The Little Flower Shop by the Sea (3 page)

Would this shop – my grandmother’s pride and joy – turn out to be yet another?

‘The rest of us would have jumped at the chance of taking on Grandma’s shop,’ Marigold had piped up at the will-reading. ‘It would be an honour. Goodness knows why she left it to you, Poppy.’

‘I
know
…’ Violet joined in whining. ‘You of all people. I mean, can you cope with that sort of thing these days?’ She’d tipped her head to one side and regarded me with fake pity. ‘I heard you were still taking
medication
.’

‘The only medication I’m taking is a pill to help me deal with annoying and ignorant cousins,’ I’d told her as she’d glowered at me. ‘I’ve been fine for some time, Violet, as you well know. Perhaps Mum’s right, perhaps Grandma Rose knew that and she wanted to give me a chance. Unlike
some
people.’

Violet had then stuck her tongue out at me like a petulant child.

‘I’m really not sure about this, Flora,’ said Aunt Petal, turning to my mother with a look of concern. ‘The Daisy Chain is such an important part of our heritage. Should we allow Poppy to be put in charge of it with her…
history
.’ She’d whispered the last word as if it was poison.

‘I am here, you know,’ I’d reminded her.

‘Poppy,’ my mother had put her hand up to quieten me, ‘let me deal with this.’ She’d turned back to Petal. ‘Poppy may have had her
issues
in the past, we all know that. Just as we all know,’ she’d added pointedly, ‘what caused them.’

The others had all looked slightly ashamed, and I’d closed my eyes; I couldn’t bear people pitying me.

‘But she’s a changed person now, aren’t you, Poppy. How long were you at your last job?’ my mother asked, nodding with encouragement.

‘Six months,’ I’d mumbled.

‘See!’ Marigold shrieked. ‘She can’t stick at anything.’

‘It wasn’t my fault this time. I thought the guy was coming on to me in the hotel room, what was I supposed to do?’

In my last job I’d been quite content working as a maid in a 5-star hotel in Mayfair. It was hard work, but not taxing, and I hadn’t minded it anywhere near as much as I thought I would. In fact I’d stuck it longer than any job I’d had before. That was until one evening a guest had got a little too frisky for my liking when I knocked to turn his bed down one night – a pointless part of the job, if you ask me. I mean, who can’t pull their own sheets back? However, it was part of my job description, and every evening at around six o’clock I’d begin knocking on doors. On this particular occasion I was told I’d
over-reacted
by tipping a jug of water over the guest’s head after he’d suggested from his bed that I might like to help him ‘test his equipment to see if it was working’. How was I to know that five minutes earlier he’d called down to reception to ask if someone could come and sort out his room’s surround-sound system, which didn’t appear to be working?

So I’d been
asked
to leave yet another job…

Ignoring the interruption, my mother had fixed her smile and continued:

‘Well, however long it was, it’s an improvement, and that’s all we want to see.’ She’d nodded at the others, hoping to gain their approval. ‘I think we need to give Poppy a chance to prove herself to us, and to herself. I know you can do this, Poppy,’ she’d said, turning to me. ‘And Grandma Rose knew it too.’

I peer through the gloom towards the back of the shop to see if the old wooden counter that I remember my grandmother serving behind still remains. To my surprise it does, so I make my way carefully across the shop towards it. As I do, I knock into one of the empty tin buckets standing on the floor and it crashes to the ground. I quickly stand it upright again and continue on my way.

I approach my grandmother’s desk slowly; my brother and I had spent many fun-filled hours hiding under here when customers came into the shop; for a laugh, sometimes we would leap out from our hiding place to make them jump. Well, I did; Will was always too polite and well mannered to go through with it and scare someone.

I run my hand gently along the soft, warm, now heavily worn wooden surface, and recollections of the three of us fill the room as I do. It’s as if I’ve rubbed a magic lantern and released a genie made up of memories.

I wonder?
 

I crouch down behind the desk and pull out my phone, activating the torch on the back. The underside of the desk is suddenly filled with light, and I direct the beam into a corner.

It’s still there.
 

In the upper left-hand corner of the desk is an inscription. It had been carved roughly with a pair of my grandmother’s floral shears in a moment of madness; it might well have been a dare – from me.

That’s what Will had written. I smile at his correct use of an apostrophe to represent the missing
h
. Even graffiti had to be grammatically correct with Will.

That’s what I had scribbled underneath.

Except we weren’t really rebels; we were good children, if sometimes a bit mischievous. I was ten when we wrote that, Will was twelve.

I never thought I’d still be rebellious twenty years later.
 

‘I… I don’t know,’ I’d stuttered to my expectant family as they had awaited my decision. ‘I hate flowers – you all know that, and I don’t like responsibility either, it’s just not my thing. Maybe I should sell the shop?’

There had been gasps from all round the room.

My mother had sighed heavily. ‘Give me a minute,’ she’d told the others before they could all jump on me. She grabbed my hand and pulled me into the hotel foyer.

‘Poppy, Poppy, Poppy,’ she’d said sadly, shaking her head, ‘what am I going to do with you?’

‘Well, I’m a bit too old to be spanked,’ I’d joked, my usual defence mechanism when faced with a serious situation. ‘You don’t see many thirty-year-olds being spanked with a hairbrush – well, not in the foyer of fancy hotels like this. Perhaps in the rooms…?’

My mother looked at me reprovingly. ‘This –’ she’d placed her finger gently on my mouth – ‘will get you into very big trouble one day. You’re feisty, Poppy, feisty with a sharp wit and a quick temper. It’s a dangerous combination.’

I’d smiled ruefully. ‘Already has, on a number of occasions.’

My mother had stepped back to look at me. ‘You probably get it from her, you know,’ she’d said reflectively, ‘your temperament. I remember your grandmother keeping my father in check with her sharp tongue. She never meant anything by it though, it was always in jest – same as with you.’ Then she’d reached out to stroke my hair. ‘When she was younger, your grandmother had a mane of raven hair just like yours. I remember spending ages combing it for her in front of her dressing-table mirror. In those days, she didn’t have the joy of straighteners to keep it tamed the way yours is – I guess that’s why I remember her wearing it up most of the time.’ She’d sighed as her pleasant memories made way for present concerns, which as usual involved me. ‘I don’t know what my mother was thinking of, leaving her precious shop to you, Poppy, really I don’t. She was under no illusions about what you’re like. But knowing Mum she had her reasons… and although I would never admit it when I was younger, she tended to be right about most things.’

She’d looked at me then; her dark eyes imploring me to change my mind.

‘OK, OK – I’ll go,’ I mumbled quietly, looking down at my Doc Marten-clad feet. There was an unusual gleam to them today because I’d polished them up especially for the funeral.

‘Really?’ Her face had lit up, like I’d just told her she’d won the lottery. ‘That’s wonderful news.’

‘But here’s the deal. I’ll go to St Felix and check the shop out, but if it’s not for me or I have any…
problems
while I’m there, then I’m selling it. OK? No guilt trip.’

My mother had flinched slightly, then nodded. ‘Sure, Poppy, you have a deal. I just hope St Felix can work its magic on you like it used to when you were small.’ Then she did something she hadn’t done in a long time: pulled me into her arms and held on to me tightly. ‘Maybe it can bring back my old Poppy. I do miss her.’

As I’d returned my mother’s embrace, I knew that, unless St Felix could turn back time, there was no way I’d ever be
that
Poppy again.

‘Is anyone there?’

As I sit under the desk, comfortably wrapped in my memories, a voice breaking into my thoughts makes me jump up, banging my head.

‘F—iddle.’ I manage to say, as a male face looks questioningly at me over the top of the desk.

‘What are you doing down there?’ the concerned face, which is attached to a tall, broad body, asks.

‘Looking for something.’ I stand up, rubbing my head. ‘Why, what concern is it of yours?’

‘Should you be in here?’ he asks, his dark chocolate eyes looking me up and down suspiciously.

‘You think I’m a criminal? If I was, I wouldn’t be a very smart one: there’s nothing here to take.’

‘You’d also be a noisy one.’

I stare at him blankly.

‘I was walking down the street and heard the crash from outside,’ he explains. ‘That’s why I came in to investigate.’

I glance at where I’d knocked over the pot earlier. ‘
Oh
…
I see.’

‘So what
are
you doing then?’ He stands with his legs apart and his arms folded.
The classic male defensive position
. One of my early therapists was a body-language expert – she taught me a lot.

I sigh, and jingle a set of keys at him. ‘New owner, aren’t I?’

He looks surprised at this. ‘I thought Rose’s granddaughter was taking over the shop.’

‘How do you know that?’ I demand.

‘Her mother phoned and told me to expect her. I’m Jake Asher, I own the local flower nursery.’

‘Oh,
you’re
Jake!’

‘Yes…’ Jake says, looking puzzled. ‘And you are…?’ But he quickly holds up his hand before I can speak. ‘No, wait,
you
must be Rose’s granddaughter.’ He nods confidently. ‘Yes, that would explain it.’

‘Explain what?’

‘Nothing, just something your mum said on the phone about your temperament…’

He tails off as I narrow my eyes at him.

‘Perhaps we’d better start again, hmm?’ he says, holding out his hand. ‘Welcome to St Felix.’

I eye him suspiciously before taking his hand, which is surprisingly large. His fingers wrap themselves around my hand and shake it.

‘Thanks.’

Suddenly there’s a rustling from the top of one of the wooden cabinets, and in the shadows I can just make out something climbing down the shelves.

‘What the hell is that?’ I cry out, about to duck back down behind the desk.

‘It’s OK,’ Jake says, holding out his arm. ‘It’s just Miley.’

Something jumps from the shelves and lands on Jake’s shoulder.

‘Is that a monkey?’ I ask in astonishment, still not quite able to see properly in the unlit shop.

‘She is indeed.’ Jake moves towards the door and flicks on the shop lights. ‘A capuchin monkey, to be precise.’

‘But why?’ I ask, still staring at the tiny, furry creature.

She eyes me warily, while licking her left paw.

‘Why is she a capuchin? Because Mummy monkey and Daddy monkey got together and —’

‘Funny. No, I mean why have you got a monkey? Isn’t it cruel to keep them as pets?’

‘Normally I’d agree with you.’ Jake rubs the monkey under her chin, and she nuzzles into his hand. ‘But Miley is different. She was trained to be a helper monkey over in the States for people with disabilities, but she didn’t quite make the grade. She was a bit too rebellious for the charity’s liking. But she couldn’t be put back into the wild, or into a wildlife park, because she’s too humanised. So when friends of mine who live over in the US told me her story, I agreed to take her.’ Miley strokes Jake’s sandy-coloured hair, then to my horror she begins to preen him.

I pull a face.

‘It’s OK, she won’t find anything in my mop to eat!’ Jake jokes, pulling a nut from his pocket. He passes it to Miley and she greedily leaps up on to an empty dresser to begin removing the shell. ‘She’s just doing what comes naturally.’

I watch Miley suspiciously from behind the desk.

‘So you agreed to look after a monkey, just like that?’ I ask doubtfully. Monkeys were something you saw in a zoo or on television. I wasn’t used to someone keeping one as a pet.

‘Yep,’ Jake says tersely, to my surprise. ‘Just like that. Why, do you have a problem?’

‘Noo…’ I hold up my hands. ‘What you do with your monkey is no business of mine!’

Jake’s expression changes and his lips twitch.

Realising what I’ve said, my cheeks redden. I look at the monkey; she’s now finished her nut, and is eyeing me warily again.

‘Does she eat fruit?’ I ask hurriedly. ‘I have an apple in my bag.’

Jake nods. ‘Yep, Miley loves apples.’

I scrabble about in my leather rucksack and produce a slightly battered green apple. I hold it out.

‘Er…’ Jake begins to say.

‘Oh, doesn’t she like Golden Delicious?’