Chapter 18
18
B y three fifteen, as per Cassie’s strict instructions, six of the invited guests had arrived.
Digby, Lucy’s friend from school, who Cassie had first met at Lucy’s hen weekend years before, was a slight, fair-haired man always with a mischievous glint in his eye who worked at Sotheby’s in the Rare Books department. His partner, Kwame, was tall, dark and very handsome, and suave where Digby was usually flustered. He also came with a mischievous glint in his eye as a standard feature.
Cassie had also first met Anita, Lucy’s friend from university, at the hen and been in awe of the human-rights lawyer who wore all black without looking like a goth and could drink everyone under the table. Anita was still a human-rights lawyer, still preferred a monochrome colour palette but now she had a husband, Azad, who owned several gyms, didn’t drink and loved to wear a T-shirt and shorts no matter what the weather. There was also a small daughter who adored the colour pink. ‘She’s a great disappointment to me,’ Anita would always say fondly.
Then there was Iris, a friend from the NCT classes Lucy had attended when she was pregnant with Fleur, and the only one not to be subsequently culled when the baby bubble burst. Iris’s humour was as dry as a vodka martini, her auburn curls were vibrant and the volume knob on her broad Glaswegian accent was usually at an eight. She and her partner, Bill, her childhood sweetheart, were both architects, though her real passion was for vintage clothes.
These were Lucy’s three best friends, plus partners, and they were good friends of Cassie too. Especially Kwame, a theatrical agent, who worked round the corner from her in Soho. They had a monthly tradition of going to see a play, then a late dim sum supper in Chinatown.
They’d attended each other’s birthday parties, summer picnics, anniversary dinners – and not forgetting the raucous night out in honour of Digby finally getting his PhD, which had ended with them singing songs from Cabaret in a Hackney dive bar.
There had been many years of many shared joys and some sorrows. As she showed them around the house and to their rooms, Cassie was painfully aware of the chasm that now existed between her and these long-standing friends. She was the guardian of a terrible secret that would mean their little friendship group would never be the same again.
Marc wasn’t as thick with the six of them as Cassie was – he was somewhere in the gap between acquaintance and friend. Today he was on his best behaviour, abandoning his usual distanced, diffident stance to help carry luggage (Iris had packed for a whole fortnight), then pour champagne and fetch soft drinks for the non-champagne drinkers.
Cassie clutched a delicate coupe of the ruinously expensive champagne and took tiny sips, the bubbles tickling her nose. OK, her palate was far from refined but she still didn’t know why it cost quite so much a bottle.
‘If you hold that glass any tighter, it will snap,’ Kwame said as he came to join Cassie where she was standing in the archway between lounge and hall. ‘Babes, you’ve done an amazing job. Now stop stressing.’
Cassie looked at her phone. It was 3.45 p.m. ‘I’m not stressed,’ she managed to force out, though she was gritting her teeth, hard. ‘I’m fuming. Lucy and Russell will be here any minute, and Heather and Davy still haven’t turned up.’
Heather had been riding Cassie’s arse all day, but now she wasn’t answering her phone or responding to any increasingly urgent messages.
‘Maybe her broomstick got stuck in traffic,’ Kwame suggested, his dark eyes dancing because he knew that on the one hand, Cassie thought it was reductive and offensive to refer to women in that way, but on the other hand, Heather really was a witch.
‘Let’s not even get started on Davy,’ she muttered, tensing up as she heard car tyres on the gravel outside.
She tore across the hall to open the front door and almost sagged with relief that it was Heather and Davy.
‘I hope you remembered my cashew milk,’ Heather said as she clambered down from Davy’s massive black four-wheel drive that was unnecessary when you lived in very un-rural West Hampstead.
Cassie knew that she should be the bigger person. That she should set the tone for the weekend and be welcoming and rise above. But all she could say as Heather had the audacity to air-kiss in her general direction was a hissed, ‘You were meant to be here at three. Lucy and Russell are just behind you and you’re going to ruin the surprise.’
‘Keep your hair on, Casserella,’ Davy said, also going in for a kiss. Cassie stepped back because she knew that it would be far too near her mouth for comfort and with a sly hand on her arse as an added bonus. ‘Now go and get a man a drink. I’m gasping.’
‘Yes, Cass. Champagne was on the itinerary.’ Heather tried to move past Cassie, who was planted firmly in the doorway and not budging.
Instead she turned her head to call out for Marc but as if she’d been emitting a high-pitched distress signal that only he could hear, he was already crossing the hall.
‘Marc.’ Her voice thrummed with barely suppressed rage. ‘Have Heather and Davy paid the two hundred pounds into your account?’
‘I haven’t checked,’ he said, his gaze and tone of voice both even.
‘Could you?’ Cassie asked with more artificial sweetness than a multipack of Diet Coke.
‘We can sort that out later,’ Heather said breezily but she wouldn’t meet Cassie’s eye. Probably because Cassie was sure her retinas were sending laser beams at Heather’s face, which was so like Lucy’s that it was always a little bit freaky. But where Lucy wore her warmth and her good nature in her ready smile and kind eyes, there was something more pinched, more petulant about Heather. ‘Out of the way, Cass, otherwise we really will ruin the surprise. Such a fuss when it’s not even Lucy’s birthday for another two weeks.’
Cassie felt Marc before he stepped close behind her, a steady hand on her shoulder. ‘I’ve checked my banking app but there hasn’t been a payment,’ he said easily, because two hundred quid was pocket change.
It was the fucking principle of the thing. ‘Then you’re not coming in,’ Cassie said because she was going to die on this hill, or rather this doorstep, to make Heather and Davy see the error of their tight-fisted, freeloading ways.
‘I can’t believe you’re being like this,’ Heather hissed as Davy pulled out his phone.
‘Haven’t got the bank details, have I?’ he said with a helpless air.
‘You have. By email and by about fifty WhatsApp messages,’ Cassie said, as Marc’s hand tightened on her shoulder.
‘You holding a grudge is such good entertainment when I’m not the target,’ he whispered in her ear.
The grudges she held against Marc, or rather the one massive grudge, didn’t matter right now. Even though she and Marc had worked as a team for most of the day, normal service would soon be resumed.
It took long minutes and much huffing and puffing from Davy until he nodded tersely at Cassie and Marc. ‘It’s gone through now.’
Marc’s hand was still on Cassie’s shoulder, keeping her safe from the collective glare of Heather and Davy, which would otherwise have turned her to dust. ‘Yup, received with thanks,’ he said, letting go of Cassie so she could take a step back and usher Heather and Davy through the door with a big smile that was as insincere as her greeting.
‘ So lovely to have you here,’ she simpered. ‘Go through. Help yourself to some champagne.’
The three other couples greeted the late arrivals with varying degrees of friendliness.
‘What are the bedrooms like?’ Heather asked in lieu of a hello. ‘I bet you’ve all bagged the best ones.’
Cassie didn’t have the energy to point out, again , that she’d allocated the rooms and it hadn’t been a Real Housewives -style free-for-all.
‘All the rooms are lovely,’ Iris said rather sharply with a sharp look at Heather to match. ‘Considering that Marc is footing the bill for this beautiful house, I’d be happy to sleep on the floor if I had to.’
This was a lie. Iris had arrived with her own Tempur pillow and a special cooling duvet for her hot flushes. Her words barely glanced off Heather, who’d dumped her handbag on a sideboard, which looked very old and very antique-y to Cassie, and was busy checking the provenance of the champagne while helping herself to a huge handful of spicy nuts.
‘So, yes, nuts – did you get my cashew milk?’ she asked Cassie again.
‘That wasn’t possible.’ Cassie sighed in relief when her phone chimed from the depths of the pouch pocket of her hoodie. ‘OK, that’s Russell. They’re just driving through the village now. You guys stay in here and wait for my signal.’
‘What is your signal?’ Anita asked. ‘Have you organised a marching band to come stomping down the drive?’
Cassie sighed. ‘I couldn’t get Marc to sign off on the marching band.’
‘I also said no to the Red Arrows doing a flypast,’ Marc said, from where he was perched on a window seat with a view of the drive. ‘Or somebody could just look out the window and when Lucy and Russell get out of the car, that’s the signal.’
‘Yes, that would work,’ Cassie agreed, as that had been her plan anyway. Though a marching band would have been amazing.
She waited anxiously by the arch, until Marc drawled with a complete lack of urgency. ‘They’re just pulling up outside now.’
Cassie flailed her hands. ‘OK! OK! We are now moving to the hall in a timely fashion.’
Once everyone except Davy, who hadn’t moved from his comfy spot on the sofa, and Heather, who was looking put upon as she poured herself another glass of champagne, was gathered in the foyer, Cassie opened the front door just enough to see a silver Audi come to a halt and the driver’s door open.
‘Right, hang on … OK, now!’ she said, opening the door wide, so everyone could spill out to greet Lucy and Russell.
The collective shout of ‘Surprise!’ was a bit ragged but Cassie didn’t really care because as everyone, minus Heather and Davy, hurried over to greet Lucy and Russell, she realised they’d made a terrible mistake. She’d made a terrible mistake.
It was Lucy getting out on the driver’s side, even though Lucy never drove long distances because she was scared of going on the motorway. She looked as if she was about to burst into tears – and not happy tears, either. ‘What are you all doing here?’ she asked sharply, then looked over to Russell. ‘Was this your doing?’
Russell smiled sheepishly. ‘Guilty as charged.’
Cassie hadn’t seen Russell since that morning a couple of weeks earlier when he’d come home from his emergency trip to hospital. He’d looked tired then. But now he looked exhausted and he got out of the car very slowly. She was sure he was thinner but his face puffier. He seemed to have diminished during the past fortnight.
Which was why Lucy wanted to spend this weekend with Russell, just Russell. Because the time they had left was now measured out in months, hopefully lots of months, and weeks and weekends and days, hours, minutes, seconds.
Those tears that were never far away came closer. Marc was standing next to Cassie at the front door. ‘We should have persuaded Russell to cancel,’ she said but then Lucy mustered up a smile. It wasn’t her usual sparkling smile that made the recipient want to bask in its warmth, but it was convincing enough.
‘It’s so lovely to see everyone,’ Lucy said, as she was folded into an Anita and Iris sandwich. ‘I can’t believe you managed to sneak a surprise past me. Russell is the worst at keeping secrets.’
It was Digby’s turn to hug his oldest friend. ‘If he’d let the cat out of the bag, Cassie would have ended him.’
Cassie winced at Digby’s choice of words but Marc put that steadying hand back on her shoulder. ‘Don’t exaggerate, Digby,’ he said. ‘It would have been just a light maiming.’
‘It would,’ Cassie confirmed as Lucy approached her with arms outstretched.
‘I take it you were the brains of the operation?’ she asked with a genuine smile now.
‘Oh, I helped out here and there,’ Cassie said with raised eyebrows and Lucy laughed.
‘Thank goodness for that, because if you’d left everything to Russell then I dread to think how we’d survive until Monday,’ she said teasingly, taking Russell’s hand as he slowly started up the steps to the house.
‘I very much resent that,’ he said a little breathlessly. ‘But also that’s why I threw myself on Cassie’s mercy. There’s an itinerary.’
‘Of course there is,’ Lucy said, looking around the hall, the wood panels gleaming in the sun that streamed in through the open door.
‘And Marc stepped up at the eleventh hour,’ Cassie said with a sideways look at Marc, who shook his head and smiled slyly.
‘I can’t take any credit for the itinerary.’
‘But he can take credit for lots of other things, like choosing the most gorgeous champagne.’ This mutual respect and admiration really couldn’t last much longer. It was draining .
‘I’d love a glass. This place is beautiful,’ Lucy exclaimed as she walked into the huge living space. She gave a tiny, almost imperceptible flinch when she saw her sister and brother-in-law firmly ensconced on one of the sofas, an almost empty bottle of champagne on the coffee table in front of them and no fucking coaster.
‘I can take credit for that,’ Russell said, sinking gratefully into the nearest armchair and holding up his hand as Kwame offered him a glass of champagne. ‘Not for me, mate, I want to pace myself – but I wouldn’t say no to a glass of water if there’s one going.’
Once everyone was gathered on the sofas and Lucy had been ceremoniously presented with a glass of champagne and a copy of the itinerary, Cassie allowed herself to breathe out.
It was going to be all right. Even though Lucy and Heather had barely even said hello to each other. Even though Davy kept clicking his fingers at Cassie when he wanted a refill. Even though Russell was still looking absolutely done in, half an hour after he’d first sat down.
‘I’d love to see where we’re staying,’ Lucy said; her eyes were on her husband too.
‘In a cottage in the grounds,’ Heather said flatly as she ruined that small surprise. ‘It looks really poky.’
‘It’s lovely,’ Cassie quickly interjected. ‘Its design is based on a Swedish summer house and its fully eco-conscious. Runs entirely on solar power.’
Marc retrieved their bags and Cassie gave Lucy and Russell a brief tour of the downstairs. Then they strolled through the patio doors, past the rose garden and vegetable patch to the cottage, which looked as if it had been transported straight from a Pippi Longstocking novel.
Inside it managed to be both light and airy with its stark design and white-painted walls and floorboards, but also cosy with pops of colour and pattern, including a soft, invitingly plump sofa upholstered in blue and white gingham and a bold yellow and white striped dhurrie rug.
‘I thought you’d be more comfy here and you’d want a little privacy,’ Cassie said, now it was just the four of them. ‘It’s all on one level.’
Lucy sank into the sofa and shut her eyes. ‘Thank you, it’s gorgeous. Not just this cottage. Everything.’
‘I’m sorry if you thought this weekend was going to be just you and Russell.’ Cassie sat down on a white weather-beaten chair, its padded seat upholstered in a William Morris print.
‘We began organising it months ago,’ Russell explained, as he sat down on the sofa too so Lucy could rest her head in his lap. ‘Once we got the bad news, I didn’t want to cancel.’
Lucy raised her head. ‘Are you going to do a Peter’s Friends and tell them all?’ The painful-looking furrow between her eyebrows was back.
‘No,’ Russell said firmly, brushing Lucy’s hair back from her face. ‘I’m not planning any dramatic confession around the dinner table. Marc would hate that. Too unseemly. For someone who’s half French, you have the stiffest upper lip.’
‘Someone has to.’ Marc was leaning against the front door. He loved to lean on things, his arms folded. ‘You lot are far too emotional. Cassie’s been on the verge of tears at least ten times today.’
That was unfair. ‘Maybe twice,’ Cassie said, because that was the other thing that British people did. They made a joke of things even when their hearts were halfway to breaking.
‘If you cry, Cass, then I will cry too,’ Lucy said, her voice already throbbing. ‘I really don’t want to cry this weekend.’
‘This weekend was meant to be all about celebrating you, but now it’s probably going to be my last hurrah with some of the people that I love most.’ Russell leaned down to kiss Lucy’s forehead. ‘I’m sorry I’ve hijacked your birthday, darling.’
‘You haven’t. I can’t wait to make more memories with you,’ Lucy said, which was very sweet. Then she sat up and looked less sad and more … furious. ‘Who the fuck thought it was a good idea to invite Heather?’
There was no way Cassie was taking that one for the team. ‘Nothing to do with me,’ she said firmly. ‘It’s all Russell’s fault.’
‘The circumstances were beyond my control,’ Russell insisted. Even his voice seemed to lack something of its former boominess.
Cassie stood up. ‘Well, I’m going to leave you two to settle in and chill for a couple of hours. Don’t forget to check out the his ’n’ hers goody bags I left on the bed.’
Lucy shot Cassie a look of fond exasperation. ‘Even goody bags? We really don’t deserve you, Cass.’
‘Yet you’re stuck with me,’ Cassie said, trying to hide her pleased smile. She loved what she did but she also loved being appreciated for what she did. ‘We’re meeting in the lounge at seven; Anita and Az are going out for fish and chips while we make our way down to the beach.’
‘Laden up like pack mules,’ Marc added. ‘I’ll think of something to get you out of lugging duties.’
‘I can’t remember, is it far to the beach?’ Russell asked casually.
‘Apparently it’s about a five-minute walk. There’s steps cut into the cliff and, well, torches for coming back in the dark,’ Cassie said brightly, although she wasn’t exactly looking forward to either, given her chequered history with challenging sets of stairs.
Lucy and Russell shared a look that spoke volumes. Cassie didn’t need a translator.
‘We don’t have to eat on the beach,’ she said quickly. ‘We can eat on the terrace. That’s fine. Who wants sand everywhere anyway?’
‘Do you mind?’ Lucy asked. ‘We don’t want to be the fun police but we’re all about conserving Russell’s energy rather than pushing through.’
‘Don’t worry about it for a minute longer,’ Marc said smoothly, as he opened the door for Cassie. ‘We’ll get out of your hair now.’
They walked back to the house in silence. It was only to be expected but Russell’s deterioration was still a shock. He couldn’t drive. Couldn’t manage a five-minute walk down to the beach. How was he going to get through the weekend without people, his friends, realising that something was wrong?
Now Cassie was going to have to tell people that there’d been a change of plans when she wasn’t quite sure that she could speak without crying.
She took a deep breath as she stepped through the open patio doors. The group was still camped out on the sofas and looked up as Cassie and Marc approached.
‘So, we’ve made an executive decision to have fish and chips on the patio rather than having to carry everything including all that booze down to the beach,’ Marc said in a voice that dared anyone to argue.
‘Absolutely fine by us,’ Digby said as there were murmurs of agreement.
‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ Heather said sorrowfully because of course she did. ‘I was so looking forward to the gentle lap of the waves as we ate.’
‘But very much not the end of the world,’ Iris said crisply.
Cassie didn’t want everyone riding Heather for the whole weekend even if Heather was scaling new heights of absolute fuckery. ‘We could have breakfast on the beach tomorrow?’ she suggested. ‘Let’s see how we feel then. So, we’ll meet here at seven to sort out the fish and chips order before Anita and Az head to the chippy.’
‘Our treat,’ Azad insisted. ‘As long as you don’t take the piss and try to bankrupt us by ordering too many pickled cucumbers.’
Cassie slipped away as Bill lamented the price of fish and chips in poncy southern England and how in his and Iris’s native Glasgow, you could buy a fish supper for a family of four and still have change out of twenty quid.
He was drowned out by Heather’s plaintive, ‘Wouldn’t you all prefer to have sushi?’
If Cassie managed to get through the weekend without murdering Heather, it would be a miracle.