When she’d told him about her mother’s recent death, Colin was obviously moved. When he asked why she was moving house so soon after suffering a sudden and traumatic bereavement, and while she was pregnant, too, Courtney had confided in him about her eviction and the new bedsit where she was living temporarily. She’d been reluctant to share this information with him, not wanting to sound like the poverty-stricken long-lost relative who’d come crawling out of the woodwork in search of a handout, but the truth had emerged anyway during their conversations.
Colin had been dismayed when he’d seen the bedsit accommodation where she was living, going there under his ownsteam to drive past the building and get a look at the place. When they next spoke, he’d told her what he thought of the accommodation, the look on his face one of anguish and alarm, and Courtney had to bite her tongue to keep herself from telling him that it was a lot worse inside than outside.
Her living situation wasn’t Colin Austin’s problem to solve. She assured him that once the local council housing officer found somewhere more suitable, she’d move out. The bedsit was just a temporary solution and her time there would soon be behind her.
In the meantime, she was grateful and happy to have found a distant family member and begun the process of building a relationship with her uncle. After the trauma and grief of recent months, it felt good to have someone in her life who she could talk to, and it felt good, too, to connect with a family member she’d never suspected even existed. There was a lot they didn’t know about each other, but she already felt a special bond forming between them, and she was excited about where their uncle-niece relationship might go in the future.
Perhaps, she thought, things were finally looking up in her life?
That’s where things had stood until yesterday morning—Friday—when Courtney woke up at the bedsit to the sounds of someone hammering on her door and then breaking into her room.
Watching in horrified disbelief as the dishevelled, wild-haired man came crashing inside and started grabbing her belongings, and then grabbing atherwhile she lay in bed, counted as the most terrifying thing that had ever happened to her.
The man, a fellow resident with serious mental health issues, had to be dragged away by another man who lived in the next room. Courtney shuddered to think what might have happened but for his quick thinking. Whether the deranged intruder was trying to rob her, or commit a more heinous act, wasn’t immediately clear.
Courtney wasn’t sure she wanted to know either way.
Fear for her unborn child following the shock and panic of being attacked by a madman left her shuddering. The apologetic manager of the accommodation facility gave her refuge in his office and brought her sugary hot tea to settle her nerves. The manager promised the damaged door to her bedsit room would be mended straight away, and he also wanted to send Courtney to hospital for a check-up, given her pregnant condition.
But after some time spent calming herself down in his office, the last thing she wanted to do was sit in A&E for hours waiting to see a doctor. She sensed no problem with her pregnancy following the fright she’d had. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t badly shaken up.
Once she had her wits about her again, she realised the only thing she wanted to do was speak to her Uncle Colin, who she knew would offer the kind words of comfort she desperately needed to hear.
As she dialled his number, she lamented the disastrous start to her day. After working non-stop since her mother’s funeral, she’d finally agreed to her manager’s request that she take some holiday time. Although Courtney had taken some annual leave when her mother died, she still had plenty of days left over and no guarantee she’d be able to take it all in a single block before starting maternity leave. The small company she worked for could only be so flexible when it came to juggling employee needs and scheduling holidays.
So, she’d taken Friday as an annual leave day and had planned to use it to do some shopping for essential baby things. Excited though she’d been by that prospect, her enthusiasm for the plan evaporated in the wake of the morning’s upset. She was still too shaken up to enjoy the shopping trip she’d hoped for.
A brief phone conversation with her Uncle Colin helped soothe her shattered nerves, and when she told him what had happened at the bedsit, he was appalled. Because she felt so comfortable and at ease in his company, she asked if he might have some time spare to meet her for a coffee. Without her mother around to wrap her in a warm embrace, she wanted to turn to the next best thing—the uncle who was quickly coming to mean the world to her.
The moment she suggested meeting for coffee, Colin agreed, telling her he’d drive over to Southampton as soon as he could. Not wanting to put her uncle to any inconvenience, and eager to get away from Southampton for a few hours anyway, Courtney insisted she’d catch the bus and meet him in Hamblehurst. She hadn’t yet visited the little town where he lived and it would be nice to travel there… and away from her endless troubles.
And so began the chain of events that led to her unexpectedly meeting Colin Austin’s family. Unknown to Courtney, Friday was his birthday—his sixtieth birthday, no less—and she hadn’t realised she was dragging him away from the surprise party his wife and daughters had organised.
Baffled by his disappearance from the party, Colin’s wife, Lorraine, and his daughter, Rosie, covertly followed him to the Hamblehurst café where he arranged to meet Courtney, which was where the two women found her unpacking her endless troubles and the events of that morning while Colin comforted her.
The whole story about who she was and how she’d arrived in Colin’s life had come out as the four of them sat in the café.It wasn’t how either Courtney or Colin hoped the introductions would take place, but their hands had been forced. When Courtney learned of the surprise party she’d interrupted and the birthday celebrations she’d upended, she was mortified and furious with herself, not only for ruining her lovely uncle’s special day but also for not keeping the morning’s dramas to herself in the first place.
Yet, despite the upheaval she’d caused, Lorraine Austin and her daughter, Rosie, insisted that Courtney return with them to the party that was still happening back at Rosie’s house on Foxglove Street. Her protests that she didn’t want to intrude fell on deaf ears.
Which was how she found herself on Foxglove Street, in the home of her new cousin, Rosie, and joining in with the family celebrations.
Which was what led to Rosie insisting she spend the weekend with her, rather than return to the Southampton bedsit where she didn’t feel safe.
Courtney had accepted the invitation gratefully, almost tearfully, amazed at her cousin’s generosity and excited at the prospect of spending time with this new family she was lucky enough to have found, just when she needed them most.
And now, because of that whirlwind of unexpected events that followed one after the other, Courtney was lying in bed late on Saturday night in her cousin’s pretty guest room, thinking back on all that had happened over the last few months.
She’d become pregnant and been dumped by her baby’s father.
Her mother had died suddenly, breaking her heart.
She’d been evicted from the only home she’d ever known and forced to live in a grim bedsit where she’d been terrified out of her wits by an unstable resident.
The savings she’d scraped together to prepare for her baby’s arrival had instead been used to pay for her mother’s funeral and to cover the storage fees for all her worldly belongings while she waited to find somewhere else to live.
Her life felt like it was spinning endlessly out of control. No sooner had she got her head around one traumatic upheaval than another arrived to knock her back off her feet once more. She wondered when the drama would come to a halt, and when she would finally get the much needed breathing space she needed in order to get ready for her beautiful baby arriving.
This wasn’t what she thought her life would be like.
