Chapter Twenty-Seven
Excitement buzzed in the air, even during the quiet reading part of book club. Afterwards, people took their time saying goodbye as Crush turned off the last of the lights. Grace, Annie, Paz and Rosie waited in the seating area while Jasmine and Jude talked animatedly over by the door.
‘We’ll go and get a table at The Cockpit,’ Jude called over. ‘See you there.’
‘They seem to be getting on well,’ said Paz.
‘Don’t start,’ said Rosie. She turned to Grace. ‘He’s always trying to set the boy up in a relationship. Anyway, Jasmine looks too young for him.’
‘She’s twenty-four,’ said Annie. ‘Hard to believe isn’t it, with that baby face? She’s done ever so well for herself. She did one of those apprenticeship thingies and now she’s an assistant producer up at the BBC.’
‘See, she’s older than him, and anyway I just want him to be happy,’ said Paz. ‘Nothing wrong with that.’
‘He is happy,’ said Rosie. ‘Not everyone needs a partner to make themselves feel whole.’
Grace considered that. It was such a different attitude to the one she’d been brought up with. Back then, if you didn’t pair up, you were seen as peculiar. It was refreshing.
‘Ready?’ Crush dangled her keys. The others stood and followed her out of the door, waiting in the cool evening air as she put on the alarm and locked up.
‘I can’t believe I once saw you play at the O2,’ said Rosie as they walked the few steps up the parade to the micropub. A few people sat smoking at tables outside, despite the chill. ‘I’m still properly star struck.
‘That’s me, impressive as fuck,’ said Crush, standing aside under the black awning for an elderly man to amble out of The Cockpit.
‘See, I get preferential treatment wherever I go.’ Another customer sidled out while she held the door open, turning and squinting when the two women laughed, then sauntering across the road to the bus stop.
Inside the small pub, Jude and Jasmine were sitting at a table on a raised area near the bar. The others walked past the desk to the right where tin buckets held sunflowers and peonies. Shelves behind heaved with beautiful bouquets of fresh flowers.
‘I wonder who thought a pub-cum-florist was a good idea?’ said Paz. ‘It’s bonkers.’
‘It’s brilliant,’ said Crush. ‘Thinking outside the box at its best.’ She walked under the dried hops hanging from an ornately carved beam, greeted the man behind the bar and ordered the drinks.
Grace watched Jude. He was talking animatedly, gesturing with the arm that wasn’t in a sling. Jasmine’s eyes were flitting between his and she appeared rapt by whatever he was saying. Despite what Rosie said, Grace couldn’t help thinking it looked like it could be the start of something.
Her thoughts went back to the early days with Frank.
Right from their first meeting in the quad at Goldsmith’s University, she’d thought he was different to anyone she’d ever met before.
Better. When they first slept together on her narrow single bed at her digs in New Cross, she’d lain awake for hours afterwards, focusing on his face through the darkness.
She blinked away the memory and chastised herself for projecting her experience onto Jude and Jasmine.
They were discussing ideas for book club, not their future together, and she needed to stop seeing things through such a traditional lens.
Living such an isolated life had left her with out-of-date attitudes and she was determined to fix that.
Jude glanced up and noticed them at the bar. He jumped off the stool. ‘Want help carrying the drinks?’
Paz nodded at his sling. ‘Thanks, son, but you’re not as useful as you used to be.’
‘Harsh.’
Paz flicked his eyes towards Jasmine. ‘She seems nice.’
Jude grinned. ‘Yeah, she is.’ He dipped his eyes and Paz nudged him.
Grace laughed to herself; perhaps things hadn’t changed as much as she thought.
At the scuffed wooden table, Annie shifted a plant in a terracotta pot aside and brought out an A4 notepad and pen from her bag. She wrote expansion plan on the top and underlined it. ‘Who wants to go first?’
‘I’m happy to do the photography for flyers,’ said Rosie taking a sip of frothy beer. ‘You lot can be models. I’ll do my best Annie Leibovitz impression.’
‘Sounds good,’ said Crush. ‘I missed a shoot with her once because I was throwing up after …’ She paused and looked around the group. ‘I’ll save that story for another day.’
‘Now!’ said Rosie. ‘Please.’
Crush shook her head and took a slurp of her pint, laughing when Rosie crossed her arms and stuck out her bottom lip. ‘It involves a B-list actor, two bottles of Jamaican rum and a dodgy kebab. That’s all you’re getting.’
‘I could ask work to sponsor it,’ said Paz, ignoring his wife’s huffing. ‘Just printing costs and things like that.’
‘Great. I hadn’t thought about how we’d cover costs. I can put the word out at school,’ said Annie. ‘I bet there’s loads of parents who’d like to get involved.’ She grimaced, glanced around and lowered her voice, ‘Although there’s a few I’d rather not spend any more time with than I have to.’
‘We’re not trying make our group massive, though, are we?’ said Jasmine. ‘I thought this was for different times and venues.’ Her brown, smoky-rimmed eyes were full of concern. ‘It’s not that I want to exclude anyone. It’s just—’
‘I hear you,’ said Crush. ‘We don’t want our group to get bigger than it was before; about ten to twelve people at the most. It’s my safe space. I know all you guys, and you know me, on a cellular level, you know?’
‘I don’t know the rest of your Annie Leibovitz story,’ said Rosie, pouting.
Crush turned to her. ‘Are you part of book club?’
‘Could be,’ sulked Rosie.
Crush laughed and turned back to the rest of the group. ‘We’ll aim to have enough options for everyone who wants to join.’
‘I agree,’ said Grace. ‘If each group has around ten to twelve regulars, that’s a good number. I’ve only been with you for a short time, but I already feel part of something special.’
Annie hooked her arm around Grace’s shoulder. ‘You’re a very welcome addition. It’s a bit like having part of Frank back with us, isn’t it?’
Crush and Jasmine nodded and when Grace noted the petulance replaced by pride in her daughter’s eyes as she looked on, she had to gulp back grateful tears.
‘What we’re aiming to do is give other people the opportunity Frank gave to us,’ said Annie. ‘And if we can offer different times and dates, then people will be able to choose.’
Jasmine nodded. ‘Great. Jude and I were thinking we could pool our resources on the media front, weren’t we?’ He nodded back enthusiastically.
‘People engage more with videos these days,’ said Jude. ‘Like reels and TikTok.’
‘Not all people,’ said Grace. ‘I’m more likely to see an advert on a board at Chislehurst Library than a video on social media.’
‘Good point,’ said Annie. ‘We need to make sure we reach all sectors of the community, so we need to think about how to get the attention of someone who might be lonely, for example. Maybe posters in local shop windows?’
‘Understood. Nanas still use Facebook, though, don’t they?’ Jude winked at Grace, who tutted, pretending to be affronted. He raised his hands. ‘What? You’re on Facebook.’
Grace had to concede, she was. ‘There’s a community group on there that’s very helpful, actually. No dog stays lost for long when a post goes up, I can tell you that much. There’s a WhatsApp group too. I could post a video on that.’
‘So, Rosie will do the photos for flyers and posters.’ Annie made a note in her book.
‘Paz will try to get funding.’ She caught his eye and he nodded.
‘Jude and Jasmine will film some kind of video.’ She tapped the pen against her teeth.
‘What will the videos be of? It should be something bookish, but a film of us all reading silently might not make the most riveting viewing.’
‘What are the core messages we want to get across?’ said Jude.
Paz put his hand on his son’s back. ‘In my head you’re still ten, but then you go and say something all professional, and I remember you’re an adult with a career and everything.’
Jude gave a dismissive shake of his head, but Grace recognized the pride in his smile.
‘Books rock, big time,’ said Crush. ‘That’s point number one. We want people to know reading is cool.’
‘And how do we put that across?’ said Annie, pen poised over the paper.
‘By letting people know what we get from reading?’ said Jasmine. ‘Authentic, personal experience always works best.’
‘Well, that’s easy,’ said Crush. ‘We could film ourselves explaining why we love the books we do.’
‘We need to avoid lecturing people, though. I feel like it needs a theme,’ said Jude. ‘A unique selling point to grab people’s attention … like … I don’t know.’
They sat quietly ruminating, the sound of other customers chatting and laughing all around them.
Grace looked at the ancient wood surrounding the fireplace, then the window out on to the dark parade with its picture of two cockerels with magnificent plumage for inspiration.
On the table to their right a portly man with a booming voice was telling another man about something he’d heard on the radio that afternoon.
The conversation sparked something in Grace’s mind.
‘I think I might have it,’ she said. ‘What about this?’ The others leaned in close as Grace began to explain.