You’ll stay?
Until the wedding, yeah.
Oh,Bren.
She does not rush at him, like she’d done the night he’d arrived, but she does lift her hand to her mouth.
It’s not a big deal, he says, feeling hot for a different reason, now. It’s just a couple of months more. If that’s okay.
Ofcourseit’s okay. Oh, Bren, she repeats, and this time, she does move towards him; loops her twiglet arms around his waist with a strength that surprises him. He inhales her; bread flour, magnolia perfume. Hesitates, then pats her on the back.
You’ll be here for Easter, then? she says, looking up at him like a child. He may not be tall, but his mother is tiny; seems to be getting smaller by the day.
I guess so?
Your fatherlovedEaster, she says, didn’t he? And she lays her head against Bren’s chest once more as he struggles to respond, then draws back and dabs at her eyes with the tissueshe keeps bunched beneath her sleeve. Better than Christmas, he used to say, remember?
And Bren does.
It’s not so long away, now, Josie goes on, as she folds the tissue back under the cuff of her cardigan. Middle of April, this year, in fact.
Cool, Bren says.
Maybe it would be nice if we did something for it? All of us, together?
Whatever you want, he says, because he knows it’ll just mean a pot of tea in the kitchen, hot cross buns on the lawn, at a push. I’m going to miss the bus, he tells her, even though he has nowhere to be.
And then thewedding, Josie says, so soon! Oh, I can’t wait, Bren. Whatlovelythings to look forward to.
Definitely, Bren says, as he pulls on his coat.
I can’t wait, Josie repeats, and he nods, playing along. Like she’ll be able to leave the house for it. Like she’ll have no problem putting on a cocktail dress and high heels, one of those stupid little net hats. See you later then, he says, ending the conversation. Closing the door, and walking away, the morning cold and clear as glass.
_
What areyoudoing here, Shay demands, when Nora walks into the café the following Saturday. They split weekend shifts and it is not her turn to be here, making coffees, selling ceramics, sweeping the floor of crumbs. Not that Shay is doing much of that, by the looks of things; she’s reading a well-thumbed paperback behind the coffee bar, twiddling her purple hair in her fingers.
I’ve got an appointment in London this afternoon, Noratells her, which she’d intentionally kept quiet, all week. So thought I might as well stop by.
That is so sad, Shay says.
Is it?
Yes! Go to a café that you don’town, for crying out loud, on your precious Saturday! Or go and wander round a gallery, or a shoe shop! Don’t come to work if you don’thaveto work, Nora, Jeez.
Never worked a day in my life here, Nora says, and Shay calls her sad again, while simultaneously seeming happy about what she’s just said. Because it’s true. It is such a soothing space, Nora thinks, as she crosses the room, with its exposed plaster walls, the handmade objects on the shelves. And for some reason, since the night of the fajitas – before that, even, at her party – Nora has felt the need to be soothed.
Behind the curtain in the back room, she finds Horace lying beside the radiator, his limbs long and grey, a cluster of paws. Nora feeds him a biscuit from the jar on the desk. Strokes his silken ears, looks into his glum, drooping eyes, before she opens the summer events timetable on the laptop and stares at it, without seeing.
So why are you here, again, Shay asks, sticking her head through the curtain. What’s the appointment for?
Nora says, without wanting to, that if she must know, she’s going to look at wedding dresses. Because they’re moving on this plan of Robin’s.
Horace groans.
The plan where you get hitched at the drop of a hat?
Nora nods. Says they’re telling people to be ready for a quick turnaround. If they can make it, great. If not, it doesn’t matter. People have lives, right, and they’re not set on a big, fancy day, anyway.
