Chapter Three
Jess
New Year’s Day
‘Five, four, three, two, one, Happy New Year!’ the presenter shouted.
The fireworks in Princes Street Gardens lit up the night sky as Mark yelled, ‘Happy New Year’ in Jess’ ear and kissed her.
His kiss still managed to make her melt. Pathetic, she knew, but she was in love with this man and had been for many years.
‘Happy New Year.’ She lay her head on his shoulder and wrapped one arm around him for warmth. Edinburgh was magnificent, but it was also bloomin’ freezing. Minus eight.
They stood silently together, absorbing the impressive display, high over Edinburgh Castle: a smorgasbord of Catherine wheels, rockets and Roman candles.
‘I love you, Jess Maitland.’
‘I love you back, Mark Featherstone.’ She did, and a part of her still hoped for the next ten seconds that he would propose, but when the clock chimed for the twelfth time, it appeared the opportunity had passed him by. Again.
As they cheered along with all the other revellers, Jess tried to suppress a soupcon of doubt over not starting the year quite as she’d hoped. There were more important things than getting married, although right now she was finding it difficult to focus on them. She should be grateful that she was here, on a mini-break, with the love of her life, her soulmate, her best friend, the boy who had fallen for her the first day she’d started at his school.
Mark hugged her to him. ‘Come here, you. Let me heat you up.’ He folded her into his open jacket, equally as puffy as hers, which effectively gave her another layer. It worked too. They stood enveloped in each other’s arms, like the lovers in Rodin’s sculpture The Kiss , but with more clothes on, yet still Jess felt as if something were missing. Guilt flooded through her at the thought, and she tugged Mark by the hand and led him to one of the food stalls nearby. ‘I’m starving. I need some food to soak up the alcohol.’
‘On that note, I need more alcohol to go with that food.’ Mark’s blue eyes twinkled as he leant in and kissed her full on the mouth.
Once the lion’s share of the festivities had died down, they made their way back to their hotel in the west end of the city.
‘So, where should be our first trip this year?’ Mark asked as they strolled along, hand in hand, his thumb tracing small circles in her palm.
Jess had already thought about this in recent weeks, but for very different reasons. She wasn’t yet ready to divulge her thoughts on that, though, so instead she said, ‘Well, technically, this is our first trip of the year.’
Mark nudged her with his shoulder. ‘I meant one that requires a passport.’
‘Ah, now you didn’t say that,’ teased Jess.
‘Well, we’ve done Lisbon, Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Pisa.’ Mark ticked off the cities on his fingers.
‘And we would have done Prague for New Year if Mum hadn’t booked the tickets and the hotel here without us knowing. So we could do Prague. I know you went on James’ stag a few years back, but I dare say there wasn’t much sightseeing done.’
‘I think you might be right there. I remember a clock, loads of pubs, a lot of other stag parties and not a great deal else,’ confessed Mark.
‘Lisbon was fantastic. And I loved that day trip we took to Sintra, and the monastery. But it was so hot.’
‘Yeah, a little too hot, if I’m honest.’
‘Any other ideas apart from Prague?’ she asked, fishing.
‘Hmm, let me think about it. Maybe I’ll drop in to the travel agent’s when we get back and pick up a few brochures. Sometimes it’s easier to decide looking at a glossy brochure than picking something out of a million possibilities on the internet.’
‘True. So, you don’t fancy doing the independent holidaymaker thing again?’
‘Thanks, but no. Not after last time. When we go on holiday, I want us to be able to relax, enjoy the high life, get jiggy.’ He waggled his eyebrows.
She grinned. It had indeed been a fiasco, and Mark liked his high-end hotels and numbered seat.
At least the hotel Jess’ mum and dad had booked for them was lovely, and clean, a Georgian townhouse with an incredible view onto a park, where they had already sat earlier in the day admiring the view and people-watching.
They really needed these few days away. Even though as a teacher, Mark had just over two weeks off at Christmas, Jess had no such respite from the daily grind. She loved her jobs, and being self-employed suited her, but with no holiday pay and with clients in her dog-walking business expecting her to work almost every day of the year, it was difficult to take more than a few days off at a time, which was probably why they tended to opt for city breaks.
Edinburgh certainly knew how to bring in the bells, she couldn’t argue with that, but it didn’t feel like a real holiday the way their other breaks had, since they only lived forty-five miles away in Glasgow.
Perhaps that’s why Mark hadn’t proposed. She’d been so sure he would this time. Why hadn’t he, for heaven’s sake?
When Mark had mentioned the day after Boxing Day that they’d received an invitation to a university friend’s wedding in March, she’d felt certain he was sowing the seed. But now nothing. Was he just clueless? They’d been together for, well, forever, almost, yet it didn’t seem to occur to him they should be taking those next vital steps in their relationship. She knew he was super laidback, but c’mon, if he was any more laidback, he’d be reclining on a chaise longue.
They had one more day in Edinburgh, then it would be time for her to return to work for a day before heading off on Kelsea’s hen weekend in Arran. Perhaps Mark would realise how much he missed her when she was in Brodick with Kelsea, Kelsea’s sister Lauren and some of Kelsea’s close friends.
She didn’t begrudge Kelsea getting married, despite the lack of proposal from Mark. They’d been friends for such a long time, and although she didn’t see her ex-neighbour so much nowadays, whenever they caught up, it always felt like they’d seen each other only the day before: a sign of true friendship.
She just wished her own path to married life was further along than its current stasis. But what to do about it?
Thursday 2 January
‘Right, Coco, let’s go, girl.’ Jess led the greyhound down into Queen’s Park where a grey squirrel paused to look at them, as if taunting Coco, who was on a lead, then scampered off into the nearby undergrowth. Jess waved to a fellow dog walker who was juggling four dogs on extendable leads. She shivered. Recipe for disaster, unless you knew what you were doing. Jess preferred stress-free walks, plus she wanted to enjoy the time with each dog. She pleaded over and over with Mark about getting a dog, even a small one, although she’d rather have a Pointer or a German Shepherd, but he stood firm each time, saying they tied you down– OK, they did, but they were so much fun, and gave so much affection.
She was so glad that in the absence of having her own dog, she’d had the brainwave a couple of years ago of supplementing her yoga and aerobics instructor work with her own dog-walking business. Pawsitive Pooches had been born and she’d never looked back since. In fact, she now had to turn business away. Fifteen dogs was quite enough. There was only her, after all, and she already had a successful fitness business. It was as well she always had bags of energy.
As she passed the pond, ear buds in, listening to her favourite playlist, she breathed in the fresh air, and as she exhaled her breath formed a cloud in front of her. She was lucky living so close to the park. She wasn’t made for being indoors all the time. An office job would have killed her. Fortunately, she loved her classes at Victoria Road Leisure Centre, and the mix of exercise classes and dog walking was a good one for her. Moreover, it meant she didn’t need to worry about finding time to work out. How many people could say that? And it wasn’t your traditional nine to five. Plus, she passed her days with her favourite people. Well, not people, her furry friends, but to be honest, she generally preferred animals, or at least dogs, to people. You knew where you were with dogs. And they were always pleased to see you. Always forgave you. Every little slight. Spending an hour with Coco, or one of her other charges, was the perfect antidote to not being able to cuddle up on the sofa of an evening with a dog of her own.
She dropped Coco back with Wilfred, her elderly owner, and chatted with him for a few minutes. He’d inherited her from his son when he died tragically in a car crash, but unfortunately Wilfred was in no position to walk her as he was too infirm, hence he’d engaged Jess’ services. At least Coco provided him with some company, though, and he doted on her. Jess knew she was often the only person Wilfred saw in a day, so the fact he at least had Coco with him all the time made her feel a little better. Coco would bark the house down if anything were ever wrong with her owner.
With a cheery, ‘See you tomorrow,’ she headed off to pick up Rocky.
As Jess approached Rocky’s house, she smiled. Mark called him Rocky the Riot, and sometimes Rocky the Rocket. He was your proverbial St Bernard in a china shop. Jess didn’t allow herself favourites, but if she had, Rocky would have topped her list. Brown and white, enormous, even by St Bernard standards, he was a walking, running, knocking-you-over barrel of fun. And at two, he was still growing. Never mind her walking him, it was definitely the other way around, and at this rate, she’d be able to ride him soon. All that was missing was the saddle.
She was still about fifty yards away from the house when she heard him barking, then whining, then scrabbling at the door. His poor owner was at his wits’ end and had to regularly repaint sections of the house as Rocky scratched and tore at everything. And then there was the chewing. She surveyed the mid-terraced house for a moment, wondering at why some owners chose certain breeds of dogs without truly considering the consequences or factoring into the equation the size of their home. At least Rocky didn’t live in a one-bedroom flat like the Pointer she walked.
Since Rocky’s owner was at work, she let herself in with the key, and the minute she opened the door, he almost bowled her over in his enthusiasm to see her and indeed go for a walk. She kept a lead in the van especially for him, because if she’d had to go in and fetch his from the kitchen, half the house would have been destroyed in the process, such was Rocky’s eagerness to go for his walk.
Once he’d licked her to show his joy at her arrival, she gave him a puppy treat and he sat until she calmed him. Then they set off. She was keen to reach the park as soon as possible, as handling a St Bernard in a park was one thing, being dragged through the busy roads of the south side of the city quite another. It wasn’t the first time she’d almost been mangled under the wheels of a number three bus.
But once in the park, Rocky was happy to walk beside her, albeit he pulled on the lead a little, OK, a lot. They had an understanding, though. Rocky would stop at the same bench every day and await his puppy treat, which was problematic if there was someone else sitting there, although they soon vacated it, clearly not wanting to mess with a St Bernard, or perhaps be slobbered on. Then they would sit for five or ten minutes simply enjoying the view, until Rocky saw a rabbit, or more commonly a squirrel, or another dog. And then all hell would break loose.
By the time Jess returned from her walks, she was a little sweaty and dishevelled. She decided to shower before packing for the hen weekend. Why is everything always so close together? First Christmas, then our New Year trip away, and now the hen weekend on Arran. Even when you had a holiday, once you returned, it never really felt like you’d had one, as you always had to catch up after being away. She shouldn’t complain though, as it was so rare for her to have time off, never mind so much time in only a few weeks.
She had to admit, though, she was really looking forward to seeing both Kelsea and Lauren, the sisters who’d lived next door to her when she was growing up. Apart from Mark, they’d been her two confidantes, and the four of them always got up to mischief. Nothing dramatic, just loads of fun. She couldn’t imagine that Kelsea’s hen weekend would be anything other than phenomenal.
Once she’d showered, she noticed the pile of mail on the table. It must have arrived before Mark left for school. Her hand rested on an elegant, posh-looking envelope. Cream. Embossed seal. The writing was as sophisticated as a calligrapher’s. What’s this? Another wedding invitation. You have got to be joking. What is there, an epidemic? A fire sale on wedding dresses? Unprecedented discounts at luxury hotels? A run on the markets? She’d almost missed it too, hidden as it was amongst all the late Christmas cards.
Carefully, she slit the envelope open with a paperknife– Mark’s. He was very OCD about things like that. Hated his letters to be ripped open.
You are cordially invited to the marriage of Casey and Millicent.
Jess snorted. Millicent. Milly hadn’t been Millicent since her christening, she expected. Certainly, when Mark had spoken of her, and on the few occasions their paths had crossed, no one had called her Millicent, not even her parents. Millicent was one of Mark’s friends from his Cambridge days.
It was all becoming too much for her. No New Year proposal, Kelsea’s hen weekend, yet another wedding invitation– they’d only just been to a wedding in October, for goodness’ sake. Plus, they’d received one on Boxing Day for a wedding in March.
Jess’ jaw clenched. No, she knew what she had to do: take control of her life. Fate was only good for so much. She had to put herself back in control of her own destiny. If he wouldn’t propose, then she would. And by the end of the year, come what may, she would marry this man.