CHAPTER EIGHT
Friday dawned with a lovely message from Ellie wishing me happy birthday and saying the fizz was on ice for the special birthday tea she’d arranged for once the café had closed for the day.
There was no message from Caleb yet, but I wasn’t worried. He was sure to phone me later. He might even call round.
It was my day off and I’d arranged to meet my friend Primrose that morning in Guildford.
She’d just landed a part-time job at a doggy day care centre there, and she was absolutely loving it, but it meant she couldn’t make the tea party later with the rest of us girls.
So we were meeting in a café for a brunch of coffee and pastries before she started her shift at twelve.
It was so lovely catching up with Primrose. She and her partner Sam seemed to have quite a hectic life these days, what with both of them working now and juggling childcare between them. Four-year-old George was the light of their lives but a proper little scamp, by the sounds of it.
I arrived first and bagged a table in the window.
I’d wait until Primrose arrived to order, and in the meantime, I scanned the board over the counter, wondering which coffee to choose and reading the entire menu, then I picked up the menu on the table and began reading my way through that as well – all so that I wouldn’t be tempted to check my phone for messages for the hundredth time since I left the flat.
Caleb was a busy man. He’d phone to wish me happy birthday as soon as he had a spare minute.
There was a young couple sitting on a table nearby, and the girl had moved her chair so that they were leaning together, her cheek nestled into the crook of his arm.
They were murmuring to each other and smiling into one another’s eyes, clearly madly in love, and quite frankly, I was finding it rather nauseating.
My hand went to my bag, and before I knew it, I was checking my messages.
Still nothing from Caleb. But maybe he had a surprise up his sleeve for later? The postman hadn’t appeared by the time I left the flat, so there was still time for me to receive a card from him.
My phone rang and I pounced on it, my heart almost leaping out of my chest.
It was my Granny Olga, wishing me a happy birthday, and I thanked her for the very generous book token she’d tucked inside her card. ‘That will keep me in books for an entire year, Gran!’ I told her. ‘Your card arrived yesterday.’
‘Oh, good. Good. Now, I have another little gift for you and I have made your birthday cake, so you must come here and sample it some time. Your father is very anxious to taste it so I am hiding it from him. I tell him he must wait because it is your cake! But I suppose you will be busy tonight with that lovely young man you are dating?’
‘Erm . . . well . . . no plans just yet.’
‘No plans?’ She sounded surprised.
‘No. But I’m having coffee with Primrose this morning and then Ellie’s organised a tea party for me at the café – just the girls? I was going to pop in and see you and Dad on the way over there. Will you be in?’
‘Yes. I will tell him we’re having birthday cake this afternoon. That will be lovely, my darling.’
‘See you later, Gran.’
‘Katja?’
‘Yes?’
‘Would you like to go to the ballet with me? A treat for your birthday?’
‘Oh, I’d love to.’ Gran and I were both big fans of the ballet.
‘I will see if there are tickets for tonight. As you don’t have any plans?’
I swallowed. It wasn’t exactly how I’d imagined spending my birthday evening – going out with my gran. But actually, it came a pretty close second to spending it with Caleb. Gran and I had always been super-close.
‘I’d absolutely love that,’ I told her truthfully.
If Caleb happened to call last-minute and suggest he take me out tonight for my birthday, I’d just have to say, ‘Ah, sorry, no. I’m afraid I have something else planned.’ And it would serve him right for not marking my big day the way a boyfriend should!
Gran sounded pleased. ‘Excellent. I will phone the theatre now. Say hello to Primrose!’
No sooner had I got off the phone with Gran than Primrose herself was bursting through the door and rushing over, full of apologies for being late.
‘So sorry,’ she gasped, her cheeks flushed and her green eyes sparkling, ‘but George decided to fill all the button holes in the Chesterfield sofa with orange juice five minutes before I was due to leave.’
‘Oh, no!’ I couldn’t help chuckling. It was such an amusing image, and Primrose was laughing about it, too, now.
She was shaking her head in disbelief. ‘He came to find me in the kitchen so he could show me what he’d done. He was so proud of himself!’
I grimaced. ‘Was there juice all over the sofa, then?’
‘Actually, he’d done a quite amazing job filling up those holes. There was hardly any mess anywhere else. Although obviously we then had to set to with the damp cloths and undo all his good work.’
‘He’s obviously got a steady hand. Maybe he’s destined to be a surgeon.’
We laughed about that and then Primrose sighed and said, ‘Honestly, life is so hectic these days. Especially with starting the new job. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.’
I nodded and smiled, so pleased for her.
Primrose hadn’t had the best of starts in life, losing her parents when she was still very young.
But then she’d begun searching for the grandmother she’d never known and she’d finally managed to find her.
She and Sylvia were so close now, and meeting and falling in love with Sam, and then having George, had been the final missing pieces in a life that had once been full of uncertainty.
‘What are you up to tonight?’ she was asking.
‘I’m off to the ballet, hopefully. If we can get tickets.’
‘Oh. How lovely to be with a man who likes that sort of thing. I think I’d actually have to pay Sam to go with me to the ballet! Even if it was my birthday.’
I forced a smile. ‘Blokes, eh? No, I’m going with my gran.’
‘Olga? Oh!’ She looked surprised. ‘What’s happening with Caleb?’
‘Oh, we’re fine. He’s just very busy. At work.’
‘Right.’ I could tell she was puzzled.
I sighed. ‘It’s kind of my fault, really. I’ve been going on about wanting to take things slowly.’ I shrugged. ‘So I can hardly blame him if he decides to play it a little cool about my birthday.’
‘But I thought you two were so close?’
‘Well, we were. But that was kind of the problem? I just felt that after Richard and all that pain, I just couldn’t possibly go through the same again.
Not so soon after . . .’ I trailed off with a shrug.
It actually sounded rather pathetic saying it out loud.
And I could tell Primrose was mystified, although she was trying hard not to show it.
‘Caleb isn’t Richard,’ she said gently.
‘I know. I know. You’re thinking I’m mad and that I should just go for it with Caleb . . . that love is worth all the pain.’
‘There might not be any pain with Caleb.’
‘True.’
‘I think you might have fallen into the trap of thinking that because one person did the dirty on you, the next man you choose will do the same. Which is really understandable. But it’s not logical when you stop and think about it.’
‘I know. You’re right.’ I smiled ruefully. ‘Caleb isn’t Richard. I won’t get hurt again.’
‘Exactly.’
We started talking about Ellie’s idea for a Christmas market at the glamping site, and thankfully, the subject of Caleb was forgotten.