The Secret of Happy Ever After (44 page)

Anna looked at Phil, and she knew before he spoke that he had nothing useful to say.

Since her dinner with Harvey, Michelle was finding it even more difficult to sleep, despite refurnishing her bedroom with some of her new bedlinen, transforming it into a marshmallow-white oasis of calm and soft serenity.

It wasn’t just the hot weather that was unsettling her. For several days in a row, Anna had come into the shop with bags under her eyes, and wouldn’t say what the problem was. Michelle knew it had to be a family issue, and felt hurt that Anna clearly didn’t expect her to understand. Their chats seemed shorter and more work-orientated every day, and Michelle was irrationally jealous of whoever it was that Anna was talking to now.

And then there was the bookshop. Anna had displayed a surprising new lease of confidence about her ‘Deckchair Classics’ campaign, but with most locals on holiday or cutting back it was a losing battle, and Michelle was finding it hard to come up with reasons to carry on. She knew she should listen to her Jilly Cooper audiobook so they could do their ‘summer reading’ interview in the paper, but all Michelle’s instincts were telling her to stop rearranging the deckchairs on the
Titanic
and ring for the
Carpathia
asap.

Tavish was off his food. She’d tried all kinds of tempting nibbles, but he was eating less and looking as morose as a dog that looked like a black car-wash brush could. Rory hadn’t mentioned it, so either he hadn’t noticed or Tavish preferred living with Rory – which would be the final bloody straw.

And Harvey. God. He’d gone quiet, which didn’t mean a thing. It just meant he was thinking. He wouldn’t have given up, she knew that. He was waiting for her to follow through on her threat and send the papers. What would be unleashed if she did that? What would he say to her dad? How far would Harvey go?

There were other darker thoughts he’d churned up too, about herself and who she was. Harvey was right when he said no one really knew her. Even Anna didn’t, not really. Michelle had done such a meticulous job of building her new life, refurbishing herself just like she’d done up her house and shop, that she sometimes forgot too. Harvey coming back like that had disturbed the layers of dust and something was moving inside her that scared her.

Her mind skirted around the worst thought, then touched it, tentatively. How could she still have felt that shiver of attraction to him, when he looked at her like that? She
loathed
Harvey, but he
did
know her. And still wanted her.

The only small consolation was that her dad wasn’t ill. As far as she could tell, anyway. She’d got in her car one morning and made a surprise visit home, catching him and her mother on their own before Harvey could sniff out her presence. When her mother had gone out to answer a call from one of her brothers, Michelle had asked her dad in a roundabout way what he’d been up to, how he was feeling – he’d seemed surprised, and told her about the track day he was planning for his birthday. That didn’t sound like a man who was ‘fragile’.

More to the point, when she’d brought the conversation round to the business, he hadn’t mentioned anything about her and Harvey taking over the dealership network. The thought of Harvey playing her father, who trusted him, as well as her, made Michelle angry and sick.

She looked at the perfectly plastered ceiling rose above her bed. It was gone five. She wasn’t going to sleep now.

What can I achieve in the next few hours? she thought.

When in doubt, run.

Michelle turned on her iPod and headed out of the house, along the canal path, feeling her way into her running rhythm as her heart began to pump in her chest. Running made her feel better, more connected to things. It occurred to her that this might be a good time to listen to the audiobook for her and Anna’s interview, and she clicked her way into it without breaking stride.

To begin with, Michelle wasn’t really listening to the words, hoping they’d sink into her subconscious on their own, but as she left the yellow arrows of the riverside footpath and headed up the poet streets towards the centre of town, the story started to catch her attention and her brain engaged.

The names were as familiar as friends on her old school register. Rupert Campbell-Black. Jake Lovell. Helen. As each character appeared, swimming into focus in her mind’s eye, Michelle began to get odd flashbacks to school, to the places she’d been when she’d first read
Riders
and these characters had first sauntered across her imagination, with their jodhpurs and Jack Russells and their cruel mouths that bruised girls with Marlboro-tinged kisses.

Michelle never thought about her past life, but now it came back to her in pin-sharp detail.

The library. She had a sudden, almost physical memory of the cool, green smell of the oak-panelled school library in summer, where she’d snatched a few chapters when she should have been revising. The too-sweet perfume of the tiger lilies that sat in the Gothic alcove above her usual place. The moment the narrator’s voice caressingly described Rupert’s horse’s flanks, and then his, Michelle could smell the flowers again, and knew where the rest of her English set would be sitting, in their usual places too. She remembered the disorientating but delicious embarrassment at reading something so sexy so close to other people.

She shook her head and missed a few steps, nearly tripping over her own feet as she tried to get her stride back.

But now she was listening to the book it started to come back in twin streams – the story, with its passionate crushes and twists and yearning love triangles and sweating horses; and the memory of her reading of it for the first time, in a place she’d pushed so far to the back of her mind she’d almost forgotten it had been real.

By the time she got to the park, deserted at this time on a Sunday morning, the narrative had moved relentlessly on and she had no way of escaping it. A tidal wave of emotion swept over Michelle, so fierce that she felt as if she were choking under the weight of her own need.

I wanted to be loved like that
, she thought.
That’s how I thought it would be when I was grown-up. And it’s not. It’s not.

She stumbled to a halt and held on to the railings, pretending to be stretching her hamstrings, but really bending her head so she could fight back the tears. She yanked the ear buds out of her ears, but the voice carried on in her own head; Michelle remembered now how the story ended, and something scraped inside her chest with longing for a happy ending like that.

Once upon a time, she’d actually believed it was round the corner. She could remember believing it, sitting in the library, confident that that sort of jolly, easy, vigorous love was about to arrive in her life.

She stared unseeing at the park railings, the black paint flaking away in chunks, exposing the Victorian iron beneath. Why hadn’t it come? How had she got to thirty-one, been married and nearly divorced, and never felt the knee-weakening passion even frumpy, mousy Tory Maxwell had enjoyed?

Michelle knew herself well enough to know the answer. Because she hadn’t let it come. It was easier to keep everything at arm’s length, under control, because this new Michelle, the bright tough Michelle, was not the sort of girl who let things happen to her, not like hopeless romantic Tory.

The old Michelle, the girl who’d sat in the library with her shoes off, reading when she should have been revising, reading when she should have been training, reading when she should have been listening to good advice and not believing in easy happy ever afters . . . That Michelle let things happen to her, not the other way round.

Her heart contracted as if an invisible hand were trying to squeeze it dry. I
want
to be loved, she thought in one sudden clear pang. I
want
to be held. I
want
to be swept away by someone. When was the last time someone kissed me and I felt like that?

Thirteen years ago. The last time she’d felt her whole body go light with lust was thirteen long years ago. Ed Pryce.

Michelle bent her head and let the pain rush through her, clinging to the railings as her chest throbbed. She had no idea where all this pain was coming from, but her body was aching as much as her heart, and big sobs were racking her chest, the sort of gulping child-like sobs she hadn’t had in years, the sort that wouldn’t stop until they’d blown themselves out.

She pulled herself nearer the railings, trying to make herself invisible in the clipped box hedge.

‘Are you all right?’

She felt a hand on her shoulder, and spun round.

Rory, of all the people in Longhampton, was standing right behind her, too close as usual, with Tavish by his side, not on the lead. Tavish looked pleased to see her, Rory less so.

To her mortification, Michelle couldn’t stop the sobs. ‘I’m fine,’ she hiccupped, trying to hide her face.

‘No, you’re not.’ He peered at her. ‘Are you hurt? Have you pulled a hamstring?’

‘No!’ The hiccups made it almost unintelligible, but she couldn’t stop them. Her chest was aching doubly now with a sobbing stitch.

‘Do you want me to look at it?’ he persisted, as if he was actually keen to investigate her injuries. ‘I’m the first-aid officer at work. I’ve been on a course for—’

‘Fuck off,’ gasped Michelle. ‘Please!’

Rory took a step back, apparently realising she was crying, rather than moaning in pain. Michelle flapped her hand, hoping he’d take it as a sign to go away, and for a second, she thought he might.

Then he took a step nearer again and put his hand on her shoulder, with a gentleness that nearly set her off again. ‘You’re not all right. Please let me take you home.’

It wasn’t an order, like Harvey would have issued. It was concern, and for a moment, Michelle thought about letting Rory lead her home like a lost dog. Then she grappled her dignity back under control.

‘I’m fine,’ she hiccupped, and wiped her face with her hand, amazed at how wet it was. She dragged a breath into her lungs. The only thing to do was to run it out, to run away from Rory and force her body to start doing something else.

To run away from yourself
, you mean, said a cool voice in her head; but she ignored it, pushed herself off the railings and set off in the opposite direction without turning back.

Crying and running was hard, but it distracted her mind and by the time Michelle turned back down towards the canal, it was nearly eight, and her face was normal enough not to raise concern from the early morning dog-walkers she encountered on her route.

She jogged slowly down Swan’s Row, lining up a whole morning’s worth of tasks to blot out the lingering embarrassment, and slowed even more when she saw a figure sitting on her front step.

Rory, and Tavish. Rory was eating a croissant from a paper bag and Tavish was waiting patiently for crumbs. A thick wodge of Sunday papers was on the step next to him, along with a Sainsbury’s bag of breakfast ingredients.

‘Oh God,’ breathed Michelle out loud, as he got up to welcome her.

‘Morning,’ said Rory, brushing pastry flakes off his trousers with a flick of his hand. ‘I’ve got to bring Tavish back early today so I thought we could do brunch and papers . . .’

‘You didn’t think I might want to be on my own?’

‘What could I do?’ Rory pointed at the dog. ‘I’m at his beck and call. We’re merely his hand-maidens.’

Grudgingly, Michelle reached under the terracotta dovecote, withdrew the house key and let them in.

Rory insisted on making breakfast while she showered, and when she came downstairs in fresh jeans, her hair damp and unblowdried, the smell of a full English was filling the house and Rory was busy at the hob, a tea towel over one shoulder.

Michelle assessed the damage to her clean kitchen. He’d used four pans, five bowls, several plates and had still managed to get crumbs over the countertop. Tavish was also sitting right underneath his feet, wearing the guilty but triumphant air of a dog who’s been fed from the kitchen work surfaces.

Michelle looked more closely and saw that Tavish had crumbs in his straggly black beard. ‘Rory,’ she began, ‘has Tavish had—’

‘Sit down,’ said Rory, without looking round. ‘I’m bringing it all to a precision finish. Timing is crucial.’

Reluctantly, Michelle sat down at the table and poured herself a cup of tea from the pot. Then she put the pot on a trivet and coasters under the mugs in advance.

‘There. Eat that.’ Rory slid a full plate in front of her and one in front of himself, and proceeded to cover his bacon in tomato sauce, then brown sauce. ‘Dig in,’ he added, when she didn’t start immediately.

Michelle ate a bit of sausage and had to admit that Rory could make good scrambled eggs. Her churning stomach began to feel better the more bacon she shovelled into it.

When Rory had cleared his plate, and Michelle was halfway through hers, he pushed back his chair and regarded her with his cool, clear gaze.

‘Well, while we’re both here, I want to tell you about me and Esther and Zachary,’ he said.

‘Why?’ She carried on eating to hide her surprise. ‘It’s none of my business.’

‘Yes, it is. You’re judging me all the time about being a selfish absentee dad. Don’t deny it. All that stuff you keep implying, like I only volunteer at the old people’s home to drum up business, you don’t think I can take care of Tavish properly . . .’