Milla’s laughing. ‘That’s the leggings not the baby, Clems.’
‘Come on Diesel.’ Charlie gets to his feet, and for the second that he stands staring at us, there’s a shadow passing across his face. Then it goes as fast as it came, and he strides across to me.
My legs are welded to the spot. ‘Are you taking him back?’
But before Charlie can, Nell rushes in, scoops him out of my arms and whisks him off for a photo with his mum and dad.
28
In Clemmie’s flat
Hand knits and dirty tricks
Even later that Tuesday evening
With something as big as a proposal, it takes a while for the excitement to subside. While Charlie makes everyone coffee, Ben and Rachel phone their families and friends. Then they take advantage of the high speed Seaspray Wi-Fi to share their news on Facebook, and the congratulations come flooding onto their phones in a non-stop flurry of beeps. When they post another photo on the Singles’ Club page the beeping spreads all along the balcony.
Eventually, Sophie takes Milla home to bed and drops Plum off on her way. And after coming back four times to say their last thank yous, Ben, Rachel and Levi finally head off with Diesel too so Charlie can drive them home in their car, and give Diesel his late-night dog walk on the way back.
Which leaves Nell and me to do the final tidying, which is barely any at all. Once we switch off the fairy lights and blow out the candles, it’s just the two of us in the dark with a rug and a director’s chair each, a bottle of left over prosecco at my elbow on the table, resting our bare feet on the balcony rail. There’s a clicking as Nell winds the musical box. Then she lifts the lid and sets it going. I’m listening to the gentle lap of waves along the bay with the overlay of tinkling notes from the musical box blowing across the beach when I notice a gulping sound next to me.
I look along the balcony for a pale splash of Pancake and call to her anyway. ‘Good girl, Pan-pan, we truly appreciate that you saved your fur ball retching for after the proposal.’ Considering cat behaviour, that’s amazing.
There’s a whole lot more choking snuffles. But the giveaway is the huge sniff that’s way too big for a cat. As I stretch my arm out sideways and my hand hits Nell’s shaking shoulders the sniffs escalate to a low moan.
‘Nellie Melon, what’s wrong?’ As I dip into my pocket for a tissue pack and pull one out her wail is so forlorn I almost find myself joining in.
She takes the hanky, and does a massive nose blow. ‘I’ll be fine … in a minute.’ She’s mumbling through her tears. ‘I’m just a bit … emotional.’
I’m squeezing her into a hug. ‘Babe, was it the proposal?’ Of all of us, Nell’s famed for her no-nonsense, unsentimental approach to life. When the rest of us were crying buckets over weepy films, she’d be rolling her eyes and popping another can. As a kid, she’d be the one who’d grit her teeth when she fell over and cut her knees and refuse to cry regardless of much blood was gushing down her legs. She made it through her entire wedding day dry-eyed and her break-up too. It’s not that she’s hard-hearted because as a friend she’s warm and sympathetic. It’s just she just doesn’t express herself by bawling. Although it seems like the proverbial flood gates have been opened here.
‘It’s just Ben’s proposal was so beautiful … the way he told her she made him complete … and he couldn’t imagine life without her …’ She’s blubbing louder than ever, gulping back the sobs. ‘When I walked down the aisle at the register office with Guy …Somewhere over the rainbowwas playing that day … that was supposed to be forever … and now it’s all stuffed up and wrecked.’
I remember that too. Nellie was dancing in time to the music, singing along, having such a great time she almost looked like she didn’t want the aisle to end.
‘But wasn’t it a mutual decision to go your separate ways?’ When it comes to helping married people the best I’ve got is divorce jargon picked up from the office. All I know is her howls are a long way from the matter-of-fact split I’ve heard about. No one else involved, a dignified separation. How did it go?We’ve reached a place where we’d be better apart than together. And we both wish each other well.Not that I’m the greatest at recall, but it sounded like someone put a lot more thought into the wording at the end than at the beginning. As I recall, Nell’s wedding promise was a joke about who was going to make the ham sandwiches.
She sniffs. ‘That’s what we told everyone, and what I believed. But a month later he’d moved in with someone else. Now he’s up there on Facebook in a red jumper with a dog and a baby, out on bloody date nights, having a ball doing all the stuff he’d never do with me.’
‘Bloody hell, of all the underhand, shitty tricks.’ Mostly I’m doing a huge silent ‘Jeez’ about the baby. ‘Where does the knitwear come into this?’ Charlie must be way more intuitive than I gave him credit for.
Nell pulls a face. ‘Whenever I bought Guy colourful jumpers to make him less mopey he left them in the drawer. He pulled off a no-fuss exit from our relationship when he was screwing someone else and had her waiting open-legged in Glasgow. And you know what’s even worse? They’ve got chickens.CHICKENS!Guy didn’t even like chickens, and now he’s got a bloody garden full and I haven’t got any at all.’
‘That’sreallybad.’ I know how much she misses her hens.
‘They’ve even put fairy lights on the henhouse like I had.Fucking fairy lights!’ She lets out a long, low moan then she carries on. ‘I’m jealous of everything they’ve got and I haven’t. Whatever we said before, when he drove off in his rental van he left this gaping hole in my life. I hate living on my own. I know I’m a fraud because I’m always encouraging other people to get together. But I can’t face putting myself out there, and having it happen all over again. I just can’t get over that someone I thought I knew as well as myself could lie to me like that.’ It’s as if now the tears have started, she can’t stop them.
Even with my limited experience, one thing sticks out a mile. ‘Nells, I’m so sorry. But you can’t seriously let one bastard stop you getting on with your life. You’re the nice one here, you deserve to be happy. As you say yourself there are some great guys in St Aidan, we just need to find you one of the good ones, one you can really trust.’ It’s meant to be a leading statement.
She takes a breath and completely misses my suggestion. ‘Obviously, I had my one-off revenge shag straight away. There was no point messing about, I got that over really fast.’
I’ve got no idea why I’m so surprised. ‘And how was that?’
‘Absolutely fucking amazing.’
I’m grinning in the dark. ‘Any clues as to who that was?’
She chokes. ‘Absolutely not.’ She gives a sigh. ‘I was bloody discrete. I chose the guy very carefully, booked a room at The Harbourside, we had one drink at the bar, and left six hours later. Bish bash bosh, all done.’ Not judging here, but that sounds like a long time for a quickie.
