‘Wow, look at you! Don’t you look fantastic?’ Leaning on the counter of her hut, Libby couldn’t help but smile at the adorable scene before her. From the antlers adorning his dark hair, to the little fuzzy tail sewn onto the seat of his brown trousers, Michael’s costume was fantastic.
Clutching the hand of his little sister who was clad in a fetching fluffy red bobble hat, navy down coat and shiny red wellingtons on her feet, the little boy who was Noah’s best friend beamed up at her. ‘I’m a reindeer! I’m going to be in the parade later! Will you watch?’
‘I sure will! I love your costume.’
A smiling woman came to stand behind Michael, a rosy-cheeked baby in her arms. ‘Eliza made them, she’s an absolute whizz with that sewing machine of hers.’
Libby nodded in agreement. ‘She always has been. They’re around here somewhere. I think her hut’s between the ones for the pub and the emporium.’ She pulled a mock-glum face. ‘They’ve all deserted me. Even Owen’s up there helping Sam with some taster treats from the restaurant.’
Michael’s mother wrinkled her nose. ‘I’ve heard lots of great things about Subterranean, but I’m not sure it’s our kind of thing.’ She surveyed the array of goods Libby had on display. ‘This all looks so delicious. We saw someone earlier with a sausage roll and I’ve been trying to find out where they got it from for the past half an hour. I must say, I never thought to try your hut because I assumed you’d be doing fish and chips.’
‘I fancied a bit of a change.’ It had been the stock response she’d given all afternoon to variations of the same comments from people. She’d been tempted to tell people about her plans, then decided against it. With her dad still away, time was running out and the prospects for her little teashop were slipping ever further from her grasp. Without the prime seafront location the chip shop occupied, it would be a struggle to tempt visitors to stray from the beach into one of the streets further up the hill upon which the town was laid out. Perhaps she could speak to the council about a permit to trade upon the beach, instead. She just didn’t know. But those were problems for another day, and she was determined to make the best of the festive weekend. If she could impress enough people with her pies, pasties and pastries then word of mouth would soon spread once she got herself up and running.
‘Well, I for one, am delighted you did. We’ll take three sausage rolls, and…’ She glanced over her shoulder to her husband. ‘You wanted a pasty, didn’t you, love?’
Coming to stand at her side, he slipped an arm around her waist, the other balancing a smiling baby—the twin to the one in his wife’s arms. ‘Yes, please, and maybe a Bakewell tart for afters?’ He grinned up at Libby. ‘Everything looks smashing, I could eat the lot.’
Blushing from the compliment, she made herself busy wrapping the ends of the sausage rolls and the pasty in thick paper napkins. ‘There you go. Mind your fingers, Michael, they’re still quite hot.’
With a serious nod which made the antlers on his head bobble about, Michael took a sausage roll and handed it carefully to his sister. ‘Careful, April.’ Only once he was sure she wasn’t going to drop it, did he reach for his own. ‘Thank you, Libby!’
‘You’re most welcome. I think Noah is up by the pub helping Eliza.’
‘We’re going there next! Daddy wants some molly wine.’
After perching the baby on the edge of the hut’s counter and bracing her in place, Michael’s dad dropped his other hand to his son’s head, careful not to dislodge his antlers. ‘He certainly does!’ Turning back to Libby, he reached inside his jacket and pulled out an envelope which he offered to her. ‘I don’t suppose there’s any chance I could leave this for Owen?’
With a lift of one shoulder, she took it from him. ‘Sure. I’ll stick it inside. I’m going back to get some more stuff out of the warmers anyway.’ Curious, she couldn’t help but run her fingers along the sides of the A4 envelope to trace the stack of papers inside it.
‘Thanks. I was going to post it, but then I wanted to make sure it got to him so decided to hand deliver it instead. Though I suppose I could’ve just hung onto it as I’ll be the one sorting out all that kind of stuff for him soon enough once I’m his office manager.’
The announcement rocked her back on her heels. Owen had recruited an office manager? She knew he’d taken on a few building commissions, though he’d kept the details to himself. An office manager implied something bigger than she’d been envisaging. Something more permanent… ‘Really? Oh, wow, that’s great news.’ Her heart did a funny little flip in her chest. Owen sure was doing a good impression of a man planning on sticking around for the long term.
Beaming, his wife shifted the baby into the crook of her other arm as she reached for her sausage roll. ‘It really is. He’ll finally be able to give up his taxi job, and I won’t have to worry about him out on the roads in the awful weather we’ve been having. When I see Owen, I’m going to give him a big sloppy kiss. He’s not just Michael’s hero anymore.’ A sheen of moisture glittered in her eyes. ‘You’ve landed yourself a keeper there, Libby, and no mistaking.’
Her husband nudged her hip with his, then gathered their other baby up in his arms. ‘If I have to watch you mooning over my new boss all evening, I’ll definitely need a glass of molly wine!’ He was grinning from ear to ear as he said it. ‘Now come on, we’ve taken up enough of Libby’s time.’
‘Bye, you guys.’ Libby waved as they moved away.
The rest of the afternoon flew past, and the stall was so busy Libby didn’t even have time to notice the cold. Even if the work hadn’t kept her warm, Owen had made sure she was okay, popping by frequently to bring her one kind of hot drink or another he’d picked up for her and checking the cardboard he’d lined the floor of the hut with was still in place to keep her feet insulated from the cold ground. When she’d told him about the envelope from Michael’s dad, he’d shrugged it off like it was no big deal, as though giving an entire family grounds for hope was something he did every day. Maybe it was, for all she knew.
A wave of laughter, cheering and applause rippled its way along the promenade, and Libby slipped from the back door of her hut to worm her way into the crowds gathering along the railing facing the beach. When she caught a glimpse of the little tractor chugging towards them, she too began to laugh and wave. Behind the tractor was a trailer decorated to look like Santa’s sleigh, with huge sacks of presents piled around the bearded, red-suited figure of Father Christmas sitting pride of place. Six little brown-clad figures with antlers on their heads waved from the front of the trailer, their bodies linked with a bright red harness. And as for the driver of the tractor…Libby did a double-take then gave a scream of laughter because it was none other than Jack, dressed in an adult-sized version of the kids’ costumes and with a bright red flashing stick-on nose. Oh, Lord, how Eliza had talked him into doing that, she’d never know!
Behind the tractor, a crowd of green and red clad pixies shook jingle bells in one hand, while carrying yellow collection buckets in the other. The local Lions club always did something for the local community in the run up to Christmas. The presents in the sacks would be delivered to children stuck in the local hospitals over the holiday period, as well as being donated to refuges and hostels in the area.
The tractor and trailer chugged on towards the far end of the beach, did a slow, wide turn and began to make its way back. Each time it passed a set of steps leading to the promenade, a pair of the pixies peeled off from the group to make their way into the gathered crowd to collect donations. Like the other adults around her, Libby delved into her pocket for a handful of coins to drop into a bucket and received a bright smile and a ‘Merry Christmas!’ in return.
With a smile on her face, Libby returned to the chip shop and opened the door. It would be dark soon, and the grand switch-on of the lights would begin. With Owen’s help—and by help she meant his insistence on doing all the work under her direction—she’d covered the windows and door of the shop with a waterfall cascade of white lights. By blocking any view of the counter, she’d hoped to distract people enough to deter them from thinking the chippy would be opening for business. She crossed her fingers, then flipped the switches on the plug sockets. The inside of the shop glowed from the stunning display in the window.
As she let herself back out, securing the door behind her, she could see lights blinking on up and down the promenade as the other business owners and traders turned on their own window displays. All the colours of the rainbow glittered and flashed for as far as she could see on either side. Oohs and aahs rose from the crowd as they began to stroll once more, pointing and nudging each other as a particular display caught their attention.
Libby resumed her position in her hut just in time to greet an older man and his wife. ‘Hello, Mr Wallis, Mrs Wallis. What can I tempt you with this fine evening?’ Mr Wallis had been a fixture on the local council for as many years as Libby could remember, and his wife a stalwart in the WI. They were what her dad had always called properly civic-minded people.
Mr Wallis rubbed his hands together as he surveyed the display. ‘Well this all looks very tempting.’ His eyes lit up as he spotted one of her handwritten plastic signs. ‘Curried chicken? I’ll have to give that a go.’
She wrapped the pasty for him then turned to his wife. ‘And for you?’
‘Oh, one of those lovely looking mince pies, I think.’
Libby handed it over, accepting a handful of change in return. ‘There you go. If you like it, I’m taking orders for Christmas.’
Mrs Wallis widened her eyes. ‘Are you really? How fantastic. I do prefer homemade, but who has the time these days?’ She bit into the pie, and her lashes fluttered for a second. ‘My word, that’s delicious. Put me down for two dozen. Can I come in and see you next week to sort out the particulars?’
‘Absolutely.’ Libby scribbled a quick note on the pad under the counter. There was already a gratifyingly long list of names and orders on it.
‘Well,’ said Mr Wallis with a grin, ‘I think it’s safe to say that based on this, your new venture will be a roaring success. I must say I wasn’t sure when your young man first submitted his planning application, because we’ve always loved the chip shop. But times move on, and if you’re going to be serving delicious fare like this, I know where I’ll be coming for my lunch. Merry Christmas to you, Libby!’
Open-mouthed, she watched the Wallises stroll away arm in arm. Her young man…planning application… Heedless of the other customers waiting, she dashed out of the back door of the hut, through the chip shop and upstairs to the second floor. Without hesitating, she began to rifle through the folders and documents on Owen’s desk. Unfurling and abandoning several sets of plans, she finally found what she was looking for and sank down on the edge of his bed.
There in black and white was a three-storey plan of the building she knew every inch of. Only it looked nothing like the layout she knew like the back of her hand. The ground floor had been opened up into one large space, the kitchen and seating areas divided by a right-angled counter. It was everything she’d imagined, and more besides, as though Owen had somehow reached into her brain and translated her dream into a 3D sketch.
Gone was the higgledy-piggledy jumble of rooms on the first floor, and in their place a sleek, sophisticated layout which flowed seamlessly from living/dining to kitchen and sleeping ‘zones’. There was even a tiny rendering of a teddy bear in the smallest of the two bedrooms. Her heart began to pound harder. The second floor had been equally transformed. In place of her own cosy bedroom and the spare room she was currently sitting in was an open-plan one-bed apartment with a short staircase leading up to a roof terrace covered in raised bedding areas and even a soft-play zone.
‘Libs? Libby, where are you? Is everything okay?’ Owen’s shout from below was followed by the thunder of his feet on the stairs. ‘What are you doing in here? I came to give you a break, but when the stall was empty I panicked.’
Unable to speak, she simply thrust the plans in her lap towards him. He tilted his head to study them for a moment, the colour draining from his flushed face as he realised what she held. ‘I…I can explain.’
‘Explain what? How you and Dad have been lying to me for months? How you thought it was okay to leave me in the dark, while I worried and fretted over my future?’
‘It’s not like that, I swear.’ Sinking to his knees beside her, he tried to reach for her hand, but she tugged it out of reach. A weary sigh escaped his lips. ‘Look, I promised your dad I wouldn’t say anything, and then it all became such a bloody tangle I didn’t know what to do for the best. I thought if I could get everything squared away, show you I had it all in hand, then you wouldn’t be quite so mad at me.’
He was in for a disappointment then, because she’d never been so angry in all her life. Of all the high-handed, bloody arrogant things he could’ve possibly done, this had to be the worst. ‘What did you think you were doing, Owen? Just because your own family was a disaster, did you think that gave you the right to buy mine lock, stock and fucking barrel? I’m not a toy you can manipulate to fit into this perfect world you’ve created on a piece of paper. I’m not for bloody sale!’ Her hand convulsed, crumpling the plans as she began to sob.
All day long she’d been thinking about him, about the conversation she’d had with Michael’s parents and what it had revealed about Owen. She’d even entertained the idea of giving him a second chance, if he’d wanted one after she’d pushed him away. She had imagined them at the Christmas market next year, Owen carrying their own rosy-cheeked baby as they strolled hand in hand between the stalls. She’d thought he’d been sincere about giving her space and time to sort things out, when all the time he’d been going behind her back to lay the trap before her. To put her in a position where she had everything she wanted, but only because he’d made it so.
God, he’d taken it all away from her. All her power and self-determination to build a future for herself robbed with a few strokes of a pen and the money in his pocket. What he’d laid out on the plans clenched in her hands wasn’t a partnership, it was a contract of ownership.
Dashing the tears from her eyes, she let the plans fall to the floor at her feet and forced herself to look at Owen. How would he explain it? How did he think he could possibly justify his actions?
He stared back, his dark eyes wide with shock, disbelief and more than a hint of pain. He had a bloody nerve to feel hurt over this when she was the wronged party, but as usual everything was about him. ‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘What have you got to say for yourself?’
‘Do you really think I’m trying to buy my way in here?’ A shutter fell, blanking his expression as he pushed to his feet. ‘If that’s what you honestly think of me, there’s nothing more I can say to you.’ And with that, he turned on his heel and walked out of the room.
The sky outside darkened, cheers rose and faded—marking, she assumed, the grand switch-on of the promenade Christmas lights—and still she sat there on the end of Owen’s bed. Her initial anger had faded to disappointment, and then sadness that she’d been proven right in the end not to trust to him. A creak sounded on the steps followed by a gentle tap on the open door. Hating herself for the surge of hope that it might be him creeping back with his tail between his legs, she glanced up to find Eliza watching her from the doorway. ‘Owen’s up at the farm. He asked me to fetch a few of his clothes and his laptop, that kind of stuff.’ She edged into the room. ‘Oh, Libs, what happened?’
Pointing the plans on the floor, Libby swallowed down her disappointment. ‘That happened.’
Kneeling, Eliza studied the drawings for a few moments before glancing up at her. ‘I don’t understand.’
A bitter laugh escaped Libby’s throat. ‘Neither do I as he didn’t bother to stay long enough to explain himself, but Owen’s the one who’s bought this place from my dad.’
‘Owen? But how? You didn’t even tell him it was for sale, so how did he find out? Did he gazump the original buyer, or what?’
All the same questions had been ricocheting around in her brain for the past few hours, none of which she had an answer to. ‘You tell me.’
Eliza dropped her eyes back to the plans. ‘It looks wonderful. Is…is the upstairs flat supposed to be for your dad?’
Tears filled Libby’s eyes. ‘I suppose so, not that he’d want to live in it. That’s why he’s gone to Spain, to find himself somewhere to live.’
‘Oh, darling.’ Rising on her knees, Eliza wrapped her arms around Libby and held her as she sobbed out all her pain and grief over the loss of what might have been. When she finally quietened, Eliza sat back to regard her. ‘You’ll have to forgive me for being stupid, but I don’t understand why this has caused such a rift between you and Owen. Anyone can see he’s absolutely mad for you, and if you didn’t already know that yourself, then this surely proves it.’ Her hand waved towards the plans. ‘Look what he wants for you, Libs. Look how hard he’s trying to give you everything you’ve ever wanted.’
Libby could only shake her head, gobsmacked at her friend’s blindness. ‘It’s not for him to give it to me, don’t you see that? I should’ve been able to do this for myself. I was doing it for myself, and he’s just swanned in and taken it all over.’
Eliza frowned. ‘That doesn’t make sense, at all. He’s not taking anything from you, he’s helping you to achieve your dream.’ Her arms came across her chest in a defensive motion. ‘Do you think less of me because Jack’s building a workshop at the farm for my soap-making and stuff? That I should’ve waited and struggled on my own rather than adapt my original plans to encompass a better life we can have together? Does it offend your feminist sensibilities that Sam now lives with Beth and their combined income will allow her to expand and experiment the ranges she carries in the emporium because he’s now shouldering half the rent and bills?’
Libby stared. ‘That’s not what I said, not at all. And it’s different for you two, you’re in love.’
‘And you’re not?’ Eliza snorted. ‘Honestly, Libby, you talk nonsense at times. Do you know what I think this is all about? I think you’re terrified that Owen will let you down somehow and that’s why you broke up with him in the first place. Ever since he moved in here with you, you’ve been looking for another excuse to push him away, to slam the final nail into the coffin of a relationship you’ve always assumed was going to fail anyway.’
Anger flared, and beneath it a flash of shame which Libby stuffed back down immediately. ‘That’s not true! I’ve bent over backwards to accommodate Owen, to let him be a part of the baby without feeling like I’ve been trying to trap him into anything. I didn’t ask him to do this, I didn’t ask for any of this!’
‘Ask for what? For a decent, honest, generous man to fall in love with and embrace your accidental pregnancy while barely batting an eyelash? God, Libby, you’re so right. Why on earth would you ask for something like that?’
‘Shut up! You’re twisting my words.’ Feeling sick and sad and sorry for herself, Libby stormed out. Shaking, she threw herself down on her own bed. She couldn’t bear it. Eliza had never so much as raised her voice at Libby in all the long years they’d known each other, never mind spoken to her in such harsh tones. She didn’t understand. Nobody, it seemed, would understand. The tears came, and she let them pull her under.
She didn’t know how much time had passed, when Eliza knocked once more. ‘I’ve got Owen’s stuff, and I’m going now. I’ll lock up and push the key back through the door behind me.’
Too afraid to speak in case either of them said something that might rend the very fabric of their friendship apart, Libby lay silently on her side. A soft sigh reached her ears, then Eliza spoke once more. ‘We all love you, Libby, so much. I just wish you could learn to love yourself even half as much as we do.’