The journey from the center of Bristol back to Henbury at two in the morning normally took ten minutes. This time the trip was punctuated with a whole series of stops and starts.
It’s worse than musical bloody chairs, thought Poppy, willing herself not to scream as Jen, spotting a still-open burger joint, begged the driver to pull up outside. Susie had already sent him on a convoluted tour of local cash dispensers in search of one that worked. If Dina announced that she needed to find yet another public loo, Poppy knew she would have a complete nervous breakdown. At this rate, it would be four o’clock before they even arrived home.
But they made it, finally. Dina, with her stressed bladder, was dropped off first. Then Susie, then Jen. Kissing each of them good-bye in turn, Poppy wondered how they would react if they knew what was racing through her mind. Jen was Rob’s cousin, Dina his sister-in-law. Only an hour or so ago Susie had confided tipsily, ‘If I could meet and marry someone even half as nice as your Rob I’d be so happy.’
‘Edgerton Close is it, love?’ asked the taxi driver over his shoulder when only Poppy was left in the car.
Poppy looked at her watch for the fiftieth time. Quarter to three. She took a deep breath.
‘Delgado’s, Milton Street. Opposite the university. Hurry, please.’
***
Delgado’s was a trendy post-nightclub hangout popular with students and diehard clubbers alike. Poppy, who had visited it a few times in the past, knew its atmosphere to be far more of a draw than the food.
But with its white painted exterior and glossy dark blue shutters it certainly looked the part. On a night like tonight, Poppy knew it would be even busier than usual, packed with people showing off their tans, making the most of the perfect weather while it lasted and pretending they weren’t in Bristol but in the south of France.
As her taxi drew up outside Poppy wondered just how stupid she would feel if she went inside and he wasn’t there. She looked again at her watch. One minute to three.
Then she saw him, sitting alone at one of the sought-after tables in the window. He was lounging back on his chair idly stirring sugar into an espresso and smoking a cigarette.
Poppy’s pulse began to race. Twelve hours from now she was due to walk down the aisle of St Mary’s church on her father’s arm. Twelve and a bit hours from now she would become Poppy McBride, wife of Robert and mother—in due course—to three, maybe four little McBrides. It was all planned, right down to the middle names and the color of the wallpaper in the nursery. Rob was a great one for thinking ahead.
‘Here, love?’ The taxi driver was showing signs of restlessness. When Poppy still didn’t move he lit up a cigar and exhaled heavily, making smoke ricochet off the windscreen and into the back of the cab. This usually did the trick.
Poppy didn’t even notice. She saw Tom look at his own watch then gaze out of the window. She knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that if she stepped out of the taxi now her life would be changed drastically and forever.
The taxi driver shifted round in his seat to look at her. ‘Don’t tell me you’re dozing off back there.’
Hardly. Poppy, awash with adrenaline, wondered if she would ever sleep again. Her fingers crept towards the door handle.
‘Look, love,’ began the driver, ‘we can’t—’
‘Edgerton Close.’ Poppy blurted the words out, clenching her fists at her side and willing herself not to leap out of the cab. ‘Please.’
‘You mean back to Henbury?’ The driver stared at her in disbelief. ‘Are you sure about this?’
‘No, but do it anyway.’ She turned her face away from Delgado’s and held her breath until the taxi reached the far end of Milton Street. It was no good; she couldn’t go through with it.
The bad news was, she didn’t think she could go through with the wedding either.
Since sleep was out of the question Poppy didn’t even bother climbing into bed. Instead, making herself cup after cup of tea and pacing the moonlit back garden as she drank them, she went over in her mind what had happened so far. And, nerve-rackingly, what had to be done next.
By six o’clock, the sun was blazing down out of a flawless duck-egg blue sky and upstairs Poppy heard her father begin to stir. She showered, pulled a comb ruthlessly through her tangled hair, cleaned her teeth, and threw on a white tee-shirt and jeans. Then she tapped on his bedroom door.
‘Dad? I’ve made you a cup of tea.’
Since the death of Laura Dunbar ten years ago there had been no other woman in her father’s life. Poppy had missed her mother desperately following the nightmarish accident when an out-of-control lorry had careered down Henbury Hill smashing into Laura and killing her outright. Her mother had been fun-loving, vivacious, and openly affectionate. She had also doted on Poppy, her much-loved only child.
In the first unbearable months following the accident, Poppy had secretly wondered why the lorry couldn’t have suffered brake failure in front of her father instead. It was shameful to even think it, but at twelve years old, you couldn’t always control your thoughts. And it would have been so much easier to lose the withdrawn, humorless, silent parent who didn’t even seem to like her that much anyway.
But it hadn’t happened that way. Laura had been the one to die and Mervyn Dunbar had never made any attempts to replace her. Gradually, Poppy had grown used to the fact that from now on there would be just the two of them. Poppy had made heroic attempts to learn to cook. A cleaning woman came in twice a week to keep the place hygienic.
Despite Poppy’s best efforts, her father had continued to treat her as more of a stranger in the house than a daughter. In turn, she had taken to going out a great deal. He was her father but Poppy wasn’t sure she loved him. It was hard to love someone who so plainly didn’t love you back.
Now, having knocked on his bedroom door, she waited downstairs in the kitchen. Ten minutes later he appeared, fully dressed, in the doorway.
‘Dad, I can’t do it. I’m going to have to call the wedding off.’
Poppy watched him heave a sigh before reaching slowly for his cup of tea. When he had taken the first sip he would pull a face. She knew this because it was what he always did when she had made the tea.
‘Why?’ her father said at last when he had swallowed and grimaced. ‘What’s he done wrong?’
‘Nothing. Rob hasn’t done anything wrong.’ Poppy pushed her fingers through her wet hair, wincing as a strand of it caught up in her engagement ring. The small diamond twinkled in the sunlight. She would have to give it back. ‘It’s me. I just can’t go through with it.’
‘And it’s taken you until now to realize this?’
‘I know, I know.’
‘Do you enjoy it?’ her father said bitterly. ‘Causing trouble?’
She stared at him, appalled. ‘Of course I don’t!’
‘You’ve always caused trouble.’
‘I have not,’ Poppy almost shouted, outraged by the lie. If there was one thing she’d never been, it was a troublemaker.
‘You’re like your mother.’ Mervyn Dunbar’s voice dropped to a hoarse undertone. With her red-gold hair pushed away from her forehead like that, Poppy so resembled her mother it was unnerving. And she was twenty-two now; the same age Laura had been when he had first met her.
How he had loved Laura, he thought wearily. And how she had hurt him in return.
‘What do you mean?’ Poppy began to feel sick. She had never heard him say anything like this before. Her mother wasn’t a subject he had ever seemed to want to discuss.
Mervyn Dunbar finished drinking his tea. ‘Nothing. I’m just saying you like a bit of drama, that’s all. So what happens after you’ve called the wedding off? Have you thought about that?’
‘Not really—’
‘And where will you live? Or,’ said Mervyn heavily, ‘does this mean you’ll be staying on here?’
It was ironic, thought Poppy, that she should ever have worried about having to leave her father to fend for himself. Not normally slow, it had taken her until now to realize he would actually prefer her out of his way.
‘It’s all right, I’ll move out.’ She spoke jerkily, not having had time yet to think things through. ‘I don’t know where. Maybe out of Bristol. At least that way I won’t keep bumping into Rob and his family. And all his friends—’
Poppy jumped as out in the hall the newspaper clattered through the letter box. She looked up at the clock on the kitchen wall. Ten to seven. Oh dear, she’d better get a move on. Poor Rob. He wasn’t going to be very pleased.