Chapter 18
Fiona hadn’t had such a poor night’s sleep in a long time. But then again, she supposed it was to be expected: she hadn’t been kissed by a man in a long time. Not since her husband had been taken from her.
Oh, Bradley , she lamented. What would he think if he could see her now?
She knew the answer to that question even as she thought it – he’d be cheering her on. As everyone had told her over the years, Bradley wouldn’t have wanted her to mourn him forever. He would have been dismayed to think that she had been without companionship and love all this time. She could picture him remonstrating with her, telling her to enjoy the rest of her life, and if that meant letting Bill into her heart, then so be it.
Bill was a good man, Fiona felt. Underneath the gruff and grouchy exterior, lay a warm and considerate person. Which was probably why he had looked as shocked and horrified as she’d felt.
She knew her reason for her distress at that kiss, but what was his? Was he worried that he might have upset her? Or was he concerned that the kind of intimacy they had shared on her doorstep last night would signal the end of their friendship.
That it could signal the start of something new instead, if only she would let it, wasn’t something she wanted to think about.
What she wanted to think about was Bradley , and the uneasy feeling of guilt that was running through her. Bradley was her husband and always would be, and she didn’t know how to be with anyone else. She wasn’t ready. She would never be ready – because no one could replace the man she had vowed to love and cherish for the rest of her life.
Abruptly she remembered that she had taken his watch into the jewellers weeks ago and hadn’t yet collected it, and her stomach twisted. How could she have forgotten?
She had been too busy with the cafe, and Bill, and enjoying herself, to remember that she needed to pick up Bradley’s watch. David hadn’t mentioned it either, which made her feel even worse. It was as though she and her son were gradually erasing him from their lives, their thoughts, and their memories; which she knew was daft, but she couldn’t help how she felt.
She would fetch it right now, she decided. The delivery for the cafe wasn’t due until this afternoon so she had plenty of time to nip into town.
The jewellers had been there for years, and she knew the chap who owned it. He was old-school, able to do many of the repairs himself, and she trusted him to do a good job.
‘I had to send away for a new crystal,’ he told her. ‘And while I was waiting for that to arrive, I gave the mechanism a good clean and replaced the broken strap. It’s as good as new.’
He laid the watch reverently on the counter and Fiona picked it up. It did look like new. It looked the same as it had when she’d bought it from this very jewellery shop all those years ago. It had cost her an arm and a leg, and she’d saved up for months, but she’d wanted something special to mark Bradley’s fortieth birthday.
He had been killed not long afterwards, but she still recalled how delighted he had been with his present and how he had worn it every single day until the day he’d died. She had given it to David on his eighteenth birthday, and although he hadn’t worn it much at first (preferring a sports watch which told him his heart rate and whether he was getting quality sleep), she had noticed that as he’d grown older, he had begun wearing it more often. It always warmed her heart when she saw it on his wrist.
With tears in her eyes, she paid for the repairs then hurriedly left the shop, dabbing them away with a tissue and trying not to bawl.
‘Good heavens, whatever is the matter?’ Fiona heard someone say. She felt a tap on her arm and looked around to see Evelyn Brown peering at her, squinting through thick-rimmed glasses.
‘Hello, Evelyn how are you?’ she asked the old lady, her voice hoarse with emotion.
‘I’m good, or as well as can be expected at my age. But you clearly aren’t.’
‘I’m fine.’
‘Pull the other one. Has someone upset you?’ Evelyn glared at the shop’s door. ‘Do you want me to have a word?’
Fiona smiled blearily at her through her tears. ‘Not at all. I’ve just had Bradely’s watch repaired and I got a bit upset. Silly, really.’
‘It’s not silly. We are all entitled to a little weep when we think of those we’ve loved and lost. But best not to do it in the middle of the high street, eh? You’ll get people talking. Come on, let’s have a nice cup of tea and you can tell me all about it.’
‘There’s nothing to tell.’
‘Get away with you! I’m sure you’ve got lots of news. Molly says that you’re going to be in charge of the cafe in the park.’
‘I am, yes.’ Fiona nodded, falling into step beside the old lady as they made their way slowly along the pavement towards the square.
Fiona didn’t want to have a cuppa in Best Bites, but it seemed churlish to refuse just because she had once owned the place. Besides, there was nothing to go home for, just four walls and an empty house, so she may as well keep Evelyn company for a while.
Evelyn said, ‘Molly tried to get me to do a couple of hours a week, but I’m too old for that malarkey. She forgets I’m eighty-seven. Anyway, you’ve got Bill Greaves to help you out. I used to be friendly with his mother. Lovely woman. Connie was a few years older than me, but when you get to my age it doesn’t make much difference.’
They reached the cafe and Fiona held the door open for her. ‘Shall we sit over there?’ They had their choice of tables as the place was less than half full.
Evelyn pulled out a chair and eased herself onto it with a wince. ‘Old age doesn’t come by itself,’ she grunted. ‘I can’t stand for long, these days. I’m all right if I keep moving, but as soon as I stop I need to sit down.’
Fiona hung her bag on a chair and went to take a seat, but changed her mind when Evelyn told her that orders had to be made at the counter now, because there was no longer any table service.
Fiona tried not to tut. It had always been table service in her day, and she intended Sweet Meadow Cafe to be the same. But things move on, and Pamela Edwards evidently had a different way of doing things. Her place, her rules, Fiona thought, as she approached the counter.
Pamela did a double-take when she caught sight of her. Her eyes widened, then just as quickly turned into a suspicious glare. ‘Come to check out the competition, have you?’
‘Not at all. I’m having a quiet cup of tea with Evelyn Brown, if that’s all right with you?’
‘You’ve not stepped foot in this place since you left.’
‘I have, but only once, and I’m sorry for that.’ She wasn’t, but there was no point in making waves and the little white lie wouldn’t hurt.
‘Yeah, I bet.’ Pamela drew herself up. ‘What do you want?’
Charming, Fiona thought. If this was the way she spoke to her customers, no wonder the place was half empty.
‘Two cups of tea, please, and a Danish pastry.’ A Danish was what Evelyn used to have whenever she came into Clover Cafe. Fiona didn’t have much of an appetite. She supposed she should eat something, but she hadn’t been able to force anything more than a cup of tea down her throat this morning because she had been too upset.
She was still upset – she was simply hiding it better now, that’s all.
Pamela set about making the tea, slapping the teapot down on the tray and slopping milk into a stainless-steel jug. Fiona felt sad when she thought about the lovely patterned milk jugs that used to be here when she’d owned it. None of them had matched, but that had been part of the charm. These soulless stainless-steel monstrosities were an abomination to good taste, and in her experience none of them ever poured properly.
Fiona paid and took the tray to the table.
Evelyn reached for a cup. ‘She was ninety-one when she passed, so she had a good innings,’ she said, picking up the teapot and beginning to pour.
‘Who are we talking about?’
‘Bill’s mother.’
‘Ah, right.’ Fiona had hoped chatting with Evelyn might take her mind off Bill, but that wasn’t to be, and her heart squeezed when she heard his name.
Suddenly, Evelyn leant forward and clutched Fiona’s arm just above the wrist. ‘I hope you don’t mind me asking, but are you and Bill courting?’
Fiona froze. ‘Courting?’
Evelyn frowned. ‘Silly me, it’s not called that these days. What do the youngsters say…? Dating? Seeing each other? Going steady?’
‘Er, no we’re not.’
‘Shame. You made a lovely couple at the tea dance. I said as much to Molly. After what poor Bill has been through, a good woman in his life wouldn’t go amiss.’
‘I don’t follow.’
‘You know … that dreadful business with that American woman he was engaged to.’
Fiona didn’t know anything about it. ‘What American woman?’
‘Hasn’t he told you? I thought he would, seeing as the pair of you are so close.’
‘We’re not that close,’ Fiona replied, pushing the memory of just how close they had been last night, to the back of her mind.
Evelyn ploughed on. ‘He probably wants to forget all about it, and I don’t blame him. Being jilted at the altar isn’t something you shout from the rooftops.’
‘That’s awful! She left him on their wedding day ?’
‘Not quite. She ditched him three days before, but that was bad enough.’
Poor Bill. Fiona’s heart went out to him. ‘Do you know why? What went wrong?’
‘Dunno, Connie never said.’ Evelyn sounded aggrieved. ‘It near broke her heart. She was upset enough about not being able to go to the wedding, and then for that to happen… As you can imagine, she wanted to be there for her son – even grown men like Bill need their mothers when things go wrong – but he went straight back to sea and stayed there.’
‘Why wasn’t she invited to the wedding?’ Fiona was aghast. It seemed so callous and not at all like the Bill she knew.
‘It’s not that she wasn’t invited, because she was. She refused to go. She was scared of flying and hated boats. And with Bill only having his mother on his side, it didn’t make sense to cart his fiancée’s family over to Wales. It would have been expensive, too.’
‘So Bill was getting married without his mother there?’
‘That’s right. Connie put a brave face on it, but I could tell she was upset. Still, Bill promised her that they would come to stay with her for a week or so when they came back from their honeymoon, so at least she would have got to see them, but I doubt whether that would have been any consolation, and goodness knows how she would have coped if Bill had given her grandchildren, but that would have been another story.’
‘When was this?’
‘Oh, now, let’s see… thirty-five, thirty-six years ago.’
‘And he never married?’ Fiona asked, despite knowing the answer.
‘Never. His mum would have given her right arm to see him settle down, but as far as I know there’s not been a whiff of another woman since. Seeing you and him together, I thought—’ Evelyn sighed. ‘Never mind. It looks like he’s still a confirmed bachelor. Glenys Sidwall will be disappointed. She’s got her sights set on him.’
Fiona wasn’t surprised to discover that Evelyn had come to the same conclusion as her regarding Glenys. Mind you, Glenys had set her sights on quite a few men over the years, so it wasn’t unreasonable to make that assumption.
‘He’s a good catch, is Bill,’ Evelyn was saying. ‘He’s got his own house, his own teeth, and his own hair. I dare say he’s got a decent pension, and it’s common knowledge that Connie left him a few bob as well as the house. And not only is he quite well off, but he keeps that house spotless, so he’s housetrained. I know he’s a bit of a misery guts, but you can’t have everything, can you?’
Thankfully, the conversation moved away from Bill as Evelyn gossiped about what the people in her street were getting up to, and Fiona was able to forget about him for the time being. There would be time enough to think about him when he came to help with the delivery later.
And if she was honest, she was dreading it.
***
Fiona put the last bag of flour on the shelf, then dusted her hands off on her pinny. There, that was everything put away. All that was needed was the delivery of fresh stuff on Friday morning, and she would begin baking in the afternoon. With the opening ceremony on Saturday, she had a lot to do but there was little point in starting too early as she wanted everything to be made fresh, which meant leaving it as late as possible.
Once again, she glanced out of the window and her gaze roamed around the park. And once again Bill was nowhere in sight. She had told him the time the delivery would be arriving, but he hadn’t shown up.
Maybe he had forgotten?
Or maybe he was avoiding her.
The latter was entirely possible, given the expression on his face last night, but he couldn’t avoid her forever. He was supposed to be helping in the cafe for one thing, and for another she would be in the park on a regular basis, so they were bound to bump into each other all the time.
While she had been sorting out the delivery, Fiona hadn’t been able to stop thinking about what Evelyn had told her. Fancy Bill being jilted three days before his wedding! The poor, poor man. He must have been devastated. Had it put him off marriage for good, or hadn’t he found another woman to compare to the one he’d lost? Fiona guessed she would never know. It wasn’t the kind of thing she could ask, was it?
It was now getting towards five o’clock and as he hadn’t put in an appearance, she decided to take a stroll along his street and knock on his door. Part of her didn’t want to because she was scared of her reception, but if he was avoiding her then the sooner they got this first post-kiss encounter out of the way the better, and they could go back to the way they had been before.
Could they though ? a voice in her head asked.
Ignoring it, she rinsed her hands, slung her cardi around her shoulders, made sure the cafe door was firmly locked, and set off. She knew Bill usually walked Patch early in the morning and late afternoon (and sometimes at night too, if he couldn’t sleep – Bill that is, not Patch), but as she had yet to see him in the park this afternoon, she hoped he would be in.
Although she knew she was playing with fire by visiting him and that it would be better for her state of mind (and her heart) if she didn’t, she firmly believed they needed to clear the air. Or to at least pretend last night had never happened.
Fiona asked herself what she would have done today if the kiss hadn’t taken place and he hadn’t shown up as planned, and she knew she would have gone to check on him, so that was what she was going to do.
She would make sure he was all right and leave it at that. She would be her usual friendly self and make no reference to the elephant in the room, then she would go home and try to forget that she had feelings for Bill that she wished she didn’t have. And from what Evelyn had told her, Fiona guessed Bill would be more than happy to brush last night under the carpet as well.
As she neared Bill’s house, she noticed his car parked outside. It being there didn’t mean that Bill was in, but it shortened the odds a fraction.
Jabbing the bell with her finger, she listened for the sound of Patch’s barking and her heart sank when all she could hear was silence.
Hope fading, she rang it a second time, waited a few seconds more, and was just about to leave when she heard a flurry of barks.
When the door eventually opened, Bill seemed distracted. ‘Sorry, we were in the garden.’
‘Er, hi. I, er, thought you were going to help with the delivery today and it’s not like you not to turn up when you say you will, so I thought I’d better check that everything’s OK.’ Fiona reached down to stroke the dog’s ears as the terrier wound himself around her legs like a cat.
‘Ah, yes, the delivery. Sorry about that.’
‘It’s no bother, I’ve sorted it,’ she said hurriedly, in case he thought she was remonstrating with him or trying to make him feel guilty.
‘I, er, had to go out.’
‘Oh, right… Anywhere nice?’ Fiona could have kicked herself as soon as the words left her lips. It sounded as though she would have liked an invite.
His voice was stiff as he replied, ‘I had an appointment.’
Fiona was mortified. ‘Oh, I see. In that case, I won’t keep you. I just wanted to make sure you were all right. After yesterday.’ Oh god, she was making a right hash of it. Any second now and she’d be mentioning the very thing she didn’t want to talk about – but she couldn’t seem to get control of her mouth.
Bill frowned and scratched his chin. ‘Yesterday, right…’
‘I mean, I was worn out last night after all that walking. I had a hot bath and went straight to bed. I couldn’t keep my eyes open.’ She was aware she was waffling, but she couldn’t seem to stop.
‘Hmm.’
‘My feet ached like the devil this morning.’ She was still waffling and from his expression she guessed that Bill was unimpressed. She didn’t blame him. There was an uncomfortable silence before she added, ‘Right then, I’ll be off. Glad you’re OK.’
‘Thanks for popping by.’ His tone was stiff and formal, and it cut her to the quick.
‘See you, then.’
‘Yes, see you.’ He ushered Patch inside and as she walked away she heard the door close firmly.
That was that, then. Not for one second did she believe his story about having an appointment. He had clearly been lying to her and he’d used it as an excuse not to help with the delivery. He’d used it as an excuse not to see her . And no wonder, knowing what she knew now. Fiona guessed that, like her, a romantic relationship wasn’t on the cards for Bill.
But unlike her, Bill hadn’t been daft enough to fall in love.