Chapter 4
The man in the green anorak is growing increasingly red in the face.
‘You know the book,’ he says to Alfie, gesturing in the air with one hand. ‘It was in this weekend’s Sunday Times. You know. Blue cover.’
Alfie tries his best to remain calm and not to tell the customer that the book having a blue cover doesn’t exactly narrow things down.
‘You know. Written by that posh bloke on the telly,’ the man adds.
Which doesn’t especially help either.
‘Just give me a moment, sir, and I’ll see what I can do.’
As Alfie turns to the computer he tries to focus on what he is doing and not let his attention wander to the door, looking out for a flash of ginger hair.
It’s the first of February and Matilda Nightingale’s next book is waiting on the shelf.
Every time the doorbell jangles today he has found himself looking up, wondering if it might be her.
But she hasn’t stepped inside the shop since that day back in January.
The fingers of one hand dart across the keyboard, then he flicks through the weekend papers and a copy of the London Review of Books, which he keeps on his desk for moments like this.
Five minutes later, the customer leaves with a copy of a recently published historical biography under his arm, Alfie having just managed to stop himself from pointing out that the book was actually featured in the Telegraph, not the Sunday Times.
For the rest of the day he unloads books, rearranges shelves and deals with online orders and emails from publishers. But the customer in the tweed coat with the colourful buttons, and with the bright orange hair, never appears.
‘Sorry I’m late, I had some invoices to finish dealing with,’ he says later that evening as he unclips his bicycle helmet, his hair springing up in defiance of having been constrained for the fifteen-minute ride.
‘You work too hard,’ says the five-foot-one woman in the doorway, dressed in jeans, slippers and an orange jumper, greying hair in a messy bun. ‘Just like your father,’ she adds as she reaches up and he stoops down so he can kiss her on the cheek.
‘Hi, Mum.’
Alfie can distinctly remember the moment he surpassed his mother in height and how disorientating it had felt.
As a child, she’d always seemed so reassuringly big to him: the place to run to when he came off his bike and grazed his knees, or if his older sister, Tash, hid one of his favourite rocks to annoy him, or later teased him for having a rock collection at all.
But before he knew it he had grown gangly limbs and people kept telling him how much he looked like his father.
And then one day he was leaning down to hug his mother rather than the other way around and it felt like he was no longer allowed to be a little boy, even though sometimes he still very much felt like one on the inside.
As she holds on, Alfie rests his chin on the top of her head, catching her familiar Nivea face cream and Imperial Leather soap smell. The smell of home.
‘So, what needs doing, then?’ he asks, heading straight for the cupboard in the hall, reaching for the toolbox.
‘Just a few pictures that I picked up at a flea market this week. I want to hang them before Andrew gets back from his work trip.’
‘So he has no choice if he hates them?’ Alfie teases, following his mother into a living room filled with knick-knacks.
‘You know Andrew doesn’t care about things like that,’ she says, waving a hand as Alfie gets the drill ready.
She’s right. While Andrew might pretend to grumble occasionally about their flat resembling a second-hand shop, thanks to Emylia’s car boot sale addiction, in reality his mother could fill the place to the ceiling or paint it neon pink and Alfie’s stepfather wouldn’t care, as long as Emylia was there when he came home.
Once the pictures are hung Alfie suggests a takeaway.
‘Are you sure? I don’t want to drag you away from friends. Or a date …’ she adds hopefully.
‘There’s nowhere I’d rather be. Pizza or Indian?’
Her face brightens. Because Alfie knows she doesn’t like being alone in the evenings. It brings back bad memories.
He lets her pick what they watch. It’s not until the third episode of a house makeover programme that he lets himself question how he’s ended up at this place: sat with his mother on a Friday evening watching couples discuss wallpaper choices and knowing that this is preferable to his alternative plans for the evening – getting intimate with an Excel spreadsheet.
As he watches, his thoughts drift to Matilda Nightingale and the day Joe Carter visited Book Lane.
He looked around Alfie’s age but was unsteady on his feet, his face pale and eyes sunken.
Alfie immediately offered him a seat, which he took with a, ‘Thanks, mate.’ When he told Alfie about the order he wanted to place, it knocked the air out of him but he did his best to remain professional.
And now it’s hard not to feel personally invested in this particular order. He made a promise that all twelve books would reach their intended recipient, no matter what. But what if Matilda Nightingale never comes back?
‘… and we’re seeing an uptick in the youth market, driven by some TikTok success stories …’
Tilly looks down at her notebook, aware that she agreed to take notes for today’s editorial team meeting but that so far she has written nothing. She writes ‘TikTok’ then scribbles it out.
‘Now, we’ve just acquired a big new book,’ says her boss, Sade, a copper-skinned Black woman dressed in her signature crisp white shirt, colourful acrylic jewellery and slim-fit trousers. ‘Esmerelda Love’s first memoir.’
She clicks a button and a montage of photos appears on the screen.
Last night Tilly put off going to bed alone by staying up late working on this newest presentation, using the social media account she has for work – but very rarely uses herself – scrolling through endless photos of Esmerelda Love.
A neatly arranged montage of photos showing a young, slim, blonde white woman posing in a variety of beautiful locations in a variety of expensive-looking neutral-shade outfits floods the screen.
‘Tilly, you’re Esmerelda’s editor, do you want to say a few words about the book?’
The eyes of the entire editorial team swivel to face her.
They are sat in one of the office’s glass-fronted meeting rooms. It gives Tilly a view of the bookcases that line the corridor, books turned cover out and bearing the faces of the celebrities whose memoirs they have published over the years.
There’s a brief silence as her colleagues and boss wait for her to speak.
Sleep deprivation fills her mind with fog.
After a moment her brain kicks in and the facts and figures from the proposal that kept her company last night, along with a bowl of pesto pasta and half a bottle of wine, come out of her mouth.
She speaks with the confidence and experience that, combined with years of late nights and weekend working, have earned her the position of senior editor at Splash Books.
At her last appraisal, a potential promotion to deputy publishing director was dangled – that is, if her projects this year pan out well.
‘And she has a combined social media following of around a million,’ Tilly finishes. ‘So, we’re hoping this will be a big book for us.’
‘That’s brilliant, thank you, Tilly. Will Esmerelda be writing the book herself or do we need to secure a ghostwriter?’
‘She’s asked for a ghostwriter.’ Most of the celebrities Tilly works with do, although very few are upfront about the fact. ‘I’m going to start compiling a potential list today.’
Sade slips her glasses off and twirls them in her hand the way she always does when she’s thinking.
‘How about Rachel Harding? She could be perfect for this project. I get the impression from Esmerelda’s agent that Esmerelda can be exacting …
’ Code for a nightmare. ‘Rachel is level-headed and pretty unflappable. Plus, she has the experience to go with it.’
‘Rachel Harding?’ says Tilly, looking up from her notebook.
‘Yes, isn’t she a friend of yours? Can you call her to see if she has availability?’
‘Um, sure …’
Tilly returns to her desk after the meeting, the space cluttered with teetering piles of advance copies of books. She stares at her computer screen and writes and rewrites an email to Rachel several times, before finally settling on something that is brief and to the point.
From: matilda.nightingale@
To: rachelhardingwrites@
Subject: Proposal
Hi Rachel,
I hope you’re well. I know we haven’t seen each other in a while but I have recently acquired a new author – social media influencer Esmerelda Love.
She has requested a ghostwriter and we all thought you would be the perfect fit.
The book proposal is attached. Could you please let me know if you are interested and have availability over the next few months?
Tilly
To her surprise a reply comes in, just minutes later.
From: rachelhardingwrites@
To: matilda.nightingale@
Subject: Re: Proposal
Hi Tilly,
It’s lovely to hear from you! That sounds great. Shall we meet up soon to discuss? It would be good to see you. I’ve missed our pub nights.
Rachel xx
*
From: matilda.nightingale@
To: rachelhardingwrites@
Subject: Re: Proposal
Hi Rachel,
That’s brilliant news. Esmerelda and her agent will be thrilled, as are we. I’m sending you over a draft contract and some potential dates for a meeting with Esmerelda. Do let me know if any of these suit you.
Tilly
It will be the first time seeing Rachel in months, and Tilly’s chest tightens at the thought.
Rachel was the ghostwriter for the very first memoir Tilly edited, and they clicked instantly.
Tilly had been nervous about working on her first book, but as soon as Rachel came on board as the writer she felt more relaxed.
In contrast to the highly strung celebrity chef whose memoir it was, Rachel was relaxed and down to earth.
In the first meeting between the three of them, Tilly got stuck on a broken-down Tube and arrived at the restaurant ten minutes late, frazzled and apologetic.
But Rachel had ordered drinks and was chatting away to the chef, who seemed surprisingly at ease.
Rachel flashed Tilly a supportive smile that made her feel as if Rachel had her back.
Over the years they grew closer, meeting regularly at their favourite pub in Camden to catch up on industry gossip and the projects they’d been working on.
Joe was a great listener but with Rachel she could talk in minute detail about the intricacies of the industry, knowing her friend understood and was just as invested.
She shared Tilly’s taste in books too, and whenever they met up they’d each arrive with a tote bag full of books to swap.
It will be strange working together again but Tilly is a professional. If she can handle working with some of the celebrities she has to deal with, then surely she can handle working with her old friend.
‘Rachel is on board for the Esmerelda Love book,’ she tells Sade, popping her head around her boss’s door.
‘Brilliant news. I have a good feeling about this book. You’re on a good path right now, Tilly. Well done.’
Tilly knows the words of praise should boost her but she can’t escape the uneasy feeling about the email exchange with Rachel. And if she does get the promotion, she already knows that the first person she will want to tell is no longer here.
She pictures the copy of Matilda on the coffee table at home, and the package waiting for her at Book Lane – which she hasn’t summoned the courage to collect yet.
She isn’t sure she can face the bookseller after the way she acted last time.
And despite her curiosity at what Joe might have picked for her next, does she really deserve another book when she still hasn’t read the first?