A Brit on the Side (Castle Calder Book 1)

by Brenda St John Brown

  Scarlett’s known me and my weight issues long enough she knows exactly where my head goes. “Half a stone is seven pounds. You don’t have to put on half a stone. In fact, you don’t have to put on a single pound. I usually gain more weight my first week back in Atlanta than I do all summer, making up for all of the chips and guacamole I’ve missed.”

  “Not me. I lose it as soon as I leave because the food at uni is so bad.” Claire laughs. “It all evens out, don’t worry.”

  “Jaz will run with you if want,” Scarlett says with a shrug, like why I’d want to run, let alone with Jasper, is beyond her. Scarlett is one of those willowy naturally thin people who could eat cake three times a day and be no worse for it.

  “Or you girls could skip pudding?” Lou says. “My mum swore by skipping seconds and only having pudding twice a week.”

  Twice a week? Try twice a month and only if I run regularly. Dessert twice a week sounds like an absolute treat. Theo only ever allowed himself a single square of dark chocolate daily and my mom’s idea of dessert is sugar-free jello, so dessert has always felt decadent and forbidden.

  I feel my stomach rumble. Six-fifteen can’t get here fast enough. I say, “All this talk of food and dessert is making me hungry. Distract me and show me what else I need to do for tonight.”

  Claire, Scarlett, and Lou all somehow agree I’ll follow Claire until dinner. “To get a feel for the cadence of the restaurant,” Claire says. I follow her to the bar where a middle-age couple sits, glasses of wine on the gleaming wood before them. No one else is in sight and I wonder if it’s an honor bar type of thing until I see Scarlett’s dad come around the corner.

  Paul St Julien is one of those guys who you see and you have to smile. No kidding. He’s tall and lean, an older version of Jasper without the glasses, and has a grin that could melt the polar ice caps. He’s also about eight years younger than Mrs. St Julien, which I’m sure is why I can call him Paul, no problem, but stutter over Hannah. When they came to Parents Weekend, half the girls on our floor had an instant crush on Paul. It didn’t even faze Scarlett; she said it would be weird if they didn’t.

  Now, he calls across the room, his voice warm and booming, “Bea. I heard you were about. Welcome to merry old England.”

  The couple at the bar smile and I do too. “Thanks. It’s great to be here. How are you?”

  “Great, just great.” He comes over and claps a hand around my shoulder. “They’ve put you to work already, have they?”

  Claire jumps in. “Emma’s not in tonight, so Bea said she’d help out. Besides, it’s good to get stuck in, right?”

  “Absolutely,” Paul says. He turns to me, his expression serious. “If the jet lag catches up with you, though, don’t be afraid to bugger off. Scarlett and Claire could serve tonight’s reservations with their eyes closed.”

  Claire laughs. “Well, that’s probably a bad idea.”

  Paul laughs, too, but his attention has shifted to the people at the bar. As he asks, “You folks doing all right tonight?” Claire nudges me back towards the dining room.

  “He’s in host mode, so let me show you a few things before we eat,” she says.

  And show me, she does. Knowing I’m working in the kitchen, not the dining room, is the only thing keeping me from freaking out over Claire’s whirlwind tour. She shows me the small red light by the clock that means hot food is waiting on the counter and the stack of dishes in the warming drawers. She explains the timing of approaching the table and how to gauge whether the customer is more of a chatter or a chewer. For someone who’s never worked in a restaurant before, it feels complicated, although Claire assures me it’s not.

  “It’s all about reading people,” she says as we head back to the kitchen. “We’re not working for gratuity, but you still want people to leave good feedback about their dining experience, so it’s important to read the situation.”

  As she pushes the door to the kitchen open, the smell of food fills my nose and my mouth waters in anticipation. Scarlett is texting with one hand, stirring a pot with another as Lou takes a tray out of the oven. Claire breaths in. “That smells amazing.”

  It does. And it tastes even better as we’re all standing around the counter eating five minutes later. The chicken is tender and moist, covered in the best mushroom sauce I’ve ever tasted. I let Lou put an entire chicken breast and a full scoop of sautéed green beans on my plate, even though it’s twice what I’d normally eat. I’m pretty sure the mushroom sauce has cream in it too, but it’s worth every calorie. Judging by the lack of conversation as we eat, everyone’s either as hungry or as preoccupied with the fat content of the sauce as I am. I’d bet against the latter.

  Scarlett is the first one to put her plate down, a small portion of chicken and green beans pushed neatly to the side. She never cleans her plate, a strategy she swears keeps the dreaded D-word out of her vocabulary. At home, I try to follow her lead, but tonight I can’t. It’s too damn delicious. She wipes her hands on her apron, looks at me and says, “Right. Are you ready for your first Calder dinner?”

  I swallow and give a small smile. “Maybe?”

  Claire and Lou put their plates down too. Claire straightens and tugs the V of her T-shirt up, tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and smiles. “Okay, let’s do this.” To me, she says, “Good luck. If it feels overwhelming, remember, it gets easier.”

  Right. I smile again, bolstered by the fact Claire said ‘if’, not ‘when’.

  Chapter Five

  Three hours later, when Scarlett walks into the game room brandishing a bottle of Pinot Grigio and three glasses, my borrowed flannel shirt is wet, I have a small cut on my thigh from where I dropped a knife, and my hair has fallen so far out of its ponytail it’s not even up anymore. I take an empty glass with a tired smile. Half a glass is only one hundred calories. I’ve earned at least three.

  “You made it,” Scarlett says, twisting the cap off the wine as she plonks down beside me. “Congratulations and well done.”

  “Thanks.” I hold my glass out for her to pour.

  “You did great, Bea,” Claire says. “Really, for your first day, you were ace.”

  For my first day. I have a feeling if Lou was still here, she’d disagree, but she didn’t demand I leave the kitchen and never come back, so I’m counting it as a win. She did tell me to make sure I got some sleep before the Fisher party arrives on Friday, but I don’t know if that was related to my performance tonight or not, and I was afraid to ask.

  “Thanks, you guys, for your help. I promise I’ll study the menu so I know what goes with what,” I say.

  “There’s plenty of time for that.” Scarlett finishes pouring Claire’s glass of wine and raises her glass. “For now, we need to toast to a great British summer.”

  “Hear, hear,” Claire says as we clink glasses.

  The wine tastes amazing, cool and crisp. I take a big gulp and say, “Wow, I needed that.”

  Scarlett laughs. “I know what a light weight you can be, so let me know now if we need someone on standby to get you back to your cabin because you’re not crashing with me. I’m taking up my entire bed and then some tonight.”

  I sink back into the soft leather couch. “I’ll happily sleep right here. Besides, I don’t want to crash with you because you snore.”

  Claire laughs. “She does. Oh my God, when we went to London last summer, she kept me up half the night. I seriously thought about going to camp out by the ice machine down the hall for some peace.”

  I laugh and Scarlett does too, even though she gives Claire the finger. “I’d love to go to London.” I change the subject because Scarlett really does snore and it’s something she can be super sensitive about. She says she has a deviated septum or something, which might be true, but the bigger truth is she’s tried every remedy under the sun to stop it. Unfortunately, the only thing that works are those little strips you stick on your nose. Not exactly sexy. The first time Scarlett broke them out in our dorm room –
night three of us being roommates, I think – I laughed and she burst into tears. I felt terrible, but it also cemented our friendship. The “perfect” exterior packaging was not the girl, after all.

  “Well, obviously, you two should go together since you’re such delicate sleepers,” Scarlett says.

  “Oh, come on. We love you, even if you sound like a tractor stuck in the mud,” Claire says. “Seriously, we should do another London trip. Or even Edinburgh. Although London would probably be more exciting for Bea.”

  “And for you,” Scarlett says. “As I recall, you enjoyed London very much last time.”

  Claire reaches across the low coffee table to swat Scarlett, but misses. “Let’s not give Bea the wrong impression on her first day.” She turns to me and says, “We met a few blokes, but it was very tame.”

  “If you call making out with a stranger on Tower Bridge tame,” Scarlett says.

  “That’s as far as it went.” Claire sounds defensive. “Considering how it could have gone, I’m calling it tame.”

  “Fab point. Remember the guy who kept grinding up against you in that one club we went to?” Scarlett says. “There was a strong possibility of him ending up in our hotel room.”

  Claire laughs and turns to me again. “He was hot, but he knew it, which is never a good thing.”

  Scarlett glances at me and I know she’s thinking of Theo, so I say it before she can. “I was engaged to a guy like that.”

  “Scarlett said you were engaged.” Claire nods. “Aren’t you the same age as us?”

  I feel the heat begin to creep up my neck. “Being engaged at twenty-four sounds dumb, but it seemed like the right thing at the time. Theo is a little older and he wanted to move things to the next level.”

  “Wow.” Claire takes a long swallow of wine. “And you didn’t, I assume? Judging by the past tense you used.”

  “I did for a long time.” I let out a sigh. “Until I didn’t.”

  As I take a gulp of wine, Scarlett says, “Theo is the quintessential perfect boyfriend.”

  “Ah, hence the problem?” Claire says, nodding.

  “Sort of.” Gah. I hate this twisty feeling I get whenever I try to explain what happened with Theo because nothing ever feels like a good enough explanation. “He’s great. He really is.”

  “Oh, Bea, he’s not.” Scarlett scowls at me. “He’s perfect on paper, but I’m sorry, any man on the planet who says you need to go running more because, well, your genes work against you, don’t they, is shite.”

  “He said that?” Claire’s mouth drops.

  “He did, but I don’t think he meant…”

  “He did.” Scarlett bangs her hand on coffee table. “I’m sorry. He had his good points, but at the end of the day, Theo wanted a Barbie doll. And I’ll give credit where credit is due, you tried very hard to be one, but --”

  “Everyone knows traditional Barbie dolls are completely unrealistic in their proportions. Even her head is out of line with the measurements of a real woman,” Jasper says from behind me.

  Oh. My. God. I pray for a sinkhole, an errant castle ghost, or a sudden power cut to save me from having to turn around and see the look on Jasper’s face. Because judging by the remark he just made, he heard more than enough of our conversation for me to feel like a complete moron.

  Scarlett nods. “Exactly my point.”

  She looks like she’s gearing up to continue, but Claire interrupts. “You know, who decided Barbie dolls represented the ideal woman, anyway? I mean, now they have the more realistic Barbies, but the traditional one is iconic and it’s not like she’s been forgotten. Even if we all know she’s unrealistic, the seed’s been planted she’s the ideal.”

  Scarlett nods again as Jasper slips into the wingback chair beside Claire and picks up the bottle of wine. “Any more glasses?” he asks.

  “Drink from the bottle. We’ll get another one,” Scarlett says. She turns to Claire. “The media, in general, does women no favors in representing the so-called ideal. Even the fact there is such a thing is degrading. It certainly doesn’t take into account any kind of diversity. Haven’t you seen those things on Facebook about beauty standards around the world? What’s considered beautiful in South America is very different than what’s considered beautiful in, say, New York, but media consistently holds up New York as the ideal, period.”

  Jasper takes a swallow from the bottle and I allow myself a glance at him, finally. He’s still wearing the trousers he had on before, but has ditched his sweater for a simple gray T-shirt. His hair is more tousled than it was this afternoon and it looks better, not worse. He puts the bottle back on the coffee table and says, “Let’s not pretend it’s only women. I know physical standards are more exacting for women, but there are pressures on men as well.”

  Scarlett scoffs and says, “Okay, but it’s like comparing apples to oranges…”

  Claire leans in and murmurs, “And they’re off.”

  I straighten, but don’t let myself look at her. If I had any doubt she intentionally threw me a save, it’s gone now, though I’m not sure why she did it. Was it because she could sense I was embarrassed by Scarlett raking Theo over the coals? Or was it because she could sense I didn’t want Jasper weighing in on a conversation about my love life? If it was the latter, I assume it was because Claire wouldn’t want a guy she barely knows judging her ex either. But my brain niggles at me until finally my admonishment is as clear as if I said it out loud.

  You know what happens when you assume. You make an ass out of you. And me.

  Chapter Six

  Day two at Castle Calder, I wake at ten to a note on the table from Claire telling me to take it easy and rest today, so I promptly go back to bed, letting the rain lull me back to sleep until mid-afternoon. I’m exhausted from such a long day yesterday, but the three bottles of wine at the end definitely didn’t help – especially with Jasper in the mix.

  As I carry my second cup of tea back to my bedroom, I groan, recalling the argument we had about cycling as a valid form of transport and the need for dedicated bike lanes in major cities. We were actually on the same side; the argument came when Jasper suggested certain roads could be dedicated to cycle traffic only and I cited the traffic problems in Atlanta as a reason why that would be impossible. Less roads to choose from would increase congestion on existing roads, I said. He countered with the argument that lessening available routes would force people to change their habits, and it escalated from there.

  Both of our arguments were valid; it was how vehemently we defended them, sounding pompous and self-righteous, that feels even more cringe-worthy to me today than the amount I drank. Especially remembering Claire’s knowing half smile, which convinces me that in less than one day she’s got an inkling of the secret I’ve hidden from Scarlett for two years.

  At least I feel too hungover to eat, so that’s a small blessing. I cup my hands around my tea and close my eyes. But they fly open a second later as the door to the cabin rattles and I hear Scarlett call, “Wake up, sleepyhead.”

  “I’m awake,” I say, but my voice is small and I have to clear my throat and try again. “What’s up?”

  “You’re still in bed? Oh my God, I’m so jealous.” Scarlett stands in the doorway, dressed in a long black jersey skirt and an oversize blue button-down she could have stolen from her dad. It looks effortlessly chic except for the black eyeliner, which makes me smile.

  “You look like you might be better off in bed yourself.” I scoot over and she collapses next to me, taking half my pillow. “Feeling rough?”

  “My bloody head. And Mum got me up at nine to help make up the beds.” She reaches for my tea. “I’m dying.”

  “You never can handle your wine. Remember the one time --”

  “If you speak of it, I’ll volunteer you for the kitchen tonight.”

  I sit up and fumble for my phone on the bedside table. “Shit. Am I supposed to be there? It’s already 3:12.”

  “Emma’s here
, so you’re good, but if you get cheeky about my past, ahem, indiscretions, I’ll get Lou to send Emma home.” Scarlett closes her eyes and holds the tea out to me. “You know I’d do it.”

  I lean back and take the mug from her hand. “You’re hiding out here, so I actually don’t think you would.”

  “I came to see if you were as worse for the wear as I am, but sleeping in obviously has restorative effects.” Scarlett smiles, her eyes still shut. “Jaz was a little green this morning, too.”

  “Was he drunk?” He didn’t seem drunk to me, just animated.

  Scarlett lowers her voice. “Well, you know, Bea, cycling as a primary mode of transportation rather than simply an alternative makes excellent sense on several levels.”

  I groan and squeeze my eyes shut. “Oh, God. Tell me that conversation wasn’t as painful to listen to as it was to participate in.”

  “Both of you were very, very committed.” Scarlett turns to face me. Her face is close enough I can see the small clump of mascara on her left eye. “I’m not used to that side of you.”

  Right. Which takes us right back to Theo, where this whole thing started last night. Because, truthfully, would I have stood my ground so firmly with Jasper if I wasn’t holding onto the Barbie doll comment somewhere in my head? Even now, I bristle. “That’s not fair.”

  “You’re normally more about keeping the peace is all I’m saying,” Scarlett says. Judging by her posture, she either doesn’t hear my change in tone or she’s choosing to ignore it.

  “I like to choose my battles.” Before I say anything else, I jump up from the bed.