“You will miss me?”
She tried to backtrack. “I might do,” she teased, thinking back to his arrival not even a month before. “I wish we hadn’t wasted time battling over your plans for the gelateria.”
He laughed. “We have made up now, mostly.”
They continued to walk in silence for a bit.
Sacha stopped when they reached a bench. “Shall we sit for a moment?”
He sat next to her. “I have enjoyed getting to know you, Sacha,” he said, leaning forward and kissing her.
Sacha leapt to her feet. “Stop it,” she shouted, taken aback by the harshness of her words.
Alessandro’s mouth fell open. “Sacha,” he took hold of her hand. “What have I done?”
“You shouldn’t keep kissing me,” she snapped pulling her hand from his and walking on to the nearby vantage point.
He came up behind her. “I’m sorry. I misjudged the moment.”
Embarrassed by her over-reaction, she forced a smile. “Look, it’s fine. Let’s go back to the car. I think I misjudged the time it took us to walk here,” she said, when he opened his mouth to say something further. “Look, the sun is going to set very soon.”
Without waiting for him to agree, she marched off along the pathway, swallowing the lump forming in her throat, desperate not to give in to the misery that was threatening to overwhelm her. Why was she in love with him, of all people? She heard him catch up to her.
“Sacha,” he said, his voice strained. “Please slow down, the pathway is narrow and uneven and you should be careful not to fall.”
He was right. Her toe had only just healed and the last thing she needed was to damage herself again, especially when there was so much she needed to do.
“Why don’t you go ahead,” she said, stopping to let him pass. “Then at least if I trip I can grab hold of you to break my fall.” She knew she was wasting her time trying to make light of the moment, but she felt compelled to try.
He walked ahead of her in the direction of the road. The view in front and to the side of her was stunning, but not quite as attractive as his rear view. From his broad shoulders to his narrow waist and tight bottom, it was all rather gorgeous. She couldn’t help staring at his firm bottom, encased in faded jeans, and sighed. Why was life so unfair, sometimes?
Alessandro suddenly stopped and turned sideways to look at her. “You should walk in front of me,” he said. “It is getting darker now the sun has almost set and I would rather walk behind you.”
She was about to tell him that she was more than capable of looking after herself, but didn’t wish to antagonise him further. It wasn’t his fault he’d been in love with someone before they’d even met, and she’d already given him a difficult enough time. She did as he asked.
As they walked, her mood dipped further. Sacha thought back to how content she’d been before meeting Alessandro, and wondered briefly whether life would have been easier if she hadn’t met him in Rome.
“Everything is done, I think,” he said, as they concentrated on the rugged stony pathway. It took her a moment to understand what he was talking about. “The stallholders have booked their spots along the boardwalk. Bella, she tells me a friend has arranged for a small band to play. The actor is coming to open the event and I think all we need to do is put up tables for the stalls, hang up the, um…”
She tried to picture what he meant. “Bunting?”
“A strange word. Yes, that must be put up, but it has been collected by some ladies in the village.”
“The WI?”
“Yes, I think that is what they said. Now we only need to be sure we have enough supplies for our businesses so that we don’t run out if many people come along.”
They reached the road.
“Look,” he said pointing out to the rolling waves. “Is very beautiful, calming. I wish I didn’t have to leave you.”
They stared silently out to the sea in front of them. She tried to imprint the smell of his clean skin into her brain, so that she wouldn’t ever forget it. She couldn’t help wondering how good they could have been as a couple. She would miss him more than he knew, even more than she’d realised until he’d told her for certain that he would be leaving.
He put his arm around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. “I will miss you very much, Sacha,” he said. “My beautiful friend.”
There it was again. His friend. “Come along,” she said. “It’s getting too dark to be out here.”
Chapter Thirteen
Sacha parked the car. It had been an awkward drive back with both of them deep in thought. They walked along the boardwalk, stopping in front of the café. The smell from a nearby beach barbecue filled the warm summer evening. Alessandro looked around before bending down to kiss Sacha’s cheeks. She wished the place wasn’t so busy, but on perfect evenings like this one, they always were. She thought ahead to the grey days only a few months away and how she wouldn’t be able to share them with Alessandro.
“Are you angry with me for kissing you?” he asked quietly, after looking around to check that no one could overhear him.
“No,” she said miserably. “If the circumstances were different, I’d be happy for you to kiss me again,” she said, forgetting her embarrassment for a moment and being honest with him about her feelings.
“Hi, Sis,” Jack said, as he walked out of the café. “Have a fun afternoon?”
Sacha stepped back from Alessandro and cleared her throat. She wasn’t sure if she was grateful for Jack’s interruption or irritated by it and decided in this instance it was the former.
“It was fun,” she said. “Right, I’d better go. I’ll see you sometime tomorrow, no doubt,”
He frowned. “We need to be up early to begin—” His words were cut off by a sudden commotion as Jack returned to the café just as people came outside carrying tables, chairs and filled bags. It was as if someone had sounded an alarm Sacha and Alessandro couldn’t hear.
“What the hell?” She looked around and gasped when her café door sprung open and Jack’s excited chatter could be heard coming from inside. She followed his voice. “What’s going on?”
“I was about to tell you, but you were acting a little weird.”
“Jack?” She narrowed her eyes at him, hoping he would shut up and tell her what was happening.
He widened his eyes and gave Alessandro a sympathetic glance. “Lexi phoned earlier. There’s a reporter coming to interview George Newton first thing tomorrow, so we’re getting ready.”
“That’s brilliant.” A bubble of excitement built up in Sacha’s stomach. It was a relief to have something other than her relationship with Alessandro to focus on. “What about an interview with the Gazette?”
Jack moved the table slightly. “A journalist spoke to him up at the cottage,” he said, standing back and checking it was in the right place before moving it a little to the left. “They were delighted when Aunt Rosie tipped them off that George was here. He agreed to discuss his latest film project, as long as they mentioned the fête.”
“When will it be published?”
Jack laughed. “That was Aunt Rosie’s other bargaining point. They had to publish it in tomorrow’s edition. It’ll be out around 11 a.m.”
“So, there’ll be plenty of time for people to read it and come along.”
“Grab the end of this,” Jack said, pointing to the long trestle table she hadn’t noticed behind him. He must have collected it from their parent’s home. “Finn is getting stuff together at your place,” he said to Alessandro. It was his cue to leave and he took it.
“I’ll go and help him,” he said, giving Sacha a fleeting smile before hurrying off in the direction of his gelateria.
“You really are away with the fairies, aren’t you?” Jack gave her an affectionate smile. “You knew the fête was tomorrow, when did you think we were going to do this?”
She had no idea. Her mind had been filled with so many conflicting emotion
s, she’d somehow lost track of what was happening with the fête.
“Stop being so bossy,” Sacha said, lifting the end of the table and walking backwards out to the boardwalk.
Her sadness at Alessandro’s news about his departure lessened as the excitement of everyone on the boardwalk became infectious. Sacha couldn’t help smiling as she noticed Bella holding a ladder for Lexi who was tying the end of a string of bunting to one of the lampposts. She waved at Jools, delighted to see her back from her holiday in Ireland. Finn was pointing up at the shutters on one of the houses and explaining something to her, but she seemed more interested in looking at him, rather than listening to what he was saying. Even the two elderly statesmen that met in her café several times a week, to argue over local politics, were putting up a temporary pergola at the other end of the row of stalls. Betty was nearby, leaning on her walking stick and giving directions.
“Everyone’s so organised,” she said when they’d placed their table opposite their café window.
They walked back to collect a small row of bunting to hang across the front of their table.
“We all knew what jobs we had to do,” Jack said.
Sacha looked around. The buzz was building and she finally believed that they could make the event the success it needed to be. “It’s exciting, isn’t it?”
He nodded and pointed to Mrs Joliff, setting up a stall opposite one of the cottages. “Mrs Joliff is selling Jersey Wonders, which she and Betty will be making. The next one along is selling salted caramel and chocolate smoothies. That one there,” he pointed to the next stall being set up. “will be bringing veggies from their farm and there’s another one further along selling produce from several allotments in Gorey.”
Sacha’s heart swelled with pride that they’d managed to pull this together at such short notice. “I just hope we end up raising enough money,” she said, wondering if she should approach Betty to find out more about the Occupation and her part in it. She didn’t want to risk upsetting her before the fête, so decided that if she didn’t manage to speak to her parents about it then she’d approach Betty cautiously afterwards. “At least the weather forecast is good,” she said, aware Jack was waiting for her to say something.
“We’re taking it in turns to keep an eye on the stalls overnight,” he said. “Just in case our mysterious artist, decided to pop down here and change things. One of us one end and another at the other end, so no chancers coming across this set up will be able to take advantage and mess everything up.”
“I can help, if you need me to,” she said.
“You can, if you like, but I thought you’d want to make up extra batches of smoothies for our stall.” Jack began erecting the makeshift pergola. “What’s he doing down there?”
She looked in the direction Jack was indicating and spotted two women chatting excitedly with Alessandro outside his gelateria. One handed him a notepad and pen and Sacha watched, wondering what he could be writing down for them.
“I’ve no idea,” she said, as Alessandro continued to speak with the two excitable young women. He couldn’t be giving directions. He barely knew his way around. He looked rather awkward but still beamed at their cameras as each took turns standing next to him for selfies. It dawned on Sacha that the girls must have recognised Alessandro from his modelling days.
She turned to help Jack with one side of the pergola when Alessandro waved goodbye to the women and looked in their direction. She didn’t want him to think she was spying on him, but was intrigued.
She peeked up through her lashes to see him going back inside the gelateria.
“Anyone would think they’d mistaken him for a pop star, or something,” Jack laughed.
“Oh yes, did you know, he used to be a model?”
“So, he’s gone from posing for a living, to digging holes?”
“I wouldn’t put it quite that way,” Sacha said, wondering if her brother and Alessandro would ever be friends.
It took a few hours but by ten in the evening everything that their neighbours could set up was completed. Sacha returned to her café and made some smoothies. She usually made them as customers waited, but needed some stock made up and refrigerated, ready for the following day.
She fell into bed just after midnight, tired but satisfied that they’d done everything they could.
A commotion outside her bedroom window woke her. She rubbed her eyes to try and come around and realised it was daylight. Had she overslept? She squinted at her bedside clock. Nine-thirty! She’d never slept this late. She leapt out of bed and pulled the curtains open, peering down in the direction of voices below.
A camera crew was there, filming George Newton. She scanned the people congregating round the interviewer as she spoke to the actor, but couldn’t see her aunt. Running through to her bathroom, she quickly showered and dressed, wetting her hairbrush to dampen down her bed hair before hurrying down to the café.
“Good morning,” Lucy said, smiling as she placed two plates of toasted cabbage loaf down in front of the fisherman and his daughter. “Jack asked me to wake you about an hour ago but I’ve been too busy to leave the café, I hope that’s okay?”
Sacha frowned. She couldn’t argue, but couldn’t imagine not having a moment to run up the stairs to bang on her bedroom door. “It’s fine. Um, Lucy, can I have a quick word?” she said, lowering her voice so the customers couldn’t hear her as she led the young girl through to the kitchen.
“Is it something I’ve done?” Lucy’s eyes widened.
“No, but I’ve been meaning to have a quiet word with you.” Sacha reached out and patted her forearm. “Don’t worry, I only wanted to check that everything is alright. You know you can always confide in me if you need to?”
Lucy stared at the floor for a few seconds. “No, I’m fine. Thank you.”
“If you’re certain?” she asked, aware that she needed to get outside. Lucy nodded. “Can you manage here for a bit longer?”
“I’m fine. Milo’s here.”
Sacha didn’t bother to ask why Lucy hadn’t asked Milo to keep an eye on the café while she came to wake her - after all, she’d been the one to oversleep, not the other way around. “Thanks for looking after things,” she said. “I’m not sure why I didn’t wake at the usual time.”
She ran out of the café and hurried to join the others to watch George being interviewed. He was dressed smartly in a two-piece suit, holding forth about his upcoming role as a spy in a new film. He looked so well-groomed that his appearance seemed slightly at odds with the casually turned out people grouped around him. As he answered questions, she scanned the boardwalk to check if everything was still in place from the night before. She spotted Mrs Joliff and Betty arranging napkins and plates on their stall, and another stallholder unpacking a box of jars of Jersey Black Butter, which reminded her that she was running low and must buy a couple of jars for the café.
“He’s so hot,” said a female voice.
Sacha looked over, expecting the girl to be referring to George but was surprised to notice that she was looking the other way. Following her line of vision, she spotted Alessandro chatting to Bella near her cottage.
“Go and ask him for his autograph,” one of the girls said to the other.
She nudged her friend, saying,” No, you go. I pointed him out to you.”
They giggled and whispered something to each other. “Fine,” said the taller of the two. “We’ll both go.”
Sacha watched them run over to Alessandro and start chatting to him. By the look on Bella’s face, she wasn’t pleased to have her conversation interrupted and went back into her cottage.
Alessandro spotted her as one of the girls took a photo of him with her friend. He smiled at her and she nodded her acknowledgement before turning back to George who was wrapping up the interview. As soon as it was over, she went over to him.
“Thanks very much, George,” she said. “We really appreciate your help. I’m sure you must have
lots of people vying for your attention and it can’t be easy finding time for yourself.”
“It’s fine,” he said, putting his arm around her shoulders and walking with her towards the café. “I’m happy to do anything to help a good cause and when Rosie told me about Betty I thought it was the least I could do.”
“Can I offer you breakfast at the café?”
“That would be wonderful. I’ve been meaning to come down here to sample some of your food but haven’t had the time to actually do so.”
Sacha led him inside, and the buzz of chatter died away. Sacha guessed it must happen whenever George Newton made an appearance, and felt a bit sorry for him. She spotted a couple paying at the counter and showed him to the table they’d vacated.
“If you sit here I’ll ask Milo to clear the table. I’ll be back to join you in a few seconds.”
She hurried to the kitchen “Milo, can you clear that table over there,” she said. “It’s George Newton. I don’t want to leave him on his own, or people will start pestering him.”
Returning to the table she handed George a menu and sat opposite him. He read it and placed it down on the table, smiling as he looked around the café.
Milo came over to take their order, notepad and pen in hand, calm and relaxed, unlike the customers who were craning their necks to get a good look at the handsome actor.
“I’ll have the fried eggs on toasted cabbage loaf,” George said. “With a mixed fruit smoothie.”
“Me too,” Sacha said. “Thanks, Milo.”
“I love any place that serves toasted cabbage loaf, you just can’t beat it.”
“Untoasted?” she teased.
George laughed. “Maybe.” He smiled at one or two people. “I love this place,” he said. “I used to come here when I was a teenager.” He thought for a moment. “In fact, I think this was where I had my first holiday job. Yes, it was.”
Sacha tried to imagine a teenage George serving in the café. “I can imagine it was full of teenagers on the days you worked here,” she laughed.
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