‘It’s about HeartBaker.’ I’d seen Jamie pretty sheepish more than once over the past few months. Today he looked at risk of being roasted and gobbled down with mint sauce.
‘What?’ Sarah grabbed the counter behind her. ‘You didn’t hunt him down, did you? Is that why he stood me up? Have you done something to him? And all this time I thought he was a selfish, lying slime-ball.’
‘No!’ Jamie looked horrified. ‘I don’t know what you think it is I do, but I don’t hurt people. Well, unless strictly necessary to avoid other people being hurt… Anyway, no! And he’dtriedto get in touch with you. He was mostly in areas with no signal. Underground. Out at sea. Places like that. When he left, there was no time to explain and he thought he’d be able to let you know later on, but things kicked off a lot quicker than planned, he was kind of… ambushed. And he’d have walked away, left someone else to deal with it, put you above his work but there was a kid. A boy. And he thought, if this was Edison, Sarah would want him to get her boy back.HeartBakerwould do anything to get him back. And if he walked away from that, just to find a phone signal so he could call and cancel a date, or explain why he didn’t turn up, he wouldn’t be good enough for you anyway.’
‘Urrr, just to be clear, we are talking aboutyouhere, aren’t we?’ Sarah asked.
Jamie took a breath so deep I thought his T-shirt would burst open.
‘You are HeartBaker.’
He nodded.
‘Okay. I will have many, many questions about that later, and you’d better have some damn good answers. For now, get over here and kiss me.’
If it had been possible to squeeze myself into one of the cupboards, believe me, I would have. Instead, trapped behind both Sarah and Jamie, who I was fairly sure were oblivious to my presence in the kitchen, I opted for wedging myself into the corner of the room. Yes, it would have been tactful to turn my head to the wall, but I’m ashamed to say I peeped, as Jamie took three strides over to Sarah, gently cradled her head in his hands and looked in her eyes for a full minute, before slowly, so slowly I nearly shouted, ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, get on with it!’, he pressed his lips to hers.
* * *
I spent the next few weeks working hard at forgiving myself for what was, in the grand scheme of things, hardly worth having a nervous breakdown over. Talking it through with my friends helped. Getting my mind off my own problems and onto other things helped too. Watching Sarah trying to play down how increasingly potty she was about Jamie was delightful. Kiko and Adam took the girls to Japan, and started a weekly date night. She was considering going back to work part-time, once she’d figured out what she wanted to do.
‘Nothing in an office.’ She shuddered as we gathered round a picnic bench on the Common on the last weekend of the holidays. She winced as Lily let out an ear-piercing scream in response to Edison and Jonno waving their muddy sticks too close to her face. ‘Or with children.’
‘There’s a healthcare assistant’s job going in the maternity ward,’ Ellen said, after instructing the boys to play somewhere else.
Kiko took a sip of coffee. ‘I’d quite like to be a taxi-driver.’
‘Awhat?’ Sarah goggled. ‘Ferrying drunks home from town at all hours of the morning? Have you lost the plot?’
‘I wouldn’t mind making sure people got home safely. I’m used to having hardly any sleep. But, I was thinking more of providing an alternative to Tezza,’ Kiko said. ‘Now the bus services are being cut again there must be plenty of older people needing help with their shopping. Tourists who’d pay good money to access the local attractions accompanied by fascinating facts about the forest. Service with a smile, for a change.’
‘Tezza would be so furious,’ Ellen said.
‘Do it,’ Sarah added, grinning.
‘I’m looking into it. But Adam’s back to work in a few weeks, so I’ll need to find some child-care. If only I knew someone amazing at looking after kids. Someone local, flexible, gorgeous…’
‘Maddie would be over the moon to have more girls in the house,’ Ellen said, looking at me. ‘And you could get a lot more decorating done with the extra income.’
‘I could,’ I mused. ‘Except, I’m considering my own career change. I love looking after your kids. And that job has saved my life in more ways than one. I hate to leave you in the lurch, but I’ve been wondering about whether I could hack it as a teaching assistant.’
‘Yes!’ Sarah said, banging her mug down on the table. ‘Yes, you could. I’d pay you myself to assist teaching Edison.’
Ellen beamed. ‘Talk to Will about it. He’d love to help.’
* * *
A fortnight into the new term, after stuffing three filthy PE kits in the washing machine, texting Dawson to say that, yes, he could stay at Lily’s house for tea, and agreeing that, yes, the triplets could build a teddy cannon as long as no teddies were hurt in the process, I answered a sharp rap at the door.
‘Grandpa!’ the boys whispered, before promptly disappearing upstairs.
Great. I’d heard nothing, from either Jamie or Brenda, about the possible culprit behind the intimidation tactics at the house, and with no further incidents I’d finally managed to stop jumping at every creak or bang. But I hadn’t been able to shake my suspicions about Fisher.
‘Ellen won’t be back for an hour,’ I said.
‘That’s not a problem,’ he replied, slithering past me into the hallway and dumping his briefcase at the bottom of the stairs. ‘I can wait.’
Not a problem for whom? I chuntered to myself, following him into the kitchen.
