They’d paid and were making their way out of the supermarket when they spotted Lucy coming towards them. Carrie saw her eyes light up at the sight of them and feared she was about to face an inquisition about her and Michael. She looked around for an escape route but there was none and Poppy waving and calling out, “Hello, Lucy!” sealed her fate.
“Hi, Poppy, hi, Carrie! How are you both?” Lucy asked.
“We’re good, thanks.”
“It was nice seeing you and Michael together in the coffee shop earlier.”
“Your food is delicious,” said Carrie.
“Thank you. I’m so glad you enjoyed it,” Lucy replied. “So, you two have been in together a couple of times now...”
Carrie prayed Poppy wouldn’t add in her two pennies’ worth and swiftly handed her the packet of chocolate buttons to distract her.
“Michael has been a big help since I got here,” Carrie replied, carefully.
Lucy looked like she was hoping Carrie would say more, but was destined to be disappointed.
“Don’t let us hold you up,” said Carrie, with a smile. “You must be tired after running the coffee shop all day and desperate to get home.”
“That’s true,” said Lucy. “My feet are killing me!”
“Well, enjoy your evening!” said Carrie.
“You too!” replied Lucy.
Carrie let out a sigh of relief as they carried on out of the shop. Lucy was lovely, and she couldn’t blame her for being curious. She could only imagine what a piece of really juicy gossip was worth in a little town like this. However, she wasn’t about to explain her friendship with Michael to Lucy and especially wouldn’t want to explain to Lucy why she’d been comforting Michael. Lucy was relatively new to the town and might not be aware of Michael’s history. It certainly wasn’t Carrie’s place to tell her. She shook her head, clearing it of the sad image of Michael as a teenager that had filled her mind. He’d seemed so grown up back then and unapproachable, but of course he hadn’t been. She wished she’d had the courage to speak to him, maybe befriend him.
They got back to the flat and Carrie cooked them a chicken stir-fry with noodles — Poppy’s request, mainly because she loved trying to eat the noodles with chopsticks. There was usually a lot of mess and slurping involved and it wasn’t a meal which invited polite company.
They sat next to each other at the kitchen island companionably, with Poppy filling her in on how they’d walked up to the castle during holiday club and a lady had shown them around and taught them how soldiers had shot arrows through really thin windows and how a drawbridge worked. The little girl seemed far more impressed with the castle ruins now an expert had talked her through them.
“That sounds like a very awesome afternoon,” said Carrie when Poppy had finished. “And to think I was stuck slaving away in the bookshop!”
Poppy giggled. “You love working in the bookshop, Mummy. You’re always happy when you’re in there. I think you like it much more than working in the school.”
“I do love being in the bookshop, you’re right,” said Carrie carefully. “But sometimes we enjoy doing things because they’redifferent and it’s nice to have a change. It doesn’t mean that we’d necessarily want to do them all the time.”
“I’d like to live here all the time,” Poppy said.
“You’d miss your friends from school though, especially Sophie.”
“Maybe she could come and visit and then you could see her mummy too.”
“That would be a good idea,” Carrie said. She wished things were really as simple as Poppy suggested. “But don’t you think Auntie Mary would like her shop back sometime?”
Poppy thought for a minute. “Yes,” she concluded. “But Granny says Auntie Mary is getting on a bit and should be taking it easier, so maybe you could still help her, and then you could help Michael too.”
“Michael doesn’t need my help, Pumpkin. He’s very good at his job and I think I would probably just mess things up for him. He uses a lot of glue, and you know the state I get in whenever I try to glue something.”
“I don’t think Michael would mind, Mummy. He really likes you. Sometimes he looks at you with a smile on his face when you’re busy doing something.”
Carrie blushed. Did Michael really do that? She needed to change the subject.
“Right, well, if you’re all finished eating, why don’t you go and get your pyjamas ready and check your bedroom’s tidy? I’ll be up to run your bath in just a minute.”
Poppy climbed down from her stool and skipped cheerfully up the stairs, leaving Carrie once again thinking about a certain bookbinder.
Chapter 14
