I still can’t believe they said yes.
Ellie stacked the pages that had finished spewing out of the co-op’s ageing printer, then stapled them into batches. She paused, aware her fingers were trembling, the memory of Tess, Annie and Dee’s enthusiastic support four days ago for her farm shop and café suggestion still a bit unnerving.
Of course, it had been a qualified yes. A yes that the four of them at the Lemon Drizzle Summit had decided to keep secret from the rest of the co-op, even Annie and Tess’s husbands, until Ellie could work out a coherent business plan.
The business plan that she was supposed to be presenting to everyone in approximately two minutes. No wonder her fingers were trembling.
Over the past week, she’d got stuck into her role as the new admin manager while also spending the last four days creating that business plan, which had meant contacting the Council Planning Department, looking at the financial projections in more detail, checking out investment possibilities and doing about a billion and one spreadsheets.
On top of that she had also taken it upon herself to finish correlating, alphabetising and reorganising all the paperwork, and worked out a system for filing the VAT and tax returns online.
The work had exhausted her, requiring ten-hour work days which had included some important field trips with Tess, a couple of meetings with their gang of four to hash out tonight’s presentation, a trip to the local bank to schmooze the manager and hours spent bent over the new laptop she’d bought to replace the ageing computer Art had inherited from Pam. She’d even taken it to bed with her last night so that she would be fully prepared for tonight’s meeting.
But now it was show time, and the storm of anxiety in the pit of her stomach from four days ago, when she had first suggested this idea to Dee, Tess and Annie, had become a Force Ten gale.
It shouldn’t be this important to her, that she – or rather they – got the vote of confidence they needed to go ahead with the shop. She stuck the printouts under her arm and headed out of the office.
It wasn’t that important. She was blowing this out of proportion. She had nothing to prove to her mother, or anyone else. This was just an idea. And it wasn’t even her idea, it had been Pam’s idea originally. If everyone else decided it was rubbish, it would be absolutely fine. And if they went for it, she could hardly take the credit.
The smell of freshly made coffee wafted around her as she walked down the corridor and through the kitchen door. Everyone sat round the table, chatting amiably, and she was struck anew by how much the place had changed from nineteen years ago. But then she’d changed too. The thought strengthened her resolve, as her mother and Tess and Annie threw her reassuring smiles from the head of the table.
Everyone gave her warm greetings, even the sleepy Melody sitting in her father’s lap with her thumb tucked in her mouth.
Everyone accept Art, who stood apart, propping up the sink, his hands wrapped round a mug of her mother’s coffee.
She shook off the trickle of apprehension. This wasn’t personal. And she needed to stop making it so. But, even so, her gaze lingered on him.
In a V-neck T-shirt that offered a tantalising glimpse of dark springy curls, and faded jeans that moulded to his long legs, his freshly showered hair slicked back from his forehead, he looked clean and probably smelled delicious. The memory of his scent, infused with hints of man musk and motor oil and the industrial cleaner he used to wash it off, spiced the air even though she was too far away to smell it.
Their eyes connected, and awareness skittered over her skin.
She ran her tongue over dry lips, recalling their meeting in the corridor outside her room the previous evening, while he was padding back from the bathroom, a towel hooked round his hips, his legs and feet and chest bare. Moisture had collected on the dark curls to drip through his six-pack. He had grunted a greeting and carried on walking, giving her the opportunity to follow his retreating arse down the corridor. His flexing glutes barely concealed by the towel.
She hadn’t slept very well last night.
He blew over the steaming coffee, never losing eye contact, and she felt the phantom gush of breath whisper over the skin of her cleavage.
Her mother bustled past, cutting off her line of vision. Ellie straightened, jerked out of her trance.
Get a clue, Princess Drama.
She had a meeting to chair. An important meeting. And entering into a fugue state over the memory of Art’s V was inappropriate. Not to mention distracting.
‘Everyone’s here.’ Her mother handed her a cup of coffee.
Ellie concentrated on adding a dollop of cream. She took a sip and placed the mug on the table, dispelling thoughts of Art and her inappropriate scent fantasies. She handed the stack of printouts to Annie to pass round.
Art glanced at his copy, before stuffing it into his back pocket.
Her heart did a somersault.
He’s dyslexic. It’s a fairly common learning disability. Get over it.
She cleared her throat. ‘Hi, everyone, thanks so much for coming tonight to the meeting me and my mum, and Tess and Annie have called.’ She launched into the introduction the four of them had prepared. ‘Hopefully this won’t take too long, but Tess, Annie, Dee and I have been working on something.’ She paused. ‘An idea, a fairly radical idea, but we think an exciting one, that we wanted to present to you guys.’
‘You can keep us as long as you like, if Dee’s walnut dream cake is involved,’ Rob Jackson, Annie’s husband, announced while cutting himself a slice of cake almost as large as the head of his toddler son Freddie who was squirming on his lap. Freddie reached out to sink his fingers into the frosting.
Ellie coughed out a laugh. But it sounded trite and forced.
What was she actually doing here? Her CSUB certificate said she had five years’ event-planning experience and knew how to get good flow round the food and beverages area during a non-profit fund-raiser. It did not mean that she could save this business, especially as her own business had already collapsed into a quagmire – not unlike the chemical potties she’d hired for the Orchard Harbor Jazz-ateers’ centenary festival last year.
She gripped the sheet of paper, feeling as if she had a spotlight shining on all her misplaced hubris and imperfections.
She took a steadying breath and talked herself out of the pit in her head. That jazz festival had been an event for three hundred people, and she’d managed to find replacement toilets at the last minute so none of the Jazz-ateers had been forced to crap al fresco in the driving rain.
The failure of her business hadn’t been her fault. And she had every intention of trying to resurrect it, in some form or another, when she returned to the US and the scandal of her impending divorce and Chelsea Hamilton’s baby bump died down. She could do this. She could present a well-intentioned business initiative to the families living on this fledgling housing co-op. Whether they chose to follow through on it would then be out of her hands.
‘Do you want to tell everyone Pammy’s idea?’ Her mother’s suggestion cut through the fog of insecurities. Ellie looked up from the sheet grasped in her hands to find eight pairs of eyes focused on her. Everyone except Freddie Jackson, who was bouncing up and down on his dad’s lap as if he’d just swallowed a pound of crack cocaine instead of a fistful of coffee frosting.
Only one pair of eyes held her gaze though, searing right through her composure to the washed-up event planner beneath.
‘Yes, of course.’ She glanced at the first bullet point on her notes.
Ignore Art, he can’t intimidate you any more.
‘Basically, we called this meeting because after having looked closely at the project’s accounts, I think the co-op needs to think about investigating new avenues for profit growth to create a sustainable future.’
‘The project’s purpose is to create a sustainable living for everyone here. We’re not trying to make ourselves rich.’ Art’s terse tone sliced right through Ellie’s composure.
Her bouncing stomach went into a tailspin.
She’d expected debate and discussion, and possibly some probing questions about what qualified her to make suggestions about the project’s future when she wasn’t a resident. What she hadn’t expected – or been prepared for – was to have the plan dismissed before she’d even presented it.
Suddenly all she could hear was the fake concern in Caroline Myerson’s voice as her final client sacked her, because having an event planner in the midst of an acrimonious divorce hadn’t been the sort of vibe Caroline had wanted for her thirtieth wedding anniversary celebration.
‘I’m not talking about getting rich,’ Ellie managed, clinging to her composure before her confidence crumbled completely. ‘I’m talking about establishing more of a financial cushion. At the moment you’re skirting the edge of financial ruin every time you need to buy a new piece of farm equipment or…’
‘That sounds serious,’ Jacob said, bouncing the other Jackson twin on his knee. ‘Are we about to go bankrupt?’
Art jerked away from the sink, the indolent pose history. ‘That’s bullshit. We’ve been in profit for the last two years.’
By a few hundred pounds.
Ellie swallowed down the retort with a gulp of coffee. Her purpose had never been to scare anyone.
Relax, rewind, re-engage.
She repeated the mantra that had seen her through the early days in Orchard Harbor, when she’d been touting for business and getting knocked back at every turn. If she could schmooze the ladies who lunched, she could schmooze the good people of Willow Tree Farm.
‘I didn’t say you’re about to go bankrupt,’ Ellie qualified, Art’s glare making her agonisingly self-conscious. Why was he being so combative? Even with his literacy issues, he must know the project was one broken boiler or Inland Revenue audit away from serious problems. ‘Your finances aren’t on a solid enough footing. You need more revenue to increase your available operating capital, not just to insulate yourselves against emergencies but also to make up for the shortfall in your income during the winter months.’
‘And Ellie’s discovered that Pam had a brilliant idea five years ago, which never got actioned…’ Tess sent Dee a consoling smile ‘…because of her illness, but which might be able to save all our bacons.’
‘Brilliant ideas are always welcome here,’ her husband Mike chimed in, his enthusiasm in marked contrast to Art’s antipathy.
At least someone was willing to listen without prejudice.
Ellie glanced back at her hit sheet, memorising the bullet points until her fingers had stopped trembling and her stomach didn’t feel as if it were about to plummet to the stone floor.
‘OK,’ Ellie began again. ‘Before I outline Pam’s idea, I want to give you an overview of why it could work.’ She kept her voice steady. Sounding confident was as important as being confident. ‘Basically, by far your most profitable venture is the products and produce you sell at the community markets in the region. I worked with Tess on the stall the Sunday before last and it was obvious you have a lot of regular customers in Salisbury alone. In contrast, revenue from orders for the dairy products and organic produce straight from the farm are much harder to come by because of the competition from the big supermarkets.’
‘That’s been a problem since we started the business,’ Rob said, with Mike nodding in agreement. ‘There aren’t enough independent outlets nearby to sell to, our yield is too small to attract the supermarkets and it’s against the farm’s ethics to transport our goods long distance. When we get a new contract, the feedback’s always really good, but we’re struggling to find enough stockists at a wholesale price that can sustain our profit margins – which is why we started selling the surplus at the local farmers’ markets.’
‘All of which is exactly my point and where Pam’s idea comes in,’ Ellie said, beginning to warm to her cause. ‘Five years ago, Pam submitted a planning application for a change of use for the back barn.’ Ellie glanced at her mum. ‘She didn’t tell anyone, because we think she may have wanted it to be a surprise. And then she was diagnosed and well…’ She paused, not sure how to continue.
‘The thing is, Ellie found the application approval in Pam’s files,’ Dee kicked in. ‘So we could go ahead with Pam’s idea now, without having to wade through too much red tape, because Pam has already done all that for us.’ The emotion in Dee’s voice had Ellie swallowing the block of emotion in her own throat.
How come she had never realised exactly how much her mother had loved Pam that long ago summer?
‘A change of use to what?’ Rob asked.
‘A shop and café,’ Ellie said, then paused, remembering to breathe. No one said anything, so she continued, desperate to fill the silence. ‘Pam wanted to turn the back barn into a shop and café for Dee. You’re in an even stronger position now to launch such a venture after your success locally. Rather than being at the whim of other local stockists or having to transport your surplus to a whole network of community markets around the region – and be at the mercy of their timetables – you could sell everything you produce on the farm, and all the products you make for the markets right here. You’ve got a great range of stuff, which local people obviously love, and it would effectively cut out the middleman.’
The silence continued for a moment, but then suddenly everyone started talking at once.
‘Damn, that is a brilliant idea, why the hell didn’t we think of that ourselves?’ Mike said.
‘There’s sure as hell a gap in the market locally,’ Rob spoke over him, while trying to fend off Freddie, who was happily combing his dad’s hair with sticky fingers.
‘And the real brilliance of it,’ Annie cut in, ‘is that we have all the labour and talent we need right here to make it happen. The four of us have already worked out a possible timetable.’ She flung her arm out to indicate Ellie as well as Dee and Tess. ‘To renovate the barn and then open by the beginning of August so we can launch during the summer. It’s tight and it’s going to be hard work, but we think it’s doable.’
‘Who’s going to run the place once it’s open?’ Rob asked.
Tess grinned. ‘That’s the best part. The plan would be for me and Annie to jack in our jobs. We could share the childcare, and we were already baking like insane people in our spare time to supply the community market stalls we attend so it wouldn’t be that much more work.’
‘I’d be happy to help out with childcare or baking chores when I get home from work in the evenings,’ Maddy said, the enthusiastic smile she sent Ellie full of gratitude. ‘Maybe me and Jay could give up our jobs too, eventually? Our dream was to work on the farm and it might actually become a reality if this works.’
‘Anything I bake would probably poison the customers,’ Jacob said, his enthusiasm almost as pronounced as Maddy’s. ‘But I spent some time in foster care as a teenager, so I know how to ride herd on younger kids.’ Little Jamie Jackson chortled on his knee in confirmation. ‘And I would ace the customer service given my astonishing charm.’
‘Yeah right, Mr Lover Man.’ Maddy laughed.
‘How would we publicise the place?’ Mike asked. ‘We certainly don’t have the funds to advertise?’
‘And how are we going to fund the renovation?’ Rob said.
Ellie held up her hands to halt the flow of questions. ‘If you want to take a look at the business plan I’ve printed out, it includes suggestions for marketing and PR, as well as some costings for the original set up and running costs.’ She’d done her homework on this in the past four days. ‘But in answer to your specific questions,’ she smiled at Mike and Rob. ‘I agree, paid advertising is too expensive and won’t necessarily pay off. To start with we need to keep costs as low as possible. But you’ve already got a great customer base. While we’re setting up the shop, I’d suggest giving out flyers at all those markets, to get the word to your customers that they can get your great products any time of the week if they’re willing to travel to the shop. From the enthusiasm of people in Salisbury, I don’t think that’s going to be too big an ask.’ She carried on talking as everyone began reading their printouts. All except Art, who she noticed was the only one who hadn’t made a comment yet about the idea. ‘The truth is, there’s no better advertisement for what you do than the products themselves,’ she continued. ‘That said, there’s also tons of stuff we can do especially with social media and I’d be happy to set up a website while I’m here. I designed one for my own business and it’s not hard. When it comes to the regulations, I’ve checked with the council and the planning approval still stands, plus Dee already has all the necessary health and safety documentation for the stuff she sells at farmers’ markets, all the other red tape will be to do with the building conversion for the shop itself.’
‘Isn’t that going to need a lot of work?’ Jacob said, lifting his head from studying the business plan. ‘It’s almost derelict.’
Ellie cleared her throat. She was on shakier ground here, knowing absolutely nothing about construction. But she’d braved a walking tour of the facility with Dee and Tess even under threat of rat sightings, and read through Pam’s original specs for the conversion, so she wasn’t going to be deterred. ‘The back barn is actually a beautiful old Victorian building. The high ceiling and exposed beams will look magnificent once they’ve been cleaned up. It also shouldn’t be too expensive to get the running water and electricity connected from the dairy barn.’
‘What about the rat problem?’
At last, he speaks.
The nerves in Ellie’s stomach spiked. Art’s caustic comment was accompanied by his trademark scowl. Apparently there was one member of the co-op who had not been won over. Yet.
This time she was ready for him, encouraged by the positive response from everyone else. Pasting a helpful smile on her face, she prepared to schmooze the unschmoozable.
‘We’ll call in an exterminator,’ Ellie said. ‘Obviously you haven’t felt the need to invest in one up till now, because you’re only using that barn as a dumping ground for defective equipment. But I had a quick chat with Bill Greenman in Gratesbury who runs the hardware store and does pest control on the side.’
‘We know who Bill is,’ Art interrupted. ‘Because the rest of us actually live here.’ The observation struck right at the heart of Ellie’s insecurities, and she was sure Art knew it.
‘OK, well…’ She forced herself to continue in the same upbeat manner, determined not to be put off by his attitude. ‘Bill said once we renovate the building and put in a proper floor, we’ll probably find the problem has remedied itself. But either way, he’d be happy to come by and check out the situation and will eradicate any remaining vermin in return for a year’s supply of Dee’s apple and almond polenta cake.’
‘You’ve done a ton of work on this,’ Rob said, as he finished leafing through her business plan. ‘And I for one am really impressed,’ he added, looking pointedly at Art.
‘I got a lot of help with it from Tess, Annie and my mum,’ Ellie said, feeling oddly teary at the chorus of approval from everyone else in the face of Art’s continued silence.
‘Bugger that! We did virtually nothing,’ Annie said, getting nods of agreement from Tess and Dee. ‘This is Ellie’s baby and she’s done nearly all the work. And we wanted to ask her if she would consider managing the shop, at least until she goes back home?’
Ellie’s stomach went into free fall as all the co-op residents except Art chimed in.
‘I don’t know…’ She hadn’t even considered it. After all, she was only here for the summer. But, as Tess and Annie and Dee continued to try to persuade her, she sniffed and smiled, and found herself agreeing to the request.
As everyone started clapping and cheering, the wave of approval almost knocked her off her feet. What was making her so overemotional? This really wasn’t that significant. She’d had nothing else to do in the last week and she’d enjoyed working on the business plan – having a project like this to sink her teeth into was exactly what she loved doing. The planning, preparation and troubleshooting before and during a job were the things she’d excelled at as an event coordinator. But still, she couldn’t deny the feeling of achievement and acceptance that both humbled and excited her as everyone began to talk at once about the project and Tess and Annie both came up to thank her.
Her mum pushed a plate of walnut coffee cake in front of her. ‘I think you’ve earned this,’ she said.
‘Why don’t we take a vote and make the Willow Tree Farm Shop and Café Project official?’ Mike Peveney said, placing an arm round his wife’s shoulders as Tess sent her a thumbs-up.
Ellie wanted to kiss the man. To kiss all of them.
‘All in favour…?’ Annie shouted.
‘Where are we going to get the money from?’ Art’s surly tone sliced through the optimism filling the room like a machete, hacking down the forest of raised hands in its wake.
Ellie stared back at him, trying not to take his negativity personally.
‘Your costing says fifty grand,’ he continued, when she remained silent. ‘I think that’s underestimating it. You want to get it up to code, it’s going to cost more than that. And you just finished pointing out we don’t have fifty grand to spare.’
She stared at her papers, to give herself a chance to calm down and stop her voice betraying her thoughts. ‘The plan was for us to all chip in with our labour to do the grunt work, the painting and decorating et cetera, in any free time we have,’ she said.
Dee had also been singing Art’s praises as a possible project manager, because he supposedly had major skills in carpentry and construction.
So much for that idea.
‘Pam had done costings on the main expenses, which will be hooking up the water and electricity, laying a proper floor and fitting out the kitchen.’
‘And her costings are five years out of date.’ Art dragged a hand through his hair. ‘It’ll cost more now. And you still haven’t said where this magic fifty grand is coming from.’
‘I factored in a five per cent increase in those costs for inflation,’ Ellie replied, her voice rising in counterpoint to his. The rest of the company had gone silent, glancing from her to Art, obviously scenting the tension between them. ‘We’ll have to get a business loan, but there are grants we can apply for too.’
‘If you think all this is going to happen in five weeks, you’re nuts,’ Art replied. ‘Even if we could get the finance in place, how the hell is everyone going to find the time in their schedules? We’re all busting our balls already to keep this place afloat and you–’
‘Art,’ Dee intervened. ‘Stop it. We’re all adults here and we can decide for ourselves whether this is something we can devote enough time to or not. Between the four of us…’ She paused to encompass herself, Ellie, Tess and Annie. ‘We’ve worked out a detailed schedule, which includes an estimate of exactly how much time it’s going to take. It’s daunting,’ she continued. ‘We all know that. But we four will be doing the bulk of the work and this would give us all a chance to work towards achieving our dream for this place, which was Pam’s dream too, instead of just keeping our heads above water. And that’s why, for me, it’ll be worth every extra hour I spend busting my backside to make it happen.’
The emotion in Ellie’s throat swelled back up again. That her mother had backed the project was one thing, that she’d stood up to Art to do it seemed even more significant. She swallowed, determined not to get sidetracked by feelings that were nineteen years past their sell-by date.
‘I agree with Dee,’ Rob added. ‘Plus you need to chill out, Art. You’re getting worked up about nothing. This is just a vote to give Ellie the go-ahead to get confirmed estimates and check out the situation with a loan. If you’d actually bothered to read this like the rest of us–’ he held up the business plan then slapped it back down on the table ‘–before getting your bollocks in a twist, you’d know that.’
Ellie knew full well why Art hadn’t read the plan more carefully. But she couldn’t muster any sympathy for him.
His enmity felt personal because it was personal, just like it had been nineteen summers ago when he had made her life hell. She hadn’t belonged then, she’d been the outsider, and he’d rubbed her nose in it. This time the tables were turned, the members of the co-op had welcomed her, had given her a stake, albeit temporary, in this place. And he resented that. She might not want to get sidetracked by the past, but he appeared to be stuck there.
‘So are we all finally ready to take a vote?’ Annie said, lifting her eyebrows at Ellie in exasperation.
The vote was carried, with only one abstention – who left the kitchen without another word.
No one commented further on Art’s behaviour, everyone keen to congratulate Ellie and talk about all the things they could contribute in the weeks ahead, if they could secure the loan and turn Pam’s dream into a reality.
After about an hour, all the enthusiasm and excitement had begun to wane, as tired children whined for attention. Toto and Josh appeared to demand their supper and Maddy and Jacob disappeared upstairs as everyone else began to pack up their kids and head home.
‘Don’t worry, Art will come around. Especially when he sees how brilliant this is gonna be,’ Annie commented as she left with the now exhausted Freddie snuggled in her arms.
Once everyone had gone and Toto and Josh had been sent to bed, Ellie helped her mother put the used coffee mugs and plates into the industrial dishwasher. But Art’s intervention kept running through her head.
He’d managed to cast a shadow over what had been an otherwise energising and exciting evening full of potential for the future.
The man was the anti-karma.
‘Don’t be angry with him,’ Dee said, as she loaded the last of the cutlery and set the machine.
‘Angry with who?’ Ellie scooped the cake crumbs off the table, refusing to meet her mother’s eyes.
She really didn’t want to think about Art and his shitty attitude because it was totally destroying her happy buzz. And reminding her of the distance between her and her mother. That absolutely did not bother her. She wasn’t a teenager any more and she was not about to get into another pissing contest with Art over her mother’s affections. He’d already won that one, but apparently he didn’t even have the good grace to be magnanimous about it.
Dee rested cool fingers on the tight muscles of Ellie’s forearm. ‘Art’s not good with change.’
The justification spiked Ellie’s temper. ‘Art’s also not good with people generally. And me in particular.’
And she’d never done anything to deserve it. Not nineteen years ago and certainly not now.
‘He can be difficult when he feels threatened,’ her mother continued, as if this was still all about Art. ‘He had to deal with so much when he was younger. And I suspect it was the only way he could cope.’
‘Like what? What exactly did he have to cope with that gives him the right to be an arsey prick for the rest of his natural life?’ Because she really wanted to know now. She’d been so pathetically grateful for her mother’s support. But why should she be? Didn’t she deserve at least a little support from her own mother?
Why had her mother always protected Art? Why was she still excusing his behaviour even now? Her mother didn’t know the full extent of what had happened between the two of them back then, and Ellie certainly didn’t intend to enlighten her, because neither of them would come out of it looking good. But she was not about to let Art treat her like that again.
‘I got some of it out of Laura,’ Dee said, not disputing that Art was an arsey prick. So you’re OK with that, are you, Mum? ‘And some of it in confidence from Art. And the rest I can only guess at,’ Dee continued, being annoyingly cryptic. ‘But you mustn’t take his manner to heart. It’s just his way.’
She so would take it to heart, because she had been the one tonight taking the direct hit. But she could see there was no mileage in arguing the toss with the president of the Art Dalton Fan Club. Her mother had declared on Art’s side when she’d made the decision to stay at the commune and become Art’s surrogate mum instead of coming home to London to be Ellie’s real mum.
The futile resentment burned the back of her throat, but she forced herself to ignore it.
Ultimately, she’d survived without her mother, she and her father had muddled through on their own.
She heaved out a sigh and tried to take stock.
She’d made progress with Dee in the last two weeks. She didn’t want to revisit all those old resentments. It was ancient history now. And anyway, her mum wasn’t the one with a case to answer here. Dee wasn’t the one who had comprehensively tried to screw her over tonight for no good reason.
‘Don’t worry, Mum. I’ve had to deal with more than a few difficult clients in my time.’
Although dealing with a budget-busting change in the entrée from salmon to scallops twenty-four hours before a banquet for five hundred accountants at the end of a team-building weekend didn’t seem quite as daunting right now as corralling six foot two of hard-arsed macho diva.
‘I can handle Art Dalton,’ she finished.
Or she would be able to, once she’d given him a crash course in why not to piss on Ellie Preston’s parade.
*
Dee watched her daughter leave the kitchen, the temper in her stride a welcome change from the nervous tremor in her fingers at the start of the meeting. She picked up the cloth Ellie had left on the table, rinsed it at the sink and draped it over the tap.
You can’t smooth over everything, Dee. Sometimes you just have to let bad things happen and then deal with it the best you can.
Pammy’s words rang in her head, the way they had a million times since that summer. Sentiment mixed with loneliness in the pit of her stomach making her feel tired.
She could go and warn Art that Ellie was on the warpath, but she wasn’t sure he deserved the heads-up. He had been out of order during the meeting.
She switched off the kitchen light, and closed the door on the memory. As well as the idea of interfering any more than was strictly necessary in The Ellie and Art Show.
Ellie and she had problems that didn’t involve Art. Problems that Dee had been too much of a coward in the last two weeks to discuss with her daughter. But it was good to know Ellie was now a successful independent career woman – the wobble earlier in the evening could only have been performance anxiety. She certainly wasn’t the vulnerable, lonely, insecure girl who’d been torn between two parents who had both shoved her needs aside to make themselves happy.
Stop beating yourself up about that, Dee. You did what you had to do, we both did. One day Ellie will understand.
Pammy’s words pushed the guilt back, a little.
Her daughter was keeping a lot of secrets, secrets that she didn’t trust Dee enough to share. She still hadn’t mentioned her husband. And Josh hardly ever mentioned his dad either. And how had Ellie been able to leave her event-planning business for a whole summer, when surely that was the most lucrative time for such a business?
These were all questions Dee wanted to ask, but still didn’t feel she had the right to ask. The farm shop wasn’t just a terrific initiative to solve the farm’s financial problems and a wonderful way to honour the woman she’d loved, it also had the potential to give Dee the thing she’d yearned for – to reforge the relationship with her daughter. To make it strong and true again. The way it had been before that difficult summer. She didn’t want to jinx this chance. Which meant Art was on his own if he continued to behave like a dick.
For all his lack of communication skills, Art was not that angry, reckless boy any more. He was a strong, capable and caring man, who, against all the odds, had lived up to the responsibility of parenting a child solo. And Dee had formed a strong bond with him in the last nineteen years.
But he could also be a moody bugger.
Mounting the stairs to her room, Dee could hear Ellie further down the hallway laying down bedtime law to Josh.
‘Ten past ten on a school night is ten minutes past lights out, so you need to get in that bathroom now or you’re going to be brushing your teeth in the dark.’
Josh’s answering plea was way too tired to gain a reprieve.
Dee entered her room, rubbing the tight muscles in her neck.
She heard Ellie’s shower go on in the bathroom down the hall as she went in to start her own night-time ritual, the flicker of concern turning into admiration.
Her daughter was certainly no pushover any more. Time to step back and watch The Ellie and Art Show from the sidelines.
Dee removed her make-up and waited to hear Ellie’s shower switch off before she stepped into hers. The boiler hadn’t been able to cope with two showers at once for over a decade, no matter how often Art overhauled it.
Art would be in his workshop putting his carpentry skills to good use, burying any wayward emotions under a pile of sawdust and lumber. The way he always did when he had stuff to process. The way he’d been doing almost every night until the early hours ever since Ellie had arrived.
Dee shifted her head to one side, letting the heating jets pummel the tight muscles.
Stupid of her not to realise the significance of that until now.