Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Flora
Any nerves I’d had at meeting Bea’s friend, Carrie, disappeared within seconds of us all taking our seats at a table in a local bistro.
She was funny, warm, friendly, and very chatty.
For the first five minutes she spoke about her daughter, Charlotte, and the baby she was carrying and then went on a twenty-minute rant about her husband, Gabe, who, it appeared, was getting increasingly protective of her as her pregnancy progressed.
She swore, laughed and threw in the odd hiss as she went over the struggle she’d had to get out without him and then reeled off all of the rules he’d laid down for her.
“He’s a bloody nightmare,” she finally finished, but then a huge grin spread across her face. “But he’s mine and I love him.”
Both Bea and I laughed at her admission, not that it was a surprise, not even to me because every time she said his name, spoke about him or revealed another fact, she beamed. She was totally head over heels for her husband.
Once Carrie had finished, Bea launched into her own little rant about Seb.
Her rendition of Seb’s overprotective routine included him banning her from taking a bath in case the water in the tub somehow drowned the baby, to him becoming a nutrition expert who spent hours in the supermarket checking labels.
The one that amused me and Carrie the most was his sudden refusal to have sex because he didn’t want to hurt the baby by poking him in the head.
Carrie snorted loudly, while I ended up losing some of the wine I’d taken a good gulp of down my nose.
“This might be absolutely none of my business, but just how hung is he?” I asked and while Bea laughed and gave me a wink, Carrie put her fingers in her ears and began to hum loudly.
“Well, not to do my man a disservice, whilst his concerns for our unborn baby’s risk of a serious head injury are ill placed, he is beyond adequate.”
“No!” squealed Carrie. “I can’t sit opposite him at family functions knowing details.”
Bea and I sniggered more than a little immaturely, before Bea waved her friend’s concerns away.
Once Carrie had removed her fingers from her ears and was picking up her glass again, Bea squealed three words quickly, “Like a horse.”
Tears ran down my face while Bea roared with laughter.
“For fuck’s sake! How the hell am I going to face Seb when he sits in my house having his hair, nails and make-up done by my daughter, knowing he’s packing?”
Bea shrugged as I continued to cry with barely contained laughter as I drank my wine. “You two would be out of control with alcohol, I am sure.”
“Well, once these babies have hatched, we’ll show you how hard core we are,” Carrie said before turning her attention fully to me. “Now that we have provided amusement via our men, tell us about you. Boyfriend, ex, someone in your sights.”
“Ouch!” I cried as I was kicked beneath the table.
“Sorry, was that you? I didn’t mean to kick you.” Bea looked embarrassed, unlike Carrie who laughed again.
“I think the kick was meant for me.”
Carrie rolled her eyes at her friend and it suddenly became clear. Bea had intended to kick her in an attempt to warn her about going down the line of conversation that was my romantic past or present, and presumably, Maurizio, who was now on her conversational radar.
“Sorry,” Bea said again, but this time it wasn’t for the kick, maybe more for having discussed me and presumably Maurizio.
“No problem. I have no boyfriend, the most horrendous track record, and possibly even worse taste when it comes to the opposite sex.”
“Let’s drink to the opposite sex,” said Bea, raising her alcohol-free cocktail for us to clink.
I laughed with a shake of my head. “Did you not hear that I have really bad taste in the opposite sex?”
“That’s because you haven’t tried things with the right man,” Carrie chipped in.
“Oh God! You two are like a bloody tag team.”
They looked at each other then back to me and smirked.
“Well, I’m not looking, so . . .”
“And that is when it happens,” Carrie shrilled, as if issuing a warning. “Look at us, neither of us were looking.”
“What happened with the Walkers?” I was fishing but I thought it was a reasonable question to ask. She had never visited or had access to the children to the best of my knowledge since my arrival, so, where was she and why was she absent?
“I’m not sure that’s really our business,” Bea replied and sounded prickly.
Judging by Carrie’s expression, I was not the only one taken aback by her response.
“I’m not asking for specific details. I was just curious as to why she didn’t see the children and if there was something I should be aware of.
I wasn’t being nosey or looking for gossip.
” I’d taken on the same prickly tone. I did admit, internally, that there was more to my quest for knowledge, just a little.
“Of course not,” Carrie said now, throwing Bea a sideways glance.
“Sophie left, suddenly. Long story short, she had been having an affair with another woman and she left. The children remained with Maurice and had Bea to care for them and that caused the least amount of disruption to their lives. Sophie came back very, very briefly and then went again.”
Still, Bea said nothing.
“I don’t understand how she could remain away from them. Her relationship with their father is irrelevant in all of this.”
“I don’t have any answers on that. I don’t understand it either.” Carrie sounded genuinely perplexed, as I was, but in no way judging Sophie, perhaps, unlike me.
“Maybe none of us need to because it’s none of our business.”
Carrie and I both spun to face Bea who looked conflicted.
“I’m not being a bitch to you Flora, really I’m not, but I knew Sophie, liked her, and although she wasn’t a friend like Carrie and you are, for a while she felt like one, so talking about her makes me feel uncomfortable.”
Perhaps I had been na?ve to have not thought about Bea’s relationship with Sophie, but truly, I hadn’t seen that coming. Watching on as Carrie stretched over and patted her hand, maybe she hadn’t either.
“I’m going to the toilet,” I told them, hoping that my return would allow us to revert back to simpler, easier topics, even if that did mean dealing with their answer for everything attitude.
“And then we’ll talk about Maurice when you return,” said Bea. Her words earning her a high five from her friend. “Like your doe-eyed expression and the rise in temperature when you’re together.”
I couldn’t help but like them both, I was relieved that my broaching of the subject of Sophie hadn’t damaged things in our fledgling relationship, but they were going to be a pain in my arse with their need to fix me up and make me as ‘happy’ as they were, especially as there was only one man who currently made me ‘happy’.
There was another glass of wine waiting for me when I retook my seat.
“So, Maurice,” Carrie said with a glance at Bea.
“You could cut the sexual tension with a knife,” Bea told her friend while I sat there, unsure what to say, especially as I considered Bea’s flat tone.
“Come on, Flora, you can tell us anything. When I first moved here, I knew nobody and then I met a few nannies, one of whom was Bea. She became my friend and helped me through the minefield of things between me and Gabe.”
Bea took things up now. “Same for me. I had a few friends, but nobody especially close until Carrie. She introduced me to Seb and when things got serious, or just tricky, I went to her and if nothing else, she listened to me.”
I nodded, understanding what they had, but doubting if I could fit into that friendship with them. Especially as I recalled earlier what had felt like Bea warning me off. Although, it had seemed she was warning me off discussing Sophie rather than fancying the pants off her estranged husband.
“Maurice likes you. Like I say, the sexual tension is unmistakable.” Bea looked at me and waited for a response.
“He is very, very handsome, and smells better than anything I have ever known.”
“Yay!” Carrie let out a loud cheer. “You are seriously fucked if you are already hooked on his smell.”
I laughed, and Bea joined in too.
“Come on, tell us all about how he smells and then we’ll move on to his bum . . . I love a nice tight bum . . . and don’t ever tell my husband I said this, but old Maurice is packing some seriously biteable booty.”
My laughter increased, but she was absolutely right.
Watching their eyes grow wider as they seemed to sense some kind of admission or revelation from me, I knew I needed to play this down because, apart from anything else, there was no me and Maurizio to discuss.
Not really. As lovely as these two seemed.
and Bea had been nothing but friendly and welcoming, I didn’t know them well enough yet to trust them to be confidantes and I didn’t want to compromise Bea or our relationship by inadvertently making her uncomfortable about Maurizio or Sophie again.
“But he is my boss, and totally out of bounds.”
They exchanged a glance that said they weren’t buying it.
“There’s no harm in window shopping though, is there?” I asked, raising my glass in salute before clinking it against theirs.
“I won’t point out that my husband was also my boss.”
With a shake of my head, I laughed. Laughter they both joined in with.
“I thought I recognised the sound of witches around a cauldron.”
I snapped my eyes in the direction of the male voice that had interrupted us to find an attractive, younger man, at least younger than me, standing at our table wearing a beaming smile that showed off his dazzling white teeth.
Both Carrie and Bea leapt up and engulfed him in a group hug. “Ash!” they cried in stereo, making all three of them laugh.
Turning to me, Carrie made the introductions, “This is Flora, she is Bea’s replacement with the Walkers. Flora, this is Ash, he’s a manny for a family at the far end of the village.”
“Manny?” I wasn’t sure if I’d heard correctly.
“Yes,” he confirmed offering me a hand and a smile. “I am a nanny, but as I am a man, these two thought they were so bloody witty by making me a manny! They have watched too many reruns of Friends.” He rolled his eyes but grinned at the other two women.
“Join us,” Bea said. “We are both on the wagon, but Flora isn’t so you could keep her company.”
“I’d love to.” With a wink in my direction, he took the space next to me.