Chapter Six
Six
Harriet couldn’t take her friend’s lunchtime call for obvious reasons, which meant that Emma, unable to contain her need to know everything that had happened from the night before up to and including Harriet’s stint in police custody, arrived promptly at seven p.m. with a Chinese takeaway, two liters of cranberry juice, and a bottle of D-mannose. A friend bearing cystitis remedies was a friend indeed.
“Howdy, jailbird! I want you to know that I was fully ready to hide a chisel in a loaf of banana bread to spring you from the clink.” Emma beamed. “Ooh, it smells gorgeous in here.”
Harriet always had candles burning for when people came over; she was known for her cozy ambience.
Emma marched into the sitting room with the white plastic takeaway bags dangling from her hands. She was petite, swore like a sailor, and wore her dirty-blond hair in a pixie cut which suited her heart-shaped face. Harriet was barely five foot six, but when she stood beside her bestie she often felt like Hagrid.
“Where are the decorations? You’re normally the first person I know to get your Christmas groove on.”
“Oh.” Harriet tried to act casual. “I haven’t had time to put them up yet.”
“You want me to help you? We could do it after we eat.”
“No, no, it’s fine. I’ll probably put them up at the weekend when I’ve got a bit more time,” she lied.
Emma nodded and took the bags through to the kitchen.
Harriet hadn’t had the energy to go back into work after the police station. She’d made a quick call to Ali, who confirmed that all the students were present, correct, and looking decidedly sheepish, and demanded the skinny on what had gone down. Then she emailed HR, claiming she had a migraine and needed to take the afternoon off, and came home, where she collapsed on the sofa. She was not a woman prone to calling in sick, even when she was actually sick, but today had been exceptional.
Despite her supposed migraine, Cornell had called her three more times before the end of the school day. The first was to ask her to put together a phased-return plan for a student who had been absent with anxiety; the second was to chase a report he’d delegated her to write on his behalf to the governor’s board; and the third was to ask where his stapler was. One of these days he’d delegate himself right out of a job.
Over tumblers of cranberry juice and bowls of vegetable chow mein, Emma extracted as much information as she could about Harriet’s night with James and her brush with the law.
“So, do you like him?” Emma asked, slurping up a long brown noodle.
“I did last night, and then I didn’t, and now I don’t know.”
“But you fancy him.”
“He is irritatingly hot, in a high-end-funeral-director kind of way.”
“Right.”
“But he’s mean. He knew I was freaked out with the whole police thing, but instead of being compassionate, he was petulant. What a baby! Sure, I behaved immaturely, but I’m out of practice at waking up in a strange bed. I haven’t had a one-night stand since I was thirty, and believe me when I tell you, I don’t look as good when I wake up as I did when I was thirty.”
“Me neither. It takes my face at least an hour to decrumple and that’s if I haven’t been drinking. Throw a few glasses of vino into the mix and my skin looks like I’ve slept in a food dehydrator.”
Harriet waved her fork in agreement. “Exactly. And my eyes were puffed up, and I hadn’t brushed my teeth for obvious reasons before I went to sleep. When I got home, I found a hair like a hog bristle poking out of my chin. So I was basically a horror show. It would have been like waking up with a gorgon.”
Emma spluttered into her cranberry juice.
“You never know, he might have been beastly too. How old is he?”
“I don’t know, late forties? But it’s different for men, isn’t it?”
“Not in the morning. Pete looks like he’s been dead in the water for two days when he wakes up.”
Now Harriet laughed.
“You’re so mean. James Knight probably wakes up looking like a catalog model. I think he might be made by Mattel.”
“Or is the reason he jumped up and rushed into the shower because he looks like Leatherface before he’s moisturized?”
“I’ll never know now, will I?” Harriet plucked an escaped bean sprout out of her cleavage and threw it into her mouth. “How is it I always manage to get food down my tits? It’s like a disorder.”
“Nah, I’m the same. I found a corn flake in mine when I took my bra off the other night. It must have been in there since breakfast. My bra is the adult equivalent of one of those baby bibs with a catcher tray.”
Harriet lived in a flat above the local library, which never ceased to make her happy. Her sitting room had high ceilings, picture rails, and large sash windows that looked out over the park. An original cast-iron Victorian fireplace dominated the living room, and above it hung a modest flat-screen TV. Facing each other on opposite sides of the fireplace were two sofas covered in William Morris print scatter cushions. Harriet and Emma had a sofa each, the fire crackling between them and Miss Marple gently sleuthing—regardless of being ignored—on the screen above.
“Have you got his number?” Emma asked, smooshing a whole prawn cracker into her mouth.
“Nope. I didn’t think to get it last night, and I was too annoyed at him to ask today. And I left a cardigan at his place.”
“Which one?”
“Third favorite.”
Emma sucked in a sharp breath. “I’m so sorry. At least it wasn’t first favorite.”
She sighed. “I suppose.” Her first-favorite cardigan only came out for very special occasions. “Oh god!” A fresh wave of humiliation washed over her. “What must he think of me? First, I behave in the exact way that I’ve always sneered at men for, and then I get caught trespassing.”
“Who cares? It’s done now and there’s no reason why you should see each other again.”
“I guess. Although he did say I’d have to sign another contract.” Was it weird that she kind of did want to see him again? He was the first man she’d really gelled with in a long time. If only she hadn’t panicked this morning, things might have worked out differently. She might have stayed for breakfast and then called in sick at work (to be fair, this was unlikely) and they’d have spent the day together (even more unlikely) and she’d never have known that her students were AWOL or followed them into that cursed theater…
“I hope you’re going to make those students help with the cleanup.”
“Yes, I flapping am!” She hesitated for a moment, wondering if she should share the thoughts that had been brewing ever since she’d stepped into the crusty old foyer. As her best friend poured her another glass of juice, Harriet decided that Emma would tell her outright if this idea was good or straight-up bananas. “I’ve been thinking about them, the students—”
“How to disembowel the little shits and get away with it?”
“After I’d thought about that. They need a place, you know? Somewhere they can hang out.”
“Like a youth club?”
“Yeah, kind of. Some place that’s only gently supervised but safe.”
“Okay.”
“I mean, if I’m cleaning up the theater anyway, maybe I could propose something to Ms. Winter, ask her if she’d consider letting us use it. It’s not like it’s being used for anything else. They could put on shows, start a glee club…”
Emma snorted.
“No, seriously,” Harriet protested. “These kids would like that! Given the chance, they like reading and drama, they write poetry—angry, sweary poetry, but poetry all the same. I could get speakers in, inspirational people to give talks about careers and charities they could get involved in…”
“I’m not disagreeing with you, but isn’t that what school is for? There must be after-school clubs.”
“Yes, but they’re filled with the kinds of kids you’d expect, and that isn’t these guys. But for all their raging against the machine, I believe they want what any teenager wants: to find a place where they fit. And I think I could give it to them. I’m talking about a community space, not just for kids from Foss Independent, but from all over. Ms. Winter might be happy to have it useful again.”
Her friend nodded and hummed, letting Harriet spill her thoughts out across the space between them. When she stopped for breath, Emma speared another floret of broccoli in oyster sauce and asked, “Have you ever met Evaline Winter?”
“No,” Harriet admitted. But how bad could she really be?
Everyone knew about the theater magnate, but few had been acquainted with her. She resided in the manor house that overlooked the town. Her father, Fitz-William Winter, had famously squandered the Winter fortune, and when he died Evaline inherited the estate and all its debts. Unlike her father, she had a head for business and had not only settled all his debts but grown the Winter assets to ten times what she’d inherited.
“Well, I have,” said Emma, her lips pursed in distaste. “She’s a hard-nosed cow-bag and she’s got a finger in every pie in Little Beck Foss, and none of those fingers contain an ounce of community spirit.”
“She might feel differently once the place is cleaned up a bit. I thought I might try to set up a meeting, run it past her.”
“You’ve really thought about this, haven’t you?”
“Do you know what they were doing when I busted them?”
“Drinking vodka and smoking?”
“Half right, I think it was a bit early for vodka.” She took a sip of cranberry juice. “They were reading Dickens. The novel and the play.”
“Okay. I didn’t see that coming.”
“Exactly, nobody does. It’s easier to make yourself fit into the suit you’ve been pegged for than to try and break out of it. These kids have got bigger things to worry about than trying to change people’s minds about them.”
She was thinking about Billy, how he looked out for his little brother, how he worried about the system pulling them apart. And she was thinking about Zoe, her own personal ghost, the bright, clever girl who could have been anything she wanted if only Harriet hadn’t let her down.
Emma looked hard at her.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but sometimes I feel like you’re still trying to atone for what happened, even though you had nothing to do with it.”
Harriet waved it away. “It’s not about that.” It was about that. She’d been too busy, too tired, and she missed the signs. She pushed the memory away and met her friend’s stare. “This could make a difference.”
“I believe you. Just do me one favor, before you go rushing into opening a community theater. Make sure this isn’t another knee-jerk reaction to Maisy’s announcement, like your one-night stand with James .” She said his name in a husky whisper. “?’Cause, you know if you’re really suffering with empty nest syndrome, you can take some of my kids.”
Harriet laughed, knowing Emma was only half joking. Her teenage kids’ hormones were hell on wheels. When she’d had Taylor and then the twins—Jordan and Phoebe—with only eighteen months between them, everyone had told her that the hardest part would be the first three years. When the kids grew into their teens, Emma had suddenly realized that everyone had been lying to her.
“Maybe there’s a little bit of empty-nest panic to it,” Harriet confessed. “But under no circumstances do I want your kids.”
Emma groaned exaggeratedly. “What kind of husband’s ex-girlfriend are you?”
“The sensible kind.”
“You’ll still come to us, though, won’t you? For Christmas, I mean. As far as Pete and I are concerned, this year’s just like any other.”
Harriet, Emma, Pete, and their combined children spent every Christmas together, alternating households each year.
“But it isn’t, is it? Maisy won’t be here.”
“But we always do Christmas together.”
“Because we didn’t want Maisy to miss out on Christmas Day with her parents and siblings—”
“And because we love you! The kids will really miss you if you’re not there. You know they like you better than me.”
“Only because they don’t live with me,” said Harriet, smiling.
“And when my little shits decide to ditch Christmas with the olds, I’ll still be expecting to spend it with you. We’ll start a Christmas rejects club.”
“I don’t know. I’m not feeling very festive at the moment. I just…I feel adrift. This is what it’ll be like permanently soon. I’ve been a parent for almost eighteen years; I don’t know how to be only me.”
“What do you mean, ‘only you’?”
“You know what it’s like—you spend your whole life putting them first, always thinking about what will make them happy, cozy, safe, better. What am I if I’m not parenting?”
“Oh, you mean besides being an intelligent, educated woman with a career and an excellent best friend.”
“I know all that, I’m talking about mum-me.”
“You’re still a parent. Maisy’s always going to need you. Especially for money.”
“Yeah, but I’m not ready to be retired from active parental service.”
“Fuck me, I dream of being retired from active parental service. This is how my exit from the house went tonight. Me: ‘Bye kids, Dad’s in his office if you need anything. Love you.’ Them: ‘Where’s my basketball kit? I’m hungry. Where’s the remote? Can I have twenty quid? There’s no bog roll!’?”
Harriet laughed. “You’ll miss it all when they’re gone.”
“I promise you I won’t.”
“Let’s have this chat in five years’ time and we’ll see how you feel then.”
Emma flopped dramatically to one side, her face buried in a Larkspur patterned cushion.
“Five years! Is that how long I’ve got to wait until they leave home? FML!”
When Emma left, Harriet turned up the volume on the TV to drown the quiet. Then she went round and blew out the scented candles. No point leaving them burning just for me.