Heart in the Right Home

by Lisa Hill

  ‘Are you going to serve me or what? Some of us have got to get to work you know.’

  ‘Oh, sorry, Mr Leach,’ the words were tumbling out of her mouth quicker than Louise could think, ‘I thought you were retired these days.’ Mr Leach and his wife lived up in Rosefields, the little cul-de-sac of houses where the Hardwicke development was being proposed to lead off from.

  ‘Huh!’ Mr Leach said, gruffly. ‘Might not be paid work anymore but doesn’t mean I still don’t have places to be.’

  By which he meant the Clun St Mary Golf Club, Louise thought as she gave him a wry smile, whilst jumping up the step behind the shop counter.

  ‘Ah, there you are, Louise,’ a voice called, as Louise was ringing Mr Leach’s purchases through the till.

  Louise looked up to see Audrey Wiggins gliding towards her in a striped apron, patting down her neat, wavy bob as she neared the counter.

  ‘Sorry, Johnnie showed me how to use the till in the tearooms but not the till up here in the stores.’

  ‘Right,’ Louise said, pretending like she knew what was going on without a clue. Mr Leach made his contactless card payment and grabbed his shopping without as much as a good day, let alone a thank you. Louise took the next customer’s basket of shopping.

  ‘Anyway, I thought it best to wait for you, Johnnie said you’re usually down before eight. I’ll get back to preparing for the post school run rush.’

  Louise was about to ask what on earth was going on when Audrey quickly glided off again. Louise watched her lithe outline swiftly disappear and had to marvel that she hoped she was that agile in another forty years’ time.

  Even if she still didn’t have the foggiest about what was going on.

  Chapter Ten

  ‘Good morning, how can I help—’ Lottie stopped looking at her laptop, where she was pouring over grandiose properties for a client who was looking to relocate to Leeds. ‘—oh, it’s you,’ she said, returning to a rather ostentatious townhouse with a freestanding bath.

  Pamela looked startled. ‘Well, that’s no way to—’

  ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’ Lottie rolled her eyes and shut down her screen. She had been avoiding Pamela ever since Jack had announced their joyous news on Tuesday. There was a time last year when she’d taken up running just to avoid one of Pamela’s unannounced visits; at least she did have the bona fide reason of working these days.

  Not that that seemed to put Pamela off.

  ‘Emily, could you just keep an eye on Sales for ten minutes?’ Lottie hated asking but as their business was still in its infancy, she and Drew had decided that they should keep costs to a minimum with skeleton staff. Lottie usually worked out of the business hub, covering her relocation work alongside some property management but their sales negotiator, Toby, was out on a viewing, so she was covering the sales office which was shared with the lettings side of the business, represented by Emily, their lettings negotiator.

  ‘No problem.’ Emily smiled and went back to the list of registered clients she was phoning out to about a new rental.

  ‘Thanks, I’ll be ten minutes and I will return with coffee.’ Lottie winked and strode as fast as her limiting pencil skirt would allow her. She could hear Pamela’s little legs hurrying to keep up. ‘Quick coffee?’ Lottie asked, turning into the kitchen.

  ‘Oh, no, it doesn’t sound as if you have time and—’

  ‘I’ll make you an espresso,’ Lottie said, flicking the coffee machine on. Pamela rarely made an appearance at work. In fact, the last time she had specifically visited Lottie at work it had been during her separation from Drew when she had wanted Tom’s address in order to send him an invite, so she could have a celebrity at her housewarming. Lottie had a sense of dread that this was something equally as pressing, namely wedding invites, which was certainly going to require strong coffee.

  ‘Thanks.’ Pamela leant against the kitchen worktop. ‘How are you?’ she asked, looking around the narrow galley kitchen. It was a miniscule kitchenette really, but it was big enough for all the staff to use to make refreshments and lunch.

  ‘I’m good, thanks.’ Lottie hid her face, busying herself with the espressos, knowing what she was going to have to say next, whether she meant it or not.

  ‘Good. And Drew? Apart from the wedding last weekend, I don’t feel I’ve seen him in months.’

  ‘Workaholic, isn’t he?’ Lottie took the wand off the machine and dumped the ground coffee in the kitchen caddy. She handed Pamela her cup and saucer, biting her lip, knowing what she needed to say. ‘I hear congratulations are in order.’

  Pamela beamed. ‘Thanks,’ she said, taking her espresso. She took the spoon and started stirring the black coffee, sheepishly grinning but avoiding Lottie’s gaze. ‘I thought you might be angry,’ she said, continuing to concentrate on stirring.

  ‘Funny, Dad thought the same.’ Lottie returned to making her coffee, slamming the wand back onto the machine, conceding that perhaps she sounded it. ‘Why would I be angry?’ she asked over the noise of the machine whirring away.

  Pamela shrugged. ‘Well, I’ll be your step-mother on top of being your mother-in-law. I thought Drew might be cross too?’

  Lottie stopped the machine. ‘Why?’

  Pamela was still stirring her coffee. She stopped and finally looked up. ‘It’s not that long since I split up with his father.’

  Lottie rolled her eyes. In terms of being Edward’s number one fan, she certainly was not. In fact, they could almost be sworn enemies, she despised him that much. Last year he had tried his very best to drive a wedge between her and Drew and at one point it had felt as if he had succeeded.

  ‘Long overdue though, don’t you think?’ Lottie raised a quizzical eyebrow.

  Pamela’s look of concern made way for laughter. ‘Oh, Lottie, you are so right!’

  ‘I guess these things all happen for a reason,’ Lottie said, reminded of her conversation with James earlier this week. ‘If Edward hadn’t got involved with Rebecca, it might not have given you and Dad the courage to get together, and you’d still be stuck with him.’ That was good, that sounded how she hoped it would. Aid James’ cause if his plans worked out.

  It was not interfering.

  ‘I guess so,’ Pamela said, taking a sip of her coffee. ‘But Edward did choose to leave me. I’m not sure I would have found the courage to tell him I was leaving.’

  ‘Only because Dad forced his hand.’ Oops.

  ‘Lottie, he was having an affair!’

  ‘Hmmm, and you and Dad weren’t having an emotional affair?’ Shut up Lottie, shut up! This was not going to help James.

  Pamela bristled. ‘A friendship perhaps, but I wouldn’t say it was an emotional affair. Jack’s like you; he likes to interfere.’

  Lottie took a sip of her coffee to stop her from retaliating. The problem was it was true; she did like to interfere. Only when she knew certain individuals needed a generous nudge in the right direction. Like buying a house that would suit them down to the ground. Or getting your best friend together with her celebrity boss. Or finding your celebrity clients their dream home and inadvertently discovering the owner is your mother-in-law’s, very-much-not-dead mother, in fact, your grandmother-in-law.

  Fine. She was addicted to interfering. It was her calling in life, obviously.

  ‘Which is why I’m here, actually.’ Pamela set her cup and saucer down on the side. ‘I need your help.’

  Quelle surprise. ‘Oh?’

  ‘With our wedding.’

  Lottie set her cup down and took a deep breath. ‘Pamela, as flattering as that is—'

  ‘It’s regarding my sister, Jean. Do you remember her?’

  Remember her? It was hard to forget her; both her and her husband Mike were large enough to block out the sun. How Jean was related to Audrey and Pamela was beyond Lottie.

  ‘I do. It was at that particularly awkward meeting at Oak Acre, where, if I recall, your mother returned from the dead and you stormed off, a
ccusing me of interfering, again. Now you’re standing here asking me to help you do the same?’

  ‘Well, not exactly the same,’ Pamela blustered.

  ‘No?’ Lottie tried to supress the smile trying its hardest to appear across her face. It felt good, being assertive with Pamela. She’d only been practising for fifteen years.

  ‘Oh, Lottie!’ Pamela pushed her jacket sleeves up her arms as her bangles jangled angrily on her wrist.

  ‘I’ve heard all of this already from Audrey. How you want Jean at your wedding. She’s practically having kittens about it. Why don’t you talk to Jean yourself?’

  ‘Because she won’t listen to me! She thinks I’m just after Mum’s inheritance.’

  Lottie could see Jean’s point, what with Pamela turning up again after forty years absence, however, even after she’d divorced Edward, Pamela was likely to be a wealthy woman in her own right, much wealthier than Audrey, Jean and Mike put together.

  Looking at Pamela, with her pleading face, reminded her of James’ similar expression on Tuesday night; like mother like son. Still, perhaps this was the bargaining tool she needed.

  Not that she was interfering.

  ‘Okay, how about I think about it?’

  Pamela visibly relaxed. ‘Thank you, Lottie, I’d really appreciate that.’

  ‘I’m not promising you anything, but I will think about how a reconciliation could come about.’

  Pamela clasped her hands together. ‘Oh, thank you Lottie, I knew—’

  ‘But I want you to remember this. There might come a time in the future where I need you to return the favour.’

  ***

  To say it had been a morning of mixed emotions for Louise was an understatement. Intrigue and bewilderment of what the hell was Audrey doing working in the tearooms was clashing furiously with the growing frustration and anger that Johnnie had abandoned ship with no explanation, like he had almost purposely forgotten it was her birthday. All these feelings had been put aside whilst she’d dealt with the morning rush of shoppers but now it had quietened down, curiosity was getting the better of her. Not to mention fear over what was happening down in the tearooms with Audrey having been let loose.

  Quickly checking no-one was about to descend into the shop from the high street, Louise locked the till and scurried down to the back of the shop to see how Audrey was getting on. Remarkably well, it appeared. Mums were chatting, pensioners were engaged in conversation, pieces of cake dangling on forks mid-air as their conversations took precedent over eating, and Audrey was humming away to herself as she wiped down the serving counter.

  ‘Ah, Louise!’ she said, pausing, ‘there you are. I forgot to say earlier, happy birthday!’

  ‘Thank you,’ Louise said, trying to quell the feeling of irritation growing in her stomach that it was late morning and still Johnnie was nowhere to be seen. ‘Erm,’ Louise cleared her throat. A million questions were swirling around in her mind but how to start without revealing that Johnnie had made the decision to employ Audrey without consulting Louise? ‘How are you getting on?’

  ‘Oh, it’s wonderful!’ Audrey said, slamming her cloth down on the counter. ‘I feel alive again; I couldn’t quite believe it when Johnnie asked me!’

  ‘He asked you?’

  Audrey’s wide smile dropped, as she frowned. ‘Yes, he said it was a good time for me to learn the ropes seeing he’s going to be so busy with all this development protesting. I thought you knew?’

  ‘Knew what?’ Johnnie said, out of breath as he appeared through the French doors of the tearooms from the garden, a bumper size pack of toilet rolls under one arm and a pallet of serviettes in the other. ‘Happy birthday, darling,’ he added, leaning forward to kiss Louise on the cheek.

  She turned her face away. ‘Where’ve you been?

  ‘The wholesalers. Didn’t the girls tell you?’

  ‘Yes, but why did you have to leave so early? On my birthday.’

  ‘Oh, darling, don’t be like that! It’s a busy day; we were out of toilet rolls for the customer toilets—’

  ‘We sell toilet roll in the shop,’ Louise interrupted.

  ‘—that’s embossed; too expensive to put in the tearoom cloakrooms,’ Johnnie continued. ‘And, as I was saying, we’ve got the first VOCAB meeting tonight and so I needed to pop into the municipal offices in Harrogate and take a look at the plans for myself. Look,’ he said, putting down the consumables and taking his phone out of his back pocket, ‘I’ve taken some photos, I thought I could print off the drawings and—’

  ‘Johnnie, all those drawings are online!’

  Johnnie rolled his eyes. ‘Yes, but I can’t speak to a planning officer online can I? I managed to speak to the officer assigned to Hardwicke’s application, Martin Greening. He’s up for a meeting with the villagers so we can air our opinions and…’

  ‘You don’t know all the villager’s opinions.’

  ‘Well, we will when we’ve canvassed them all. We’re going to discuss it tonight.’

  ‘So, you’re still not coming out for dinner then?’

  Johnnie rolled his eyes as he dropped his phone into his back pocket. ‘Lou, we’ve been over this, you could change the meal to tomorrow night.

  ‘Fine.’ Louise managed to mutter, feeling anything but.

  ‘I’d better go and clear some tables,’ Audrey said, looking uncomfortable.

  ‘I’ll help you now I’m back,’ Johnnie said. ‘So, what do you think, Lou?’

  About what? Your abandonment of me on my birthday? The fact you hired an octogenarian without consulting me? The state of our marriage?

  ‘Hmm?’ Louise responded.

  ‘About Audrey coming to work for us!’ He put an arm around Audrey, his tall frame towering over tiny Audrey, making her look like a borrower.

  Louise nodded, still as confused as when she got up this morning. ‘Great,’ she said, more enthusiastically than she felt. She bit her tongue as the three of them stood there grinning inanely at each other. No, she couldn’t hold it any longer. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, Audrey mentioned to me that her and her late husband, Brian, used to run their own small holding. They had a little enterprise going in the outbuildings; she made cakes, chutneys, jams and sold them at local markets.’ ‘Oh, I loved it.’ Audrey clutched her hand to her chest and looked wistfully into the middle distance. ‘We had so many happy days working together after Brian retired. You must love working with Johnnie every day.’

  Once upon a time Louise must have felt like that but not at this moment in time. She was just about ready to throttle him. He was the one always bleating on about the fact they were a team, they made decisions together and yet here was Audrey, their latest member of staff without even discussing if they needed, let alone could afford, another pair of hands.

  ‘I thought it would help you out.’ Johnnie said, as if reading Louise’s mind. ‘If we get more wedding bookings then you’ll need time to focus on the catering for that and I’m going to be busy for the foreseeable future with VOCAB.’ He shrugged. ‘It makes sense, doesn’t it?’

  Louise looked at Audrey, smiling back at her, looking so grateful for what was obviously a second chance in life for her, suddenly rescued from the societal rubbish heap to live to see another day. She looked like a woman with a purpose and Louise could certainly identify with a need for that.

  She nodded. ‘Yes, it does. I shall look forward to working with you, Audrey.’ Even if I might have employed someone a little younger who could work at a faster pace, she silently added. Although, so far, Audrey had seemed quite agile so perhaps she would prove Louise wrong. ‘And on that note, we’d all better get back to work.’ There was already an orderly queue of customers forming in the shop.

  ‘Ah, not you,’ Johnnie said, moving towards Louise and taking an envelope from his jacket pocket. ‘It’s your birthday, you’ve done more than enough work for one day.’

  He handed her the envelope and she tentatively handled it in much
the same way she picked up Cerys stinky hockey kit from her bedroom floor. What was it with envelopes? Had she become that difficult to buy for that she needed to be given subscriptions and days out and… oh! She was just being emotional and ungrateful.

  ‘Go on then, open it,’ Johnnie said, encouragingly.

  Louise took out a voucher for a spa treatment at Clun Park, a luxury hotel on the outskirts of Clun St Mary. ‘Thank you,’ she said as enthusiastically as she could muster. ‘I haven’t had a spa treatment since before the girls were born.’ Because I hate them. It was utterly ungrateful, but it was true. She got precious little time off work as it was and when she did she liked to use it creatively, not sitting around in a dressing gown. The cake decorating course Cerys had given her was much more up her street. But Johnnie was being thoughtful by trying to give her some time off. However angry she felt about his abandonment of her this morning – and putting VOCAB aside – he had drafted Audrey in to give Louise a much-needed break.

  ‘I know, and I thought that seeing Audrey’s here, you could go this afternoon.’

  Louise pressed her lips into something resembling a smile. ‘Are you going to come with me?’

  ‘Oh, no sweetheart, we can’t leave Audrey here on her own.’

  ‘No, of course not.’ Louise said, turning the voucher over in her hands, silently fuming again, because it appeared Johnnie seemed intent on spending as little of her birthday with her as possible.