Starry Skies Over the Chocolate Pot Cafe

by Jessica Redland

  Always immaculately turned-out, Leanne made me her pet project. She taught me how to tame my frizzy curls into sleek waves, how to apply make-up and how to shave/wax/pluck. Over the years, we must have spent a phenomenal number of hours sitting at her dressing table or mine, preening ourselves. She regularly took me shopping, educating me in different designer labels and how to accessorise. I eagerly lapped it all up although it wasn’t because I was interested in handbags or shoes – it was because I loved spending time with Leanne and those were the things she seemed to enjoy.

  Thankfully our relationship wasn’t only about vanity. She occasionally took me to the cinema, the theatre or museums. Considering there was a seven-year age difference and she was therefore in a very different place to me physically and emotionally when I arrived on the scene, Leanne was exceptionally generous with her time.

  From the moment I moved in, Leanne had a constant swarm of devoted male followers round her, some of whom she introduced as gay friends, others as hetero friends. She always had a boyfriend in tow too and they were without exception gorgeous and rich, and usually much older than her. As far as I could tell, she never had her heart broken, always being the one to end the relationship.

  When I was sixteen, I returned to The Larches after my final school exam, expecting the house to be empty because Tim and Kirsten were at work. I was therefore surprised to find Leanne there, pacing up and down in the lounge. She was still officially living at home but spent most evenings staying over with her boyfriend or friends.

  I’d barely removed my school blazer before she told me she had a congratulations-on-finishing-your-exams gift for me, which she knew I was going to love. I remember looking round the room expectantly, but there were no gift bags or boxes.

  ‘It’s in your bedroom,’ she squealed, grabbing my hand and running upstairs with me.

  I had all sorts of thoughts running through my mind. Perhaps she’d had my room redecorated, or she’d bought me some new clothes. Pausing outside my bedroom door, she insisted on blindfolding me with a furry sleeping mask – essential for maximum impact. Then she opened the door, led me to the bed, and told me to put my hands out and touch my gift.

  I did as instructed and screamed as I touched something warm. Shoving the mask away from my eyes, I screamed again. There was a man lying on my bed. A very gorgeous but very shirtless man.

  ‘Hi, Tamara,’ he said, flashing me a sexy smile. ‘I’m Isaac.’

  ‘Hi,’ I muttered, backing away. I looked at Leanne, waiting for the punchline on a joke I didn’t understand. Why was there a half-naked man lying on my bed?

  She walked round to the other side of the bed, kneeled on it and ruffled his hair. ‘Isaac’s twenty-eight and he works out which I think is pretty obvious. He’s an actor and he’s just secured an amazing role. Your boyfriend.’

  ‘This is some sort of joke?’

  She raised one perfectly drawn eyebrow at me. ‘Do you see anyone laughing?’

  ‘Then I don’t understand.’

  ‘What’s there to understand, baby sister?’ she purred. ‘There’s a half-naked man on your bed and he’s going to play the part of your devoted boyfriend and teach you a few things that I can’t.’

  My heart started racing and I hardly dared ask the question. ‘What sort of things?’

  ‘All sorts of amazing, exciting things. But he’ll start with the basics. Like how to kiss, because I know you’ve got no experience in that yet, have you?’

  Colour flooded my cheeks. That was private stuff. And it wasn’t my fault. I’d been to an all-girls private school and I didn’t have any friends. I wasn’t bullied, but everyone knew I was a foster child and ‘not one of us’ so they avoided me and, if I’m honest, I avoided them too. I put my head down and I studied hard. There were occasional social gatherings with a local boys’ school, but I gave them a wide berth. When a school full of girls made me feel invisible, why would I want to add a school full of boys into the mix? So, at age sixteen, I’d never even kissed a boy.

  My gut reaction was to turn and run but I still couldn’t shake the feeling that this was a joke that I didn’t understand and that I’d look like an idiot if I fled.

  ‘Excuse us a moment, Isaac.’ Leanne ruffled his hair again, then returned to me, put her arm round my shoulders and led me onto the landing, closing my bedroom door behind her.

  ‘I thought you’d like my present,’ she said, her tone dripping with hurt. ‘Don’t you think he’s gorgeous?’

  ‘He is, but—’

  ‘But what? You want to get married and have children one day, yes?’

  ‘Yes, hopefully.’

  ‘And you’ve had how many boyfriends so far?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘And you’ve kissed how many boys?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ she said, dragging out the words for emphasis. ‘The thing is, kissing is very important in any relationship. If that’s not working, the relationship isn’t going to work. Imagine you meet the man of your dreams. You go on this amazing date and he leans in to give you a kiss goodnight, but you don’t know what you’re doing so it ends up being all awkward and slobbery. Do you think he’s going to ask you on another date?’

  I didn’t like her patronising tone but she had a point. ‘Probably not.’

  ‘Definitely not. So that gorgeous beast of a man is your temporary boyfriend – or playmate as I like to think of him – and he’s going to teach you all about kissing. And perhaps build up to a few other things. But no sex. He knows that’s strictly off limits. A little kissing can’t do any harm, though, can it?’

  I wasn’t sure. It was all new to me.

  ‘Can it?’ she prompted, poking me in the ribs.

  ‘I suppose not,’ I muttered.

  ‘You could sound a bit more grateful.’

  ‘I am. I think. It’s just that, when you said you’d got me a gift, this isn’t quite what I was expecting.’

  ‘Giving you what you expect would be boring. Life should be full of the unexpected. Life should be full of Isaacs. So are you ready to go back into your bedroom and play with your gift?’

  My cheeks flushed again. ‘I’ll speak to him.’

  ‘You’ll do more than that.’

  ‘Maybe one kiss?’

  She rolled her eyes at me then smiled and pulled me into a hug. ‘You’ll love it. I promise. Just relax and consider it the next part of your education. Your exams are finished and now you’re learning a far more important lesson. You’re learning about life.’

  Opening my bedroom door, I looked towards Isaac lying propped up on his arm, a gentle smile on his lips. An hour or so being taught how to kiss by a man who looked like he’d stepped out of a Hugo Boss advert was not going to be a great hardship. I looked up at Leanne. ‘Can he put his shirt back on?’

  ‘Of course he can.’ She clicked her fingers at him, making me wince. ‘Shirt. Now.’

  He did as he was told.

  ‘Would you mind sitting on the edge of the bed instead of lying on it?’ I asked him.

  Obediently, Isaac adjusted position and gave me a dazzling smile.

  Butterflies going crazy in my stomach, I swallowed hard, licked my dry lips and shuffled towards the bed, absolutely terrified.

  ‘Tell you what,’ Isaac said, standing up. ‘How about we pretend we’ve just been on a date? We’ve been to see a romantic film and I’ve walked you home. It’s been a brilliant evening and I’m about to kiss you goodnight.’

  ‘Okay.’

  I looked up into his dark eyes. ‘Close your eyes,’ he whispered, ‘and tilt your head back slightly. Relax your mouth.’

  Then, for the first time ever, I felt a man’s lips touch against mine.

  ‘That was just a gentle peck on the lips,’ Isaac said, ‘but now I’m going to kiss you properly. I want you to try and copy what I’m doing.’

  ‘Are you going to put your tongue in my mouth?’ I’d seen that on films and overheard girl
s at school talking about it. The very idea of someone else’s tongue in my mouth was repulsive.

  ‘Not this time,’ he said. ‘We’ll build up to that.’

  Clearly satisfied that I was taking my education seriously, Leanne left us to it before we kissed again. I definitely relaxed more, knowing we weren’t being watched. It never entered my head that she was filming me. Why would it? I trusted Leanne and never in a million years would I have expected her to be so manipulative and devious. Maybe if I’d not been the invisible foster kid at school, I’d have known that having a ‘playmate’ wasn’t normal, but I had no idea. No idea at all.

  After the initial awkwardness and discomfort, I started to enjoy my congratulations-on-finishing-your-exams gift. I started to enjoy it very, very much. Over the next six months or so, my ‘education’ with Isaac continued. We never went out together and he never came round when Kirsten and Tim were home. Roughly fortnightly, when The Larches was empty, Leanne would arrive with Isaac and brief us both on the ‘objectives’ for the lesson.

  I liked Isaac, but I didn’t fall for him. I suppose it’s hard to fall for someone when you know nothing about them. I’d always imagined the man I fell in love with would make me laugh, make me feel safe and be there for me no matter what, like Dad had been there for Mum. I imagined he’d be my lighthouse. While I could appreciate Isaac’s model good looks and his toned physique, I wasn’t shallow enough to be sucked in by appearance. For me, it absolutely was all about the personality and I had no idea who the real Isaac was. Leanne had been very clear that chit-chat was an unnecessary distraction from our objectives.

  The practical side of me knew that Isaac didn’t love me either but I liked the way he acted like he did. If he really was an actor, he was a good one. Every touch was so tender and he was so attentive to my needs. I once asked him what was in it for him, especially when there was no sex. He laughed and said, ‘If someone offered to pay you to do this every fortnight, wouldn’t you? Beats waiting tables or pulling pints.’ Of course. Money. If it wasn’t about sex, it had to be about money. If Leanne was paying him, I suspected she was paying him well.

  In the New Year, Leanne announced that Isaac wouldn’t be returning and introduced me to Dominic – yet another mature, toned, gorgeous man. My relationship with Isaac had been strictly clothes-on, or at least on my part. He’d taken his shirt off several times and I had to admit that it did feel good running my hand over his chest or down his bare back. Leanne made it clear that Dominic was going to take me to the next level but, again, no sex. My ‘objective’ was to learn how my body responded and reacted.

  I was in my second term at catering college by then and working several evenings in Vanilla Pod so I didn’t see Dominic as often as I’d seen Isaac. He was my ‘playmate’ for well over a year before I received my eighteenth birthday present – Mattia. My ‘objective’ for my time with Mattia was to learn what I needed to do to please a man.

  Leanne continued to educate me in her own way. She’d often remind me that my ‘playmates’ were our little secret and I must never let her parents know. Alarm bells probably should have sounded but they didn’t. Having a secret with my big sister made me feel really special. She’d eagerly lap up all the details about progress in my lessons and paint this beautiful image of the future where I’d meet the man of my dreams and have such a perfect life with him because I knew how to please him and knew how he could please me. I idolised my big sister so much that I never questioned any part of it. Since becoming part of her family, everything Leanne had done with me or for me had seemed to be in my best interests so there was no reason to believe that my ‘playmates’ weren’t a continuation of that care and attention.

  Turns out it was all about preparing me for Garth. Everything had been about him, from Leanne teaching me how to look and dress to everything my ‘playmates’ taught me to the rosy picture of how my happy future could look. Everything. I hadn’t a clue that my big sister was grooming me. Perhaps not in the true sense of the word but my ‘education’ was for one purpose and one purpose only – to prepare me for becoming Garth’s wife.

  Leanne always emphasised that my ‘playmates’ weren’t proper boyfriends so I should never romanticise them like that. They were teachers and I was to embrace the lessons, but if she or they got the slightest inkling that I’d developed romantic inclinations, they’d be replaced. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t attracted to all three of them and I’d be lying even more if I said I didn’t enjoy my lessons because I did. If school had been that much fun, I’d have achieved top grades in every subject. With hindsight, I suppose the pleasure element was another reason why I never questioned the set-up. Nobody was getting hurt, I was learning, I was enjoying learning, and there were plans in place to protect me if I got too involved. What was there to complain about?

  At Christmas, Leanne bought me the most stunning deep-blue evening dress. It had a fitted bodice with dropped straps resting above the elbows and a full-length flowing skirt with a split to the top of the left leg. Accompanying it were high strappy blue sandals and a matching clutch bag. Kirsten and Tim insisted I try it on and they hugged each other when I appeared at the top of the grand staircase. Kirsten shook her head, her eyes sparkling. ‘Our little girl is a grown woman now,’ she said. ‘You are an absolute vision in that.’

  I was a little shocked when I saw myself in the mirror. I’d never worn anything quite so grown up. My classmates had likely worn gowns like it at the graduation ball but I hadn’t attended, so an evening dress like that was a first for me.

  ‘When will I wear it?’ I asked.

  Leanne smiled at me. ‘Mum and Dad are letting us host a party here on New Year’s Eve while they’re away. The dress code is black tie and all eyes are going to be on you in that dress, my beautiful baby sister.’

  When we had some time alone later that evening, Leanne sidled up to me on the sofa. ‘If you love the dress, you’ll be beside yourself when you see your main present on New Year’s Eve.’

  ‘A new “playmate”?’ I whispered, already feeling excited at the prospect.

  ‘A million times better than that,’ she said, squeezing my hand. ‘You’re going to love me forever.’

  After Christmas, Tim whisked Kirsten away to Jamaica. Although Leanne had moved out by this point and was living with her boyfriend, Darryl, she moved back in to keep an eye on me and to prepare for the party. I’d once asked her if Darryl knew about my playmates but she swore he didn’t and I had no reason not to believe her.

  On the morning of New Year’s Eve, Leanne burst into my bedroom and plonked herself down on the edge of my bed. ‘Good morning, sleepyhead. Tonight’s the night,’ she gushed.

  I rubbed my eyes. ‘For the party?’

  ‘And for your gift. You can’t have it until tonight but do you want to know what it is?’

  I wriggled into a seated position. ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘It’s a real boyfriend. One you can tell people about. One you can go out on real dates with.’

  ‘You’ve picked me a boyfriend?’ I tried to keep my voice steady, not sure whether to be grateful or insulted that she’d not consulted me. Between long hours at work, family time, and my ‘playmates’, I’d never had any free time to properly date and I’d have liked the chance to pick my own boyfriend.

  ‘Thank you, Leanne,’ she snapped. ‘That’s so good of you, Leanne.’

  ‘Please don’t be like that,’ I said. ‘It was just a surprise. I assumed you and I would maybe go out to a bar together and I’d meet someone that way.’

  ‘Aw, Tamara, you are so sweet and innocent,’ she said, gently pushing a curl away from my eyes. ‘It doesn’t work like that. Men who pick up girls in bars are only after one thing and we have not spent the last two and a half years investing in your education only to have you jump into bed with the first man who buys you a drink.’ She stood up and wandered over to my window, sweeping open the curtains. ‘The man you’re going to meet tonight ha
s been handpicked for you by me and I know you’re going to fall in love with him instantly because he’s everything you’ve told me you’ve always dreamed of.’

  She returned to the bed and sat down again.

  ‘What’s his name?’ I asked, my interest definitely piqued.

  ‘His name’s Garth Tewkesbury. He’s a detective in the Met and on his way to his next big promotion.’

  ‘Wow! So how old is he?’

  ‘Forty.’

  My eyes widened. ‘Forty? That’s more than twice my age.’

  ‘So? Why would you waste time with a boy when you can have a man? Believe me, boys are stupid and pointless. Think about the staff at Vanilla Pod in their early twenties. They’re all idiots who spend their time out of work being loud and drunk, aren’t they? And the ones in their late twenties. And probably the ones in their thirties too.’

  She was right. I’d overheard so many conversations at the end of the shift about drunk nights out or their latest conquests and it all sounded so unappealing.

  ‘Tell me more about Garth,’ I said, settling back against my pillow.

  I was so nervous getting ready for the party that my hands were actually shaking. Leanne had to take over and do my make-up for me. All day she’d extolled Garth’s virtues and her enthusiasm for him was infectious. Back then, I was the eternal optimist. For me, if my big sister said she’d picked out the man of my dreams, then she’d done exactly that.

  Although I’d been quickly reassured that the age difference wasn’t a problem for me, it struck me that it could be for someone else.

  ‘Do you think your parents will mind the age gap?’ I asked Leanne as she styled my hair.

  ‘If it was a random forty-year-old, perhaps. But Garth is family.’

  I twisted round to face her. ‘He’s what?’ Garth Tewkesbury? The name didn’t ring any bells and I thought I’d met everyone in the Sanderson family over the years.

  ‘Turn back round so I can finish your hair.’