big, luxurious, peach cabbage roses – and shaking her head at her assistant, trying to hide her agitation by saying dismissively, ‘No, they’re not right. Swap them for stargazers or, if you can get them, hydrangeas.’
‘Wondered whether you two would ever turn up.’ Jeff Mallory, the landlord of the new property, a man with a moustache and a belly that sagged over his dark-green cords, heaved himself out of the cab of a white van.
‘Sorry, mate.’ Seb strode forward, arm outstretched for a vigorous handshake. ‘We would have been here earlier but—’
He left the reason hanging in the air. They both knew it was Anna’s fault. Stalling the packing at every conceivable opportunity. Dithering over how clothes had been folded and obsessively wrapping everything in tissue paper, then bubble-wrap until teacups were the size of footballs.
‘Not a problem.’ Jeff shook his head. ‘Just been reading the paper, nice to have a bit of time to myself if I’m honest. Nice little cottage this –
you’ll love it, just right for a young couple.’
Anna turned her head slowly from the view of the field opposite, the pungent smell of cowpats and hay and something else that she couldn’t quite put her finger on that had mingled with the sweet roses and was drawing her back in time like a whiff of an old perfume. She let her eyes trail up from the white front gate, the wild overgrown garden, the twee little porch and the carved wooden sign that she knew would spell out something hideous like Wild Rose Cottage.
You have to try, Anna.
Seb did all the chatting while she opened the car door and grabbed her handbag.
‘It’s good to be back,’ she heard him say, taking a deep breath of country air. ‘Really feels good.’
‘Well I never thought I’d see the day.’ Jeff ran a hand along the waistband of his trousers, hitching them into a more comfortable position. ‘Anna Whitehall back in Nettleton.’
She scratched her neck, feeling the heat prickle against her skin, wondering if by some miracle someone had thought to install air-conditioning in the crumbling cottage. ‘Me neither, Mr Mallory,’ she said. ‘Me neither.’ She attempted a smile, felt Seb’s eyes on her.
‘You know I played you at the village Christmas play the other year.’ He nodded like he’d only just remembered. ‘Best laugh in the house I got. Dressed in a pink tutu I had to shout, “I’m never coming back, you losers. Up your bum.”’ He snorted with laughter. ‘Brought the house down.’
Sweat trickled down between her shoulder blades as she huffed a fake laugh. ‘I’m so pleased I left a legacy.’
‘Too right you did.’ He moved round to the boot of the car to help Seb with the other cases, hauling them out as his trousers slipped lower. Seb was smiling along, trying to smooth out the creases of tension in the air. ‘Whole village has been waiting for you to come back,’ Mr. Mallory went on, regardless.
Seb wheeled a case past her over the uneven road and let his hand rest for a moment on her shoulder. She wanted to cover it with her own, but not good with public shows of sympathy she shook his hand off, trying to keep her poise.
