Chapter 3
Linney turned the page of her novel. She stifled a yawn and then turned the page back again. Her toes grazed Mac’s under the covers at the end of the bed. The newly-released bestseller was excellent, but it was late and getting harder and harder to concentrate. They’d shared a romantic dinner and at least one bottle of wine at their favourite Thai restaurant earlier in the evening and now, close to midnight, her eyelids were growing heavier with every passing moment. Mac sat in bed beside her, scribbling research notes as sleep finally won and Linney’s book slipped from her hands. Mac gently lifted her glasses from her nose, closed her book, and put both on the nightstand beside her cell phone. He kissed her forehead and picked up his pen again.
Silver Lake soon filled Linney’s dreams. She was a teenager, back at Page Turners where she’d spent hours and hours with Kirsten in the back room—originally the old home’s kitchen—doing homework and devouring as many books as Kirsten’s mother would allow. Anna and Derek joined them, dropping backpacks and grabbing cookies. Soon they were all giggling over silly jokes when the bells on the front door jangled, announcing the arrival of another customer. Derek bumped her shoulder playfully as the bells kept jangling.
No, Linney realized, not bells. What was that sound? Waking with a start to Mac jostling her shoulder, she pulled her ringing phone close to her face, squinting to make sense of the blurry letters on the display.
“It’s Derek,” she yawned, as she slipped out of their bed and put her glasses back on. “I really should take this.”
“Really? He’s calling now? Doesn’t he know what time it is here?” Mac, who’d just finished his work, but was not yet asleep, was clearly not impressed.
Their eyes met briefly and Linney felt a spike of annoyance but bit her tongue. She shrugged a dressing gown over her cotton nightgown to ward off the cool air of the late October night. Mac would have to deal with the fact that the bed would be cold for a while.
“She said yes, Linney! She said yes!” Halfway around the world, Derek was giddy with excitement, not even giving her a chance to say hello.
Fully awake now, Linney closed the bedroom door and padded into the front room. She curled up in her reading chair and wrapped herself in the worn quilt that had lain over its arm. “I’m so happy for you. Tell me all about it. How did you propose?”
“It was outside the law library where we first met back in school. We stopped to sit under the trees in the courtyard after work and I just got down on one knee, the old-fashioned way. We’re going out to dinner to celebrate now, but I had to call you first.”
There was scuffling and laughter and suddenly Linney could hear Olivia in the distance. “Linney, we’re getting married! At the lake. You’ll come, right?” The two usually ultra-composed lawyers were anything but, tonight, and they talked over each other, bubbling with excitement, to Linney’s amusement.
“You can count on it!” Yawning, she reminded them of the time. “Send me pictures of the ring. And don’t forget to tell me as soon as you set the wedding date. I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Congratulations again!” She hung up the phone and turned back to the bedroom, but Mac was on his way out to meet her.
“What was that all about?” He slipped his hands around her waist.
“Derek proposed.”
“Well, that deserves a toast!” Mac pulled Linney by the hand into the kitchen and poured them both a tumbler of whiskey. He knocked his back and as Linney slowly sipped hers, he poured himself another. He held up the bottle with a question in his eyes. Linney shook her head. One was more than enough for her, especially after the two glasses of wine she’d had earlier. She was about halfway through her drink when she covered a yawn with her hand.
“Go back to bed. I’ll be right behind you.”
Linney nodded, yawning again, and stood on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. Mac finished her glass and poured himself another.
* * *
Raindropson the bedroom window the next morning woke Linney even before the alarm. She showered, put on the coffee in her tiny kitchen and got ready for work adding a black blazer over a knit maroon dress because she knew she’d be in front of the camera that day. She was blotting her lipstick when she heard Mac groan and hit the snooze button. Hard. Linney went to the bedroom to kiss him.
“Good morning, sleepy head.”
Mac grabbed her hips playfully. “Come back to bed.” He had the gravelly voice of someone who might have had one too many drinks the night before.
“I can’t. I have to—we have to—get to work.” Mac kissed her hungrily but Linney stood her ground. “I can’t.”
“Fine, you go ahead then. I’ll be about half an hour behind you.” He let her go and gave her a playful smack on the behind as she got up.
“Mac!” With an exaggerated sigh of frustration, Linney smoothed her dress. Being involved with a colleague had complications and while everyone at work knew about their relationship, she still worried about people thinking she was a girl who slept her way to success. So she worked twice as hard to make sure everyone knew what she could do. Leaving her lover in bed, she pulled on some black boots. At the bottom of the stairs, she buttoned her trench coat, opened her umbrella, and headed out into the drizzly day.
Linney walked up one of Notting Hill’s iconic streets of coloured houses toward the tube station thinking about Derek’s call. It had only been six weeks since she’d seen him, Gran, and the girls at Silver Lake, but she missed them already. Somehow, with time and distance, the same nosy, annoying townspeople that she couldn’t wait to get away from didn’t seem quite so bad any more. They were starting to morph into warm, caring neighbours who she cared about and who cared about her. She shook her head. No. London was where it was at. She was lucky that her flat was tucked away from the tourist mayhem, on a quiet little close—a cul-de-sac she supposed she would have called it at home.
Linney turned the corner and smiled, watching the market vendors open their stalls and set up for the day. Jovial banter filled the streets as the city started to wake up. London was teeming with excitement and full of good restaurants, markets, museums, and galleries. She loved it here.
It was nearly two hours later when Mac finally arrived at work, his hair still damp from a shower. He had a folded newspaper in one hand and an insulated mug of coffee in the other. One could almost believe he was late because he was checking out the competition. Only his bloodshot eyes gave him away to those who looked closely. He strolled across the newsroom and slid into the day’s story meeting just in time. Gemma, their bureau director, raised her eyebrows and tapped her watch. He ignored her but flashed a huge charismatic smile at Linney when he saw her across the table.
That look always made Linney’s stomach do fluttery flip flops, and this time was no different. Despite herself, she smiled back. The things he made her feel. There was no way to stay angry at Mac.
* * *
While Oliviaproudly showed off the huge diamond on her left hand to her fashionable high-heeled colleagues in the tall glass Toronto tower where she toiled for long hours for TSX-listed clients, Derek shared the news with his own colleagues, including Aidan. There were congratulatory slaps on the back and good-natured jokes about his single days being over from his motley crew of Legal Aid lawyers while they drank the terrible coffee from the lunch room. Their offices were decidedly rundown and the coffee maker had seen better days, but they practised great law and helped people every day.
Derek and Olivia were as different as the kinds of law they practised, but they’d been in sync instantly from day one. He didn’t mind at all that he’d had to scrimp and save to pay for that ring.
Derek always told the story with a slightly embarrassed grin on his face. He met Olivia in law school when he was sound asleep over his books in the law library one evening. Even with the scholarships he’d won, Derek worked two part-time jobs to help cover the cost of school and the grind had caught up with him. He woke with a start to this gorgeous woman telling him the library was about to close. She was so far out of his league that in any other setting, he never would have had the courage, but in his not-quite-awake haze, he’d asked her out for coffee to thank her.
As they left the library, and as his brain started working properly, Derek realized that from the cut of her dress, the scent she wore and the designer logo on her bag, Olivia Hastings came from money. He sighed inwardly—what bad luck. Once she knew he was just a small-town kid with no money, intent on righting the wrongs of the world, she’d disappear quickly enough and he’d have wasted money on coffee. Still, he’d invited her, and she’d said yes, so Derek guided her up the street to Common Grounds, his favourite café. He studied there often—one of the few places where he could hang onto a table for hours for the price of a single cup of coffee.
They chose a table in the front window and Derek dumped his frayed backpack on a chair as she settled herself. He took her order and returned shortly with a caramel macchiato and slice of biscotti for her and a cup of plain black coffee for himself.
“How do you–”
“Are you–”
They laughed as their voices overlapped and started again. Two hours later, they realized the café had emptied, and the last remaining barista looked like she wanted to go home. The world had disappeared until it was just them. Their hands brushed against each other as they reached for the last bit of biscotti and they looked up at each other in surprise. Derek had felt a spark and he was sure she had too.
Derek didn’t want the evening to end, so when they reluctantly stood up and left the café, he walked Olivia home, insisting on carrying her heavy bag in addition to his backpack. When he kissed her tentatively at the door, it was like magic. Derek dropped the bags to the floor and gathered her into his arms. Olivia let out a soft sigh as their lips met again.
They spent every spare second together that year, snatching hours between his jobs and their studies. They picnicked on her living room floor, held hands while they drank coffee and walked arm in arm along the waterfront. They studied together, and on rare days off, visited art galleries and museums. The city seemed made for lovers.
“You don’t drink much,” Olivia remarked one evening when they were out in the Distillery District with friends, celebrating the end of mid-term exams. Derek was nursing the same beer he’d ordered when they’d arrived.
“No, I guess not. Does that bother you?” Derek hedged, not ready to share this part of his story with Olivia yet.
“Just an observation.” She cocked her head at him. “Do you mind if I have another?” He shook his head, and it was never mentioned again. Some family history was best left in the past.
On paper, they shouldn’t have worked. Olivia was from money. Derek wasn’t. They were both driven, but where he wanted to save the world, she wanted to orchestrate big business deals. He loved to kayak. She was used to cruise ships. She liked to curl up in a cashmere sweater with a good book in front of stone fireplaces at ski resorts. He thought a plaid flannel shirt, a campfire, and long hikes to waterfalls were perfect ways to relax. A complete mismatch. But somehow they clicked, and with every day that passed, they grew closer and closer. When friends saw them together, they could see a special chemistry that was undeniable. Derek and Olivia were both driven, and there were early whispers that they could be destined to grow to be one of the city’s important power couples.
Since graduation, they had been busy building their careers, working the crazy hours new lawyers do, with little time for anything other than that—and each other.
Despite–or maybe it was because of–Derek’s upbringing, he felt compelled to help people who were struggling. He didn’t care that the Legal Aid office was worn at the corners, or that the perks were few. When he sat down with a young single mother struggling to get support from an ex-husband, a new immigrant who was threatened with being evicted by an unscrupulous landlord, or an injured worker who needed guidance to get government support, Derek knew he was making a difference. Olivia was on the partner track at a shiny, upscale law firm and she was laser-focused. She was being mentored by a friend of her father’s, who made sure she was not only working on the right cases but also seen to be doing the right things.
From time to time Olivia and Derek attended charity events or went to the theatre or symphony, but most evenings, one or the other of them would come home late, with takeout from the local Indian place, or lately a new Ethiopian restaurant they’d found, to find the other sound asleep on the couch, covered in legal briefs. Once, Derek took a photo of Olivia and texted it to Linney. “My sleeping tiger” he’d typed. Linney had sent a laughing emoji back when she woke in the morning, but of course, Derek hadn’t seen it immediately. He’d already scooped Olivia up and taken her to bed. She had woken as he pulled the covers over her and they’d found a way to use natural endorphins to relieve her tension.
He knew his new fiancée was more stressed than usual these days, working on a case that required her to have all her wits about her as she helped a client execute a hostile takeover. Truth be told though, he was no better. Derek had a habit of becoming emotionally invested in his clients’ plights and it fuelled him to work hard to get them justice. His own humble beginnings meant he could relate to his clients in a very real way. He put in at least as many hours as Olivia did.
Although Derek was head over heels in love with Olivia, he had been nervous when he’d first introduced her to Linney. He’d heard stories that old friends and new girlfriends didn’t always mix and that sometimes choices had to be made. It worried him. He couldn’t imagine life without either one of them.
* * *
“She’s different than I expected,”Olivia had told Derek, as they got ready for bed.
“What do you mean?” Derek thought he’d given Olivia a pretty good description of his friend.
“Well, she’s clearly as smart as a whip, but I expected her to be—I don’t know—a little more worldly.” She rubbed moisturizer along her long legs. “I mean, did you see her clothes? And those glasses—I’ve never known anyone with glasses that thick!”
Derek laid a hand on her arm and his voice had an edge to it. “She’s my best friend, Olivia. No matter what she wears.”
Olivia put up her hands in a gesture of apology. “I know. I’ll stop.”
“So when’s the big day?” Derek was shaken out of his daydreams by Aiden’s question.
“Soon,” he answered. “Next summer, actually. We don’t want to wait, so I’ve talked Olivia into getting married at the lake, where there are no long waits for venues. And that means you’ll finally get to see where I grew up! You will be my best man, won’t you?
“I thought you’d never ask.” The guys laughed and another round of back slaps followed before the lawyers re-filled their mugs with coffee and got down to the gratifying business of getting justice for those who needed it most.
* * *
In the TCNediting suite after a day of shooting, Linney shrugged off her blazer, and reviewed the film, watching her standup critically.
“For TCN, this is Linney McDonnell, in Piccadilly Circus.” The area had been buzzing, and you could feel it on the film, thanks to her cameraman’s skill. It never got old. Never. She took great pride in the stories she told for viewers of the network, whether they were back in Canada watching on TV, or these days, international viewers watching on the internet.
Pleased with the work they’d done, Linney headed to the office kitchen, put on the kettle, and poured boiling water over the tea bag. Letting it steep for a while, she texted Anna and Kirsten.
Did you hear? Derek asked Olivia—they’re getting married!!
Kirsten: Super news!! But more importantly—when are you coming home? We miiiiiisss you!
Anna: Yeah—soon I hope?
Linney smiled, as she tossed the tea bag into the compost bin. She was lucky to have friends who loved her as much as she loved them.
Miss you guys too. Home in the spring, I think.
Kirsten: Not for Christmas ˙?˙ ?
Not this year. But depending when the wedding is, maybe I’ll be home in summer TOO.
Anna: Boo to no Christmas. The girls miss you. But yay for two visits.
Kirsten: We’ll miss you over the holidays.
Me too. Will let you both know as soon as things firm up. Kiss the girls for me!
They’d made an unlikely trio back in grade school. Pretty, but shy and bookish Kirsten, gregarious dance-obsessed Anna, and little orphan Linney, bespectacled, bucktoothed and always getting into scrapes. But they were a tight group and stayed that way, even though as teens, their physical differences became obvious.
The summer before high school, Anna suddenly shot up. She was tall, slim, and graceful—the ideal dancer’s body. That same year, Kirsten started wearing oversized sweaters and shapeless dresses trying desperately to hide a rapidly developing figure that she didn’t understand and didn’t welcome. She was mortified by her new voluptuous hourglass shape with full hips, ample chest and an impossibly tiny waist. Most grown women would be envious, but it made the boys—and a few grown men, much to her horror—lose their minds. Through gritted teeth, she endured stares, bra snaps, lewd comments, and more than the occasional hand where it shouldn’t be.
Linney was jealous of both of them as they transitioned into beautiful young women, while she still had a little girl’s body. She had waited another frustratingly flat-chested year, but finally, the day came when Gran took her to buy a bra. Her braces came off, revealing a lovely smile and some gentle curves emerged. They came with a few extra pounds, but not too many. When she looked at herself critically in the mirror, she saw no great beauty and decided she would have to be satisfied with being just the average girl next door type.