The Last Days of Summer

Chapter 5

5

O rdinarily, Cassie would have worked through her lunch break on Tuesday. London Fashion Week was in September, but unfortunately many of her clients’ big cheeses, the decision-making, final-sign-off cheeses, were away for the whole of August, so July was always hectic.

It meant that Cassie and her team were currently run ragged trying to finalise details for all the breakfasts, lunches, high teas and dinners taking place between fashion shows. The current bane of her work life was a late supper she was organising for a luxe cashmere brand launching a new range of loungewear. She’d had to go all ‘as per my last five emails’ on their marketing director that morning. She didn’t really have the time for what would inevitably be a long lunch at Manzi’s, which was something of a Soho institution.

Both she and Russell loved how glamorously kitsch the restaurant was, from the huge, truly bonkers seascape mural inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea to the turquoise mermaid figurines holding up the gantry of the upstairs bar. The restaurant harked back to an older, wilder Soho when the Colony Room and the Coach and Horses were full of reprobates who never went back to their offices after extended, mostly liquid lunches. Also, Manzi’s did a really good fish-finger sandwich.

Russell was already waiting for her. He’d snagged a window table and looked as he usually did: glowing with vitality as he was haloed by the sun streaming in. He smiled as Cassie approached and stood up so he could wrap her in a hug as soon as she reached him.

It was a patented Russell bear hug. Solid and dependable, smelling of crisp cotton and Old Spice because when the girls were younger they’d buy him Old Spice for every birthday, Christmas and Father’s Day and he now had a never-ending supply of it. Cassie felt overwhelmed with love for him. She and Russell had a deep friendship which existed independently from her relationship with Lucy and her relationship with them as LucyandRussell, two people but very much one unit.

Yet when Lucy had first mooted the idea that Cassie, her brand-new friend, should meet her fiancé, she hadn’t expected to like Russell at all.

For starters, it seemed as if Russell was posh. Proper posh. Cassie was wary of the posh; even the very, very middle class made her feel as if she was nothing better than a street urchin.

Russell had grown up in a beautiful old manor house in Surrey. Lucy said that there was a suit of armour in the hall. In the halls of Cassie’s friends, if they even had a hall and the front door didn’t open straight into the lounge, there was maybe a coat rack and very definitely a chaotic row of shoes and trainers which had been toed off upon entering.

Russell had gone to Harrow, then Oxford, before doing his MA at Durham where he and Lucy had met. Now he was finishing up his PhD, teaching at University College and writing a book. Cassie had never met anyone who’d written a book before. In his spare time, he ran marathons and belonged to a backgammon club. So posh! Besides, Russell was twenty-seven. Seven years older than Cassie. Back then, seven years’ difference when you were a chippy girl barely out of your teens felt like seventy years.

By then, Cassie had been going out with Bogdan for nearly a year, and only recently had he finally – reluctantly – agreed to make the relationship official and exclusive. Bod, as she called him (to his mates, he was affectionately known as Bodge), lived with three friends in cheerful squalor in a two-bedroom flat in Archway. The kitchen was so filthy that Cassie wouldn’t even make a cup of tea on the rare occasions that she went round there.

Lucy had suggested that they double date: Cassie and Bod, Lucy and her posho boyfriend. He was bound to be a ruddy-faced rugger bugger who’d treat Cassie as if she were Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady before her Henry Higgins makeover.

Russell hadn’t been like that at all. He was kind of ruddy-faced, but that was the only correct part of Cassie’s pre-match character assassination.

Because Russell … Russell … was a golden retriever in human form. He was so excited to meet Cassie that when she and Bod walked into the Camden pub where they’d arranged to meet, he was out of his chair and halfway across the room to greet them before Lucy even noticed their arrival.

‘Cassie? It is Cassie, isn’t it?’ he’d confirmed and when Cassie had nodded, Russell had beamed. His smile seemed to have its own force field. ‘I feel like I already know you. Lucy doesn’t stop talking about you. Look, I’m a hugger but if you’re not …’

Cassie was not a hugger but she found herself nodding and was instantly wrapped in Russell’s arms for a brief but heartfelt hug. Then the four of them had sat down, a bottle of Pinot Grigio for Cassie and Lucy, pints for Bod and Russell, and Cassie found all her prejudices melting away.

There was something so engaging about Russell that it was impossible not to warm to him. He had such a genuine curiosity about the world and the people in it, that later when the book he was writing became a surprise bestseller and a career in radio and TV beckoned, Cassie wasn’t at all surprised. Within half an hour of meeting him, she’d been utterly besotted.

First, Russell asked Cassie about what it was like to have lived in London all her life ‘because it’s quite rare to meet a native Londoner’. Then she found herself telling Russell things that she didn’t normally tell new work colleagues because she thought they’d look down on her. That her grandad had been born within the sound of Bow Bells. How she’d learned to swim at Hornsey Road Baths, with its iconic 1930s neon sign of the diving woman. About working at the funeral director’s, and the send-off for a legendary gangster and associate of the Kray twins. ‘A proper East End funeral with the horses with the black feathers. Brought the traffic in Hackney to a standstill.’

Then she’d asked Russell about running marathons. Instead of talking about his training or his run times, he’d instinctively thought of a way to talk about the subject so that Cassie, very much not a runner, would find it interesting. He became so impassioned about Kathrine Switzer, the first woman to run a marathon in 1967 in Boston, even though race officials tried to physically drag her off the course, that he actually cried a little bit. Cassie still teased him about it although Russell always insisted that they’d been very manly tears.

Russell had main character energy and Cassie, like so many people who knew and loved Russell, was happy to have a supporting role in his life.

But none of that was important now, because Russell was supposedly dying. Which was ridiculous when he was in her arms, so solid, so real.

Russell tried to step back but Cassie tightened her grip.

‘This is getting kind of awkward, Cass,’ he said, his smile evident in his voice. ‘Put me down. You don’t know where I’ve been.’

Then there was another voice. A voice that always made Cassie wince when she heard it unexpectedly, like nails running down a blackboard or someone crunching ice cubes. ‘Am I interrupting something? Do you two need to be alone?’

Cassie set Russell free in an instant so she could turn around and glare at Marc, who’d turned up yet again like the baddest of pennies. He was wearing a slim-cut, cream-coloured lightweight suit with a black shirt. It was a stylish and understated look, which, for some reason, enraged Cassie even more. Or maybe it was because of the smirk. Yes, it was definitely the smirk. ‘What are you doing here?’ She turned back to Russell, who quaked at the furious expression on her face. ‘What is he doing here?’

Russell’s smile did nothing to placate Cassie. ‘I asked him because I need to fill him in on the little secret we’ve been keeping …’

Marc paused from sliding into the booth, though if Cassie had her way he wouldn’t be staying long. ‘What little secret?’ His gaze flickered from Russell to land disapprovingly on Cassie. ‘Are you two having an affair?’

Cassie glared even harder. ‘Typical that you would think that.’

‘Now now, children,’ Russell said equably, because while Cassie and Marc employed a thin veneer of civility in company, especially if that company was Lucy’s or their mutual friends, Russell was different. It was hard to dissemble with Russell because he was always so candidly himself. ‘Sit down, Cass.’

She slid into the booth, opposite Marc. She was wearing one of her favourite summer outfits, a black, sleeveless, waisted jumpsuit. It was ridiculously flattering, edgy but professional, and cool enough for the hot weather and commuting on the Northern Line. It was the holy grail of jumpsuits. But when Marc gave Cassie his usual dismissive up and down, she felt like ripping the jumpsuit off and burning it at the first opportunity. She flicked back her heavy plait with annoyance.

‘I don’t know why he’s here,’ Cassie said to Russell. ‘I knew what you wanted to talk about as soon as I got your message. I’d been wondering the same thing. Obviously we’re going to cancel now. Not much chance of getting the deposit back …’

Russell shook his head. ‘No, we’re not cancelling. Quite the opposite. We’re going hard until it’s time to go home.’

‘Will one of you tell me what’s going on?’ Marc asked. He’d slipped off his jacket and was now rolling up his shirtsleeves to reveal the corded muscles of his tanned forearms.

What was about it forearms, even the forearms of a man she disliked intensely, that was so hot?

Cassie decided that it was best to ignore Marc. She took out her laptop and opened it up so he was blocked from her view. Then she turned her attention back to Russell. ‘Are you sure? It won’t be too much for you?’

‘I’m going to get laughing boy here to step up …’ Russell said, gesturing across the table to where Marc was staring at them both like they were talking in tongues.

‘Oh no, you don’t have to do that,’ Cassie said quickly, horror rising up in her like a sudden bout of heatstroke. ‘I’ve got this under control.’

‘For the second time, will one of you tell me what is going on?’ Marc bit out.

Cassie and Russell exchanged an exasperated look. Cassie even allowed herself a small, weary sigh, which made Marc’s jaw tighten.

‘You’ve already saved the date, mate,’ Russell said. ‘You’re in the WhatsApp group. August bank holiday weekend.’

‘Yes, we’re going away somewhere, I was waiting for you to firm up the details …’

‘It’s a four-day celebration for Lucy’s fortieth, but she doesn’t know about it,’ Russell reminded him. ‘We’re talking Whitehall levels of secrecy. My grandparents used to live in this lovely little village outside of Brighton, on the South Downs. Lucy and I honeymooned there. Anyway, they had friends who lived in the manor house, which I’ve rented for the weekend. It’s got a swimming pool, tennis courts, its own beach. Lucy will love it.’

‘And I’m on top of everything,’ Cassie said as firmly as she could. ‘I hate to break it to you, Russell, but I can manage perfectly well without you.’

As soon as the words left her mouth, Cassie realised what she’d said. She couldn’t even look at Russell and turned her face away from him even though he put his hand on her shoulder.

Marc, thankfully, resisted the temptation to point-score and tell Cassie off for her horrible, terrible, awful faux pas. The three of them sat there in silence, and it seemed to Cassie that each of them was alone in their own private hell.

Then the server, a startlingly attractive young man, came to take their order. After a brief look at their frozen faces, he swiftly departed with a murmured, ‘I’ll be back in ten.’

Cassie took a couple of deep breaths as she made a determined effort to get her emotions, her body language, her tear ducts under control. Russell would hate it if she cried. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘You’re allowed to feel sad. I’m sad too,’ Russell said with a deprecating snort because Cassie could tell that, like her, like Lucy, even Russell found it impossible to put this into words.

Marc, who’d been the quietest, the most still of the three of them, reached across the table to take Russell’s hand and, after a few long seconds of mutual hesitation, Cassie’s hand too. Cassie stared down at his long fingers clasped tightly around hers. She was surprised to discover that there was something comforting about the warmth of Marc’s hand, the strength of his grip.

Then he broke the spell. ‘I’ve been doing some research,’ he said, releasing Russell’s hand and when Cassie tried to break free too, Marc held on to her, his thumb lightly brushing the back of her fingers, which made her shiver despite the heat of the day. ‘There’s a guy in California who’s been having a lot of success with stem-cell therapy to boost immunity in liver cancer patients. I’ll sort everything, fly you out – you don’t have to worry about the expense …’

‘I’m not going to do that,’ Russell said patiently. ‘I already told you. I don’t want to spend what time I’ve got left blasted by treatments that are going to prolong the inevitable by a few months at best. Months when I’m going to feel like shit. I don’t want Lucy and the girls—’ He broke off. ‘This way is better. We can enjoy what time I’ve got, make memories that will last …’

Marc’s grip on her hand tightened so much that Cassie almost squeaked. He looked down as if he was surprised to see that her fingers still rested in his. Then he set her free. ‘You can fight this. If I were you …’

‘But you’re not me, so let it go,’ Russell said firmly but with finality, a steeliness to his tone that Cassie had rarely heard. ‘Lucy and I are decided. So, we’re going to throw her the best fortieth birthday we can muster, right?’

‘Right!’ Cassie agreed, trying to sound her very peppiest and perkiest. ‘Four days of all of Lucy’s favourite things. Tennis, swimming, yoga, karaoke, fancy dress, maybe a scavenger hunt, fish and chips on the beach on Friday night, a barbecue on Saturday then a massive roast with all the trimmings on the Sunday. Lots of carbs, lots of Aperol Spritz, lots of enforced exercise. That’s basically the highlights.’

Lucy and Russell were both very sporty, which Cassie admired but she didn’t like to get too involved. Lucy was always telling her that she should do more cardio to elevate her heart rate, ‘because good things happen when your heart rate gets elevated’. However Cassie liked her heart rate to maintain a very steady rhythm. But they were also very into food, which was more her thing, and as for …

‘Karaoke? Fancy dress?’ Marc repeated scathingly, his top lip curled. ‘Remind me again why you married this woman?’

Cassie would have bristled but she knew that, despite his many faults, Marc adored Lucy and she seemed to rather like him too. Now all the difficult emotions had sunk below the surface, predictably Marc and Russell would resort to some mild banter to restore a semblance of normality.

‘You’re talking about the love of my life,’ Russell said. ‘Even though she made me do karaoke on our first date. Once she heard me murder “Bohemian Rhapsody” I’m amazed she agreed to a second date.’

Marc shrugged. ‘No accounting for taste.’

‘Still can’t quite believe that I landed such a hottie.’ He turned to Cassie. ‘Look, it’s a very packed schedule for the weekend and I really can’t dump it all on you, Cass, so Marc will step up, right?’

Up until then, Russell had been quite happy to dump it all on Cassie. He was more of the ideas man and she was the person who made those ideas happen. The weekend played to her very specific skill set. If you needed someone to source a karaoke system, an artisanal birthday cake and tennis trophies for a bank holiday weekend, then Cassie was your woman.

So even though there were still seven weeks to go, she had everything under control. In fact, she’d been about to email the itinerary and final details to the guests. ‘Honestly, it’s all good. I do this for a living, remember?’

‘It doesn’t hurt to have another pair of eyes. Or hands,’ Russell insisted.

Once again Cassie was forced to look at the hands in question. She had a quick and sensory flashback to how those hands, on a night a long time ago, had …

Cassie looked up, away from those hands, those devastating fingers, only to catch Marc’s eye. She could feel the flush of her cheeks and maybe he was remembering too because he shot her a small, sly smile, that on that night she’d found irresistible. Now, she wanted to tear it off his face.

‘OK, Russ. It does sound like too much for one person.’ The small, sly smile had upgraded to a shit-eating grin. ‘I’m in.’

‘No, you’re out! I can do this on my own. I want to do this on my own,’ Cassie insisted stridently and very shrilly.

‘It’s far too much to do on your own. You’re making me feel so guilty,’ Russell said, so Cassie immediately felt like a worthless wretch. Russell had enough going on without her adding to his worries.

‘Well, I mean …’ She sighed. ‘I really can manage myself, but if you think that another pair of eyes might be helpful …’

‘That’s settled then,’ Russell said very firmly and with a twitch of his lips to hide his smile like he couldn’t quite believe that Cassie had let herself be played so easily. ‘Marc, you’re going to help Cass but not be a dick about it. Cass, you’re going to be your most gracious self and accept Marc’s help. Great – I love it when a plan comes together.’

‘I can’t wait,’ Marc said, his smile positively gleeful.

She was saved from doing anything drastic like throwing her glass of water in Marc’s face by the server returning to take their orders.

Cassie really didn’t feel like eating. Since the previous Friday night, her appetite had waxed and waned. Her stomach was either tied in knots, or furious and growling that she’d been denying it food because of those knots.

Marc and Russell didn’t have that problem. They shared a dozen oysters as a starter, then both had the lobster Thermidor, which seemed very decadent for a Tuesday lunchtime.

Even if Cassie couldn’t really eat, apparently she could still talk. Boy, could she talk!

She asked Russell about the family’s upcoming holiday, although they went to the same place every year so there wasn’t anything new that Russell had to impart on the subject.

Then Cassie decided to give them a blow-by-blow account of the recent outing to the Taylor Swift concert, including the friendship bracelets that Fleur and Joni had made for Cassie and her little brother, Ryan, the elderly man wearing a ‘Grand Swiftie’ T-shirt sitting in front of them with his granddaughters, and every song that she could remember from the setlist.

Cassie knew that she was talking too much, all of it entirely uninteresting unless you were a hardcore Swiftie, which neither Marc nor Russell was, but she couldn’t talk about the stuff she really wanted to talk about. God, she hadn’t even told either Russell or Lucy how sorry she was. Also, she knew what Marc was like. He wasn’t going to drop it with his experimental therapies with proton beams or what have you, so best that there weren’t any gaps in the conversation.

Russell was taking her word vomit with his usual good humour, smiling and nodding in the right places, but Marc kept shooting her these loaded glances, which Cassie ignored. She’d known Marc for sixteen years, so that was sixteen years of knowing that she irritated him. Yet here she was, at her most irritating. She was even irritating herself.

Thankfully no one wanted pudding or coffee. Marc and Russell tussled over who was paying but when Cassie suggested that they go thirds, even though her fish-finger sandwich had cost far less than their oysters and lobster, both of them (even Russell) frowned her into silence.

Marc won the battle of the bill, of course, and just as Cassie was about to slide out of the booth, Russell put a hand on her arm.

‘Just one more thing. Promise you won’t be cross with me.’

Oh God, what now?

Cassie managed to summon up the faintest of smiles. ‘Depends. I can’t really handle any more bombshells.’

Russell waved an airy hand. ‘Oh, it’s nothing. It’s just … we’re going to have to add two more people to the guest list. Don’t be angry.’

The sinking feeling must have been exactly what the Titanic experienced when it hit the iceberg. ‘Who?’

‘Heather and her hubby ,’ Russell said, flinching as if Cassie’s ferocious scowl had struck him a blow. ‘Don’t look at me like that, Cass. She suspected that something was up and she said if I didn’t tell her she’d ask Lucy, and Lucy’s been through enough and I didn’t want to tell her what was really wrong. Then I might just as well take out a full-page ad in The Times. So I told her about the surprise fortieth birthday weekend and had to pretend she was invited all along.’

Cassie’s mind was immediately besieged with all the problems this would throw up. The lack of a room for Lucy’s toxic sister Heather and her husband, self-styled cheeky chappy Davy, for one thing. The fact that they were a pair of tight-fisted freeloaders even though Davy worked in finance. Their smug, performative coupledom. Even worse, Heather couldn’t handle her drink and was a hysterical, meltdown-having drunk.

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, Russell!’ Cassie snapped. ‘This is going to be like Lucy’s hen weekend all over again.’

Russell held his hands up. ‘I know. I know. If I wasn’t dying anyway, you’d kill me.’

‘It’s a bit soon to be making jokes about that,’ Marc said sharply from the other side of the table.

‘It’s always going to be too soon to make jokes about that,’ Cassie added with a sigh. ‘You know what? It’s impossible for me to be angry with you right now. I’ll sort things out with bloody Heather.’

When they stepped out onto a blisteringly sunny street, Russell was the first to take his leave. He seemed to shrug off the carefree man he’d been during lunch; his posture suddenly seemed defeated and his face drooped. ‘I really have to go,’ he said, leaning down to brush Cassie’s cheek with his lips. ‘I’ve got an appointment with my solicitor. You wouldn’t believe how much admin there is to deal with.’

Marc lightly touched Russell’s arm. ‘If there’s anything I can do.’

Russell shook his head. ‘I’ve got it all covered. Thank God you bullied me into estate planning and taking out life insurance after Joni was born.’ He gave the two of them a half-hearted salute. ‘Anyway, I’ll see you both soon.’

Cassie watched Russell walk away, still with that loose-limbed stride as if he was strolling onto a cricket pitch, his shoulders broad in his white shirt. You’d never know to look at him that he was …

‘… Are you even listening to me?’

No, no she wasn’t. She turned to Marc, who was standing there with the harsh expression he always brought to the surface when it was just the two of them. Like he could hardly bear to even look at her.

‘I don’t need any help with this birthday weekend.’ Cassie smiled in the smarmiest way she knew how. ‘It’s all right. I know how busy you are.’

He rewarded her with a fake smile of his own, all white teeth and insincerity. ‘Russell wants me onboard, so I’m onboard. Don’t send out the itinerary until I’ve had a look at it. Then I’ll be in touch with my suggestions.’

Cassie put her hands on her hips, her chin tilting up. ‘I don’t need your suggestions.’

Marc slipped on his sunglasses and flashed his teeth again. ‘Tough. You’re getting them.’

Then he walked away, leaving Cassie bristling but miserable all at the same time.

God, how she hated him.