The Accidental Family

by Rowan Coleman

“Really?” Sophie asked him. “Only I was thinking, we probably don’t want the whole world to know right away, so it might be best if—”

  “The whole world does know.” Louis smiled as he kissed her fingertips. “After the performance we put on last night, it would be impossible for the whole world not to.”

  “Well yes, that is true. All those people know, but I mean Bella and Izzy. Mrs. Alexander. The school mums, the school mums will have a field day, and Carmen! Carmen won’t shut up about it. Not to mention my mother and Cal! Cal will never believe it. Then there’s Christina and the other girls back home. And Carrie’s mum, we have to tell Carrie’s mum. There are a lot of people we need to tell, so perhaps until we have I shouldn’t wear the ring. Not until we’re officially official—”

  “Rubbish,” Louis said. “Just tell everyone. That’s what you do, you get engaged and then you tell everyone and everyone is excited and pleased for you.”

  “Yes, I know.” Sophie stretched out her fingers to look at the ring. “It’s just that it’s such a public thing, isn’t it, an engagement ring. People look at it and they know everything about you.”

  “Well, they know that you are engaged,” Louis said, twisting the ring full circle on her finger. “It is a little bit loose though,” Louis said. “I’d hate for you to lose it. I know, we’ll take it into Newquay today and get it resized. We can take the girls. They will be so excited. They’ve been trying really hard not to talk about bridesmaids’ dresses in front of you for two whole days, but I must warn you, there is a fight breaking out between pink and lilac and there has been some mention of wings.”

  “Wings,” Sophie said absently as she studied the ring that suddenly said so much about her. “That sounds nice.”

  Louis leaned up on his elbow and looked in her face.

  “Sophie, if there’s anything, any worry or uncertainty that you have, then please, tell me now,” he said, a lazy smile on his lips that told Sophie he didn’t for a second think that she had a single one.

  “It’s only that the rest of our lives is a long time,” Sophie said slowly. She watched a slight frown form between Louis’s brows and instantly she wanted to make it disappear again.

  “I don’t mean I don’t want to marry you, I’m just saying, are you sure, Louis? Are you sure you know me well enough? After all, we haven’t been together very long and we’re still in that first flush of sex-fueled love. Maybe we should wait a bit—”

  “What, until we start getting bored and stop making love?” Louis laughed.

  “No, it’s just …I never want you to regret me,” Sophie said, suddenly serious. “I want you to be certain, because I couldn’t ever bear for you to regret me.”

  “Sophie.” Louis traced a finger along the curve of her cheek. “Life goes by in a flash, in the blink of an eye, and then it is gone. I am certain that I love you and that I need you and that for as long as I’m here on earth, I want you to be with me. I couldn’t be more certain. I certainly couldn’t be more certain that I am going to kiss you right now.”

  It was hard to concentrate as Louis kissed her, his hands rediscovering her skin under the covers as he pulled her body hard against his, and indeed as she felt his lips on her breasts and his fingers between her thighs, Sophie found it hard to think about anything at all other than how much she wanted him. But there was still one question, just an ember of a query, flickering dimly in the corner of her mind. An ember that blinked out the moment she felt Louis move inside her.

  The question she had asked herself and had forgotten in a second was: was she certain? There hadn’t been time for an answer.

  Four

  It was a busy Saturday morning in Newquay. The tourists had fallen away but the students were back in town, and even after a summer spent largely in a small town rammed up to its eyeteeth with holidaymakers, Sophie found the bustle of the vibrant town hard to adjust to, which was foolish because she was a city girl, a Londoner born and bred and used to elbowing her way through crowds along with the best of them. But something in her had changed since Bella and Izzy burst into her life. For the first time she felt vulnerable, as if the merest glancing blow would bruise her badly. The world outside the four of them seemed like a much more frightening place, with danger lurking in every corner, which Sophie had been mercifully unaware of before she had two children to worry about. Carrie’s sudden and pointless death had given her a sense of her own mortality, but more than that, it had made her see how fragile the lives of those around her were too. How easy, if improbable, it would be to lose the people she loved.

  Apart from that new nagging anxiety, she was also finding it hard to adjust to her new persona. Sophie was aware that she wasn’t Sophie Mills career-girl-about-town anymore. She wasn’t even former-career-girl-about— St. Ives, at least until she found a new professional niche for herself, which so far hadn’t progressed much further than her ruling herself out of a career as an artist, largely because Bella was constantly telling her she was the only adult in the world who couldn’t even draw a stick figure, or marketing her culinary skills as Carmen had. Culinary skills, Carmen told her, had to extend beyond heating things up in order to constitute a career. You had to know how to chop and mix and have a basic knowledge of ingredients. And although Sophie was becoming a pro at grilling, that was where her kitchen prowess ended. Whatever it was she was destined to do down here in Cornwall, apart from be happy and in love, she hadn’t found it yet and in the meantime struggled to accept the identity she did have— Sophie Mills, official engage-ée. Or fiancée, Louis reminded her once he’d pointed out that the word “engage-ée” didn’t actually exist.

  “You are my fiancée and I am yours,” Louis had told her happily as they walked up the garden path to his house earlier that morning.

  “I know, I know,” Sophie said. “It’s just going to take me a while to get my head around that word being associated with me. I mean, for starters, it’s awfully French.”

  “Okay, if you don’t like ‘fiancée,’ how about ‘betrothed’? How about I call you my betrothed?”

  “Mmmm.” Sophie sounded skeptical.

  “What—too medieval?” Louis asked her.

  “No, it’s just that it’s a very formal word,” Sophie said. “It’s not very fun.”

  “I see where you’re coming from. It’s just that I think getting engaged slash betrothed is supposed to be a tiny bit formal,” Louis pointed out.

  “I know, I’m just saying there should be a third word, a fun word. A word that isn’t quite so loaded.”

  “Loaded?” Louis raised his brow. “Okay, I’ll give it some thought.”

  “Well?” Mrs. Alexander had opened Louis’s front door before he could fit the key into the lock. She’d obviously been waiting for them by the living room window.

  “The Avalon has not burned down and Grace is absolutely fine,” Sophie reassured her. “How are the girls? Did they run you ragged?”

  “They did no such thing,” Mrs. Alexander said. “It takes a lot more than a couple of sweet little poppets like those two to get the better of me. That cat of yours, on the other hand, nearly had my eye out when I tried to pet her.”

  “That’s because she doesn’t like people. I did mention it,” Sophie said, wondering if Mrs. Alexander might consider letting them in anytime soon. “She likes her space and she’s very protective of her privacy. She takes her time forming relationships …she’s a rescue cat, you know. I’ve had her for years now and she still doesn’t like me. I try not to take it personally.”

  “Good job, by the sound of it,” Mrs. Alexander told her. She appraised Sophie with a cool blue-eyed gaze. “So, are you going to marry him?”

  Sophie’s jaw dropped and she looked at Louis. “Did the whole world know what you were planning?” she asked.

  “More or less,” Louis said, shrugging apologetically.

  “And are you?” Mrs. Alexander pressed her, still barring the doorway as if somehow their entry was dependen
t on Sophie’s answer.

  “It seems that I am,” Sophie affirmed, feeling Louis’s arm around her waist. Worrying that she hadn’t seemed sufficiently happy, she added, “Louis and I are officially to be married. It’s very exciting.”

  Mrs. Alexander beamed quite unexpectedly, which turned her habitually sour expression into one of pure delight. “I’m thrilled for you, darling,” she said, hugging Sophie with uncharacteristic fervor and releasing her just as swiftly. “I’ll need a month’s notice on the room if you’re going to want your deposit back.”

  “Oh, I don’t expect I’ll be moving out for ages yet,” Sophie said, avoiding Louis’s gaze.

  “Anyway, the girls have been waiting all morning for you. They’ve got a little show.” Mrs. Alexander stepped aside to allow them into the house, smiling at Louis. “I wanted to make sure everything was okay before I unleashed them just in case Sophie turned you down, love.” She fluttered her lashes at Louis, casting him her best come-hither glance, which if they hadn’t known Mrs. Alexander, most people would find quite intimidating.

  “Okay, girls,” Mrs. Alexander shouted up the stairs. “Take it away!”

  There was a burst of excited laughter from upstairs, the yowl of a very angry gray cat that whizzed past and out the front door with what looked suspiciously like a pink bow tied around its neck, then followed, in a much more sedate fashion, Bella and Izzy parading down the stairs humming a passable version of “Here Comes the Bride,” Bella hefting the much more submissive and lace-laden Tango under one arm.

  The shower curtain had been detached with more force than care, as far as Sophie could tell by looking at the ripped holes where the rings should have fit through, and turned into a white-plastic shiny cape. Bella’s pink flowery bedroom curtain had been fashioned into a skirt worn over two or three fairy and Disney princess costumes, and what blooms of late summer that had been left in the garden had been savagely hacked down and stuck into hair and behind ears. The girls had finished off their bridal look with a generous helping of Sophie’s second-best makeup. (She had learned long ago never to leave her best stuff lying around.)

  “We are your bridesmaids, Aunty Sophie!” Izzy shrieked as they finally reached the bottom of the stairs in one piece, which was a minor miracle in itself given that their trains contravened most health and safety laws. “We are, aren’t we? We ARE your bridesmaids?”

  “Aren’t we?” Bella reiterated, her expression a good deal more solemn and just a bit more threatening than Izzy’s despite the two rosy dots she had lipsticked onto either cheek. Sophie knelt down and put an arm around each of them, glancing over her shoulder at Louis, who was leaning on the banister at the bottom of the stairs.

  “Do you think it’s a good idea for me to marry your daddy?” Sophie asked them, aware a beat too late that she didn’t really have a contingency plan if either of them said no.

  “I do,” Izzy said, nodding as she spoke. “Because there will be a big party and a wedding cake and I’ve seen a picture of a wedding cake and it was big. And you love cake, Aunty Sophie, so getting married will make you really, really …”

  “Massive?” Mrs. Alexander offered.

  “No, happy, silly!” Izzy giggled and kissed Sophie on the cheek. “You will be happy.”

  “Excellent,” Sophie said, looking at Bella and raising a hopeful eyebrow.

  Bella twisted her mouth into the sideways knot Sophie had come to learn often preceded a difficult question. She braced herself.

  “I do think it is a good idea for you to marry Daddy,” she said slowly, as if she were working out her thoughts as she spoke. “Mostly.”

  “Mostly?” Sophie asked her gently. “What do you mean, Bella?”

  Bella shrugged. “I just mean mostly,” she said. “I want you and Daddy to be married, mostly.”

  “Okay,” Sophie said briefly, pressing the palm of her hand against Bella’s cheek. “Well, if you think of what the mostly bit means, then you will tell me, won’t you? Because how you feel is more important to me than anything; and anyway, as if I could ever possibly have any bridesmaids other than you even if I wanted to. Although I think we might have to work on your look a bit.”

  “I was thinking wings,” Izzy said. “Glittery ones.”

  “And I was thinking of ponies,” Bella said, catching Izzy’s enthusiasm and making her momentary reticence seem like a passing whim. “I thought we could ride ponies down the aisle. That would be really cool!”

  The word “aisle” made Sophie think of a million different things at once. But principally churches, dresses, guests, an actual wedding that would result in an actual marriage that would mean she had made a real and life-changing decision that would be finally finalized in about the most final way that a decision possibly could be. With a legally binding contract. Suddenly she found that she was the one who was “mostly” glad she had agreed to marry Louis Gregory.

  “Well, we can sort out all the details later,” Louis said, catching the look in Sophie’s eyes and peeling himself off the banister to help her to her feet. “For now we’re going to Newquay to get Sophie’s engagement ring resized.”

  “Can we wear this?” Bella asked him, gesturing at her bridesmaid-meets-Vegas outfit.

  It would have been churlish to refuse.

  • • •

  It wasn’t a long journey to Newquay, but it had been a very loud one.

  “Aunty Sophie,” Izzy had asked. “Who will you be once you and Daddy are married?”

  “Who will I be?” Sophie had glanced at Louis, who was driving. “I’ll be me, of course.”

  “Mrs. Sophie Gregory,” Louis said proudly.

  “I’m not changing my name,” Sophie said without thinking. She glanced at Louis, unable to read his expression from his profile. “I mean, no one changes their name these days, plus I’ve got my professional reputation to think of. Sophie Mills has a reputation in the events industry. No one will have heard of Sophie Gregory.”

  “But, Sophie, you don’t have a job anymore,” Bella pointed out with her usual clarity. “No one cares what you’re called.”

  “Don’t have a new job yet, Bella,” Sophie corrected her, noticing how Louis kept his eyes on the road, his expression set in neutral. “But I will have one and, well, I’ve been me for a long time now. I’m used to it.”

  “Could I change my name to Princess Izzy, Queen of Ice?” Izzy piped up. “I’m not used to my name at all!”

  “The second you turn eighteen,” Louis told her, soliciting an extended “not fair” moan from the rear of the car.

  Sophie did not mention the other niggling anxiety that had popped into her head the second Louis mentioned her potential name. She’d already taken Carrie’s children, admittedly according to the wishes of her friend, and now she also had her dead friend’s husband. To take her name seemed to be going too far, as if she were really trying to step into the shoes of that mythic first wife, just like a latter-day second Mrs. de Winter obsessing over Rebecca.

  “How about Mrs. Aunty Sophie?” Izzy hazarded.

  “I like ‘Sophie Mills,’ ” Bella said, providing Sophie with an unexpected ally. “And just because her and Daddy will be married doesn’t mean she won’t be our aunty Sophie anymore.”

  “Exactly,” Sophie said.

  “But what if I want to call her—” Izzy began.

  “GIRLS!” Louis had raised his voice to cut across whatever Izzy had been about to say. “That’s enough questions, you’re giving Sophie a headache! Look, we’re here now. Stop shouting and show me how pretty and ladylike and bridesmaidsey you can be. Because only quiet, respectable, ladylike girls can be bridesmaids.”

  “With wings,” Izzy muttered under her breath.

  “At all,” Louis said.

  “Except,” Bella had told him, looking at him from beneath her bangs, “that we are your daughters and so we are definitely going to be bridesmaids at all cost.”

  Sophie followed the Gregorys through the
shopping crowds from a slight distance. She knew Louis had guessed she was a bit overwhelmed by the maelstrom of feelings, opinions, and questions the girls had thrown at her, and she loved the fact that he knew her well enough to give her this small distance from them while she adjusted to everything that was happening. The very fact that he had discovered that about her gave her joy in itself. It was evidence of how their relationship had deepened since they’d first met. And she had discovered that she wanted to make him happy, and that she’d do more or less anything to do that. That had to be love.

  What she needed to do, Sophie decided, was to take baby steps. First step: she was in love with Louis Gregory. The wild leaping of her heart whenever she stood next to him proved that conclusively—she had already taken that step and she thought she’d adjusted to the news rather well, what with all the sex and happiness it entailed. Second step: she had very recently agreed to marry him, which would take a bit of getting used to, but she was confident that she would get used to it because, after all, she had got very used to step one alarmingly quickly. Third step: she’d have to think about some sort of wedding eventually, although she’d read in an old edition of the Tatler she’d found in the doctor’s surgery when Izzy had a chest infection that long engagements were the latest trend, so perhaps it didn’t have to be that soon. Fourth step: that would be the actual being-married-to-Louis step, the part where she moved out of the Avalon and in with him and the girls. Then there was the fifth and final step: the whole rest of her life with Louis and the girls, the rest of her natural life being fully married.

  As her heart was gripped by a sudden vision of eternity, Sophie decided then and there not to dwell on any of the steps past one and two. One and two really were the only pertinent steps right now. After all, she hadn’t even told her mother yet that she was engaged, and everybody knows that nothing is really ever true or real until you’ve told your mother.

  As long as she had a little more time simply to enjoy being in love with him and getting her head around being engaged to him, then Sophie was certain she’d be able to deal with the other issues eventually. After all, now that she’d said yes, there was no going back.