Chapter 14
How could somebody go from not having enough hours in the day one minute, to having so many that it was a job to find something to fill them with, Fiona thought, as she gazed at her living room window. She had a lint-free cloth in one hand and a spray bottle of glass cleaner in the other, in preparation for giving it a wipe over, when she remembered that she had cleaned the window only two days ago and it hadn’t needed cleaning then. It certainly didn’t need another right now. And neither did anything else. The house had been cleaned to within an inch of its life this week, and there simply wasn’t anything left to be polished, scrubbed or mopped.
Putting the cloth and spray bottle away, Fiona wandered into the living room and dropped onto the sofa with a sigh. She reached for one of the library books off a pile on the side table that she had been trying to read for the past three days, but hadn’t been able to get into. Cross, she closed it and went in search of her mobile, wondering whether to phone Bill. She hadn’t seen him since Sunday and it was now Wednesday, so it wouldn’t hurt to give him a call to see how he was.
On the other hand, she didn’t want to hassle him or make him think she was angling after another trip out. The visit to Keeper’s Pond on the weekend had been lovely, though…
Restlessly, Fiona paced around the room and was wondering what to do with herself when her eyes alighted on the stack of books once more and she decided she would go to the library and get some new ones out. Not only would the walk do her good and get her out of the house for an hour or so, she would also have fresh reading material, something that would hopefully capture her interest.
On her walk into town, she went via the park, but she didn’t see anyone she knew and the cafe was locked up. Slowing down as she neared it, it occurred to her that she couldn’t face a return to her old way of life. If these past few weeks had taught her anything, it was that she needed this cafe. When Molly had told her that she planned on re-opening it and had suggested that Fiona might like to run it, Fiona hadn’t realised just how much she’d missed preparing food and serving it to hungry customers. She missed being busy, and she missed chatting and gossiping with people. Without Clover Cafe in her life, she had become bored, lonely and miserable. The reopening of the cafe in Sweet Meadow Park would keep her occupied, and hopefully she would be more sociable and much happier.
The library was busy, and she nodded and smiled at the people she recognised. A group of three middle-aged gents were gathered around a table, the books on it telling her that they probably belonged to the local history group. A huge tub of Lego was on another table, and a mother and her toddler son were sorting the blocks into colours, and several computers in a side room were in use.
Fiona went to the automated system to check her books back in, then wandered over to the nearest shelf to see what was on display. The staff picked a different theme each week, and books that reflected the theme were showcased there.
Fiona grinned when she saw what this week’s theme was – baking. There were a couple of cookbooks on display (as she would expect) but there were also other goodies such as a hardback on the history of windmills, plus several novels with baking involved in one way or another. One was a lighthearted romance set in a tea shop with a patisserie chef as the heroine, which sounded right up her street, and there was also a cosy mystery set in a bakery, so she decided to give that a go as well. Now for something a bit darker – a thriller, maybe? She always enjoyed a Felix Francis. She liked historical novels, too. There weren’t many genres she didn’t read, and if she took a wide selection home with her, she stood a greater chance of something capturing her attention.
Another shelf caught her eye. It was full of jigsaw puzzles and although she hadn’t borrowed jigsaws previously, she debated whether to take a chance. She used to love doing them as a child, but hadn’t had time as an adult. She certainly had plenty of time now. And the dining table would be a perfect place for it. All she had to do was choose one and pray that all the pieces were there!
She was trying to decide between a river scene (the memory of the canal and Bill floated into her head) or a cottage garden, when she caught sight of Glenys out of the corner of her eye.
‘Yoo-hoo!’ Glenys called, making a beeline for her.
Fiona winced. It grated on her that libraries were no longer the silent places of her childhood, and she still expected to be shushed if she made a noise.
‘Gosh, you do like to read, don’t you!’ Glenys exclaimed, eyeing the books under her arm. ‘I envy you. I wish I had the time, but I don’t have a moment to myself. I’m only here today because Mrs Griffiths on Oak Place needs me to swap her Mills and Boons for new ones. I swear she must have read all of them by now. Do you know how I can tell which ones she hasn’t?’
Numbly Fiona shook her head.
Glenys glanced around and lowered her voice. ‘She puts a little line under the number on page seventeen. That’s her birthday. So if a book has got a mark on page seventeen, I know she’s read it. With all the reading you do, you ought to try it; when you get older it’s easy to forget things.’
Fiona glared at her in disbelief. The damned woman was only a couple of years younger than her! The way she was talking, anyone would think it was a couple of decades!
Glenys carried on with her inane chatter, oblivious to Fiona’s ire. ‘How will you get that lot home? It’s a bit of a trek up your hill, isn’t it? Would you like a lift? I’ve got my car.’
‘No thank you, I like to walk.’
‘Of course you do. It’s good for the elderly to keep active.’
Fiona gritted her teeth and held in a retort. No matter how much Glenys irritated her, the woman was a potential customer and Fiona had no intention of alienating her.
‘Take Bill, for example,’ Glenys continued. ‘All that walking has done wonders for him. I always see him out with his dog. I’m hoping to bump into him later. Did you know I won a bottle of shampoo in the jumble sale raffle?’
Fiona gazed at her blankly. Had shampoo been one of the raffle prizes? And if so, who had decided on that and why? It was hardly a suitable prize, was it?
‘I’m hoping to persuade him to help me drink it,’ Glenys was saying.
‘Pardon?’
‘I simply adore champagne, but I don’t want to drink it on my own.’
So that’s what she meant! Fiona vaguely remembered Glenys crowing that she had won a bottle.
Glenys was saying, ‘I’m sure Bill will give me a hand. I bet he used to drink champagne all the time when he was abroad.’
Fiona couldn’t think of a single thing to say in response to that.
‘I’ll pop in to see him after I’ve dropped Mrs Griffiths’s books off. I’ll invite him over to mine for a bite to eat and a few drinkie-poos. Does he like oysters, do you know?’
Fiona had no idea whether he did or didn’t.
Glenys simpered. ‘Never mind, I don’t expect he’ll need them. Candles and a bit of smoochie music should do the trick.’
Do the trick? The woman was incorrigible. Fancy being so blatant about making a play for him! It made Fiona’s blood boil. Poor Bill wouldn’t know what had hit him.
Or would he?
She recalled seeing him and Glenys together on the day they were giving the posters out. He hadn’t seemed to mind her flirting. And hadn’t he been speaking to Glenys on the afternoon of the tea dance, when Fiona had returned from ‘powdering her nose’? She hadn’t taken much notice at the time because she’d been intercepted by one of the members of the bowls club, but looking back they had seemed rather cosy.
Jealousy, hot and sharp, stabbed her in the chest. Did Bill have other fish to fry – more vivacious, younger (albeit only marginally), more interesting fish?
Hmph! She could be interesting if she wanted to be. But not Glenys’s kind of interesting – Fiona didn’t do simpering smiles and fluttering eyelashes. Her ‘interesting’ was more of the intellectual variety. At least, she hoped it was.
Glenys broke into her thoughts. ‘Ooh, look at the time! I must dash – things to do, people to see. Good luck with the cafe, by the way.’ She tilted her head and gave Fiona a smile, the sort of sad, pitying smile you give to a person when you want to convey sympathy for a recent bereavement. ‘A word of advice: make sure you don’t overdo it and that it doesn’t get too much for you. You don’t want to run yourself into the ground and make yourself ill, otherwise I’ll be adding you to my list of people who need a bit of help.’
‘Over my dead body,’ Fiona muttered under her breath as Glenys toddled off. She’d show her! She would make a success of this cafe if it was the last thing she did!
***
‘White is clean and fresh, but it’s a bit clinical, don’t you think?’ Fiona mused, as she scanned the interior of the recently plastered but yet to be painted cafe. It was Saturday morning, and she had been on her way into town for something to do, when she had spied activity around the cafe and had headed towards it to find out what was going on.
Molly had asked for her thoughts on painting it white, and when Fiona gave it, Molly nibbled at her bottom lip. ‘What did you have in mind, if not white?’
‘A nice pastel shade.’
‘Not magnolia?’ The horrified expression on Molly’s face made Fiona chuckle.
‘No, not magnolia. A pale pink maybe, or turquoise?’
‘Like you see on The Great British Bake Off ?’
‘Bingo! Exactly like that.’
‘Will that style fit in with the old-fashioned vibe of the place? You know, the marble counter and tabletops, and the wrought-iron chairs.’
‘I think it will. As I recall, the interior used to be cream – more vanilla ice cream than magnolia, to be fair – but I think we can do better than that. I’m envisioning people having an olde-worlde experience, as though they’ve been transported back to the 1950s.’
‘How about a pale blue, with cream, pink and aqua accents?’
Fiona beamed. ‘That sounds lovely.’
‘And a deeper blue for the exterior?’
‘Perfect.’
‘Would you like to come with me to buy the paint? I don’t trust myself to choose the right shades.’
Fiona knew that Molly was perfectly capable of choosing paint on her own, but she was pleased to be included, nevertheless.
‘I would.’ Her reply was heartfelt. Despite her best efforts, she was finding it increasingly difficult to keep herself occupied.
‘We could go now,’ Molly suggested. ‘Unless you’re busy?’
Fiona wasn’t. ‘Now is good.’
‘I’ll just tell Jack where we’re going, and go grab my bag.’
Jack was outside, halfway up a step ladder, sanding down a window frame. Standing next to him was Bill, Patch at his feet.
Fiona faltered, warmth spreading through her at the sight of him, then she caught herself and greeted him cheerily. ‘Hello, Bill. How are you?’
‘I’m good,’ he replied, smiling widely.
‘Have you come to help?’ she teased.
‘He’s supervising,’ Jack said as he climbed down the ladder. He headed for Molly, so Fiona took the opportunity to chat to Bill for a minute.
‘I haven’t seen you since the weekend. How have you been keeping?’
‘Mustn’t grumble. You?’
‘Tickety-boo, thanks,’ she replied. She wanted to ask him whether he had helped Glenys drink her champagne yet, but she didn’t want to appear to be prying, although she still felt cross whenever she thought about it. And she felt even crosser when she remembered how patronising Glenys had been when she’d bumped into her in the library the other day, and how her comments had ignited a fire in her chest.
Fiona kept telling herself that she shouldn’t want to make a success of the cafe because of that woman, that she should be doing it for Molly and for the people who frequented the park. And for herself, because without it, what else did she have? There was David, his wife and the grandchildren of course, but they were busy and had their own lives to lead. She couldn’t expect them to entertain her all the time. And it wasn’t fair on Bill; she couldn’t rely on his friendship, especially if Glenys had got her claws into him. Therefore, it was down to her to keep herself busy and occupy her time. The cafe would certainly do that.
Fiona was still thinking about Bill and the very real possibility that he might cast her aside for a more interesting, more fun prospect, when she and Molly arrived at the DIY store.
Molly grabbed a trolley and Fiona fell into step beside her.
As they headed inside, she said, ‘I think Glenys has got a thing for Bill.’
Molly turned to look at her. ‘Really?’ She sounded surprised. ‘I never would have guessed. If I’m honest, I thought he seemed quite sweet on you. ’ She bumped Fiona with her hip.
‘You’re imagining things.’
‘Seriously, he likes you.’
Fiona shrugged, pretending indifference. ‘And I like him.’
When Molly arched her brow, Fiona scowled at her and added, ‘Not like that. We’re just two lonely old people who enjoy each other’s company.’
‘If you say so.’
‘I do. Now, which one is the paint aisle?’ She’d had enough of this discussion. Molly didn’t know what she was talking about.
***
‘It’ll take three coats,’ Molly’s dad Duncan said on Sunday morning, as he examined the large pots of paint which sat on a dust sheet in the middle of the cafe. ‘The first has to be a mist coat, followed by two normal coats a couple of days apart, because you have to give them time to dry.’
Fiona and Bill eyed each other in confusion; however, it was Reuben who asked the question.
Duncan explained. ‘A mist coat is a paint and water mix. If you paint straight onto new plaster, the paint can bubble or peel off. The mist coat seals it.’
Fiona made a face, glad that she wasn’t the one to be applying it. Neither would Bill, on account of his knees. It occurred to her that Bill’s knees were a convenient excuse to get out of doing something he didn’t want to do, but she couldn’t fault him. An excuse like that could come in rather handy.
For this activity it was her age that gave her a pass and considering she’d volunteered her and Bill’s services for refreshment duty, everyone was more than happy. Being fed and watered at regular intervals was equally as important as painting.
As Molly, Jack, Molly’s parents and Reuben divvied up the DIY tasks, Bill and Fiona fired up the barbeque, whilst keeping a watchful eye on Patch and Jet.
It was reminiscent of the day that Bill had organised the townsfolk to clean up the park, except this time there were far fewer people. No one had felt the need to round up volunteers today, aware they’d already tapped into that particular well several times already.
With the electricity now on, and the antique coffee machine serviced (the chap who had come to service it had raised his eyebrows and tutted quite a lot, but he’d managed to get it working and declared it safe), Fiona was able to offer a variety of coffees, as well as tea. The cafe hadn’t got a fridge yet, so cold drinks were currently housed in two coolboxes. She was hopeful that the cold storage situation would shortly improve, if the promised donation of a second-hand chiller and freezer came to pass.
People’s generosity continued to amaze her, and even the council had chipped in by arranging to have the water heaters (there was one behind the counter, and one in the tiny loo) checked over and replaced if necessary, although Fiona suspected Jack might have had a hand in that.
It didn’t take long before the aroma of sausages and burgers drew people towards its source, and they soon attracted a crowd.
‘I didn’t realise the cafe was open already,’ one chap said.
Fiona replied, ‘It isn’t, but it will be shortly.’
‘Shame. Me and the boy could do with a hot dog.’ He gazed at her hopefully.
Fiona looked at Bill, who shrugged. ‘￡1.50 each?’ Bill suggested.
‘Perfect! And do you have any cold cans?’
‘I can spare a couple,’ she said, making a mental note to keep some back for the workers. She would also have to be frugal with the number of hotdogs and burgers she sold, as she hadn’t anticipated random people wanting to purchase them. She should have done, she supposed, because few people could resist the smell of a barbeque. Teenagers were no exception.
‘Give us an ’otdog,’ Liam said, fishing in his pocket and bringing out a mobile phone. He flourished it at her.
‘Pay for mine, Li,’ Connor pleaded. ‘My mum didn’t give me any pocket money this week ’cause I forgot to put the bins out. I’m skint.’
Liam shrugged. ‘I dunno if I’ve got enough, and I haven’t got any cash on me.’ He turned his attention to Bill, who was expertly flipping the burgers. ‘How much are they?’
‘Three quid for two,’ Bill replied. ‘But we don’t take cards.’
‘It’s not a card. I’m paying with my phone, ain’t I?’
‘We don’t take phones, either.’
‘ What? That’s stupid.’
Fiona stepped in. ‘We’re not officially open yet. This—’ she gestured to the barbecue and the table set up next to it which held rolls, a couple of onions, tomato sauce (plus brown for the weirdos) and a pile of paper napkins ‘—is supposed to be for the workers.’
‘What workers?’ Liam asked.
‘The people who are decorating the cafe.’
The boys peered through the open door, glanced at each other, then Liam said, ‘We’ll paint a wall if you give us a hotdog each.’
Fiona grinned and held out a hand. ‘Done.’
Liam looked at it, then wiped his palm on his joggers. But before he shook her hand, he said, ‘Hot dogs first?’
‘Hot dogs first,’ Fiona confirmed.
‘Sweet.’ He put his phone away and stared expectantly at Bill.
Fiona lifted the lid of the nearest coolbox. ‘Help yourself to a cold can.’
‘Got any cider?’ was Liam’s cheeky response.
When Molly and the others stopped for a break, Fiona was surprised to see the two lads carry on working.
‘They’re good lads,’ Duncan said, squirting a generous dollop of tomato sauce onto his burger and taking a bite. ‘Mmm.’
Fiona took pity on them and called Liam and Connor to come outside. ‘Here.’ She handed them a burger each.
Connor said, ‘Does this mean we’ve got to stay all day?’
‘No, it doesn’t. You can leave now if you want, and we’ll call it quits.’
The boys exchanged glances once again. ‘Nah, we’ll do a bit more,’ Liam said. ‘Thanks, missus.’
‘It’s Fiona.’
Liam’s response was a diffident shrug.
As soon as everyone had eaten, they went back to work whilst Fiona and Bill cleared up, pottering around quite harmoniously, as though they had been working together for years.
Fiona found herself humming. Surprised, she stopped, having not hummed for ages. The contentment she was experiencing was a surprise too, and she put it down to feeling useful once more.
But after the remnants of the lunch had been cleared away and afternoon cake had been produced and enthused over, the reality of what she was about to do reared its ugly head. In no time at all, the cafe would be officially open and she would be in charge.
The prospect worried her more than she used to worry about her own business. Which was odd. Had she lost her mojo? She could still bake with the best of them (she had no qualms on that score), but being responsible for the takings, the ordering, and so on, filled her with dismay.
She had lost her mojo. At some point between handing over the keys to Clover Cafe to Pamela, and Molly asking her how she felt about reopening the cafe in Sweet Meadow Park, Fiona’s confidence had deserted her. The brave words she had told herself after her most recent encounter with Glenys, had been just that – words. And, as everyone knew, words and actions were often miles apart.
‘They’ve done a grand job,’ Bill said, standing next to her.
Fiona gave herself a mental shake and peered into the cafe’s interior. She had to admit that it did look wonderful. The walls were a pale turquoise, with a slightly deeper shade on the woodwork, The ceiling was white, which bounced light around the room, and now that the tiled floor had been given a thorough scrub, the place looked fresh and clean. Everything needed another coat of paint, which would be tackled next weekend, then the tables and chairs had to be fetched from Molly’s parents’ garage, curtains needed to be hung at the windows, and all the crockery and other bits and pieces had to be brought from her house, but then the cafe would be good to go. It would need to be stocked of course, and Fiona already had a list of foodstuffs as long as her arm which had to be purchased, and she only hoped there was enough money left in the kitty.
‘You’re quiet,’ Bill said. ‘Is something wrong?’
What could she say to that? After all the hard work, both with the fundraising and getting the cafe ready, she could hardly admit to not feeling up to the job of running it. She didn’t need the money (she would be the only paid person – the rest would be volunteers), so it wasn’t as though she had to do it, but neither could she back out at this late stage.
There was also something else to consider – her pride.
There was no way on God’s earth she was going to give Glenys Sidwall the opportunity to say I told you so . The woman had put her down enough already, and Fiona would be damned if she’d give her any further reason to.