by Shari Low
Past tense! Oh, cruel, cruel blow.
‘…and I think that for a minute there we got our love for each other confused with a different kind of love. But I think we’ve worked that out. We should never be more than friends, Carly. That’s what we’re meant to be.’
I didn’t feel it necessary to inform him that my clitoris had, at that point, just tracked down a big gun and shot itself.
He held out his hand. ‘But I will always love you, Carly.’
‘And I’ll always love you too.’
As friends, I thought to myself. Definitely as friends. There could never, ever be anything more.
Could there?
‘Ding Dong. This is the last call for all remaining passengers travelling to London…’
‘Hurry, Sam, hurry.’
Fuck. If there were any paparazzi lurking they were going to be able to retire on this one. Sam Morton, A-list movie star, lying on the floor trying to saw through a pair of plastic handcuffs with a knife.
Finally, he broke through and released one crying little boy from the clutches of the furniture demon.
‘I’m sorry, Mummy,’ Mac wailed.
‘That’s okay, honey. It’s okay,’ I consoled him. Okay, so I should have grounded him for a fortnight for being so bloody silly but the wee soul had given himself a genuine fright when he thought he’d be forever stuck in the salubrious surroundings of LAX.
‘Thanks, Sam,’ I said when he clambered back to his feet.
‘No problem. I freed an entire race from religious oppression when I played Moses, so a wee boy in handcuffs was a walk in the park.’
I laughed.
‘Thanks anyway. For everything, Sam. Everything.’
I reached up and touched his face.
‘Mum, why are you crying?’ Benny asked.
I sniffed loudly. ‘I’m not.’
‘Are’
Sam and I smiled at each other.
‘So…Nothing I can do to change your mind then?’ he asked.
‘Not unless you can magic-up a hot-shot producer with a six-figure sum for my debut script.’
‘Nope, all out of them, I’m afraid.’
I leaned over and kissed him. Then…
Why did my bloody phone always ring at the worst possible moments? If this was Kate I was having my yoghurt-maker back.
‘Carly Cooper,’ I said in a terse voice.
‘Carly, this is Dave Marino at Global. Listen, I’ve got a script here that’s just come across my desk and it’s crying out for you. I love it. I just love it. But I’ll love it even more once you’ve polished it up for me. It’s a big one, hon, over a hundred-mil budget so we’ve got a bit of room on the fee. Only thing is they’re already on location. We’d need you on a plane en route to Hawaii tonight, and we’re talking snappy, snappy, snappy. Whaddya think, hon, will it fly? Tell me you’re in, Carly Cooper. Tell me you’re in.’
Step Nineteen
My stomach churned as I stepped off the plane.
I’d done it. I’d actually done it.
Right up until the last moment I wasn’t sure that it was the right thing to do.
After all, how often does that kind of crossroads come along in your life?
Someone smart once said that life was what happened when you were busy making other plans. That was exactly what had happened to me. I planned to stay with Mark forever. I planned to crack Hollywood. I planned to do lots of things and somehow life just always got in the way.
But then, that’s when you rely on destiny to throw you a curveball that, after the concussion wears off, will show you which way you’re supposed to be travelling.
And in my case it did.
Dave Marino’s offer had come out of the blue. It was sensational. The stuff that dreams are made of. Especially mine. It was the screenplay for Husbands and Lovers. Yep, the bonkbuster written by Jackie Collins, my spiritual mother, was being made into a movie. And they wanted me–me!–to work on the script.
In Jackie’s holiday home in Hawaii.
So I made the decision. There and then, in that crowded restaurant in LAX, I made the biggest decision of my life. Sure, it would involve sacrifices. There would probably be times when I regretted it. And it was never going to be an easy decision to live with.
But who the fuck liked easy?
The most important thing was that I had a gut instinct it would be worth it. And when I saw Mac and Benny charging up the arrivals corridor and knocking their father clean on his arse, I knew it definitely was.
He hugged me for a long, long time. And so tightly I gave serious consideration as to whether he was trying to suffocate me in plain view of a thousand people so that he could later plead that it was an accident at the tribunal.
He leaned down and squeezed the boys.
‘I’m so glad you came back,’ he said eventually, with a definite catch in his voice.
‘Don’t be crazy,’ I gasped, ‘there was never any doubt that we’d come back.’
That banging noise is the gates of heaven slamming shut. Look, it was only a white lie–I was a reformed character, but that didn’t make me perfect.
‘Come on, let’s go home,’ I told him. ‘Let’s just go home.’
He took my hand and we walked off, towards the airport doors, walking back towards our old life.
Or at least, that’s what would have happened if he hadn’t said, ‘Erm, Carly, there’s something I have to tell you about that.’
‘What?’
No! Don’t tell me our house had buggering flooded again. Those freaking pipes were a nightmare. Or burnt down. How the hell had he managed to burn the house down when his idea of cooking was boiling a kettle for a Pot Noodle? Shit, an electrical fault within the kettle. That’s it, I was suing Kenwood. They might be a multi-million-pound corporation, but…
‘There are boxes, lots of them, all over the house. I really didn’t think that you’d come home so I’ve already started packing up.’
I tried to breathe but someone had seemingly removed my windpipe. Packing up? Was he leaving me? I’d just knocked back Jackie bloody Collins for him and now he was leaving?
One word sprang immediately to mind. ‘Divorce.’
Actually, there were a few more, but if I repeated them Mark would have grounds for an injunction.
‘Wh—Wh—Wh—’
I was actually just gasping for air, but he interpreted that as a ‘Why?’
‘Carly, you were right. I realised it when I got back from LA. You know, I saw my boys more in those two and a half weeks than I’ve done in the last three years. My own children are growing up and I didn’t even know them. What is that all about?’
I had absolutely no idea. I was both mute and vacant.
‘And what had happened to us? We were a divorce court waiting to happen. And I’m a lawyer, for Christ’s sake, so I know how much that costs.’
Still speechless. Nodding now.
‘Actually, strictly speaking, I was a lawyer. I quit my job.’
‘You what?’ I meant it to be a quiet gasp, but it came out as a roar so loud that several dozen people stopped to stare.
‘I quit my job. Or at least took a sabbatical for a year. I can decide then whether I want to go back. There are a few things to tie up so I finish at the end of the month. Michael is going to rent our house–Cal and Carol have finally evicted him. So I’m boxing up everything that’s personal, breakable or pawnable.’
He reached over and stroked my pink face.
‘I just want to be with you and the boys, Carly Those days down at Mother’s Beach were so fantastic. Except for the first one, but that’s another story.’
I finally found my voice. ‘I heard. Mandy and the girls asked me to tell you that they missed talking to you.’
‘They do? I kind of miss talking to them. In a very macho way, of course,’ he said with a grin.
‘Of course.’
‘It just all reminded me of what real life was like. Or, at
least, should be like.’
It was incredible. Somewhere between London, LA and back to London again, Mark Barwick, high-flying workaholic lawyer had morphed into Cool Dude Ken, the one that came complete with surfboard, scuba set and three-quarter-length flowery shorts.
Talking of which, Benny was going to have to take that scuba mask off sooner or later otherwise his graduation photos were going to be highly unusual. I glanced down at my sons, who were patiently sitting on our suitcase waiting for their parents to stop gabbing. Which we would. Just as soon as I got my head around the logistics of their father’s mid-life crisis.
‘Honey, I have never loved you more than I do at this very minute. Or at least, as much as I will after I’ve had you drug-tested and confirmed that you’re clean. But your sabbatical plus my overloaded credit cards equals poverty. Where are we supposed to live?’
‘Beverly Hills.’
‘What?’ I gasped.
He reached into his inside pocket and pulled out tickets–four of them.
‘Flights back to LA, a month from now, for all of us. I intended to rent an apartment, but I spoke to Sam this morning and he said that a director pal of his was going on location…’
‘Cameron King,’ I interjected.
‘…and was looking for someone to house-sit for a few months. That girl Jojo called back a wee while later to say that she’d love you to do it, if you didn’t mind.’
Mind? The world was going mad. Completely mad. Maybe it was me who’d inhaled some mind-altering substance and we were actually already halfway home at this very minute, stopping to pick up essentials like milk, bread, and another fix from the local dealer.
‘Oh, and she said to tell you that Sam was having dinner with one of the apostles tonight. Does that make any sense?’
‘Perfect sense.’ Go, Sam.
‘Okay. So the house is sorted. But we’ll still need money…’
Sold the car…
‘Visas?’
‘Our tourist visas will last for three months. We can possibly extend them to six. By that time, you’ll be working for a studio. Or if not, then we’ll go somewhere else. It’ll be an adventure, Carly. One great big sodding adventure!’
Tears started to flow down my face. Huge great rivers of them. Guilt had kicked in. I couldn’t carry on with this. I couldn’t let him do this after everything that had happened. I checked to see that the boys weren’t listening then whispered…
‘Mark, I need to tell you something. While we were in LA, I had impure thoughts about Sam. I’m so, so sorry.’
Mark’s gorgeous brow furrowed. Ecstasy had turned to torment in a split second. For the first time in all these years together it was me who had burst his bubble.
‘Did you do anything about it?’ he replied, deathly quiet.
‘No. I thought about it, but I didn’t. I promise. Oh, Mark, I’m sorry.’
Eventually, after an eternity, he spoke. But it was so quiet that I couldn’t hear him.
‘What?’ I asked him. This was it. This was where he told me that I was a manky tart and I should never darken his door again. Presuming he ever got another door, that is, since our present one seemed to be in the hands of an estate agency.
‘I had impure thoughts about Mandy.’
The bastard! But hey: goose, gander.
‘Did you do anything about it?’
‘No. A decision I was glad of when I discovered her boyfriend…’
‘Fiancé,’ I corrected him.
He grinned. ‘She said yes? Great. Well, her fiancé plays American football for the LA Raiders–he’d have killed me.
‘Carly, we wouldn’t have been human if we’d never thought about anyone else–our marriage was dying. But now it’s okay. Isn’t it?’
I nodded. The sobs were starting to subside now, good news on the snot front for Mark, because at that moment I leaned over and kissed him. Kissed him like I hadn’t done in years. And he kissed me back.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
It was coming from the general direction of my ovaries. How predictable was I?
I suddenly had an overwhelming urge to be horizontal in a dark room.
‘Let’s go home. Now. Quickly. Can you carry my bag?’
‘Sure,’ he said, picking it up and grabbing Benny’s free hand with his.
I took Benny’s other hand, then reached for Mac. ‘Come on, Mac, time to go.’
‘I’m not Mac.’
Here we go.
‘Fine! But even Darth Vader has to take his mother’s hand in a busy airport.’
‘Not Darth any more.’
‘Who are you?’
‘Batman!’
My life was now complete. I had my husband back, Benny was happy and my oldest son had returned to the right side of the law.
‘Da na na na Da na na na Da na na na Da na na na BATMAN!’ screeched Benny.
Bliss. Sheer bloody bliss.
It was so blissful in fact, that as we strolled off towards the exit I didn’t even hear my phone ringing.
Mark grabbed it out of my bag and answered it. He held it out to me. ‘It’s Kate.’
I took the phone. She must have known all about this and she hadn’t said a word. But I knew how happy she’d be for me.
‘Kate! Can’t talk, babe, but let me tell you, ORGASMIC! Slap my thigh, colour me happy and sheer bloody orgasmic. I’ll be home in an hour or so and I’ll pop right in!’
‘I’m sorry?’ she said in what sounded like a very confused voice.
Perhaps Mark hadn’t told her after all. She was talking again–I strained to hear her over the noise of the terminal.
‘I think you might have me mixed up with someone else. This is Kate. Kate Winslet. We met a few months ago in Richmond Park and you gave me a copy of your book. I’m so sorry it’s taken me so long to contact you but I’ve just had a chance to read it and…’
About the Author
For much of Shari’s working life she was a nightclub manager, standing on club doors arguing with crazy drunk people in Glasgow and Shanghai. She now lives in Scotland with her husband and two children and spends her days writing books, screenplays and two weekly columns for the Daily Record newspaper. It’s great … but she does miss the crazy drunk people …
For further information on Shari Low, visit her website at www.sharilow.com
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
Copyright
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
AVON
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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2007
Copyright © Shari Low 2007
Shari Low asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work Spiderman Words and Music by Stephen Lemberg © Kama Sutra Music Inc, USA EMI United Partnership Ltd, London WC2H 0QY (Publishing) and Alfred Publishing Co, USA (Print) Administered in Europe by Faber Music Ltd Reproduced by permission All rights reserved. Batman Theme Words by Neal Hefti © 1966 EMI Catalogue Partnership and EMI Miller Catalog Inc, USA EMI United Partnership Ltd, London WC2H 0QY (Publishing) and Alfred Publishing Co, USA (Print) Administered in Europe by Faber Music Ltd Reproduced by permission All rights reserved. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN-13: 978-1-84756-003-2
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EPub Edition © 2009 ISBN: 9780007334919
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