New Beginnings at Seaside Blooms

by Jessica Redland

  She sighed. ‘I know. I’m probably the one who should be saying sorry.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For being such a crap friend.’

  ‘Because you’ve been sulking all week?’ I stuck my tongue out at her.

  ‘I’ve been a lot more crap than that.’

  ‘You’ve been seeing Jason behind my back,’ I joked.

  She sat upright. ‘Jesus! Are you mad? When I said I couldn’t stand him, I wasn’t hiding some deep carnal lust. I genuinely couldn’t stand him.’

  ‘Okay. Point made.’

  She slumped back onto her elbows again. ‘But I have been a crap friend because I haven’t been there for you. I’ve known how miserable you’ve been at work and with Jason for the past year and I haven’t said anything to encourage you to talk about it.’

  ‘You knew? How? I never said a word.’

  ‘You didn’t have to. I knew because I know you, Sarah. We’ve been friends for twelve years and we lived together for three of those. You don’t know someone that well and not notice when they’re miserable.’

  ‘So why didn’t you say anything?’ I demanded, feeling quite miffed that she hadn’t spoken up. ‘You normally blurt out exactly what you think so why keep quiet when your opinion might have made a difference?’

  She grimaced. ‘Because of all this.’ She pointed to the chaos of part-packed boxes and crates spread around the room. ‘I figured that if I encouraged you to talk about your worries, you’d finally come to your senses, ditch your man Jason and quit your job. So I selfishly kept quiet because if you had no Jason and no job, why would you want to stay in London with me? Especially when, despite your protests, I know you’ve never really settled here. And now I wish I had said something because you’re leaving anyway and I feel like a great big pile of crap for ignoring you when I knew you needed me. So I’d understand if you’re mad at me and want to throw me out.’

  I slowly shook my head. ‘If I was mad at you, I’d have to be mad at my parents, our Ben, Auntie Kay, Elise and everyone else I know because, if you noticed, any of them could have noticed and brought it up, yet nobody breathed a word. It wasn’t your responsibility to force it out of me. If I’d wanted to talk about it, I’d have talked about it.’

  ‘So we’re good?’

  I smiled reassuringly. ‘We’re good.’

  Clare exhaled loudly. ‘That’s a relief. I could do with a drink after all that heavy stuff. Can I suggest you open a bottle of wine then tell me everything? Jason, job, floristry – the lot.’

  ‘It’s only eleven. Are you sure you don’t want a coffee?’

  ‘Wine please.’

  When I returned with two glasses, Clare was fussing Kit and Kat who’d wandered in from the cold.

  ‘About time too.’ She held out her hand. ‘It’s like the Sahara in here.’ She took a long gulp. ‘That’s better. Now take the weight off your feet and tell me all about the ditching of your man.’

  ‘The packing?’ I protested.

  ‘The packing can wait. If you lend me a T-shirt I may even help you but first I need to know everything. Start with that gobshite.’ She patted the bed and I obediently sat beside her.

  ‘I might have made out that things were okay with Jason and me but, seeing as we’re being honest about stuff, the past year has been seriously grim…’

  Ninety minutes later, we’d emptied the bottle and Clare was up-to-date.

  ‘You make out like it was some major decision about the shop,’ she said. ‘But you hate your job, you hate London and you’re suddenly single. Surely your Auntie Kay’s offer was a no-brainer. I doubt many people get handed a successful business for free doing something they absolutely love.’

  ‘I don’t hate any of those things. I just don’t love them anymore.’ Clare raised an eyebrow. ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘It’s semantics but it was a really tough decision. There were pros and cons to each.’

  ‘Don’t tell me you got your Post-it notes out.’

  I rolled off the bed and opened my wardrobe doors. Stuck to the inside of the left door were a stack of brightly coloured Post-it notes listing the pros and cons of staying in London and, on the right door, a Whitsborough Bay list. I pointed to them. ‘Busted!’

  Clare picked up her glass again, drained it and then put it back down. ‘I can’t believe you make all your major life decisions through Post-it notes.’

  ‘It helps structure my thinking.’

  She shook her head. ‘I trust I’m top of your pros list for staying here?’

  ‘Of course. In capitals.’

  ‘I should think so too.’ She squinted across the room. ‘I don’t believe it. You’ve colour coded them this time, haven’t you?’

  ‘And my pen colours,’ I said, realising too late that it probably wasn’t something to be proud of.

  ‘That is so pitiful, I could cry for you. Remind me again why I’m friends with you?’

  I smiled. ‘Because nobody else will put up with your bolshiness.’

  ‘Fair point.’ She stood up and headed towards the wardrobes then turned around again and nodded at her glass. ‘I’m empty.’

  When I returned, she was standing in front of the wardrobe looking down the lists.

  ‘I see Elise is at the top of your pro list for home and your con list for here,’ she said without turning around.

  ‘And, as already stated, you’re at the top of my con list for home and my pro list for here,’ I said.

  ‘I suppose.’ She shut the wardrobe doors. ‘I could have helped you move your stuff home, you know. You didn’t have to enlist her.’

  ‘Her uncle has a van. It made sense for her to drive it down rather than hire one and have the dilemma of where to return it to.’

  ‘When’s she coming?’

  ‘Tomorrow at lunchtime. She’d have come today but there’s some family thing she can’t avoid.’

  ‘In that case, I’ll reluctantly help you pack today providing you keep the wine flowing, but you’ll have to manage without me tomorrow.’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Fine. Glad we’ve got that sorted. Will you start packing now or are you going to waste the rest of the day gossiping?’

  I opened a drawer and threw an old T-shirt to her. While she changed, I pulled a chair over to the wardrobe to climb on, trying to push aside her negativity towards Elise. It hurt that my two closest friends hated each other and I was always stuck in the middle.

  Elise had been my best friend since our first day at primary school. I’d retreated to a corner of the classroom, sobbing my heart out after my mum left me. The teacher had obviously lost patience in trying to soothe me and had left me to it. After thirty minutes or so, I had no tears left but was too scared to join any of the other children playing, so I’d sat with my head buried under my jumper until a gentle voice said, ‘Will you play in the sand pit with me, please?’ I’d pulled my jumper off my head and looked up to see a pretty little redhead standing over me with a bucket and spade in one hand and her other hand outstretched to take mine.

  My friendship with Clare had also been forged while I was in tears but many years later on my first day at Manchester University. My parents had just left me in the dark, grotty room that was to be my home for the next year. Surrounded by boxes and suitcases and wondering where to start unpacking, the enormity of leaving home to live in a huge city hit me and a feeling of absolute loneliness engulfed me. I suddenly pictured myself like Uncle Alan, all alone, with no friends and nothing to do but sit in the library studying. The floodgates opened. I jumped when an Irish voice declared loudly, ‘Jesus, I thought my room was a shit-hole but yours definitely wins the prize for dump of the year.’

  I looked up to see a tall girl leaning against the doorframe. She was the most stunning female I’d ever seen in real life: legs up to her armpits, long blonde hair so shiny that she looked fresh out of a shampoo advert, and eyes as green as emeralds. ‘I’m Clare O’Connell.’ She didn’t wait for me to give my
name, just continued talking. ‘Have you never heard of travelling light? Jesus, how many suitcases and boxes does one girl need? You’d think you were here for ten years at a time, not ten weeks.’ She moved over to a crate holding my CDs and started rummaging. ‘At least your taste in music is okay. Oh, wait. I spoke too soon. This album is a bag of shite.’ She picked out a CD – can’t remember what now – and tossed it in the bin. Through my tears, I stared at her then at the bin. I didn’t know whether to shout at her or laugh.

  ‘It’ll take you forever to get all this crap in order and there are far better ways we could be spending our time right now. We’re off to the pub.’

  ‘Are we?’ I’d never met anyone that confident and didn’t know how to react. She was scary… but also quite exciting.

  ‘Might as well start as we mean to go on,’ Clare continued. ‘Grab your purse, wipe that snot off your face, and let’s go. First beer’s on you and you’d better not tell me you don’t drink pints. Or even worse, that you don’t drink at all. Because if that’s the case, we’re not going to be friends.’

  ‘I drink, but…’ I tailed off. I didn’t dare confess I’d never had a pint in my life. University was going to be full of learning experiences and perhaps drinking pints was one I should embrace.

  Six hours and way too many pints of Irish ale later – another new learning experience – Clare and I started a lifelong friendship. I also started a horrendous hangover.

  I’d automatically assumed that my two best friends would bond immediately. Elise visited me at university the following term and I couldn’t wait to introduce them. The first hour in the pub seemed to go well but I returned from the ladies to find them in a heated debate about the value of marriage. It had been handbags at dawn ever since.

  ‘Ready,’ Clare said, pulling me back to the present. ‘You can start passing stuff down.’

  I handed down boxes and crates from the deep top shelves.

  ‘What’s in all of these?’

  I shrugged. ‘Haven’t a clue. Mum and Dad brought them down last year. They got sick of nagging Ben and me to clear out our old bedrooms so they could re-decorate so they did it for us.’

  Clare looked at the pile she’d just created. ‘It’s all your childhood crap then? Are we going to find naked Barbie dolls with shaved heads and dodgy old school photos?’

  ‘Possibly. A lot of it can probably be ditched.’

  Clare knelt on the floor and started rummaging through a crate. ‘This one’s boring,’ she said a few minutes later.

  ‘What’s in it?’ I looked up from the box of old board games I’d found.

  ‘Mainly old schoolbooks. I want an interesting box.’

  ‘I’m not sure any of them will be interesting. Why don’t you try that cardboard one?’

  Clare crawled over to the box, ripped off the parcel tape and started rummaging. ‘Ooh, what’s this?’

  I looked up as she pulled out a rolled-up piece of pale pink paper with a dark pink satin ribbon tied round it, like a scroll.

  Oh no. She’s found my—

  ‘“Life Plan of Sarah Louise Peterson, age almost fourteen,”’ she read as she unfurled it. ‘You have got to be jesting.’

  I put my hands over my eyes and felt my cheeks burn my palms. Trust me to direct Clare to the most embarrassing box in the world ever. She wanted interesting? She’d just found it.

  Life Plan of Sarah Louise Peterson, age almost 14

  Age 20–21: Meet gorgeous, kind, generous, funny, rich boyfriend with dark hair and blue eyes

  Age 22: Get engaged (Update Age 22: Big fat fail. Single now. Try 26???)

  Proposal: On a red dragon boat on the boating lake in Hearnshaw Park. (Update Age 22: proposal abroad – Venice? Rome?)

  Ring: Gold with sapphires and diamonds (Update Age 22: platinum with solitaire diamond)

  Age 24: Get married in pretty church. Reception in Sherrington Hall

  Dress: Big white dress with puffy sleeves and long train. Wear tiara and veil. Hair piled in curls on top of head. Princess for the day! (Update Age 22: ivory dress with short train, no puffy sleeves and perhaps not so BIG! Yes to sparkly tiara. Still want to be a princess!)

  Bridesmaids: Lots of bridesmaids wearing peach frilly dresses with big sleeves (Update Age 22: Eek! Just Elise and Clare. NOT peach! Definitely no frills or big sleeves)

  Age 26: First child – boy

  Age 28: Twins – one of each

  Age 30: Fourth child – girl

  (Update Age 22: 2 children. What was I thinking?! And might need to revise age due to engagement fail)

  Animals: A dog, 2 cats and a rabbit

  Home: Cottage in Old Town with sea views, garden, roses round the door – just like Auntie Kay’s

  Life: Will live happily ever after with husband who adores me just like Mum & Dad and have children who are funny, clever and beautiful. Will NOT be alone like Uncle Alan. Ever.

  I swear it took twenty minutes before Clare managed to finish reading it out loud – essential for maximum humiliation effect – because she was laughing so much.

  ‘My sides hurt,’ she said finally, wiping her eyes. ‘I don’t know what’s most funny – you writing it in the first place or you taking the time to update it in your twenties. In your twenties. And you called yourself a princess. In. Your. Twenties.’

  ‘It was an important document at the time.’ I folded my arms and glared at her. I meant it. Written shortly after I’d found Uncle Alan, my Life Plan had been deadly serious and was my way of avoiding ending up like him. I’d really believed it would happen. ‘And I’ll just point out that I was an emotional wreck after splitting up with Andy when I added to it. And very drunk. You know I wasn’t in a good place after it ended with him.’

  Clare nodded. ‘I remember. So, Sarah Louise Peterson, aged thirty-and-eight-days, what exactly have you achieved off your Life Plan?’

  ‘Two cats.’ I looked towards Kit and Kat curled up on the duvet. Tears pricked my eyes from the overwhelming disappointment of it all. ‘How useless am I?’ My voice caught in my throat.

  ‘Not useless,’ Clare said softly. ‘Sad? Yes. Pathetic? Yes. An eejit? Yes. But not useless.’

  ‘I think there’s a compliment in there. Somewhere.’ I smiled weakly.

  ‘There is.’

  We sat in silence for a while.

  ‘What if I never meet someone?’ I said eventually. What if I never get married and have kids?’

  ‘Then you don’t get married and have kids,’ she said, shrugging. ‘So what? You can’t force these things. Actually, you can, but you wouldn’t get your happily ever after. Would you rather be married to your man Jason right now with a gremlin on the way and be miserable, or would you rather be single again with the possibility that it may or may not happen?’

  ‘Neither. I’d rather be single than with Jason. Definitely no regrets there. But I don’t like the thought of that being the case for the rest of my life. I always wanted to marry and have a family.’

  ‘That’s pretty obvious from reading this.’ Clare rolled the scroll up again, put the ribbon round it and gently placed it back in the box. ‘I know you won’t want to hear this, but you need to get over this ridiculous obsession with getting married. It’s not the answer to life, the universe and everything you know.’

  ‘And you’d know that because you’ve been married how many times?’

  Clare closed the flaps on the box and pushed it aside. ‘None,’ she said, ‘as you well know. But that’s not the point. I know plenty of married people and, believe me, it’s not the happily ever after you seem to have built it up to be.’

  ‘It is for some.’

  ‘Like your parents? I think you’ll find they’re pretty unique. I know you see them as your role models and you want the same, but surely even you must realise that what they have is not the norm.’

  ‘Maybe not. But it shows that true love and true compatibility exists.’

  ‘For a very small minority
of people. For most people, marriage ends in divorce.’

  ‘Cynic.’

  ‘Realist. And if they don’t divorce, they trundle on with neither party making the other happy but not quite being miserable enough to call it quits. Don’t look at me like that. It’s a fact. And the very notion of having a written plan that says you must be married at a certain age… Really? Seriously, Sarah, if it happens it happens. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. Get used to it.’

  I sighed. ‘The thing is, I know I don’t need a man to fulfil some missing gap in my life but I want to meet someone special. I want the happily ever after.’

  ‘Need. Want. What’s the difference?’

  I thought for a moment. ‘Remember our last shopping trip. You didn’t need those expensive beige shoes but you wanted them, didn’t you?’

  ‘Beige shoes? I take it you’re referring to that stunning pair of nude Manolo Blahniks?’

  ‘Whatever. Shoes are shoes.’

  ‘Wash your mouth out.’

  ‘Do you see my point?’

  ‘I guess so. Although I still maintain I both wanted and needed those shoes.’

  ‘Of course you did. Because you only own two hundred pairs already.’ I twiddled with my ponytail. ‘There’s one other reason why I want to meet The One. As it says on the plan, I don’t want to end up like my Uncle Alan.’ What killed me about his death was that the autopsy revealed a massive hypo three days before I found him. Three days. Poor man. I tried not to think about how long he’d been on the floor, knowing he was dying, before taking his final breath. All alone. What a horrific way to go.

  ‘It’s tragic about your uncle. And I genuinely do get why that would—’

  Ding dong.

  Clare and I looked at each other.

  ‘You expecting someone?’ she asked.

  I shook my head and scrambled to my feet.

  ‘If it’s Mr Right, tell him his timing’s impeccable.’

  I flung open the door to find Elise on the doorstep a day ahead of schedule.