‘If there’s nothing to worry about, why have you telephoned with a message which will only cause your mother to do just that?’
Once again Willow was flummoxed. ‘Well … I just thought it was the kind of thing Mum would want to be told. You know, what with Martha being pregnant.’
‘Knowing Martha, she’ll have herself out of that lift unaided and back at her desk before the cavalry has so much as put its boots on.’
Another time and Willow might have agreed with this sentiment, but recalling how anxious her sister had been for Willow to stay on the line chatting to her –‘You’re keeping me from worrying that I’ll never get out of here.’– she wanted to say that Martha wasn’t as invincible as Geraldine, and many others, made out. But instead she said, ‘Just pass on the message and I’ll be in touch if I hear any more.’
Seconds after she’d ended the call, her mobile rang. It was Tom.
‘It’s okay,’ he said, when Willow began to explain why she’d left him a message to call her, ‘I’ve just spoken to Martha and she’s out of the lift now.’
‘That’s a relief.’
‘Yes. I think she’s a bit embarrassed about the whole thing. You know how she hates to be made a fuss of. Anyway, she’s insisting that she’s perfectly all right and is carrying on with the day as normal.’
‘That’s good.’
‘By the way, thanks for trying to contact me. I was with a new client so couldn’t take any calls. Anyway, how are you?’
‘Oh, I’m fine, muddling along as usual.’
‘How many more weeks do you have to go now, I’ve lost track.’
‘Eight.’
‘So if all goes to plan, you’ll have your baby easily in time for Christmas?’
‘Yes,’ she murmured, thinking there would be nothing easy about it.
After she and Tom had said goodbye, her mobile rang again. This time it was Mum, and hearing how worried she sounded, just as Auntie Geraldine had predicted, Willow rushed to tell her that she’d heard from Tom and Martha was okay.
‘Thank goodness for that,’ Mum said. ‘Were there others in the lift with her?’
Willow told her mother all that she knew and then asked about her old friend being at Anchor House. ‘Has she really left Uncle Brian?’
‘It would appear so.’
‘But why after all these years and when they’ve always seemed okay together as a couple?’
‘She wants more than “okay”. She wants excitement. More specifically, she wants what I have with Ellis.’
Willow thought about this for a moment. ‘What about what you had with Dad?’ she then asked.
There was a silence down the line. ‘I suppose that was different,’ her mother said eventually.
‘Can I ask you something personal, Mum?’
‘Yes.’
‘If Ellis had moved in next door while Dad was still alive, would you have … would you have been attracted to him? Would he have been a temptation?’
‘Heavens, what a question! What makes you ask such a thing?’
‘It was something Auntie Geraldine said. She referred to Ellis as your Lover-Boy and something to do with him being water under the bridge. Was he more than just an old friend when you were students together?’ Willow was thinking of Martha and how adamant she had been earlier in the year, and when they were first getting to know Ellis, that he and Mum weren’t telling the full story about how well they used to know each other.
‘As students we were just friends,’ her mother said in answer to her question, ‘it was … later, a few years later, that he came to mean more to me.’
‘Did you regret not marrying him, then? Was he what you might call a lost opportunity?’
