by Daisy Tate
His brother, he eventually explained, would sort it. The money, the loans, the debt – but on one condition: Monty would work for his brother as a carpenter. Which, he added eyes glued to hers, would entail staying in the West Country.
Freya realized she’d forgotten to breathe.
She pictured that anonymous hand reaching out to touch her newly pregnant mother’s hand. She remembered how frightened she’d felt the day she’d told Monty she was pregnant, only to have her worst fear come to pass: him leaving. She forced herself to remember how all of that fear and pain and anxiety had been swept away not when he’d come back, but when she saw the pride in his face as he held his infant children for the first time.
Choices.
Everyone had choices.
She looked down at her resolutions. It was such a long list.
Would any of this have happened if she’d stepped away from the shop when she started noticing things simply weren’t working any more? They could’ve switched roles. She could’ve sold things on line from home while Monty saved the world – or at least part of it – and got a steady income. She could know where Felix’s kilt pin was.
‘Freya?’ Monty sobbed. ‘Say something. Anything.’
This was her fault. Her gorgeous, beautiful, generous husband was falling to bits because she hadn’t reined in her need to prove to her parents she had what it took to make it in the fashion world.
Then again, she hadn’t been the one to take out six secret credit cards, max them all out, then drain what little they’d managed to save for the children’s uni fees, freeze the mortgage and leave untold number of bills unpaid.
Could all this have been fixed if they’d trusted one another more? Believed in one another more?
‘Give me a minute, love,’ she managed to say. Her mind was reeling so fast, nothing would stick.
‘Please Freya. I love you. I will do anything in the world so long as you forgive me.’
He sounded as though he meant it. Monty always meant it when he apologized. It was follow-through that was his problem.
It takes two to tango, darlin’.
There was a knock on her door. ‘Mum?’ Regan slipped in, wiping the sleep out of her eyes. ‘Are you talking to Dad?’
‘Yes, darlin’.’ She waited until Monty swept away his tears and blew his nose before handing the phone to her daughter. She squealed with delight when she saw Monty making a silly face at her. They gabbled on a bit about the party and how much more fun it would’ve been if he’d been there. Regan wandered to the next room so Monty could wish Felix a Happy New Year. A moment later, she heard them all burst into gales of laughter.
She began gouging thick, dark lines across each of her resolutions. The good intentions. The minutiae. The broad strokes. It all boiled down to one very simple choice. A choice that would stay with all of them for ever.
Would she spend the rest of her life resenting her husband for all of the things he wasn’t – or love him for all of the things he was?
Charlotte’s massive platter of pancakes had been demolished. The bacon had long since been eaten and one sad little remaining sausage had Bonzer’s name written all over it. The children had begged an unusually quiet Rocco for one last trip to the barns for calf-cuddles, and Lachlan had excused himself for a wee lie-down before everyone set off on their travels. It was just the girls left at the table, finishing the dregs of their coffee before Emily’s taxi arrived. Izzy steeled herself. It was now or never.
She tinged her fork against the side of the syrup bottle. ‘Announcement time!’
Everyone turned to her, foreheads lifted in curiosity, mouths tweaked into intrigued smiles.
‘Let me guess?’ Emily, who was unbelievably grumpy said, ‘You made an appointment at the GP’s.’
‘Oh, I was going to do that for you, Izzy,’ Charlotte rushed in.
‘Why can’t we all let Izzy look after Izzy?’ Freya asked. Freya clearly needed more sleep, but it was precisely the point Izzy was going to make. She was a grown woman who needed to both look after herself and ask her friends for help.
‘I have made an appointment,’ she said a bit more grandly than she’d intended.
Emily raised her arms in a ‘finally!’ gesture. Izzy reached out and clasped Emily’s hands in her own. ‘With the oncologist.’
Everyone exchanged confused looks, apart from Emily, whose face was impossible to read.
Charlotte was the one who finally managed to ask why.
‘I had breast cancer back in Hawaii. I think it might be coming back.’
‘Granddad’s car smells like moss and cow poo.’
‘It does, doesn’t it?’ Freya was refusing to let herself be annoyed by the fact that she and her children and all their bags were jammed into her father’s tiny little two-door tin bucket.
Her husband was having a breakdown. They were subterranean levels of broke. And her business was crumbling to bits. She didn’t have the remotest clue what to do about any of it. Or whether or not things could carry on as they had been. (Actually she knew the answer to that one. No. They couldn’t.)
All of which was neither here nor there, because the one thing not on her list was cancer.
Izzy’s news had hit them like an atom bomb. She’d not gone into great detail, but she’d had a single mastectomy, chemo and radiation. Owing to a domino effect of cock-ups between her hospital in Hawaii, Wales, and the one she’d yet to register with in Sussex, she was three months late on her annual scan. She’d had one shortly before she’d moved back and had been clear but, as of late, she hadn’t been feeling quite herself and, no, she wasn’t just talking about the head cold.
Freya had vowed there and then to make a brand-new set of resolutions. One of which included being grateful for everything she did have, rather than ruing the things she didn’t.
So for today? It simply didn’t matter that they were in a cramped car reeking of teenaged boy socks and cow dung. Not when the one thing they didn’t have to worry about was dying.
Poppy climbed out of the car and closed the door quietly behind her. ‘All right, Mum?’
‘Of course, darling.’ Charlotte wasn’t. She was absolutely heartbroken for Izzy. How they’d managed to pack the car, get the children in, particularly with Jack taking up his status as resident moody teen again, and hit the motorway was beyond her. She’d driven in a daze and, it appeared, pulled in for coffee in much the same state.
At least Izzy (doped up on cold medicine) and Luna (in the back row with Bonzer) were asleep. The last thing they needed was to realize they were being driven down the road by a woman in shock.
Izzy was the most exuberant person Charlotte had ever met. It was impossible to imagine all of that energy being savaged by cells, uncontrollably dividing again and again with the sole intent of malevolence.
Mercifully, any animosity Poppy had felt over seeing her and Rocco kissing had vanished. Jack, on the other hand, was re-harnessing his surliness with each passing mile. Whether it was the absence of cows to tend to or the Instagram pictures she could see him thumbing past – well, she had her guesses. The past few days had been a little bubble of perfection. A bubble now slit wide open with the blunt reappearance of reality. A reality that included a message from Hazel hoping to discuss ‘the assets situation’ sooner rather than later.
‘Mum.’ Jack tugged her phone off the charging jack, glared at it then climbed out of the car and handed it to her. ‘Dad’s sent you something.’
Irritatingly, her fingers shook as she pressed the download button. The attachment – there was no note – was from Oli’s divorce lawyers.
Something about this being the busiest time of year for divorce lawyers sprung to mind then faded as she began to read.
She scanned the document, doing her very best to keep her face neutral as she absorbed the full brunt of the blow.
If she was interested, Oliver had a buyer for the house. A friend of a friend he’d been skiing with had two small
children and another on the way and were looking to move out of London by summer. If Charlotte wanted to stay that was, of course, her legal right, but … benefiting both parties … expediting the proceedings … would have to be sold eventually …
She pinched her fingers to the bridge of her nose.
‘Is he coming back early?’ Jack asked, his ever-deepening voice tinged with hope.
‘No, darling. I’m afraid it’s to do with the divorce.’
Jack swore. Poppy told him off. He bit her head off.
‘All right, you two. Why don’t we go in and get something hot to drink, shall we?’
As they walked towards the services, Poppy quietly asked, ‘Is he going to, like, totally forget about us? I mean, he still loves us, right?’
Jack told her not to be such an idiot; he’d offered to let them stay in London instead of Sussex, hadn’t he?
Poppy snapped back at Jack that she was only asking, gawwwd, then slipped her hand into Charlotte’s.
Charlotte didn’t know whose hand needed holding more. Oli had said they could move in with him?
‘Of course he still loves you, darling,’ Charlotte said. ‘Life’s just a bit complicated at the moment.
And there it was. The complexity of divorce in a nutshell. A beeped-out word one minute. A father his children couldn’t bear to lose the next. A wife who’d thought her family’s world revolved around her, only to discover it didn’t.
‘Should we get Izzy some more cold medicine and Luna a hot chocolate?’
‘Good idea.’ Charlotte gave Poppy’s hand a squeeze. ‘I just need to run to the loo. If I give you some money, why don’t you and Jack get some hot chocolates for everyone.’
After a quiet weep in the cubicle, Charlotte pulled herself together and went to the sink to give her face a quick wash. As awful as it was, she couldn’t help but appreciate how the divorce had thrown a spotlight on how she’d lived her life. The wallflower who’d been so busy running around trying to make everyone else’s lives better, she’d nearly faded out of her own. She washed her hands, eyes locked on the long mirror as busy, tired travellers shuffled in and out of the cubicles behind her. So many lives.
She hoped she had what it took to be a good example to her children. She hoped she had what it took to look after Izzy if, god forbid, her suspicions were true. What scared her the most was facing so much loss. Her children. Her dear, sweet friend. Her marriage.
Well.
She thought of Rocco and that wonderfully perfect kiss.
The marriage was becoming easier to live without.
Izzy and the children?
She’d fight tooth and nail for them.
She gave herself a determined nod, then headed out into the world to get on with things.
Acknowledgements
If this was a pop-up book, at this juncture a very long scroll would unfurl with a squillion names on it going back to primary school. Earlier. Birth. Thank you mum and dad for having me. And thank you for bringing us camping. A lot. What a fecund pool of material to draw from. This book has been such a great joy to write for many reasons, not least of which because it rekindled a fabulous friendship with the glorious Jackie N. Thank you for all of your honest insight. Lady W – muchos gracias for the fashion advice. You are, and shall forever be, my Coco. Netts – you are, as ever, a wonder. You are made of kindness and all of the other lovely things. Beth – you read the earliest, most painful drafts of this and still had nice things to say, so thank you. Darcy – again, thank you for your honesty and insight. You iz most helpful. JP and Mich - your friendship, that chicken soup and those pickles were a godsend. Never before has shampoo been more gratefully received. Natasha, bless you for the Zencils. They made all the difference. James – thank you for the insight into the amorous tiers of lawful luvvin’. Most interesting. Christine and Pam - you’re tremendous cheerleaders. Mwah. Sue and Stu! You made real-life glamping extra fun. Sarah L – thank you for lunch and illuminating me on just what it takes to pack a large family up for a weekend under canvas. Exhausting. To my agent, Jo Bell who is not only marvellous at reading small print, but who is tremendously talented at reminding me about which small stuff to sweat and which big stuff to get on with and achieve. A heartfelt thanks to you. To the team at Harper Collins for making this twinkle of an idea a reality, especially that transcendentally superpowered Kate Bradley, my amazing faith-filled, patient, inspirational and acutely insightful editor. Thank you for believing in me. Great love to Grissom and Jorja who began this journey with me and to Skye who picked up their batons. And, of course, to my sweet beloved husband. Without you … well … that’s not really worth thinking about is it? Bring on the marshmallows!
Are the friends finished with the outdoors for good, or are they ready for another weekend of secrets and unfinished business …? Find out in the next glamptabulous instalments available to buy now!
About the Author
Daisy Tate loves telling stories. Telling them in books is even better. When not writing, she raises stripey, Scottish cows, performs in Amateur Dramatics, pretends her life is a musical and bakes cakes that will never win her a place on a television baking show. She was born in the USA but has never met Bruce Springsteen. She now calls East Sussex home.
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