The cottage still resembled a bombsite. Kieran had unpacked the essentials, but he feared a trip to the dreaded Swedish store might be on the cards. His meagre jacket and coat collection dangled from a cheap and not-so-cheerful clothes rack, while T-shirts and shirts remained higgledy-piggledy in a box. As for underwear…
The irony of Kieran being clueless on the fashion front didn’t escape him. His brainchild – an app provisionally called ClosetAura – aimed to help men and women organise their wardrobes. Purge them of unused and unloved items, help them streamline their outfits and curb impulse buying.
‘Steve Jobs did OK,’ Kieran mused. ‘Black turtleneck, jeans, trainers. Sorted.’ Except Jobs had helmed a global empire. Kieran’s fledgling business depended on customers caring about their appearances and making smart choices. Kieran looked athisuniform of whatever passed muster on the cleanliness front and laughed.
‘No one in Cranley gives a rat’s arse what you look like. They’ll think you’re some eccentric tech person who needs to be left alone. Which suits me right now?—’
Ding-dong.
Oh, joy. The doorbell. As welcome as a verruca.
He considered pretending he wasn’t home. Except the person now hammering loudly and shouting his name made that impossible.
‘I know you’re in there, so open up!’
Janette. Of course.
Kieran forced himself to the door. Good manners and a Scottish upbringing overrode the very real desire to hide in a cupboard.
‘Hi, Janette.’
‘Hi yoursel’, laddie. You’re looking a bit peely-wally. Isn’t he, Alison?’
‘Hi, Alison.’ Kieran blinked at the woman beside Janette. She was elegance personified in wide-legged cream trousers with matching cardigan – cashmere, he thought – and a chocolate-brown silk top. Janette, in contrast, wore a floaty kaftan covered in tropical birds. On anyone else it would look ridiculous. On her? Weirdly magnificent.
‘Thanks for the supplies,’ he said. ‘Sorry, I should have dropped by, but I’ve been busy getting the place in order.’ He tried to keep the door ajar, in case they saw the stacks of boxes in the hallway.
Janette harrumphed. ‘Your mum said you’re a bit of a Harry Hermit. And that you live on toast, beans and enough caffeine to give you the skitters. So we’re taking you to A Bit of Crumpet for the finest pastries and coffee Cranley has to offer. Oh, and this is my partner, Alison.’
Kieran’s brain did a tiny double take atpartner, then settled. Life was complicated, relationships even more so. He wasn’t about to make assumptions.
‘Nice to meet you,’ he said to Alison. She gave him a warm smile in return.
He grabbed his keys, resigned to his fate. At least pastries were preferable to another microwave meal.
They walked into the village, Janette delivering the local gossip with the enthusiasm of a veteran commentator.
‘Ken and Mags who ran The Jekyll and Hyde have taken a wee sabbatical. Mags, bless her, has dementia, and it got too much for Ken. Their son Ed and his girlfriend Angela are running the show now, and a little bird tells me they’ve hired someone new for the food.’
‘Her name’s Beth,’ Alison said quietly.
Janette stopped mid-stride. ‘And how doyouknow that? Have you been keeping secrets from me?’
Kieran’s mind struggled to keep up with the deluge of names. His brain felt like a badly indexed database. But one person hehadmet sprang to mind.
‘I think I bumped into Jinnie,’ he said.
Janette halted, her arm shooting out like a traffic warden. ‘You think? You either did or you didn’t. How, pray tell, did that happen?’
They’d reached the café. Through the window he saw customers chatting, laughing, consuming obscene amounts of pastry. His stomach grumbled. Escape was futile.
‘How did you meet Jinnie?’ Janette demanded again, blocking the entrance like a human barricade.
Kieran resisted the urge to sigh. ‘It wasn’t a meeting. She walked past while I was taking rubbish out. We exchanged about three sentences. Hardly a summit.’
‘Janette, honestly,’ Alison said, nudging her. ‘Leave him alone.’
Inside, the warmth and the smell of buttered pastry hit him like a nostalgic punch to the gut. It reminded him of a café he used to visit with Lisa?—
