The Cherry Tree Cafe (28 page)

‘No,’ I said quietly, ‘just leave it.’

‘But they’ve got it all wrong. I should have kept my mouth shut.’

‘Yes,’ I said, ‘you should, but you didn’t and for some reason they’ve decided to take your word over mine, and if they can jump to conclusions over something as
important as my commitment to the Cherry Tree then perhaps they aren’t the friends I thought they were after all.’

I didn’t think the morning could get much worse, but after Jay left, Ben arrived.

‘Have you got time to talk?’ he asked. ‘It’s important.’

‘If you’ve come to tell me that Jemma and Tom have finally worked out the truth,’ I sniped, ‘then forget it. I’m in no mood to hear it.’

‘This has nothing to do with them,’ he insisted. ‘This is about us.’

Reluctantly I opened the door and let him in.

‘Do you want a drink?’ I called from the kitchen, having deposited him on the sofa.

‘Please,’ he answered, ‘coffee would be great.’

‘OK,’ I passed Ben a mug and sat in the chair opposite, ‘what is it you want to talk to me about? I think we’re beyond gossiping about high-school crushes, don’t
you?’

Ben didn’t say anything but there was a definite rosy glow to his face that hadn’t been there when he arrived. It was a low blow considering my own feelings, but I was still feeling
raw and bruised and he was a sitting duck.

‘No,’ he said, ‘I’m not interested in what could or should have happened when we were kids.’

‘Well, whatever you’ve come to tell me, I’m not really interested.’

‘Look, Lizzie, I want to tell you about why I went, rather than keep apologising for the way I went,’ he said quietly, ‘and I’m sorry, but I do think you need to know why
Mum said what she did.’

‘You went because you were upset about what you told me,’ I said bluntly, ‘about your girlfriend and the terrible thing she did.’

‘That was partly the reason,’ he agreed, ‘but you only know half the story, Lizzie.’

‘OK,’ I took a deep breath and put my mug on the hearth, ‘but you don’t owe me an explanation, Ben. This really has nothing to do with me, does it? It’s ancient
history.’

‘It has everything to do with you and if you’ll give me half a chance and not interrupt or fly off the handle then you’ll see why.’

I sat back in my chair not unlike Ella waiting for her bedtime story. There was nothing that Ben could tell me that would have an impact. After everything else that had happened in the last
twenty-four hours I was immune to further shock.

‘My girlfriend,’ Ben said, looking straight at me and making my stomach do a loop-the-loop, ‘the one who disappeared and had the termination . . .’

‘I remember,’ I said. ‘You don’t need to spell it all out again.’

‘I probably should’ve mentioned her name.’

I shrugged and reached for my mug.

‘I don’t see why,’ I told him blankly.

Ben leant across the space between us, took my mug and set it back on the hearth. He held my hands tight in his and looked straight at me.

‘It was Natasha.’

‘What?’ I laughed, snatching my hands away as my stomach launched off on the rollercoaster again but for a very different reason this time. I didn’t understand. Surely the name
was just a coincidence? It had to be.

‘It was Natasha,’ he said again.

I sat and stared at him, my head and heart struggling for synchronicity.

‘What, you mean Natasha, as in Giles and Natasha?’

Ben nodded.

I thought I was going to be sick.

‘But when, how?’

Why was I asking? Why did I want to know?

‘A few days after Giles first turned up in the Mermaid and swept you off your feet, Natasha came looking for him.

Apparently she’d found out where he’d been staying and was hell-bent on revenge. I mean, she’d practically been left at the altar; she was entitled to some kind of
explanation.’

‘So where was I?’

‘You’d gone away with Giles. Didn’t he whisk you off on some mini break or something? Anyway it doesn’t matter. Neither of you were here when she turned up.’

Ah yes, I remembered. Giles had roped Mum in on that one. He’d gone to the house and together they’d packed a suitcase and found my passport and I’d been picked up after my
shift at the pub and driven off to the airport. Everyone had thought the gesture was the ultimate in romance; just as well they hadn’t got wind of the fact that Giles was already spoken for.
He would have been lynched . . .

‘Lizzie?’

‘Um? Sorry. So how exactly do you fit into all this? How did you meet Natasha?’

‘I was in the pub when she turned up. She never told anyone else who she really was. She was too embarrassed when she heard the locals talking about how their barmaid had been whisked off
her feet by a slick city type. It didn’t take a genius to work out who they were talking about. You can imagine the state she was in, can’t you?’

‘What and you swooped in and picked up the pieces?’ I snapped scathingly, trying not to think about Natasha. ‘You were little better than me then, were you?’

‘It wasn’t like that,’ Ben thundered, moving back to his chair, ‘I didn’t swoop in at all. I was just a shoulder to cry on. I never meant to fall for her, it just
happened. I felt sorry for her to start with.’

I snorted derisively, picturing the scene.

‘Our relationship was nothing like yours and Giles’s,’ Ben frowned. ‘We were friends a long time before we were lovers which is more than I can say for you!’

‘So how come our paths never crossed in London?’ I questioned, ignoring his slur on my morals. ‘How come we never ended up at the same parties and events in the
city?’

‘Natasha went out of her way to make sure she and Giles were never going to be anywhere together. Work was a nightmare for her, but socially it was just as awkward. You know the kind of
circles they moved in.’

‘And now they’re moving in them again,’ I said resignedly, ‘only now they’re together. They really were meant for each other, weren’t they?’

I was struggling to take it all in. It sounded like a Jeremy Kyle episode but with designer labels instead of trainers and tracksuits.

‘What about the baby?’ I asked without thinking. ‘If she loved you, then why did she have an abortion?’

‘She obviously loved Giles more, didn’t she? She was already back with him when she found out she was pregnant. She promised me she hadn’t slept with him, though. That’s
how she knew the baby was mine and that was why she had the termination. Giles wouldn’t have taken her back if he knew she was carrying someone else’s child, would he?’

‘Did he even know she was pregnant?’

‘No. She made sure both the baby and me were well out of the way before she began seeing him
properly
again.’

‘I’m guessing this wasn’t all that long before Christmas, was it?’

‘How did you know?’

I shrugged but didn’t answer. Giles himself had told me he’d spotted me looking at engagement rings and panicked. That had been enough to send him scurrying back to the elegant arms
of Natasha, but it didn’t matter. None of that mattered any more. They were married now, both of them lost to me and Ben, and good riddance to the pair of them.

I couldn’t believe how calm I felt, how untouched. I looked down at my mug on the hearth. I should have been smashing it against the wall, shouldn’t I? Tearing my hair out in
fistfuls and wailing like a banshee, but what would have been the point?

‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’ I asked, wishing I’d known the full story all those weeks ago when he had seen fit to fill me in on the first instalment.

‘I had planned to, but the longer I left it, the harder it got. I found myself starting to like you again, Lizzie, and then, just when you were beginning to move on, you were hurt all over
again as a result of those bloody mysterious phone calls. I didn’t want to add to your pain so I kept my mouth shut.’

Was I supposed to feel grateful?

‘And I presume this explains the whole hating me phase and making my first few days back here as awkward as arse, does it?’

‘Yes, I’m sorry. I just couldn’t stop thinking that if you hadn’t fallen for Giles then Natasha would never have come looking for him. I got it all a bit twisted in my
head and I saw you as the villain rather than the victim. I’m sorry, Lizzie, but when you arrived back at Jemma and Tom’s it tipped me back over the edge. I thought it would be OK, but
it wasn’t. The sight of you and the thought of them brought it all back again.’

At last everything was explained and the jumbled puzzle pieces finally slid smoothly into place. I
collected my mug from the hearth, took it to the kitchen and rinsed it out. There had been nothing but conflict and crossed wires associated with every aspect of my relationship with Ben Fletcher
and it had always been like that, even at school. It was time to draw a line.

It was up to me to be the bigger person here, forgive Ben for his anger and suggest it was time we both moved on with our lives. After all, I couldn’t deny that it was me who had chosen
not to break it off with Giles when I discovered he was engaged. But then another more disturbing thought occurred to me.

‘Did Jemma and Tom know about all of this?’ I stammered, rushing back to the sofa, my bottom lip threatening to betray me. ‘Did they know that Natasha was the girl who had
broken your heart?’

Ben didn’t say anything. He ran his hands through his hair and stared at the carpet. At least now I understood what Jemma had meant by ‘baggage’. I couldn’t believe she
and Tom had kept this from me. Not only had Jemma, my oldest friend, believed Jay about the City Crafting Café, she had also kept me in the dark about Ben’s biggest secret, even though
she knew how much I liked him. Suddenly it felt as though I didn’t have a friend left in the world.

‘I won’t be gone long,’ I called to Mum as she saw me off at the train station. ‘Give my love to Dad and promise you’ll look after each
other!’

‘You are sure this is what you want, aren’t you?’ Mum shouted. ‘You aren’t just going because you’re cross?’

I shook my head and smiled.

‘No,’ I called back, ‘this is the right thing to do. I just needed a little nudge to help me find my courage,’ I reassured her. ‘I finally know what it is that I
want!’

I waved and smiled, forcing myself to watch until Mum’s silhouette on the platform became nothing more than a distant speck. Only then, I told myself, could I cry; only then, with
Wynbridge behind me, would I give in to my turbulent emotions, but the funny thing was I didn’t feel like crying any more.

Anger had stamped all over the shock of what had happened during the last few days and now I felt determined to embrace the opportunity that I had finally found the nerve to grab. I may have
been leaving the Cherry Tree behind but I knew that had I not lived there, had I not tried out my little business, then I wouldn’t be sitting on a train, poised to supersize my dreams. My
time at the Café had been an essential part of my journey but now life’s path had turned another corner and I was pushing on to see what lay ahead.

Deborah had been delighted when I phoned and said I wanted to meet and discuss the sale in more detail. In her enthusiasm to make sure I was the one who took over the reins she had even offered
me a gradual buy-out option; half now and the rest in two years’ time. Now I couldn’t even use my fear of funding the project as a reason not to try to secure it.

I banged the window shut, sat down and reached inside my sewing bag. Having decided not to drive down to London, I had the opportunity to dedicate the journey to working on the crocheted mice with long tails which
were my current little project. I had already made a whole family of them in different sizes, in the hope that I could introduce them at the Cherry Tree crochet circle I’d been planning, but
I figured they would feel just as much at home in the city as they were in the town.

‘Oh these are precious!’ Heather squeaked mouse-like herself, as she scooped them up off the counter when I finally arrived.

Deborah was more reserved and discerning and took her time scrutinising the stitches and finish before pronouncing with a smile that they were ‘beautifully constructed’ and
‘ideal for beginners’.

‘That’s what I hoped,’ I explained. ‘I thought they would be just the thing for a crochet taster session.’

‘I agree,’ Deborah said. ‘Quick to finish and pretty to look at. Far more interesting than the square mats for the dressing table that I made when I was learning.’

I had hailed a taxi and gone straight to the Crafting Café when the train arrived, keen to see the place in all its glory on a busy weekday afternoon. A knit and natter session was in
full swing and the place was buzzing with cake, conversation and customers popping in off the street. I was thrilled to find Heather behind the counter looking much the same as she always had, only
on this occasion being fussed over by Deborah rather than vice versa.

‘I’ve set out all the books in the back office,’ Deborah told me keenly, ‘and the accounts. Access all areas, Lizzie, and if there’s anything I haven’t
covered just give me a shout, OK?’

‘OK,’ I smiled nervously.

‘Right, we’ll leave you to it then!’

It felt strange being in the store in my capacity as potential owner. I browsed around, pulling books off shelves, fabric samples from rolls and various kits and remnants from the sale crates
and all under the watchful eye of my two friends. Front of house was the area I really loved and in which I felt most comfortable, but I knew I couldn’t put off trying to get my head around
the managerial aspect and eventually I ducked into the office feeling something of a fraud.

I sat at Deborah’s organised desk and ran my fingers down the columns and columns of neat, pristine figures and stared at the screen, equally neat, that displayed the more recent accounts
and bills. The reality and enormity associated with running the Café struck me like a hammer blow.

This was all a far cry from setting up a few tables and teaching someone how to sew in a straight line. If I bought the place, assuming the bank would lend me enough to make up the initial fifty
per cent; I wouldn’t know what to do with all this. The whole point of starting small was to find my feet and make my own way, wasn’t it? I had no idea about what half of the figures
and columns meant. I jumped as Heather knocked on the door and appeared with a laden lunch tray.