"The only thing urgent is his need for brain surgery." Ambrose looked ready to chase after his brother with the promised shovel.
Cathy stood very still for a moment, then turned and walked past them without a word, her face carefully blank.
Sasha found her an hour later in the greenhouse, back in her work clothes, attacking innocent tomato plants with unnecessary vigor.
"He couldn't even look at me," Cathy said flatly, not turning around. "Just turned red and ran away like I'd grown a second head. Or possibly contracted the plague."
"Maybe he was overwhelmed…"
"Don't." Cathy's voice was sharp. She finally turned, and there were tear tracks on her cheeks that she'd clearly tried toscrub away. "Don't make excuses for him. He was embarrassed. Embarrassed that the help had ideas above her station. Embarrassed that I'd dared to dress up and try to be something I'm not."
"That's not—"
"Isn't it?" Cathy's laugh was bitter. "Look, I appreciate what you were trying to do. Really. But just because you and Victoria are head over heels and playing happy families doesn't mean the rest of us get fairytale endings. Some of us live in the real world where sons of the manor don't fall for gardeners' daughters. Where people like me stay in our place and people like Archie marry appropriate women with trust funds and connections."
The words hit harder than Cathy probably intended, and Sasha felt something cold settle in her stomach.
"Right," she said quietly. "The real world."
She left Cathy to her aggressive pruning and wandered back toward the house, feeling distinctly hollow. The real world. Where people like Victoria ended up with other people like Victoria, and people like Sasha went back to Ambrose's spare room to figure out how to become a functioning adult.
She found herself in the morning room, staring out at the gardens without really seeing them, when Lady Charlotte appeared with a tea tray.
"You looked like you could use this," she said, settling gracefully into the chair opposite. She poured with the sort of practiced elegance that probably came from a lifetime of afternoon teas and subtle social manipulation.
"Thank you." Sasha accepted the cup, grateful for something to do with her hands.
"I hear you've been working wonders in the gardens," Lady Charlotte continued. "Cathy says you have real talent. Says you can read plants better than people who've been doing it for years."
"I've enjoyed it. Learning from her, I mean." Sasha took a sip of tea that was, predictably, perfect.
"It's lovely to see someone so enthusiastic. Finding something you love, I mean." Lady Charlotte's smile was warm. "You know, Victoria was always the same when she found something she loved. Completely dedicated. She learned Latin just so she could read medieval manuscripts about banking history. Can you imagine? Twelve years old and conjugating verbs so she could understand usury laws."
Sasha tried to picture twelve-year-old Victoria hunched over Latin textbooks and failed completely.
"She's always been the perfect daughter," Lady Charlotte continued, her voice warm with pride. "Never put a foot wrong, that girl. Straight A's, head girl, Cambridge scholarship. She made it all look so effortless. Even when she was studying twenty hours a day, she'd come down to breakfast looking immaculate." She laughed softly. "I used to wonder if she ever actually slept or if she'd discovered some secret to surviving on pure ambition."
Perfect daughter. Perfect career. Perfect life. Perfect everything.
Sasha looked down at her tea, at her hands that still bore traces of soil under the fingernails despite vigorous scrubbing. She thought about her string of failed jobs, her complete lack of direction until approximately two weeks ago, her tendency to spill things on important people. She thought about the difference between someone who learned Latin for fun and someone who'd been fired from waitressing for dropping a tray.
"She works terribly hard, though," Lady Charlotte was saying. "Sometimes I worry she doesn't leave enough room for anything else. All work and no play, as they say. Her father and I have been trying to encourage her to take up hobbies, meet people outside of banking. But you know Victoria. Once she sets her mind to something, that's it. Total focus."
"She does seem very focused."
"Mmm. Though she's been different this holiday. More relaxed. Happier, even." Lady Charlotte's eyes were knowing over the rim of her teacup. "Less time on her laptop, more time outdoors. I wonder what's changed."
Sasha felt heat creep up her neck. "Perhaps just the break from London?"
"Perhaps." The smile suggested Lady Charlotte knew exactly what had changed and was far too well-bred to mention it directly. "Though between you and me, I think it's good for her. This relaxing business. She's always been so determined to be perfect that I sometimes wonder if she's forgotten how to simply be."
They chatted for another twenty minutes about gardens and Cornwall and the upcoming house party, but when Sasha excused herself, Cathy's words kept echoing in her head.Some of us live in the real world.
Because the real world was this: Victoria would go back to London, probably within the week once she got a job offer. She'd return to her perfect life with her perfect flat in Chelsea and her eighty-hour weeks. And Sasha would go back to Manchester, to Ambrose's spare room, to figuring out how to turn her newfound love of gardening into something resembling a career. Maybe she'd get a job at a garden center. Maybe she'd take some courses. Maybe she'd be absolutely fine.
Their worlds would separate as naturally and inevitably as oil and water.
She was sitting on the terrace steps, watching the afternoon shadows lengthen across the lawns, when she heard the crunch of tires on gravel. Her heart bounced in her chest as Victoria emerged from the car, looking crisp and professional in her interview suit, every inch the successful banker.
