The Secret of Happy Ever After

  Chloe flounced her hair. ‘I have literally no idea what you’re talking about. Are you sure Pongo didn’t have it? He likes cheese.’

  ‘There were two whole tubs of it. And now there’s no sign of either of them.’

  ‘Are you sure you put them in your shopping bag? You’ve been under a lot of stress recently, Anna. Perhaps you’re forgetting things.’

  Anna started to inform Chloe that in that case maybe she should forget her pocket money, but Phil swept in, jangling his car keys anxiously.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, flapping them into the car. ‘I don’t want to be late. You know what Mum’s like when we’re late.’

  ‘Just the same as when we’re early but slightly ruder?’

  Phil and Chloe stared at Anna. Normally she was the one who told them off for being mean about Evelyn.

  ‘Anna!’ said Chloe admiringly. ‘Are you on HRT or something?’

  Phil gave her a tetchy look. ‘We’re not that old. Look, go and get Lily. I’ll load everyone in.’

  Anna went upstairs to find Lily sitting on her bed with Mrs Piggle, Piggy-Jo and an assortment of other toys in order of height. She looked pleased when Anna walked in.

  ‘Anna, Anna,’ she said. ‘We’re playing Malory Towers. Mrs Piggle and Piggy-Jo are the French teachers and they’re going to expel someone. Who should it be? Who looks naughtiest?’

  ‘That’s not a very nice game,’ said Anna, thinking uncomfortably of Michelle.

  ‘They’re very sad.’ Lily pulled a sad face. ‘Darrell’s going to plead for them to stay.’

  ‘That’s nice of Darrell. What a nice friend. Come on, we need to leave. Gran’s waiting.’ She held out her hand.

  Lily looked at her from the bed, surrounded by her army of fluff. ‘Anna. I’ve been thinking about you and Daddy.’

  ‘Have you?’ Anna started to get Lily’s pink rucksack; the prospect of packing it usually speeded her up. ‘Do you want to take Mrs Piggle out for lunch?’

  ‘Yes. Anna . . . You know when Becca and Chloe and me go away, do you miss us?’

  ‘Course I do. Daddy says it’s so quiet he can hear Pongo . . .’ She was about to say farting, then changed it to ‘. . . thinking.’

  ‘It’ll be really quiet when we go back to live with Mummy, won’t it? And you’ll probably be quite lonely.’

  Anna stung inside at the reminder that, for Lily, this wasn’t really their home, but she pushed it aside in her head. ‘Well, that’s still a little bit away, isn’t it?’

  ‘I think you should have a baby too.’

  She stopped, then turned round slowly, her heart beating fast. She tried to keep her face very neutral. ‘Do you?’

  ‘Yes. You’re going to be so bored when Becca and Chloe and me go back to Mummy’s. You’ll be here on your own with Daddy. You won’t even have Pongo to cuddle. It’s only fair.’

  Lily was big on fair at the moment. About as much as Chloe was big on unfair.

  ‘And you wouldn’t mind, if Daddy and I had another baby brother or sister?’ said Anna cautiously. ‘I thought you were a bit upset about Mummy’s baby?’

  ‘I was upset, but then I thought she was lonely too, without us in America.’ Lily looked pleased at her own logic. ‘So that was fair. Maybe you could have a boy. Or a pig.’ She smiled, the sudden sun-through-rainclouds smile that made Anna’s ovaries twang.

  ‘Well, we’ll see,’ said Anna, and her mood lifted as if someone had deposited an unexpected million in her bank account.

  Evelyn had already arrived at the restaurant by taxi, and had decided that she didn’t like the menu, the water she’d been served, or the table they’d booked. Anna could tell all that just from the expression on her face as they were shown to their seats, but even that couldn’t dampen her spirits.

  ‘Happy Birthday, Evelyn!’ she said, kissing her hollow cheek and ushering the girls round her.

  Evelyn ignored her and focused her disapproval on her son first.

  ‘Philip, you’re just like your father,’ she informed Phil. ‘Always late.’

  ‘My late father, in fact,’ said Phil, trying to joke his way out of the awkwardness.

  Anna passed the present to Lily, since she was wriggling with excitement to hand it over; Michelle had gone to town, deploying every gift wrap option.

  ‘A scarf,’ said Evelyn, brushing aside the tissue and curled ribbons. ‘Next time I’m in my open-topped sports car or lunching with Princess Anne I’ll be sure to wear it. Did you girls pick this?’

  ‘Anna did,’ said Lily, missing the sarcasm. ‘She’s good at colours.’

  ‘How useful,’ said Evelyn. But Anna didn’t care. She had something to hug inside that sugared every acid drop Evelyn could throw at her today.

  Later that night, in bed, Anna curled up against Phil’s back while he lay on his side and checked his phone for emails.

  ‘I really liked that restaurant,’ she said happily. ‘That was a good lunch.’

  ‘Yeah. I thought Mum was on reasonable form, considering.’

  ‘I spoke to Joyce about her forgetfulness last time I was reading up there. The doctor thinks it’s just stress rather than actual dementia symptoms. They try to keep them as active as possible so he’s pleased that she’s reading, and joining in with the discussions afterwards. It’s when she stops being foul to everyone we should worry, apparently.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘It’s more than good!’

  Phil looked up from his phone. ‘Yes, it is. You’re right. Thanks for talking to Joyce. And for getting the present, and for stopping everyone kicking off at lunch.’ He sighed. ‘That’s done for another year. Well, until Christmas.’

  ‘My pleasure. Do you know what Lily said to me today?’ She snuggled into his back.

  He put his phone down, pulled up the duvet and turned off the bedside light. ‘Something about Mrs Piggle having superpowers? That was the last thing I heard. I wonder about her imagination sometimes. I mean, is there such a thing as too much imagination?’

  ‘No!’ Anna nudged him. ‘She said she thought we should have a baby. You and me.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just that.’ She leaned forward and nibbled his shoulder playfully. ‘I went upstairs to get her, and we were just chatting, and she said, I think you and Daddy should have a baby, because you’ll miss us when we go home.’

  ‘And what did you say?’ Phil didn’t turn round, but Anna didn’t care. She was too lost in her happiness.

  ‘I said we’ll see. I didn’t want to promise anything, obviously, but isn’t that sweet? She said she was upset at first about Sarah’s baby, but now she’s had a chance to get used to the idea, she’s looking forward to it . . .’

  Phil rolled over and she stopped when she saw the stormy expression in his eyes.

  ‘I can’t believe you did that,’ he hissed.

  ‘Did what?’

  ‘Put words into a little girl’s mouth. Honestly, Anna, I know you want a baby, but getting the kids involved isn’t on. It’s really not on.’

  ‘I did nothing of the sort!’ Anna squinted at him in the half darkness. ‘And that’s an offensive thing to accuse me of.’

  ‘Lily’s only saying what she thinks you want to hear because she’s scared that you’ll leave her as well,’ he whispered angrily. ‘She’s eight. The only people who should be talking about whether you and I should have a baby are you and me. No one else. And definitely not my kids.’

  They lay very close and she could smell his toothpaste-y breath, quick and angry. Part of her knew he was right, but she hadn’t coerced Lily to say what she had. Phil was using that as a moral shield for his own reluctance.

  ‘So talk,’ said Anna. She sat up and put on the bedside lamp, blinking in the light. ‘Come on. Whether you like it or not, the girls are getting used to the idea. Sarah’s showing them her scan photos over Skype – and by the way, how do you think that makes me feel?’

  ‘She’s not the most sensitive woman
. . .’

  ‘Give me a time frame,’ she whispered, trying hard to stop herself yelling. Anna could feel her mad broody self bargaining, trying to pin down her incoherent emotion into rational language. ‘You were happy to talk about waiting four years when we got married. OK. I’ll wait a bit longer, I understand it’s hard for them. But how long? Six months? A year?’

  Phil didn’t rise from his curled-up position. He didn’t even meet her eye.

  ‘Phil? I don’t mind waiting, but I want to know that I’m waiting for something,’ she said desperately.

  ‘I don’t know if I can put a time frame on it,’ he said, towards the pillow.

  ‘What? Ever?’

  A long silence stretched out and Anna felt sick, wanting to turn back time so she could start this differently.

  ‘Phil?’

  ‘I don’t know if I can go through babies again,’ he said. ‘It might be different when the kids aren’t here with us full time. I don’t know. But I miss my space. I don’t want to have another twenty years of this, when I could have more time alone with you. I barely see you as it is. I miss the way things were. Can’t you take that as a compliment?’

  ‘No, I can’t,’ said Anna. ‘When I got married, it was with the understanding that we’d have a family together. Now you’re telling me we’re not?’

  ‘This isn’t a good time to talk about it,’ said Phil. ‘Lunch with the world’s worst mother and all that . . .’

  Anna smacked her pillow, unable to believe what she was hearing. ‘You’re telling me I can’t have a baby? Ever?’

  ‘Not . . . ever. I don’t know. Stop being so selfish!’

  ‘Me?!’

  ‘Yes, you! You say you want to be a mother – well, there are three kids here already who apparently need more parenting than they’re currently getting.’

  Anna stared at him. ‘That is the most appalling, unfair, unreasonable thing anyone has ever said to me.’

  ‘Lucky you.’ He rolled over so he didn’t have to look at her, but Anna knew he wasn’t asleep. He was staring at the wall.

  She wanted to punch him, but Chloe’s room was next to theirs and she was a light sleeper.

  Goosebumps of humiliation and rage sprang up along her bare arms. She reached over and pulled her dressing gown off the bedside chair and got out of bed. Phil didn’t even ask where she was going.

  Anna didn’t let the tears flow down her face properly until she was on the sofa, with Pongo, and no one could hear.

  26

  ‘Winnie the Pooh is as charming for the adult reading as it is for the child listening, though it seems more poignant to a grown-up ear. Pooh’s misadventures are an amusing but thoughtful introduction to the silliness and greed and forgiveness of adult life.’

  Evelyn McQueen

  The August heatwave that had sent Longhampton into an unsavoury display of long shorts and hairy sandal-feet blew itself out in a two-day thunderstorm at the beginning of September. Any dreams of an Indian summer – and for Anna, dreams of reading E. Nesbit into the warm evenings under the sweet peas – were drenched by dark afternoons of sticky air and driving rain that flattened the grass and drove the remaining rose petals off the bushes in the municipal gardens.

  By the time the rain stopped, a night chill had set in, and Anna felt as if the gloom had penetrated the town’s soul, as well as its leaky windows and roofs. Macs and boots reappeared on the dog-walkers, Pongo blagged a new jacket from Auntie Michelle, and customers’ umbrellas dripped over the wooden floor of the bookshop.

  All Anna’s energy was now being channelled into the bookshop, since the atmosphere at home was bleak and silent. She and Phil moved around the house like chess pieces, dropping the girls off, collecting them, taking Becca shopping for university stuff, running Lily to ballet, fitting in as much as possible to avoid each other. She felt like a cog in a well-oiled machine; too valuable to the smooth running of the McQueen engine to leave, but invisible and unimportant. Trapped, in other words. She couldn’t even contemplate upsetting the girls any more; her only hope was that Phil might change his mind.

  Tidying the shop and updating the website and pinning the customer recommendations on the shelves almost made up for her inner sadness. The little community around the shop was blooming, and her regulars increased each week, popping in to collect their ‘book box’ or order more book bouquets. She learned to avoid the children’s section whenever her broodiness threatened to engulf her. And the rain reflected her mood.

  ‘That’s the end of our summer trade,’ she sighed to Michelle, packing away the deckchair display she’d replenished daily when the weather was glorious. The buckets of beach reads around it had been snapped up, but most of them were second-hand favourites, so the mark-ups hadn’t been quite as big as the sales figures.

  ‘End of the summer, start of the winter,’ said Michelle. ‘Time to get that fire lit in the back, I reckon. I was thinking we could start selling hot chocolate? Unless there’s a book-related hot beverage we could specialise in? Oh, and clear one of the tables to put these out.’

  She piled a soft stack of chenille throws on the counter.

  ‘What are these?’ asked Anna. ‘Shouldn’t they be next door?’

  ‘They’re for people’s knees,’ Michelle explained, taking one off the top and draping it over the side of the leather armchair that had appeared overnight. ‘Cosy. People like cosy. Hot chocolate, plus cosy, plus books. It’s a winner.’

  ‘But we’ve already got those blankets by the shelf,’ said Anna. ‘And you keep bringing more and more cushions in. And those teacups on the crime display – there are more teacups than books now.’

  She said it lightly, but it was starting to bother her. Every day Michelle moved things before she came in, to make more room for merchandise that belonged in Home Sweet Home, not here. The front part of the shop, in particular, was starting to look less like a bookshop and more like an extension of next door. There was a velvet-covered chair near the window that actually had a ‘Please do not sit on this’ note on it, something Anna had removed when Michelle wasn’t looking.

  ‘That’s the reality of selling. We’ve got to keep the profit margins up.’ Michelle was arranging the throws while she spoke and moving Anna’s books out of the way to do it. ‘You know how nice those blankets are. You’ve got one yourself.’

  ‘I know, they’re lovely but . . . they’re not books. And this is a bookshop!’

  ‘Fine. You can have just books, and you can close next month. Do you want this shop to stay open or not?’

  Anna was startled by the snappiness in Michelle’s tone but she stood her ground. ‘Of course I don’t. But if you put too much other stuff in here people won’t think it’s a bookshop. Everyone says how much they love it now. We can do other stuff. I can do more promotions, get the library involved again . . .’

  ‘Listen, I know what I’m doing.’ Michelle didn’t sound like herself at all; she sounded tight and stressed. ‘Don’t start all that “books are precious” bollocks. You’ve been doing this for eight months. I’ve worked in retail since I was nineteen.’

  ‘What is wrong with you?’ Anna burst out.

  They stared at each other, then Michelle rubbed her face. She looked on the verge of tears. Normally Anna would have been the first to apologise but today she didn’t want to. The bookshop was her baby and she was going to defend it. It was the only thing she had left.

  ‘I’ve had a horrible morning,’ said Michelle. ‘I had a meeting with my solicitor.’

  ‘Rory?’

  ‘No. My real solicitor.’ Michelle sank onto the ‘Do not sit’ chair. ‘I’m getting a divorce.’

  ‘You’ve finally filed papers?’ Anna’s concern swept away her anger and she crouched by Michelle’s side. ‘Well done. Well done, Michelle. You’re doing the right thing.’

  Michelle looked up and her eyes were hunted. It was nothing like her usual confident expression. Even her liner flicks seemed subdued. ‘It
doesn’t feel like it. I’m terrified of what Harvey’s going to do when he gets the letter. I’m worried he’ll tell my parents I’ve had some kind of breakdown. They’ll believe him.’

  ‘You’re the bravest woman I know,’ said Anna, meaning it. ‘And the toughest.’

  Michelle managed a short, sad laugh. ‘Well, I’m not exactly the person you think I am. I’m a lot of window dressing.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Anna said. This was going some way to explaining Michelle’s bad mood; if her divorce was out of her control, at least her shop wasn’t. She tried to be positive for her. ‘It’ll be grim, but it’ll be over in a few months. Then you’re free. Focus on that. You don’t have children to sort out, and the assets should be easy enough to split.’

  ‘I don’t want any money,’ said Michelle.

  ‘Come on,’ said Anna. ‘What’s the worst thing he can do?’

  Michelle shook her head slowly. ‘What if he’s right? What if he really is the only man in the world who’d put up with me? What if I am making a big mistake?’

  ‘You’re not. And if you believe that, then you’re better off on your own,’ said Anna. ‘And I can think of at least one other man who’d—’

  Michelle held up a hand. ‘Don’t.’

  Anna had thought about telling Michelle about her row with Phil but when she saw the fearful expression on Michelle’s face, she decided not to. It wasn’t so much that her news wasn’t as bad, but that Michelle just didn’t seem capable of hearing anything else.

  Anna realised she’d left her mobile phone at home just before she had to go up to Butterfields to do her Reading Aloud session, so she drove back to pick it up, taking Tavish with her for his weekly visit to the old people.

  He waited patiently in the car while she dashed into the kitchen to get it. There she found Becca standing in front of the fridge, eating mascarpone straight from the tub and staring into the chilled depths as if to see what she fancied next, with no thought to the cold air escaping from it.