Chapter 34
“You okay, my lovely?” asked Sylvie, giving Marielle an affectionate nudge. “You’re quiet.” Marielle cursed herself for being
so transparent. Every time she’d met with her friends recently, she’d been like a joy killer. But she couldn’t tell them what
was really troubling her this time because she’d get a proper earful of “I told you so’s” and she couldn’t bear that. She’d
learned the lesson now, and when Sabrina finally left, she would be letting no one stay in Little Moon unless they were people
she knew inside out. She gave Sylvie an alternative believable reason why she wasn’t the life and soul of them today.
“I had a bit of a... setto with Cilla last week. The day we went to see Psychic Pat.” Everyone seemed to lean forward then, as one, to hear more.
“She stormed round to tell me that I was an idiot and the worst judge of character on the planet, more or less,” said Marielle
with a tired huff.
“You aren’t at all,” Bev said to that. “Look at who your best mates are.”
“She meant those I’ve let stay in the flat.”
“Well, we can all make mistakes,” said Diana kindly.
“I’m still married to mine,” said Bev. “I don’t know why I’ve stayed with him. I don’t even like him. Do you know, we haven’t
had it off for seven years.”
“I haven’t had it off for over seventeen years,” said Marielle. “At least Cilla’s getting some good sex while she’s being duped.”
“Oh Marielle, we need to find you someone nice. That’s too long to be sat on the shelf gathering dust. You’re still a young
woman,” said Jackie.
“You can have Harry if you like,” said Bev, “although don’t expect any foreplay. He will give you a run for your money at
Tipping Point , though.”
Everyone laughed at that.
“How was the psychic?” asked Diana.
“Interesting. I think Sal came through for me. She said he was watching over me.” Everyone nodded and smiled, but only Bev
believed in that sort of thing.
“Well, Sal isn’t here anymore and you need a good man’s company,” said Sylvie. “Maybe he’ll send you someone if he’s watching
over you.”
“Isn’t there anyone you’ve got your eye on, darling?” Diana inquired.
“No,” said Marielle, though it wasn’t strictly true, but she’d keep that to herself too.
“Are you in a rush to get back?” asked Teddy when they reached the car. He found he didn’t want the day to end yet. He’d enjoyed
Sabrina’s company; it had been a long time since he’d gone out for a meal with a woman who wasn’t his mother, and even though
this was never meant to be a “date” date, it felt as if it could have been. It was nice to sit across the table from a woman
and eat—even substandard Ciaoissimo food—and talk and laugh and feel that she enjoyed his company too. He worked stupidly
hard, but when he stopped, like today, he realized that he missed having someone special to care about.
“No, not at all,” said Sabrina. She was glad he asked because she hadn’t had enough of today yet.
She’d liked spending time with him, just the two of them, and when she talked she noticed how intently he listened to her.
It felt like a novelty, as if whoever she had left behind hadn’t valued her enough.
“It’s a lovely day—we could have a stroll on the beach. There’s plenty to choose from.”
“Sounds great,” she said.
“I’ll even throw in an ice cream.”
“Ooh. Extra great.” She grinned with an almost childlike delight that made him grin too, and he felt something inside him,
like a frisson of warmth against sensitive nerve endings. It was unexpected but no less pleasant for that.
Teddy set off, heading out of Scarborough on the north road. He knew which beach he’d take her to: Briswith, with all its
pretty fishermen’s cottages painted in different colors and higgledy-piggledy streets, but without any steep hills, unlike
Robin Hood’s Bay.
“Loads of mermaid tales—excuse the pun—around here, you know,” Teddy enlightened her. “Did you know they sank lots of Spanish
ships that sailed here in the Armada?”
“I think I remember doing the Armada at school,” said Sabrina, “though I can’t recall them ever giving any mermaids credit
for the scuppered ships.”
“They obviously didn’t fit the narrative.”
Sabrina took in a sharp breath, and the noise made Teddy’s head spin round to her. “You okay?”
“I just... just remembered sitting on a sofa with a big ginger cat on my lap.” She had no idea why her mind had leaped
from Spanish-hating mermaids to that image.
“Maybe you were reading a book about mermaids when he was with you?” suggested Teddy.
“Maybe,” she answered, but she didn’t think it was that. Maybe it was the same sort of comfort she got from him as she was
getting here, in this kind Italian man’s company, but she couldn’t exactly say that without sounding flirty.
They were shortly in Briswith; Teddy parked up on a street and they got out, walked down a small incline, and they were there on the beach.
“Hang on,” said Sabrina, perching on the arm of a bench while she stripped off her boots and socks. “Ah, that’s better,” she
said, putting them in her shoulder bag. “I only bought the boots this morning and I think I might know why someone donated
them to a charity shop. They’re agony.”
So she’d been shopping to dress up for today. Probably blown her wages on clothes. That made Teddy feel a stab of guilt because
he was only giving her a minimum wage.
“Don’t worry, they were cheap,” she said, as if hearing his thoughts. “I got the whole outfit for thirty quid.”
She made her ensemble look more expensive than that. She exuded quiet class and Teddy wondered if, in her other life, she
was the sort of person who spent all her money on expensive clothes or was happiest in jeans. She looked really good in them, he had to say. Anyway, he didn’t want her to be out of pocket, so he’d put an extra thirty quid in her next
wage packet and lie that it was tip money.
“What’s good for the goose,” he said and kicked off his trainers and ripped off his socks too. The sand felt good underneath
his feet. The beach was on his doorstep and he never went.
They strolled along and he wondered if people they passed thought they were a couple, if they gave off that vibe, or else
friends or siblings. He liked her being at his side. He wouldn’t have minded if people bracketed them together. He imagined
what it would be like if they were. He missed being a “two.” He missed sex, missed the intimacy of sharing his bed with a
woman. Sharing anything with a woman actually: a meal, talking at breakfast across the kitchen table, watching a box set,
the excited packing for a holiday. He missed that giddy expectation of first going out with someone, of wanting to get to
know her, of wishing the date would never end and stringing it out for as long as possible.
Sabrina edged toward the sea and squealed as the cold water hit her skin.
Teddy thought that it was like being with someone who had never been up close and personal with the sea before and was experiencing it for the first time.
He thought it was sweet, especially as she went back for more and squealed again.
“Come on,” he said, taking her hand without even thinking about it and pulling her up the beach. “Ice cream time.” He held
it for not more than ten strides before letting go, hoping he hadn’t overstepped a mark, pretending it wasn’t a big deal.
It wasn’t a big deal, so why did he like the feel of her hand inside his so much?
He bought her a cornet with a flake and strawberry sauce; he plumped for chocolate, and they sat on a bench looking out to
a sun-sprinkled seascape in a companionable silence while they ate.
“Sabrina,” Teddy asked eventually, breaking into her reverie, “do you really think a lunchtime ‘Fasta Pasta’ initiative might
work?”
“I don’t see why not,” she said. “People eat on the go these days, have lunch at their desks. There’s often someone in an
office who is sent out to collect breakfast or sandwich orders, so I can easily imagine one of the big firms nearby ordering
pasta pots from you and getting a runner to pick them up. And if they’re not quite hot enough when they arrive, the container
would be easily microwavable, one quick minute blast and Bob’s your uncle. You wouldn’t need a massive takeaway menu: a few
standards, a vegan option, and a changing special. Same with pizza slices. A single giant triangle. I even thought about pizzas
in the restaurant shaped like an initial for special occasions.”
“Now that idea I like,” said Teddy.
“You’d have to use the same amount of dough for an M as an I, of course, to avoid any complaining. Just brainstorming; I expect
some of my ideas to fall on stony ground, but not many.”
Teddy smiled at her, a lopsided smile that set off a small, warm incendiary bomb inside her that she wasn’t expecting. She
wasn’t being bigheaded, he knew. She was more confident in her work than she was in herself, that was clear.
“You really are an enigma,” he said.
“Tell me about it,” she replied.
“Okay, playing devil’s advocate, what would you do with Ciaoissimo if they ever came to you and told you they wanted to take
over the world?”
“I wouldn’t work with them,” answered Sabrina. “Knowing what I know.”
“No, really, humor me.”
“Okay,” she began slowly. “I’d go back to basics with them. I’d make sure I had a mission statement which was at the heart
of my business. What do I want to do? I want to bring Italy to Yorkshire, give my customers an unforgettable dining experience—”
“It certainly does that,” said Teddy with a sneer.
“It hasn’t got its fundamentals right, but it’s forged ahead nevertheless. So there’s a Ciaoissimo in Whitby and one in Scarborough,
yes?” Sabrina asked him.
“That’s right. The one in Shoresend will be the third.”
“They’re spending their money on all the wrong things. Who owns it?”
“A group, that’s as much as I know.”
“If they’re a limited company, you can access their records.”