The Little Shop of Afternoon Delights

by Sarah Lefebve

  “In that case how come you went to his first night?”

  Maggie briskly closed the fridge door. “I’m out of milk,” she said, avoiding the question. “I’ll run down to the shop and get some. Wait here.”

  Layla pointed to her bandaged ankle and made a face. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  Maggie grabbed some small change and took her coat from a peg in the hall. “I’ll be back in ten minutes,” she shouted.

  “Good. Cos I’m not leaving until I get some answers!”

  The cottage door banged closed.

  A white-painted wood gate swung on creaking hinges in the breeze. Alex marched to the glossy blue front door and reached for the brass knocker. Overhead a seagull screeched. It settled on the chimney pot as if it had come to watch the show. He inhaled a lungful of fresh sea air. Here goes. He gave a sharp rat-a-tat-tat. The garden in front of the cottage was a riot of color. Orange and yellow nasturtium flowers, their trumpets peeking out from between flat, circular green leaves, clambered and tumbled over the low, whitewashed wall. A window box and a couple of terracotta pots by the front door contained red geraniums, poised to defy the winter weather.

  Alex hooked his sunglasses into his top pocket. The snooty voice on his satnav had been taking him around in circles for what seemed like hours. The high Cornish hedges didn’t help. Finally he’d arrived and there was no answer. Maybe she’d gone back to London. Damn!

  Hamlet had been playing to packed houses for four weeks. Maggie had been right about everything. The Jago factor was attracting new audiences to Shakespeare. It hadn’t taken him long to realize that as well as angsting on stage as the Prince of Denmark, he was angsting off-stage between performances, at all hours of the day and night, about Maggie. She’d been a nightmare to find. He knocked again.

  The door swung open and a young woman with unnaturally red hair appeared, hopping on one foot. Alex opened his mouth to say he’d got the wrong address.

  Layla cut him short. “Alex Wells, I presume. Magenta won’t be long. She’s gone to the village shop for a pint of milk.”

  Trying not to stare at the wild red hair Alex fixed on the red geraniums at his ankles. “She should bring those in. Before the first frost gets them.”

  “I take it you haven’t come all this way to offer horticultural advice.” Her lovely Cornish accent was a lot more pronounced than Maggie’s.

  “No.” Alex laughed.

  “So why have you come?” she asked, fiercely protective.

  Alex was stumped. He didn’t know exactly why he’d come. Except, he needed to see Maggie. Dog-tired from driving, stressing about what he planned to say, he ran a hand through his hair to the back of his head and threw a silent glance around his surroundings. He opened his mouth to reply, couldn’t find words, and closed it again.

  “Sorry. None of my business.” The reception party mellowed. “I’m Layla, by the way. You’d better come in.”

  Alex held out a hand. “Pleased to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you.” Although not about the hair.

  “Not as much as I’ve heard about you, I’ll bet.” A sheepish look crept across her pretty features. “From magazines and stuff. Not from Magenta. She’s taken a vow of silence where you’re concerned.”

  “I see.” A track ran up the side of a hill behind the cottage to the right, and to the left a narrow lane wound down towards the sea between higgledy-piggledy houses. He’d parked his Smart car in the lane in front of the row of cottages. One perfectly plucked eyebrow arched, Layla glanced back and forth between it and him.

  “Which way’s the shop?”

  “I think she took the cliff path.” She pointed down the hill to the sea. “But if you want to catch her up, it’s quickest to cut along the beach.”

  “Thanks.” Alex called over his shoulder. He practically ran down the lane in his hurry to find Maggie. When he got to the beach he was struck by how beautiful it was. He could taste the salt in the air. He loved Maggie’s home in an instant – the cliffs, the little harbor at the far end of the curve of golden sand, and the steady roll of the waves, breaking and washing up the beach. No wonder this was her retreat.

  He’d missed her like crazy. The flames she’d lit in him in New York wouldn’t die. He’d been an idiot. Maggie was the best thing that had ever happened to him and he’d let her go.

  Drake had brought friends to see the play. It was a compliment. Afterwards he’d come backstage to his dressing room. It was a turnaround realizing that the king of the abysmal put-down was proud of him. He’d been right in believing that there was more to being a father than sperm, after all. The emptiness in his soul had nothing to do with not knowing himself, and everything to do with missing Maggie.

  Another night Nick had come to see him backstage before he went on. He’d handed him a package. “That’s for Maggie,” he’d said mysteriously. “Go find her.”

  Nick had been clearing out some old stuff and found a children’s book that he’d held onto. It was The Little Engine That Could. The tale of a blue railway engine that had to try and pull a long train over a hill, all the time the little engine kept repeating the words “I-think-I-can-I-think-I-can”. Alone in his dressing room after the performance, Alex’s heart thundered when he opened the package and found the worn copy of the book with his father’s inscription inside. “You can! All my love, always, Dad”. Holding the book felt bizarre. He realized that there must have been a time when his parents had wanted to get it right. Even when their personal lives crumbled, determination had driven them to succeed, and despite everything else they’d passed that determination on to Nick and Alex.

  Nick and Cassandra had been pestering him about New York. His mother kept sending him texts saying things like “How smitten were you with Maggie? Do something about it!” Nick was blunt. The last one from him read, “You wouldn’t know a good thing if it walked up and grabbed you by the codpiece!”

  He had people who cared about him, but they didn’t need him like they once did. Maggie had become the one person who mattered to him most in the world and he’d closed his heart to her magic. Her belief in him was what had pushed him to nail Hamlet. All she’d needed in return was his belief in her love and he’d let her leave, too afraid of what ifs to see that he was wrong.

  What if he could take her by the hand and walk forward into the future, no looking back?

  Everything in Alex’s universe had clicked into place and all he wanted was to see Maggie again. She’d got so deep under his skin that she was like a part of him, a piece of himself that he couldn’t live without, like his beating heart. He’d requisitioned the stage manager’s Smart car, shoe-horned himself into it, and set off for Cornwall. He only had twenty-four hours to find her before he had to be back in theater-land.

  Emotional paralysis set in as Alex strode along the beach. What if she didn’t want to see him? Going by Layla’s snippy reaction to him turning up out of the blue, she mightn’t be pleased to see him. What if it was too late? What if she didn’t want him? She had every right to send him packing. He’d hurt her. She’d told him she loved him and what had he done? He’d put her in a taxi.

  He froze. A soggy, sandy dog came running up to him carrying a stick. It dropped the stick and ran off. Alex picked it up and started writing in the sand. He wrote his name. ALEX. Then he drew a great, big, enormous heart in the sand. Underneath he wrote MAGGIE. Alex heart Maggie. He stood back to look at it. Was that what he’d come to say? The dog came bounding back, ready to play. Alex threw the stick and the dog tore off across the sand, scuffing most of the letters in Alex Heart Maggie as it went. “You’ve ruined my handiwork,” he called after it. “It looks like Alex Heart Maggot. Thanks for that.”

  He scrubbed away the letters with his foot and stamped out the heart, kicking clumps of seaweed over what remained to disguise it.

  His gut churned. He wanted to hold her, touch her, love her. But how would he tell her? He was no good with words. Only ones he’d learned, reh
earsed, repeated over and over. Improvisation wasn’t his thing. He scowled at the empty beach. Where in heaven’s name was she?

  The dog reappeared at his feet. He threw the stick again. And again.

  Just then he saw her. He looked up and there she was, standing on the cliff above the beach, hair flying in the wind, wearing the coat she’d had on the night he’d put her into a black taxi. Watching the tail lights leave with her on board, he’d felt wretched. His heart thumped. She waved and started zig-zagging her way down the path to the beach. She seemed to be taking forever, ambling across the sand, swinging her shopping bag and stopping every few feet to pick up shells and put them in her pockets. He gazed at the scene, as though she was his favorite film. Bracing himself to face her, he forced his legs to move, each step he took towards her more difficult than the one before.

  Suddenly she was right there. She held out a square of opaque green glass. “Sea glass,” she said, as if she’d been expecting him. “What’s that?” Puzzled by the mess of seaweed and scrubbed out writing in the sand, she nodded to the cliff and added, “From up there it looked like “Alex heart Maggot”.

  “Blame the dog.” Alex jerked his head at the wet animal. It was sitting, looking up hopefully, stick in mouth.

  “Who’s your new best friend?”

  He wanted to say Ophelia, because the little dog reminded him of the actress who’d been relentlessly hanging around making eyes at him for the last few weeks, when all he could think about was Maggie.

  He shrugged. “Dunno. Maybe it’s a stray.”

  Maggie dropped her shopping bag. She knelt down on the sand and checked for a collar. Nothing. “She’s skin and bone under all that fur.” She searched the empty beach. “Maybe she’s been abandoned.”

  Alex crossed his arms over his chest. “What should we do?”

  “I’ll bring her home with me, give her something to eat, and ask around, see if anyone knows who she belongs to.” She stood up and dusted the sand off her hands. “I guess if no one claims her, I’ll have to keep her.” Their eyes locked and his heart missed a beat on impact. “Alex, what are you doing here?”

  “I’m … Um … I came to say …” Small white-crested waves gently rolled and broke. Pushing closer, the incoming tide swept up the beach and formed a perfect heart of foam on the sand. “I’m sorry.” Alex looked down into the face he loved and laid himself bare. “Sorry I stayed in LA and didn’t contact you. Sorry I didn’t come back for you. Sorry I didn’t say goodbye.” He hesitated for a fraction of a second. “Sorry that I let you go twice.”

  “That’s a lot of sorry.” She stared at the place near her feet where the sea had made the foam heart and hugged her arms defensively across her body. “Is there anything you’re not sorry about?”

  Unnoticed, the little dog nudged open the shopping bag, chewed through a biscuit packet and chomped away at its contents. Alex’s heart filled with hope. He should tell her that he wasn’t sorry Nick had found her. He wasn’t sorry about what happened in New York. Mostly he wasn’t sorry that he loved her more than life itself and he wanted to spend the rest of his days with her.

  “I’m not sorry that when I’m with you I know exactly who I am – who I want to be.” Remembering the stupid strategy he’d come up with on the plane to Boston, he thought of a point five.

  Point Five: Scratch the strategy and marry Maggie.

  He circled an arm around her waist, pulled her close and tucked a knuckle under her chin.

  “I’m not sorry that I want to marry you.” He searched her eyes. She didn’t try and look away. “If you’ll have me.”

  He folded her into his arms, lowered his head, and kissed her for the longest time, exploring her soft mouth, reveling in having her close. Finally, he forced himself to break the kiss. It was harder than knocking a limpet off a rock with a stone. He wanted to go on kissing her and holding her until the tide came in. He held three lives in his arms. And he loved all of them.

  In a crazy spin, Maggie reeled from his kiss. She ached to tell him that she was still in love with him. But did he love her back? Or was the marriage proposal more about being there for her? A rehashed version of what he’d offered her on the bridge that night. She needed to know, and there was only one way to find out.

  “Do you love me?”

  He put a big, strong, reliable arm around her. She gazed up at his face, the face she’d missed so badly, the face she’d wanted to forget. All stubble, and blue eyes, and heart-stopping smile, he was more gorgeous than ever. And he was hers. But only if he loved her. Melting with desire and love, she buzzed with anticipation.

  “I love you.” He rumbled out the words, dark and delicious. “I love you so much. And I plan to spend the rest of the day showing you how much.”

  He grabbed what was left of the sandy shopping and laced her fingers between his. Together they walked away from the beach, up through the meandering village houses, the little dog trotting contentedly behind. Maggie couldn’t wait to be alone with Alex at the cottage. Hop- along Layla was waiting for a cup of tea. Maggie crossed her fingers that her friend would get the hint and make herself scarce.

  Alex had told her he loved her and now she was the one who hadn’t told him back. To get to the cottage they had to cross an iron bridge over a stream trickling down to the sea. Its green paint was rusty in places and somebody had attached a tiny lovelock to it, decorated with a bright-red nail color heart, a promise of forever love. Maggie stopped in her tracks. Her fingers interlaced with Alex’s, she turned to face him. For the first time giving love wasn’t a risk.

  “Alex,” she said, reaching up to wrap her arms around his neck. “I love you. You’re The One.”

  Chapter Twenty One

  The chapel by the sea was picture-perfect for the Christmas Eve wedding. There were more fishing nets and lobster pots than holy crosses, but that was fine by Maggie. Hollowed into the cliff, it had been a sanctuary since the fourteenth century. Maggie had loved it to bits since she was a child. The church was at the heart of the community, a place where people gathered in happy times and in sad. Villagers in centuries past went there to pray for the safe return of their loved ones. When someone was lost at sea it was the quiet place where they went to cry.

  Never in her wildest imaginings could Maggie have predicted marrying her dream man in tiny Saint Elisabeth’s. Layla and her friends from the village had done a great decorating job. They’d twisted sprigs of mistletoe and holly into long green trails of ivy and dotted the church with pine cones, peppered in amongst the pebbles and seashells that were so much part of its charm. With enough candles to light a stately home, never mind a small chapel, and a tangle of fairy lights wrapped around the rafters, the place looked magical. Outside a fresh snowfall had turned the world white. It could not have been more perfect had it been a film set created in Hollywood.

  Everyone Alex and Maggie cared about was there. Nick was exceptional as the best man and Layla an outstanding maid of honor. Cassandra shone in Parisian couture. Drake put in a super-polite appearance. Ella, no longer Nick’s plus one, but still a friend of the brothers, flew in for a few hours, taking a break from filming on location somewhere fab. Maggie’s mum turned up with her fiancé in tow. Delighted to be the mother of the bride, and thrilled that the happy couple were tying the knot on Christmas Eve, she was a tad disappointed that they’d declined to sell their wedding-photo opportunity to a glamorous magazine, but she was discreet enough not to make a fuss about it. Alex had traced Maggie’s Australian grandparents and invited them. They couldn’t make the wedding, but they’d promised to come the following summer to meet their granddaughter and the baby twins.

  Maggie was every inch the stunning bride in a red-silk wedding dress. She’d been tempted to suggest that they put the wedding off until after the babies were born, but Layla had pointed out that if anyone was up to styling a still-comparatively-smallish bump it was Maggie. “After all,” she’d enthused, “You’re marrying the man you lov
e, not trying to look like you belong in a bridal magazine.” Although, given the fantabulous outcome, she wouldn’t have looked out of place.

  Layla had tried to insist that she wear a shade of purply pink that exactly matched her name, but Maggie was having none of it. In deep-forest green, a pretty contrast to Maggie, Layla, with her bright-red hair, looked fantastic. With superstitious leanings, she’d been a little bit concerned about the green, having heard somewhere that it was an unlucky color for weddings, but Maggie had been adamant that it was fine, and festive.

  When Maggie arrived at the chapel and Alex turned to see her walk up the aisle, her heart was bursting with love.

  “Do you Alexander Drake Wells take Magenta Sunrise Plumtree to be your lawfully wedded wife?”

  Alex’s eyebrows shot up. “Sunrise?” he mouthed.

  She nodded.

  “Me by Magenta Sunrise is the name of your baby collection,” he whispered, halting the proceedings momentarily.

  Things were moving full-steam ahead for Maggie. After the honeymoon, she’d be negotiating a deal with a big retailer. They were proposing to launch a new babywear range, offering her design input, and using her name to front the brand.

  “It is.”

  The young vicar raised his hand to his mouth and gave a discreet “Ahem”.

  “It’s also my … um … full name.”

  “I never knew that.”

  Alex gazed at his beautiful bride.

  “Well, now you do.”

  “I do.”

  Seizing the moment, and eager to complete his first wedding, the triumphant vicar pronounced them husband and wife. “You may kiss the bride.”

  Alex banded one arm around Maggie’s waist, drew her to him tighter-than-tight, and placed a possessive kiss on her lips.

  A cheer rang out in the candlelit harbor chapel.