A Night In With Grace Kelly

by Lucy Holliday

  ‘Libby, what the actual fuck …?’

  ‘… then the bottom line is, I probably don’t have a financier any more. And I certainly don’t have a place to live any more.’

  ‘Oh, God. Oh, Libby.’

  ‘Nor?’ There’s a light knock at the door; it’s Olly, who opens it a fraction but doesn’t actually put his head round. ‘Sorry to interrupt, but Tash is making some snacks, and she wondered if you’d like her to bring up some Brazil nuts?’

  ‘It’s OK, Ol, you can come in.’ Nora somehow produces a huge muslin from somewhere – like all nursing mothers I’ve ever seen, she seems to have an inexhaustible supply of them, stashed in pockets and thrown over shoulders – and drapes it around herself so Olly can join us without older-brotherly embarrassment. ‘Tell Tash that’s sweet of her, but I’m fine. More importantly, tell Libby she can’t move to Stevenage!’

  Olly sticks his head properly round the door now.

  His cheeks are faintly pink, probably from a combination of the warmth in the kitchen below, and residual discomfort about the breast-feeding thing. It makes him look very young – rather like the fifteen-year-old Olly I first met, in fact – and my heart aches for him.

  ‘Why is Libby moving to Stevenage?’ he asks, with genuine bewilderment.

  ‘Oh, well, things haven’t worked out too well with Elvira Roberts-Hoare,’ I say, shooting Nora a look, ‘so she’s asked me to leave her flat …’

  ‘And insisted that you move to Stevenage?’

  ‘Olly, come on, there’s no need to look so horrified.’ I try to sound cheerful. ‘There’s absolutely nothing wrong with Stevenage! It has – er – pubs. A Nando’s. It’s jolly convenient for the M11.’

  ‘Do you need to be convenient for the M11?’ Olly asks.

  ‘Well, not the M11, specifically, no, but obviously the location is a major factor in selecting Stevenage,’ I say, trying to sound as if I’ve spent ages debating the pros and cons of various commuting towns before plumping for Stevenage, rather than the fact that it’s pretty much the only place within striking distance of London where I can afford to rent both work and living space.

  ‘Besides, plenty of people move out of London! It’s not the hub of the universe, you know!’

  ‘No, but it’s the hub of your universe. I mean, your family’s here.’ His cheeks grow even more pink, with indignation. ‘Your friends.’

  ‘Not all my friends! Nora isn’t in London.’

  ‘Yeah, because Stevenage is really convenient for Glasgow!’

  ‘It’s close to Luton Airport,’ I say. ‘Only half an hour, in fact.’

  ‘Has it occurred to you,’ Olly asks, heatedly, ‘that the real reason Stevenage is so well connected is because everyone else is doing their best to get out of it?’

  ‘Well, what do you suggest, then?’ I glare at him, completely forgetting that we really ought to be keeping the atmosphere in this room nice and peaceful and quiet, so that Clara can enjoy her feed. ‘I don’t know if I have anyone backing my business any more, Olly, and if that’s the case, I’m going to have to plough every penny I’ve got into fulfilling the orders I’ve got on my books. So am I supposed to rig the National Lottery? Dig around and find a spare ten grand in an old coat pocket that I can use to cover the next six months’ rent somewhere big enough in London?’

  Olly actually seems to be giving this some thought for a moment, then he takes a deep breath and says, ‘No, but you could come and stay here while you at least try to find a better option than Stevenage.’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Yes. Here. In this spare room. Which, obviously, I won’t charge you a penny to do.’ He’s talking rather fast, presumably because he’s thinking this through even as he says it aloud. ‘And then you could afford to rent somewhere else as studio space, right? Oh! Actually, there’s a converted warehouse I just saw the other day on the way to work, right on Kennington Road, that’s definitely got studio spaces to rent. Probably big enough to use for storing your furniture, too. You could give them a call and see what their rates are …’

  I’m staring at him.

  Nora is staring at him.

  ‘Olly,’ she says, after a moment, ‘are you sure it’s … I mean, I’m not saying it isn’t a good idea. But … the, er, the two of you haven’t flat-shared since that month or two when Libby first left drama school.’

  ‘It isn’t flat-sharing,’ Olly says. ‘It’s just a temporary solution. Just for a few weeks, Lib, or a couple of months, until some other solution presents itself. And what the hell has happened with Ben, by the way? Can he just pull his investment, just like that?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I begin, just as Tash appears in the doorway.

  She’s holding a tray with a glass of water and a dish of Brazil nuts.

  ‘Hey, guys, I just thought Nora might have wanted these … what’s going on?’

  There’s a very brief silence, which is filled, after a slight cough, by Olly.

  ‘I’m just suggesting that Libby come and stay with me for a while,’ he explains. ‘She’s being kicked out of her flat, and it makes sense to save the money.’ He clears his throat again. ‘Don’t you think it’s a good idea, Tash?’

  I’m unsure as to what Tash’s reaction is going to be, to be honest. Because even though she’s always the very epitome of jolly-hockey-sticks mucking-in, I was getting a distinctly chilly vibe from her just before Nora and the others got home earlier. Not, that is, the vibe of the sort of person who’s going to be all that thrilled about someone else – a specifically me someone else? – moving into her boyfriend’s flat while she’s hundreds of miles away in Glasgow.

  ‘And I was just saying—’ Nora begins, only to be interrupted by Tash.

  ‘That’s a really great idea! Spot on, Olly.’

  The pangs of guilt I always feel about having the slightest hint of a negative thought about Tash are turning, rapidly, from pangs into actual stabs.

  ‘You’ll be so comfortable here, Libby.’ She strides into the bedroom, a dressing-gown-wearing Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music all of a sudden, seizing the curtain fabric in her hands and assessing it, expertly. ‘These are decent enough, and the walls will be fine once they’ve had a lick of paint …’

  ‘Tash, no, I’d only be staying for a few weeks!’ I say. ‘There’s absolutely no need whatsoever to start redecorating!’

  ‘… and there’s a double bed, so you could even have – sorry, what’s your new boyfriend’s name again?’

  ‘You have … a new boyfriend?’ Olly asks me, looking even more startled than he did by the Stevenage suggestion. He meets my eye properly again. ‘You didn’t mention anyone to me the other night!’

  ‘He’s not my new boyfriend,’ I say, firmly, giving Tash a … no, actually, I don’t give her any kind of a look. She’s scaring me a little, for all her chirpy Maria von Trapp demeanour. ‘Nothing of the sort. He’s just … he’s just a guy I’m seeing. There’s no need,’ I add, ‘for anyone to be buying hats just yet. OK?’

  Nobody joins me in my (admittedly awkward) laughter.

  ‘You know. For weddings. People buy hats.’

  ‘Hang on: there’s going to be a wedding?’ Olly asks.

  ‘No.’ Tash sounds ever-so-slightly snappish with him, in stark contrast to the cloud of sheer fluffy loveliness she’s wafting over me. ‘Libby said there was no need for anyone to be buying a hat.’

  ‘Exactly,’ I say, firmly. ‘It’s only a second date.’

  ‘Only a second date,’ Tash repeats, before adding, equally firmly, ‘but still, we’re all crossing everything that it does work out for you, Libby! Aren’t we, guys?’

  Nora mumbles her assent. Olly opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something, but then closes it again just as Tash carries on.

  ‘And we can make this room a really nice place to bring him back to. Oh! I could even go shopping tomorrow, while Ol’s doing the lunch service at the restaurant, and get some lovely new fresh g
uest towels, maybe a new bedside lamp … or would it be more useful for me to come over to your flat and help you pack, Libby?’

  ‘That’s … that’s really nice of you, Tash.’ I glance over at Olly, who’s looking as if he might be regretting his offer of help, all of a sudden. ‘Look, Ol, if you’re honestly sure it’s OK, then it would actually be a massive help to stay here for a bit. Just while the dust settles, and I know what’s going to be happening with work. I mean, I do have a meeting with another jewellery company on Thursday, as it happens, so if the worst comes to the worst, maybe I’ll get a job there, or something—’

  ‘Libby, don’t stress.’ He reaches out a hand and puts it on one of my shoulders. I can feel my skin tingling, even though his touch is through a layer of T-shirt and another layer of cardigan. ‘It’ll all work out. And you know you can stay here—’

  ‘… as long as you like!’ finishes Tash, putting a matey arm around my other shoulder and giving me a squeeze. ‘Tell her, Olly! What’s that phrase – mi casa e su casa? Well, your casa is Libby’s casa, isn’t that right?’

  ‘Honestly, there’s no need to go that far,’ I begin, rather awkwardly. ‘I’m not going to claim squatter’s rights, or anything!’

  ‘Oh, we wouldn’t even mind that, would we, Olly?’ Tash sings. ‘Libby squatting, that is.’

  ‘Well, I’m sure it won’t come to that.’ Olly is turning rather pink. ‘But my place is always open to … to my friends.’

  At this moment, Clara, from somewhere beneath the giant muslin, lets out a loud and very satisfied burp.

  ‘That’s her last word on the subject, then,’ Nora says, with a grin.

  ‘Then it really is settled!’ Tash heads for the door. ‘I’d better go and get dressed. Drinks in the kitchen in ten minutes, everyone!’

  ‘Yeah, I’m going to go and make a few bruschetta-ish bits and bobs.’ Olly turns back, for a moment, after Tash has left the room and headed for his bedroom to get dressed. ‘I’m really glad you’re doing this, Lib. I mean, I’m glad I can help out.’

  ‘Me too. Thanks so much, Olly. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.’

  His eyes fix, briefly, onto mine. ‘Anything for you,’ he says. ‘I mean, you do know that. Don’t you?’

  ‘I do.’ Then, because this all sounds oddly intense (and, therefore, a little bit like the kind of “I do” I might have said if we were standing at an altar right now instead of in Olly’s spare bedroom) I add, perkily, ‘A friend in need is a friend indeed, right?’

  Olly pulls a strange kind of smile and then rather quickly pulls the door shut behind him.

  When I glance round, Nora is pulling silly faces at Clara before holding her out in my direction.

  ‘Can you take her for a sec, Lib?’ she asks.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes, Libby, I’m sure. She won’t freak out or anything.’

  ‘No, but I might.’ But I’m still eager to take the warm little bundle that Nora hands over to me, even if I’m terrified I might drop her, or squash her, or otherwise alienate her in some way. ‘Hello, gorgeous,’ I say to her, while she gazes in a curious manner up at my face. ‘Remember me? I’m your Auntie Libby.’

  ‘So, are you going to be OK with this arrangement?’ Nora asks, as she gets off the bed and starts buttoning up her top. ‘Staying here, I mean.’

  ‘Of course I’m OK with it.’ I tap the tip of my little finger on Clara’s nose, to see if I can make her laugh, but she stays resolutely serious – almost ministerial, in fact. ‘It’s a hell of a lot more enticing than moving to Stevenage.’

  ‘No, I agree. Obviously it makes sense. I mean, Olly’s almost never home, anyway, so you won’t find it … you know … uncomfortable.’

  ‘Nora!’ I lower my voice to a hiss. ‘Bloody hell! I am able to control myself around him, you know. I’m not going to be sneaking into the bathroom while he has his shower in the morning and pulling back the curtain.’

  ‘Please, Lib. That’s such a gross image,’ Nora says, queasily. ‘This is my brother we’re talking about.’

  ‘So don’t bring up … that old stuff in the first place! Besides, I’m moving on, can’t you tell?’

  ‘With hot personal trainer guy?’

  ‘Yes. I mean, for the time being. I’m not saying he’s … well, he’s not some replacement soulmate, or anything …’

  ‘Oh, Libby.’

  ‘But honestly, who even needs that? I mean, you know what they say. Life is far too short to squander one’s best years bemoaning the loss of one’s soulmate.’

  ‘One’s?’ Nora looks a bit confused. ‘Are you OK, Lib? You’re talking weirdly.’

  ‘I’m fine. I’m just,’ I go on, trying to summon up a bit of Grace Kelly’s steely determination, even if I don’t really feel it, ‘trying to explain that it’s going to be perfectly fine for me to stay here – with Olly – for a bit. Because … well, I’m moving on. Getting right back on the horse. I thought,’ I add, rather desperately, ‘that you’d be pleased to hear that?’

  ‘Oh, I am. I am, Libby. I mean, it’s great. You sound like a new person.’

  ‘Well. You know. I’ve been doing some thinking about it.’

  ‘Then good for you!’

  But she still sounds, however hard she’s trying to disguise this, incredibly sad.

  Which, I have to say, isn’t a huge help. I know she probably has secret yearnings that I might still get together with Olly, and that I’d get my big happy ending the way she has. But if I’m managing – just – to move on, then she’s going to have to as well.

  ‘Let me take her back,’ she goes on, as Clara suddenly wriggles and pretty much jack-knifes herself out of my grasp, as soon as Nora’s within clutching distance. ‘Come here, Mummy’s girl,’ she tells Clara. ‘Come back for a cuddle.’

  Clara reaches up one of her soft, pudgy, squishy little hands, places it square on Nora’s cheek, and lets out the most perfect peal of delighted laughter you’ve ever heard in your life.

  I feel as if someone has just snuck into the bedroom and punched me, hard, right in the gut.

  I actually have to sit down, quite suddenly, on the edge of the bed.

  ‘Lib? Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ I croak, thankful that Nora is indeed an A&E doctor, just in case I start finding myself actually unable to breathe in the next couple of minutes, or anything. ‘Just … you’re really lucky, Nora,’ I go on, in a big rush. ‘She’s so wonderful. She loves you so much.’

  ‘I know.’ Nora’s voice softens to the consistency of whipped double cream as she gazes back at Clara. For a moment, I can tell, it’s just the two of them in the room. ‘I’m luckier than anyone deserves to be.’

  I don’t say anything. I watch them as they exist in their glorious little bubble for a moment or two.

  ‘Sorry,’ Nora says, tearing her eyes off Clara, and back to me. ‘We were just talking about—’

  ‘You know what, Nor? Let’s have this conversation another time.’ I get to my feet and slip an arm round her narrow shoulders. ‘I only have one night of you and Clara, and the last thing I want to do is waste it wittering on about this old stuff. Now, tell me more about where you’re going with Mark. It’s the South of France, right? A hotel by the sea …?’

  We head for the kitchen, from where familiar Olly-led scents of warm toast and frying garlic are emanating.

  Pressley/Waters’ offices are a little north of Paddington Station, in a swanky (albeit rather soulless) new development that overlooks the Regent’s Canal. It’s only about a fifteen-minute walk from where Cass lives, in Maida Vale, which is why I suggested – when she called me first thing this morning for a long, Zoltan-related moan – that she head here for a coffee after my meeting, so she can moan at me in person instead.

  Though actually, seeing as Bogdan has unexpectedly accompanied me to Paddington, I might just suggest that he meets up with Cass while I’m in with Pressley/Waters, and then – you n
ever know – the two of them might be having such a good bitch about their mutual loathing for Bulgarians that they don’t even need me around afterwards, and I can head back to Notting Hill to make a proper start on my packing instead.

  Which I really need to do, because Elvira texted, not long after I left Olly’s last night, reminding me once more that she wants me out of her flat by the end of this week. So, in not-very-surprising news, she’s sticking to her guns. She obviously hasn’t discovered an inner fluffy bunny since I last saw her.

  Oh, and that Ben is ‘currently travelling’ but that he’ll be in touch ‘to discuss how best to proceed’ when he gets back.

  Which sounds, let’s face it, ominous.

  It’s why I’ve been really glad of Bogdan’s presence this morning, even if I know the main reason he’s here is because he’s feeling so guilty about the whole Aunt Vanya thing that right now he’d accompany me to the moon and back if I said I was popping up there to get a few lunar bits and bobs. He’s actually managed to keep me pretty calm. And, more to the point, distracted, because when he’s not giving me a blow-by-blow account of everything that happened when he dropped Dillon off at the Grove House clinic yesterday morning (and I mean everything, from the forms they had to fill in at reception to the colour of the bedroom walls), he’s been constantly restyling me so that I look my best for ‘big make-break interview.’

  This being Bogdan, of course, he hasn’t managed a completely perfect record in keeping me calm.

  ‘For the third time,’ I say, as we get off the Tube and walk in the direction of the Regent’s Canal development, ‘this isn’t a make-or-break meeting! And, even if it is, it really doesn’t help for you to call it that!’

  ‘Am apologies. Am all confidence though, Libby. Am being certain that you will knock them out in the park.’

  ‘Knock it out of the park,’ I correct him, although – let’s be honest here – with all the disasters that keep befalling me, lately, it’s very far from impossible that I somehow would end up knocking out either Caroline Pressley or Annika Waters in a park somewhere. ‘But thank you, Bogdan. And thanks for coming with me. I really appreciate it.’