It was only two in the afternoon, but already Laura had jam-packed frenzied activity into every minute of the day. Being too damned busy to think was her master plan and it had got off to a great start: a dawn flight and rush-hour traffic on the motorway had kept her concentrating all the way home. And when she’d found the house empty, she hadn’t tarried there either – wolfing down a ham sandwich as she threw her clothes into the washing machine, she had marched straight back out again, calling Fee from the car. Twenty minutes had been allocated to choosing paints in Homebase and now she was ready to throw herself into some hard labour and pick up her own life where she’d left off. Verbier had never happened.
Laura lifted the enormous paint pots out of Dolly’s boot and staggered haltingly back over the sand towards the hut. She set them down carefully on the new veranda, determined not to create a single dent or chip in the carpenter’s handiwork. He’d done her proud – the rotten shiplap boards had been replaced, new felt put on the roof, a new floor laid and triple-glazed safety glass cut to size for the windows that would hopefully help with insulation. She patted it triumphantly.
Laura had asked Fee to go via the studio to get some clean cups and fresh milk for them both, and when she came back, they’d be set to start; all that remained now was to decorate the inside and out, and furnish the interior.
Laura looked down the beach for her, agitated, not wanting to be still for a second, but there was no sign. She cupped her hands together and breathed hot air into them, scrunching up her toes in her wellies to keep the circulation flowing. The temperature had dropped significantly over the weekend – bizarrely it felt colder here than it had done in Verbier – and storms were heading in from the North Sea. She could see the waves in the distance being whipped up like meringues, and the shore boasted a dirtied white froth on the sand like a moustache.
Laura hopped inside the hut to take shelter, shutting the new half-glazed door behind her and muffling the roar of the sea. The carpenter had fitted a deadbolt on to the door to maximize security, but you still couldn’t leave anything worth more than a biro in here. God only knows what security measures Jack would install when she gave it to him – lasers? Armed patrol?
She crouched down, levered open a paint pot with a butter knife and began to stir fast, a few splatters dotting the new floorboards.
‘Dammit,’ she muttered, smudging them hurriedly with a J-cloth.
‘I’m back!’ a reedy voice called, and Laura jumped up and opened the door. Fee was climbing the steps, her eyes to the ground as she carried a stack of letters wedged beneath her chin and two steaming cups of tea in her hand.
‘What on earth are you doing?’ Laura cried, taking the letters from her.
Fee groaned and stretched out her neck. ‘Ooh, that’s better. I was getting so stiff walking all that way like that. I felt like a swa—’ She faltered and her mouth dropped open as she took in Laura’s new blonde look.
‘I cannot believe you made the tea and walked half a mile with it, Fee!’ Laura said, panicking at her dumbstruck expression and trying desperately to divert her with anger, the best form of defence. ‘I meant for you to get the cups and milk and we’d make it here.’ She pointed towards the shiny red whistling kettle perched expectantly on the new white melamine worktop.
Fee just gaped at her. ‘You went blonde?’
‘Not my idea. Cat and Kitty’s,’ Laura mumbled, smoothing it nervously with her hands. ‘What do you think?’
‘What do I think? You know perfectly well what I think! I’ve been telling you to dye it for years! But what does my opinion matter? Three days with the posh girls and you’re putty in their hands! And talking of your—’ She picked up Laura’s hands and stared at the grey polish. ‘You never paint your nails.’
‘It’s Chanel.’
‘Oh, is it?’ Fee asked, unimpressed. ‘Well, they make your hands look like they’re dead.’ She dropped Laura’s hands disgustedly. ‘I can’t believe . . . I mean, you were gone for three days and you’ve come back looking like a completely different person!’
Laura held her breath. She had felt like a completely different person. Out there.
‘Has Jack seen you yet?’
Laura shook her head. ‘It’s only a wash-in hair colour, Fee. I can always change it back if he doesn’t like it.’ Laura rolled her lips together, trying not to cry. Her emotions were alarmingly close to the surface.
Fee softened, knowing her too well. ‘Well now, don’t be hasty. It looks a lot better, like I always told you it would. I’m just upset you trusted some strangers’ opinions over mine, that’s all.’
‘But they’re not strangers, Fee . . .’ Laura began, before catching sight of Fee’s face.
They fell silent.
‘Anyway, this looks great!’ Fee said, pointedly steering them into safer waters.
Laura nodded. It was a million miles from being a deluxe chalet in Verbier with leather floors and . . . She squeezed her eyes shut. No. ‘Well, when it’s all painted up, it’ll be, uh . . . yes,’ she faltered.
‘You’ll have to put up some hooks for your wetsuits,’ Fee said quietly, crossing to one of the side walls and patting it. The pat marked the spot. ‘And you’ll need a shelf or more hooks for towels.’
‘Yes, and I’ve just bought a basket for shoes and flip-flops. Wellies too in the winter.’
‘Yup. Storage. I like it.’
‘And I thought I’d have a go at making a curtain to pull along under this counter so we don’t have to look at that ugly great gas canister.’ Laura kicked it lightly with her foot. It was a long way from the sushi grill in the chalet.
They stood looking at the tiny, unpainted space together, their half-full cups of tea steaming in the cold air.
‘Jack’s going to love it, Laur. And he’ll be so touched when he hears all the trouble you’ve gone to to make it like this for him,’ she said quietly, looking across at her as though still trying to absorb the transformation. ‘You’ve got a bit of a tan.’
‘Really?’ Laura touched her face, remembering how this time yesterday she’d been flying across the mountains, holding on to Rob for dear life on the back of that skidoo. She still remembered how his muscles had contracted beneath her touch as she held onto him. ‘Wind-burn probably,’ she said, her voice thick. She quickly turned away, crouching down and stirring the paint.
Fee watched her. ‘Is everything all right?’
‘Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?’
‘I dunno. You just seem a bit . . . subdued.’
‘I’m fine.’
She heard Fee inhale deeply. ‘Well, you’re not the only one with stuff going on. Paul and I broke up.’
‘What?’ Laura asked, toppling backwards off her feet and landing on her bottom with a thump, splattering yet more paint on the floor. ‘That’s—’ She stopped herself only just in time from saying ‘great’. ‘That’s a shame. You seemed keen.’
Fee shrugged awkwardly.
‘Was it the incessant Korean?’ Laura asked, trying to raise a smile. But for once it didn’t work and this time it was Fee who turned away. ‘Well, I met a guy in Verbier who’d be perfect for you. His name’s Mark, he’s a ski instructor, and he’s totally drop-dead gorgeous,’ Laura said, doing her best impression of the teenage speak that Fee still used.
‘Oh right,’ Fee said, tapping her foot. ‘Well, I’ll just get the next flight out, then, book a lesson and we can get on with choosing names for our babies.’
Laura rolled her eyes. ‘Don’t be like that. Even Kitty thinks he’s gorgeous, and she’s very circumspect.’
Fee’s eyebrow jogged at the mention of Kitty’s name. ‘Well, if Kitty thinks so . . .’ she said, employing Laura’s trademark sarcasm.
‘Fee! I’m just trying to cheer you up.’
‘’Course you are. Because now you’ve got your new flash friends to run your life for you, we’d better all bow down to them. They know best, right?’
Laura bit her lip in the face of her friend’s jealousy. Suddenly, she didn’t know how she was going to bring up the topic of Cat’s launch party.
‘I care about you and want something more for you, Fee, that’s all. You could live such an interesting life. I don’t want you to just settle like – ’ She stopped.
‘What? Like you, you mean?’
‘I wasn’t going to say that.’
‘Yes you were.’
‘No! You and I both know that Jack’s Mr Perfect. You’re the one always telling me how lucky I am, and I am. I know I am.’
Fee narrowed her eyes. ‘Oh yeah? Then why’s your voice gone all funny?’
‘I’m tired, Fee!’ Laura cried, throwing her hands up in the air. ‘I was up at dawn today.’
‘You weren’t supposed to be. You were supposed to be coming back this evening,’ Fee said calmly, watching her closely.
‘Yes, and I realized I had far too much work to do to lose half a working day to packing and drinking freshly squeezed papaya juice in Switzerland.’ She swallowed hard, wondering what they had all said when they came down to her note on the kitchen table this morning:
Family emergency, so sorry, have to catch first flight. Thank you for a lovely weekend. I’ll never forget it, Laura.
If she was lucky, only Rob would know the real reason she had fled and no one would think any more about it.
‘You’re crying,’ Fee whispered.
‘I’m just tired,’ Laura half said, half sobbed, pressing the heels of her hands to her eyes. ‘I slept badly again last night.’ After two nights of deep, dreamless sleep, she had been punished for it with her usual nightmare, only with three times more menace than usual – a shadow covering her till she was blind and breathless, crushing her until her bones snapped, reasserting itself as the black shroud she must wear at all times. What had seemed so bright, so possible in the sunlight in Verbier had slipped out of reach again: passion, adventure, accomplishment, friendships . . . plain bloody fun – they were never supposed to have been hers. She belonged to the fringes, the shadows.
Fee stared at her strangely ‘Well, this hut’s not going to paint itself,’ she murmured. ‘Come on, let’s put on some music to get us going,’ she said, pulling out her iPod and scrolling through to some Tinie Tempah. She placed it on the windowsill, turned it up so loud that the panes vibrated, and the two of them immersed themselves in the job in hand, both grateful not to have to talk any more. For the first time in their friendship, a problem shared was a problem doubled.
They let themselves into the studio four hours later, speckled with paint like mistle thrushes, arms aching.
‘Aahhh!’ Laura sighed as Fee flopped dramatically on the sofa. ‘That was harder than it looked. I can’t believe we still haven’t finished it.’
She stopped in the middle of the room as she clocked the miles of warm-white fairy lights Fee had stapled around the vast windows over the weekend. The studio twinkled like a fairy’s grotto and Laura clapped her hands delightedly. ‘Wow! This looks great, Fee! Very festive. Maybe we should have Christmas in here.’ She noticed a tiny potted Christmas tree on the small table near the wood-burning stove. ‘Fee?’
Fee had been unusually quiet all afternoon. Once they’d got going, Laura had done most of the talking, but they were significantly down on their usual quota of words per minute and she sensed Fee was taking the break-up with Paul harder than she would admit – or at least admit to Laura.
‘Huh? What?’
‘Tea?’ Laura asked, walking straight over to her bench.
‘Love one,’ Fee replied quietly.
‘I meant, would you make one, you daft nana,’ Laura chuckled, trying to josh her along. ‘I’ve got work to get on with. I’ve chosen the charms from the interviews this weekend. Just got to . . . oh, make them now. Seven charms in ten days, and I’ve still got two interviews remaining.’ She shook her head. ‘Honestly, I must have been mad taking all this on.’
‘Well, think of it this way – you’re giving Jack his dream for Christmas, and you got a free holiday out of it,’ Fee replied flatly.
Laura kept her eyes down and her back turned as she arranged her tools in descending size on the bench. She couldn’t help but feel she had lost more than she had gained on that holiday. Yes, she had given herself a ‘lost weekend’ – fifty hours out of her own life to indulge in her every desire (and how!) – but it had come at too high a price. She’d been naïve to think she could take it. From the moment she’d stolen away at dawn this morning, she’d felt like she was rolling in glass, every achingly familiar step through her own life today making her heart contract sharply. She’d been robbed of the peace of mind that had made her life here bearable before.
She pressed the answerphone button, irritated by the flashing red light.
‘Hello . . . this is a message for – muffled cough – Laura Cunningham. This is Olive Tremayne speaking . . . I . . . I would like to invite you to the house for the interview on Wednesday, one o’clock . . . Don’t call back. I’ll assume you’re coming unless I hear to the contrary. Goodbye.’
Laura listened to the recording twice. The woman’s voice was clipped and incredibly strained. What had Rob said to her to force this change of heart? She closed her eyes, feeling her nerves rising already.
She pressed for the next message.
‘Hello? Anyone there?’ Laura instinctively smiled at the sound of Kitty’s voice. ‘It’s me, Kit. Just checking in on you, hoping everything’s all right with your family emergency.’ Laura shut her eyes, knowing Fee was already frowning at her. ‘All’s well here. I got back two hours ago and had to go straight into lopping trees in the orchard. Back to reality, huh?’ An image of Kitty swinging from a harness with a power tool in one hand made Laura burst out laughing, prompting further furrowed brows from Fee. ‘Anyway, I just wanted to say, please do pop in whenever you’re in the area next. Verbier was such fun! Missing you already, sweets. Byeee.’
‘She’s pally,’ Fee said coolly, sitting up on the sofa.
‘Yes, I guess so.’
‘You need to be careful, Laura.’
‘Why?’
‘“Be friendly, not familiar” – that’s what my grandpa always used to say. Wise words too. They’re only clients, remember.’
Laura looked over at her. ‘You sound jealous, Fee.’
‘I’m not jealous.’
‘No?’ Laura arched an eyebrow.
Fee shot Laura her most innocent look and a short silence passed between them. Things had been changing recently, Laura could feel it. Other people were coming between them – first Paul, now Kitty and the others, breaking the seal on their cosy little vacuum. There seemed to be an almost constant undercurrent of tension in their conversations.
‘So, tea was it, m’lady?’ Fee asked, hoisting herself up off the sofa with a pained expression.
‘Don’t worry, I’ll do it,’ Laura sighed, crossing the room.
‘Have you spoken to Jack since you got home?’ Fee asked, watching her.
‘No. But that’s a good point. I’d better try him again. There’s no reception on the beach. I’ll call him now.’
‘Oh, leave it – let’s have our tea first.’
‘I should just let him know I’m back.’
‘He can wait a bit longer. You’re always going off after talking to him. He’ll tell you he’s already home making some romantic supper and I won’t get my cup of tea. And then what’ll I do?’
‘Make it yourself?’ Laura smiled, relieved to see some of Fee’s usual dramatics return.
‘Meh!’ Fee said, swiping the suggestion away and falling back on the sofa.
Laura rolled her eyes as she walked over to the kitchenette, catching sight of her reflection in the bathroom mirror. She looked noticeably younger and healthier. More vital. She stopped and stared at her new image, trying to see herself as Jack would see her tonight. Would he like it? What would he say? What would she? Would he see the other changes in her too?
She gave a small resolute nod to her own reflection, like an officer to his sergeant. It was only a hair colour. It didn’t mean anything. She was still Jack’s girl, the girl he chose to love – in spite of all her meekness and small-mindedness and sarcasm. She blinked hard, banishing Rob’s harsh words from her mind. That was already the past. Unreal. She was home now and back on a safe path once more, no net required.