Josie pursed her lips, unconvinced. ‘Fine. I suppose. I mean, I could test your resolve by listing all her bad points again. Only, I’m not sure if we’ve got time if we want to stick to the schedule.’
Val interjected on his behalf for the second time. ‘Josie, insert that caramel log in yer gob and don’t remove it until you have something civil to say.’
Josie rolled her eyes and chewed in silence, her discomfort at the unnatural state clearly killing her. Josie didn’t do silence. She didn’t do restraint. And she definitely didn’t do withholding of her opinions.
To outsiders, it probably seemed like a strange friendship, the successful, good-looking man-about-town entrepreneur and the ageing punk rocker with a mouth like a sewer, but she’d forcefully adopted him the minute they’d met a decade or so before – some might call it more of a hostage situation – and he’d loved her ever since. People of all ages graduated to Josie and Val. They had an extended family that spanned the generations, and they were always happy to welcome newcomers into the fold, especially guys like Cammy, who had little family of their own.
They’d been the first people he’d shared his decision with, the first ones to know what he’d planned, the cohorts that were here now, helping him with his plan, even if they weren’t entirely on board.
‘Right, what’s first then?’ Val said, looking at the checklist in front of her. ‘Okay, just so you know, we drove past the restaurant on the way here and it’s looking gorgeous. All the Christmas lights are up in the square outside. It’s going to be perfect.’
Cammy nodded. Despite Josie’s antagonism and blatant disapproval, this was why he’d agreed to her offer of help. Now that she and Val had both semi-retired, they had time on their hands, and they were the type of women who let nothing stand in the way of a good party. There was no obstacle they couldn’t climb over, no issue they couldn’t solve.
Josie harrumphed and Cammy feigned exasperation. ‘Why didn’t you leave me to do this on my own if you disapprove so much?’ he teased her. ‘You know why? Because you’re so bloody nosy.’
Josie shook her head. ‘Nope, I just decided that there was more chance of me talking you out of it if I came along for the ride. It’s a tactic of war. You just don’t know when the ambush will come.’
There was no point in even trying to act offended, so Cammy laughed instead. Josie was all talk. Okay, so she didn’t love Lila, but she’d come round eventually, and in the meantime, although his ears would probably be bleeding by the end of the day, there was no one else he would rather do this with.
He was sure about marrying Lila. Absolutely sure. Wasn’t he?
Of course he was. The six months they’d been together had been the best of his life. He’d only just moved back to Glasgow after years in the States, and although he’d rekindled his old friendships, opened up the shop and found somewhere to live, it was Lila that had convinced him that coming back to Glasgow had been the right decision. They’d totally fitted from their first night together, even though it wasn’t a typical first date. She’d called him from a hotel bar after a fight with her boyfriend and he’d picked her up, taken her for a late night drink, kissed her, and that had been it for both of them. At first he’d worried that it was a rebound from the boyfriend she’d left that night, but it wasn’t long before that didn’t even cross his mind. She never mentioned the guy again. Cammy didn’t ask. It was inconsequential. All that mattered was that he wanted to be with her and she wanted to be with him.
And now he was going to make it official, not because he had a burning desire to be married, but because he knew Lila wanted it.
Hadn’t she dropped enough hints? How many times had she said she wanted to be married by the time she was thirty? How many jewellery windows had they stopped at? How many wedding magazines had she left lying around? How many times had she mentioned the fact that marriage was definitely something on the horizon? He knew this was why she’d been a bit off for the last couple of months. She was starting to get frustrated, beginning to wonder if he really was serious about her or if this was just a passing romance, a waste of her time that could rob her of the future she had planned.
After tonight, she’d know that wasn’t the case. The whole institution of marriage wasn’t something he desperately wanted – he’d have been happy just living together forever. What difference did a piece of paper and a walk down an aisle really make? However, it hadn’t taken him long to realise that it was important to her, and he was more than willing to make it happen.
At first he’d thought of using one of those proposal agencies, the companies that planned everything and took care of all the details to make it special, but when he’d told Josie and Val, they’d been outraged. ‘Och, why would you be wasting your money on that when we could do it for you?’ Josie had exclaimed, while Val had looked at her, mouth agape. ‘You can’t stand her,’ she’d pointed out the obvious. Cammy took no offence. In fact, as Josie had said, he knew it came from a place of love. Josie treated him like a son and she’d never think any woman was good enough for him. He could turn up with a supermodel astronaut who spent her lifeimproving the living conditions of the poor and brokering world peace, and Josie would still find fault.
He picked up a caramel wafer, dunked it in his tea, and took a bite, as he listened to Val running through the plans.
Whether Josie approved or not, Cammy knew with absolute certainty that by the end of the day he was going to be engaged to Lila.
3
Bernadette
Bernadette stared at the table to make sure it was just the way he liked it. Cup and saucer on the right-hand top corner of the white, freshly laundered and pressed place mat. Bowl of muesli in the centre, jug of milk beside it. Prunes in a dish to the left. Vitamins in a ramekin, next to the cafetière filled to a centimetre from the top with Jamaican Blue Mountain Roast. The coffee took a fair chunk out of her housekeeping budget every month, but, as he reminded her often, at this stage in life he’d worked hard enough to get the best.
He’dworked.
He made it sound like she had never lifted a finger in her life. Thirty years in nursing, part-time during the kids’ first ten years, when she juggled night shifts with bringing them up, while he worked days and slept peacefully through the night. Thank God, she’d had her mother then to help out, because there was no way Kenneth would disturb his beauty sleep to rouse himself for a restless child.
Oh no. He’d always insisted on uninterrupted sleep because, as he regularly pointed out, his job was life or death. He conveniently overlooked the fact that hers was too, sneering that she was just a nurse in A & E, while he was a cardiac surgeon who required sufficient rest to operate successfully. And one thing that drove Kenneth Manson was success. He had one of the most lauded practices in the country, based in a prestigious private hospital near their homein the West End of the city. Kenneth Manson was a renowned expert when it came to matters of the heart. The irony didn’t escape her.
She flinched as he walked into the room, his eyes barely registering her presence as he sat down and gave a murmured, ‘Morning.’ So it was going to be one of those days in the Manson household then. It was impossible to predict. Sometimes, she got a smile, perhaps even a peck on the cheek as he passed her. If they’d had sex the night before, he might even reach for the belt on her robe and pull her towards him. That happened less now. In fact, it had been months. Thank God. It meant she didn’t have to pretend to respond, or hate herself when she did. Mornings like this were preferable. She’d rather he ignored her or even blatantly abhorred her, than have to put up with his touch.
She saw that he was already in his cycling gear, like something straight out of mid-life crisis central. What was it they called them? MAMILs. Middle-Aged Men In Lycra. Of course, she’d never say that out loud. Nor would she tell him that he looked ridiculous in the full regalia. That was one of those happy little thoughts that she kept to herself. As was the fact that there was every chance he’d freeze his bollocks off, cycling through Glasgow streets in December.
The cycling had been a new development over the last couple of years. He’d always taken care of himself – well, in his line of work it was advisable – but he’d taken it to a whole other level when the big 5-0 began to loom on the horizon. A natural inclination to vanity had ramped up many notches. It went one way or another, didn’t it? He’d been such a good-looking man in his twenties and thirties, and when the choice came to relax and accept the passing of time, or to fight the ageing process with every fibre of his being, he’d chosen thelatter. Now, he cycled the five miles to work every morning, then got showered and changed there, before fitting in a lunchtime training session at the gym and then cycling home at night. Sometimes he even went back out later for another workout, and she’d lost count of the cycling weekends, the active breaks and marathons he’d gone off to do in cities all over Europe. She didn’t mind. Not in the least. Every day that he was away was a day less that she had to look at him over the top of his newspaper and silently hate him. Kenneth Manson. A fine, upstanding pillar of the community, saviour of many, much loved father, vile bastard of a husband.
His face flickered with annoyance as her mobile phone buzzed to signal an incoming message. He didn’t approve of phones at the table, but he could hardly ground her, could he? She wasn’t one of the kids –though even the kids weren’t children now. Nina was twenty-nine and Stuart was seven years behind her. Who was she kidding? She knew good and well that the fact she was his wife wouldn’t stop him doling out a punishment. Maybe a day-long sulk. Perhaps a barbed insult. A criticism of her appearance.
She didn’t look at the text, aware that it could set him off, yet hating herself for succumbing to that fear and allowing him to control her actions. It would be Sarah, her friend, and lately, her co-conspirator. Nothing actually illegal. At least, not yet.
Because everything was about to change.
