‘He’s not my type anyway,’ Lara said, glancing across at Betsy to see her stifling a grin.
‘Although nobody would be as bad as that last one you had,’ Fay said.
‘Lucien? Thanks for bringing him up again, Mum.’
‘I still can’t believe what he did to you. With your best friend too! Poor Siobhan…’
‘Poor nobody,’ Lara said shortly. ‘Siobhan knew exactly what she was doing. She was hardly an innocent led astray.’
‘Yes, but he was that sort – you could see it a mile off. I never expected it of her though. When I think of all the times she stayed at our house and I cooked for her—’
‘Mum,’ Lara said, a warning tone in her voice that said to drop the subject and drop it quick.
‘I knew he was shifty,’ Fay continued, ignorant to any kind of danger.
‘Perhaps you could have told me at the time then,’ Lara said.
‘I did!’ Fay said, sounding mortally offended. ‘I said I didn’t like him. He never could look me in the eye!’
‘Mum…’ Lara pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut. ‘Could we not talk about this now?’
‘Well, I suppose it’s good riddance that they’re getting married now, isn’t it?’
Lara opened her eyes, hoping to find that she’d been transported to another time and place in the second that they’d been closed. But there she was, still in the grand ballroom of a country estate, somewhere in Cheshire, being verbally tortured by an oblivious Fay. She held in an exasperated sigh.
‘And Mandy says to tell you how sorry she is for you. She says it must be heartbreaking to know that your friend and your—’
‘I don’t care about Lucien!’ Lara slapped the clipboard she was holding onto the nearest table. ‘I don’t care if they marry each other twenty times over! I don’t care if they televise it! I don’t care if the Queen is the guest of honour – they can do what they want, but I don’t want to talk about it!’
Fay threw a wounded look at her daughter, and then another at Betsy, which pleaded for some moral support.
‘I was only saying—’
‘Well don’t!’
Lara stalked off, heading for a set of French doors. They opened out onto a balcony that overlooked immaculate acres of Italian gardens. She let the doors close behind her and gripped the handrail, pulling in a lungful of fragrant afternoon air as she struggled to calm her temper.
‘A bit harsh, maybe?’
Betsy’s quiet voice came from behind her. Lara turned round.
‘I think you’re in the wrong career. Judging by how silently you’ve just followed me out here, perhaps you ought to be a spy.’
Betsy gave a sheepish smile. She didn’t know what to do or say, of course, suddenly finding herself in the middle of a family spat, and Lara wished now that she’d held her temper better. It wasn’t fair on Betsy to subject her to the scene she’d just witnessed and it wasn’t very professional either. Her gaze went beyond her apprentice to where her mum was inside, now industriously setting out the flowers on the tables.
‘I know she doesn’t mean it,’ Lara sighed. ‘I know that she’s offended by the things Lucien did on my behalf more than anything else. But it was a horrible time of my life and I just want to move on. I lost friends and a lot of dignity too, and I’m only just getting over all that. But I can’t because everywhere I turn someone is waiting to remind me.’
‘Did you love him a lot?’
‘I thought I did but now… I’m not so sure. I was hurt though, more than I’ve ever been hurt in my life. Imagine being slapped in the face as hard as you’ve ever been slapped, and then imagine that happening to your heart instead.’
Betsy looked confused, and Lara didn’t blame her. It was hard to explain to someone who’d never been subjected to that kind of pain and humiliation. And for Betsy’s sake, Lara hoped that she never would be in a position to understand.
‘Want me to go and get coffees from down the road?’ Betsy asked.
Lara gave her a fond smile. The world hadn’t yet dulled Betsy’s sparkle. She might have been confused and inexperienced, unable to empathise with Lara’s experiences, but she was still wise enough to know that Lara needed a moment alone with her mum to fix the hurt she’d caused hitting back at hurt she herself was feeling.
‘It’s not exactly down the road,’ she said.
‘Well, I know, but there is a Starbucks at the petrol station we passed a few miles back.’
‘You feel confident enough to drive it on your own?’
‘Oh yes, I’ve been driving loads since I passed my test; I’ll be fine.’
Lara nodded. ‘That does sound lovely.’
‘The usual?’ Betsy asked, turning to go back inside.
‘Yes please, and ask my mum what she wants before you go. There’s petty cash in the pocket of my satchel.’
Lara gave her a few minutes to get the money and go, and then took a deep breath before heading inside to offer a grovelling and entirely owed apology to her mum.
Four
The evening’s clients, Abbie and Matt, had employed her for the full wedding package, which meant that Lara was required to stay all day and into the evening, even after the reception had wound up and everyone had gone home. Besides making certain everything ran smoothly, she had to ensure that the wedding gifts were collected up and sent to the clients’ home and that rented equipment went back to the suppliers.
Full-package weddings, where Lara arranged everything from the very start right down to the tiniest little detail, were a mammoth undertaking, and Lara tried not to do too many at a time because they could take months, even years of involvement from her. In fact, she’d taken one on in her first month of business and twelve months later the big day had still yet to arrive. It wasn’t a case of resting on her laurels during that time either; there were regular checks to be made to ensure arrangements and bookings were still good and that the clients were still happy with what they had planned.
Many clients hired Lara simply to coordinate the actual day so that it was one less thing for them to worry about. All they had to do then was turn up and say ‘I do’, knowing that someone else would be worrying about where everyone sat in the church and whether the reception DJ stayed sober. In these cases, prior to Lara’s involvement, the couple (or other family members) would plan and book the event and then pass on the details to Lara. These sorts of bookings were far easier for her to enact, although a lot less lucrative. When Abbie and Matt had asked her to plan everything from scratch for them she’d almost turned the booking down because she was stretched as it was. But with them being so sweet and lovely, and with the timely arrival of Betsy, she’d eventually decided to take the job.
Tonight, as she hovered behind the scenes taking care of every little detail, she was glad she had. She’d sent Betsy home – the girl had worked a long-enough day as it was, and Lara was more than able to cope with whatever needed to be taken care of now. She kept a close eye on the party, but it hardly needed intervention from her because it was ticking over rather nicely all by itself. Drink flowed, food was enjoyed and old uncles embarrassed themselves on the dance floor to the sounds of seventies disco classics. Most wedding reception traditions were observed, including emotional speeches from friends and relatives and the happy couple, leading to the post-food debauchery when things would get less genteel and a lot more raucous.
It warmed her heart to see Abbie and Matt take to the floor for their first dance, and if nothing else bolstered her now often failing belief in true love, that did. She’d never seen a couple more connected, more at one. They seemed to lose everyone else in the room as they swayed to the music, lost in a universe where only they existed, where they didn’t need air or food or money, only each other. Maybe, Lara thought as she watched them, embracing so closely that they almost fused into the same person, Abbie’s dress fanning out behind her in a swirl of rustling ivory silk as Matt spun her round, maybe th
is is still out there somewhere, waiting for me to find it.
It hadn’t been that hard to smooth things over with her mum and Lara had waved her off, thankful for her help with the venue and equally thankful that they were on good terms. But it had been harder to forget Fay’s words, because, regardless of the intent, they’d hurt like hell. They’d cut like a rusting, careless old razor into Lara’s soul, her pride, everything that she was. She’d always believed in true love and, to some extent, she still did, but she’d never imagined it could be such a slippery customer. One thing she’d learned was that she hadn’t found it with Lucien and that was OK, but the experience with him had made her realise that it might be harder to recognise than she’d ever thought possible. How would she know? How could she be sure it was the real thing when it finally came her way?
In the end she’d been forced to put all her doubts and fears to one side. She had a job to do and lots of people relying on her to make this day perfect; she wasn’t going to let Lucien get in the way of that.
It was as she was collecting up the cards and gifts while the DJ packed up his equipment that Abbie and Matt came to speak to her. They looked radiant and desperately in love, their hands clasped tight together and their cheeks flushed. They were both a little tipsy too, but that was hardly surprising considering how many guests had pushed drinks into their hands throughout the evening.
‘We wanted to say thank you,’ Abbie said. ‘It’s been so perfect and it’s all down to you.’
‘It’s my job,’ Lara said cheerfully.
‘You do it brilliantly,’ Abbie insisted. And then, taking Lara so completely by surprise that she almost dropped the glass coffee pot she was holding, Abbie threw her arms around her in an enthusiastic hug. ‘You’re just the best!’
‘Thank you,’ Lara said, her light laugh edged with a tone of bemusement as Abbie let her go again and snapped back into Matt’s arms, where she seemed to fit as perfectly as a dovetail in a joint. She leaned her head into him and let out a sigh of contentment. ‘You still want all the gifts sending to your mum’s house, Abbie?’ Lara asked.
‘If that’s OK,’ Matt said. ‘We’ve still got boxes everywhere at our new place from moving in so there’s nowhere really to put all this until we’re organised. We’ll pick it all up when we’re a bit more straight.’
‘No problem,’ Lara said, brushing a lock of ash-coloured hair away from her face.
‘My friend’s getting married,’ Abbie said. ‘I’ve told her all about you – she really wants you to do her wedding too.’
‘That’s brilliant,’ Lara said. ‘I’ll wait to hear from her then.’
‘Chloe, her name is. She was here tonight but she had to go early so there wasn’t time to come and find you. I’ve given her your number. She’s done quite a lot of it herself so she won’t need everything like we did – is that OK?’
‘Of course it is,’ Lara said with a smile and a vague sense of relief that it sounded like a fairly straightforward job.
‘Taxi’s here!’ someone yelled, and both Abbie and Matt spun round to acknowledge a guest standing at the doors of the ballroom.
Matt turned back to Lara. ‘We have to go.’
‘Of course, don’t let me keep you. I’ll get all this stuff delivered first thing in the morning to the address you gave me.’
‘There’s a lot – will you be alright?’ Abbie asked, eyeing the gift pile doubtfully.
‘Of course I will – now stop worrying about me and get your taxi before it drives off!’
‘Thanks again,’ Abbie said, pulling Lara into another drunken hug. Matt merely grinned before leading his new wife away. Lara watched them go. They’d be alright, of that she was certain. As certain as she could be of anything, that was, which sometimes felt like not very much at all.
Five
At school, Lara had been taught a poem about a highwayman who’d fallen for a landlord’s daughter. Lara had thought it impossibly tragic, but also impossibly romantic as the lovelorn girl sacrificed herself to save the man she loved from the soldiers out looking to hang him. Perhaps that was where her romantic streak had first begun to manifest itself, a questionable (she sometimes reasoned) image of what true love ought to be. There was no way to tell really, but it had stuck with her, despite not having read it for many years. And one line of the poem in particular had stayed with her, something about the moon that night, a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas. Often, even as an adult, she’d look up on a bright summer’s night and see a generous moon buffeted by racing banks of cloud, and she’d think of that poem – that line – and the impassive beauty of a moon that would have looked on and not cared about the drama going on in the world below. To that moon, true love would have meant nothing.
Not that the drama was quite so epic tonight. There was the moon, round and bright, disappearing and reappearing through mountains of billowing cloud like a ship cleaving the waves. It was hardly making Lara feel romantic though. It had been a long day and, though Matt and Abbie’s wedding had wound up sometime after midnight, there had been plenty to do long after they’d left. It was Lara’s job to make sure everyone who still needed to be paid got paid, that no damage had been done to the venue, that all the gifts were accounted for and sent on, and a million other little tasks that she’d been employed to worry about so that Abbie and Matt didn’t have to.
Now, in the early hours of the following morning, all she wanted to do was crawl into bed. Instead, she was walking the streets and, as beautiful as they were in the pearly glow of the moon, it was the last place she wanted to be. She was chasing Fluffy, of course, which seemed to be a regular occurrence these days. Stupid Fluffy, she thought, and though she loved him dearly, that was what he was.
She hitched up her pyjama trousers. The elastic on this particular pair had given up the ghost months before but Lara was making them last. As long as she didn’t have to run anywhere in them, she reasoned, they were still perfectly serviceable. They’d go in the bin eventually, once the seat had worn through entirely and there was a severe risk of showing a full moon of her own, but not until then. Still, she’d known even as she ventured out in them that she was taking a risk, and she had to hope that luck was on her side. Despite the fact that she’d thrown an oversized sweatshirt over her top half, it would still be mortifying for any of her neighbours to catch her out looking like this – after all, she was a respected businessperson. At least, that was the image she worked hard to project. Sadly, these pyjama trousers betrayed the reality. Right now, Lara was less a respectable young professional with a perfectly ordered life and more a young woman who was one piece of pyjama elastic away from laughing stock.
At least the streets were likely to be deserted at this time, apart from the odd drunk rolling home from a night out or Selina, the neighbour Lara often saw on this street while she was out on her nocturnal cat rescues. She’d found out that Selina was a nurse who worked shifts and, if Lara bumped into her tonight, chances were that Selina was returning home from a long day at work herself. She was hardly going to have the energy to judge Lara’s tatty pyjamas.
There was a good reason why she was out in her bedclothes. It wasn’t until she’d been ready to turn in that she’d realised Fluffy hadn’t eaten the food she’d laid down for him that morning. A quick search of the house told her he wasn’t home either, which wasn’t really unusual in itself. However, when she’d thought about it properly, she realised she hadn’t seen him that morning when she’d left for work either. And, judging by his untouched food, he hadn’t been back at all that day, which was a longer absence than she’d like, even though she knew perfectly well that cats came and went as they pleased. He was a cat, but he was her cat, and she wanted to know that he was safe.
‘Fluffy!’ she hissed as she walked the street now, rattling a bag of his favourite cat treats. ‘Where are you? Come on out, you great stupid lump! I’ve got goodies!’
The street was silent and empty, illuminated in pocke
ts by old yellow street lights and the glow from the odd upstairs window. There was no sign of Fluffy and it was beginning to feel like a wild goose chase. Lara inwardly chastised herself for overreacting. Fluffy would come back in his own sweet time. She always ended up going out to look for him, seldom found him, and then he’d turn up a few hours later as if nothing had happened. Which, in his world, it hadn’t. He was certainly smarter than to fall for the old rattling pack of cat treats trick. Lara considered heading home to her bed, but she decided to call out one last time.
‘Fluffy! Come on!’
And then, from the corner of her eye, she spotted movement and she tracked it, expecting to see her wayward cat. Instead, she was startled to find herself looking at the biggest urban fox she’d ever seen. It was out in the light for a moment before slinking back into the shadows, and Lara’s blood ran a little cold. If Fluffy got into a scrap with something like that she didn’t fancy his chances. The sight only filled her with new resolve to find her stupid cat and take him home, whether he liked it or not.
‘Fluffy!’ she called again, daring to raise her voice a little now. ‘Where are you?’
‘You’ve lost someone too?’
Lara spun round at the sound of a man’s voice. She hadn’t heard footsteps, despite the quiet street, and all at once her senses were on red alert. No footsteps equalled stalking, which equalled danger. She hadn’t attended a jujitsu class since her teens, but everything she’d ever learned there flooded back now in a manic instant. Before she’d had time to fully process the situation, instinct had kicked in. Grabbing the man by the wrist, she twisted sharply and flung him to the floor.
‘What the—’ he gasped, clearly winded as he stared up at her. She stared back. Even she was a little shocked she still knew how to do that, especially now that she saw the size of him. He was no muscleman, but he nonetheless had the sort of build that made her flooring of him all the more impressive.
The Break Up: The perfect heartwarming romantic comedy Page 4