An Autumn Crush (30 page)

‘Do you remember what I said last night?’ Steve asked eventually.

‘Yes,’ said Juliet, the word more a breath than a voice.

‘Oh hell, I wish you hadn’t said that,’ groaned Steve.

Floz was awoken by crashes in the lounge. She flew out of her room expecting to see the world’s most unsubtle burglar, but instead she found Steve cowering behind the
sofa and Juliet missiling shoes at him.

‘Bastard!’ she was screaming.

‘Juliet, will you listen to me!’ Steve was bobbing his head up to try and explain and then escaping down to a position of safety as Juliet lobbed a court shoe in his direction.

‘What the heck is going on?’ cried Floz.

‘I’m so sorry for waking you, Floz, but this . . . this
swine
proposed to me and then took it back.’

‘Ow,’ said Steve as a large red Croc scored a bull’s-eye on his crown. ‘Floz, stop her. Just let me talk to you, Ju. I
didn’t
take it back. Juliet, give me
ten seconds of ceasefire!’

But Juliet was in no mood to listen and launched a boot grenade at him. ‘You’re not husband material anyway. I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last—’

Floz threw herself at Juliet as she picked up a five-inch stiletto.

‘Whoa!’ she screamed. ‘You’ll kill him!’

‘Good,’ snapped Juliet.

‘Ju, please, listen,’ said Steve, holding up a white tissue of surrender.

‘Stop before you hurt the baby,’ Floz insisted, not letting Juliet’s arms go. Juliet was huffing from her exertions but Floz’s words sank in. Yes, her baby was hearing
this; she needed to calm down.

‘You’ve got ten seconds, knobhead,’ said Juliet, mouthing the last word so that her baby didn’t hear it.

Steve’s head and shoulders dared to pop up.

‘I didn’t want you to remember that I’d proposed . . .’ He saw Juliet’s lip curl back over her teeth again so he continued quickly, ‘Because I shouldn’t
have done it in a bloody fish and chip shop. I hoped you’d have forgotten ONLY so I could have taken you out somewhere nice today and done it properly, by a river or over a glass of
champagne, on bended knee and holding a ring out – not in front of a woman asking us if we wanted salt and vinegar on our frigging cod!’

Juliet swallowed. ‘Oh,’ was all she managed to answer.

‘That’s what I meant,’ said Steve. He stood up as Juliet’s grip on the shoe loosened and it fell from her hand.

‘Well?’ said Floz, arms folded. ‘The man deserves an apology.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Juliet. She felt her insides turn to mush. She’d read about men who exhibited this level of tenderness in works of fiction, but never thought she would
have been the recipient of it herself. She felt humbled yet again by Steve’s respectful and loving ways.

‘Juliet, I know we’ve only just started going out together but we’ve known each other all our lives. I want the baby to be born to Mr and Mrs Feast . . .’

‘Oh, Steve.’

‘And if it doesn’t work out, divorce is easy enough these—’

Floz held up her hand. ‘Shhh! Quit whilst you’re ahead, Steven.’

Steve took Floz’s advice and didn’t finish his sentence but started a fresh one. ‘I just want to marry you, Ju. And I want to marry you soon.’

‘I don’t need champagne or fancy settings, Steve. This will do very nicely, thank you,’ said Juliet, who couldn’t imagine that the addition of a bottle of fizz or a big
moon outside the window could make her feel any more gooey and melted inside than she did at that moment.

Steve held his arms out and Juliet drifted into them.

‘We’ll go ring picking after work, okay with you?’

Floz grabbed her coat and brolly and left the flat to give them some privacy. Her brain felt crowded and at bursting-point. The clouds were heavy and grey but the breeze was too high to raise
her umbrella. It didn’t matter. She wanted the rising wind to blow through her and drag away all her thoughts – every single one of them. A brisk autumn walk in the rain was exactly
what she needed.

Guy was determined to get it right this time. This celebratory feast the night after the official engagement – i.e. not the one in the chip shop – was going to
knock everyone’s socks off, especially Floz’s. His mum and dad’s kitchen floor almost needed reinforcing from the amount of food he was going to cook that evening. He would make
the Queen’s Christmas dinner look like a McDonald’s Happy Meal.

Perry and Grainne were still in a state of rapture with a grandchild on the way
and
the news that morning that Juliet and Steve were getting married on her birthday – 5 November.
They did worry that it was all a bit fast, but then reminded themselves that they had met and married within four months. The local vicar at Maltstone, the Reverend Glossop – otherwise known
as the Reverend Gossip for his propensity to chatter quite a lot – had a cancellation on that day. It was either that or 4 March, and seeing that was the anniversary of Juliet’s first
wedding – well, that was a bit of a no-no. Everyone agreed that as a wedding date, as well as a birth date, Bonfire Night seemed to suit Juliet down to the ground.

Guy had rung Juliet to ascertain whether Floz had any food allergies other than strawberries, because he wasn’t going to take any chances. Luckily, she hadn’t. He was doing his
speciality sea-bass for starter, a feast of various meats for mains and a trio of chocolate desserts for pudding. He was going to tickle every one of her senses with this menu. He would seduce her
with food: she would be putty in his hands.

Floz sat alone in the flat, finding it hard to concentrate on that day’s brief – ‘Congratulations On Your Pregnancy’ verse. She looked at the visual
images that Lee Status had emailed over for her to match with the copy. The graphic designer had created some stunning pictures of beatific women with big rounded tums. Floz thought of Juliet
growing bigger by the day, how her stomach would push proudly against her clothes, how her walk would alter, how she would rest her hand on her abdomen and feel the baby flutter inside her. She
pictured Juliet and Steve lying on the bed, and being fascinated as they watched her tummy shift as the baby rolled within, wriggling to get comfortable. She thought of Juliet asleep in a rocking
chair, lulling the baby to sleep with her calm, soft breathing. She would look beautiful.

But Floz sent an email to Lee Status and lied that she had a stomach bug and wouldn’t be able to do the brief. Then she curled up on her bed and tried to make her mind go blank so she
could sleep, but gave it up after nearly an hour.

She got up hearing the alert that she had email. Chas Hanson had sent her a message. Had it been in an envelope, she would have ripped it open.

Floz read the mail over and over again. She didn’t know if that was true; some grief lodged in your heart and never lost its hard edge – you
just learned to co-exist. Still, it was a kind thought to send, to try and comfort her. It was like something Nick would have said.

Steve was first to arrive at the Millers’ house. He had just picked up his new car. In light of the circumstances, he had traded in his Volvo for a seven-seater
people-carrier with a massive boot, comfy seats and a zillion safety features: the perfect family car. He drove it off the forecourt imagining baby car seats in the back and Juliet with a ring on
her finger sitting next to him, and probably instructing him how to drive properly. It was a much bigger turbo thrill than he could ever have got from a four-litre fuel-injected engine.

Coco arrived next, by taxi, making an extravagant and kissy entrance and marvelling over Juliet’s solitaire diamond engagement ring. He was alone because apparently Gideon was far too shy
to meet everyone at once in a big gathering.

‘Are you sure he even exists?’ Steve teased him. ‘No one has seen him yet.’

‘Look.’ Coco fumbled with his mobile phone for a moment then thrust it under Steve’s nose. ‘Here is a picture of us taken together.’ The image was blurred and dark
though. All Steve could tell was that it was two male heads together.

‘That could be anyone,’ he objected.

‘Well, it isn’t. It’s Gideon and me, so there,’ said Coco huffily.

‘Champagne, Raymond?’ asked Grainne, proffering a long flute of pink fizz.

‘If I must.’ Coco sighed dramatically. There were only three people whom he still allowed to call him Raymond to his face: the Millers and his grandma. Mind you, his granny was a bit
senile now and more often than not called him Brenda.

‘SHIT!’ The exclamation from the kitchen accompanied a clatter of pans falling on the floor.

‘Everything all right in the galley?’ called Perry, shivering with delight as the champagne made a glacial trail down the inside of his throat.

‘Fine, Dad,’ replied Guy, convincing no one.

‘Want me to help you, dear?’ asked Grainne.

‘No, no, no,’ everyone cried in protest.

Someone rang the doorbell and Guy’s heart leaped up into his mouth. It had to be Floz and Juliet arriving. Guy made a quick check of himself in the small mirror that hung on the kitchen
wall. Then he went out to say, ‘Hi’ – except there was no Floz, just his sister.

‘Isn’t Floz coming?’ he barked nervously.

‘She’s parking the car,’ said Juliet. ‘We’re going to leave it here and pick it up tomorrow. Oh hello, Juliet, nice to see you, Juliet!’ she added
sarcastically.

‘Nice to see you, Juliet,’ said Guy on a great big exhalation of breath before going back into the kitchen.

‘What’s up with him?’ Juliet asked Steve, thumbing at her brother’s disappearing back.

‘You know what he’s like when he’s cooking – a perfectionist.’

‘Why did he say Floz’s name so aggressively? Doesn’t he want her here?’

‘Don’t be daft.’ Steve laughed a little nervously because he didn’t want to spill Guy’s secret. Especially not to Juliet with her big gob.

But Juliet picked up from that tinny laugh that Steve knew a little more than he was letting on. Maybe Floz was right, after all, and her brother didn’t like her that much. How odd.

Floz parked the car almost absently. Chas’s last mail was circling her brain like a hungry buzzard.
Grief loses its hard edge after a time
. . . She didn’t know why she was
mentally chewing on his words. She just hoped her brain would work out what it was doing and spit out the answer to her.

She straightened her dress, a jade-green one with a belted waist. It picked out the green in her eyes and made the colour of her hair like bonfire flames by comparison. She rang the doorbell,
the words of that last email from Chas still playing like a stuck record.

Guy heard Floz arrive. He bobbed his head out of the kitchen to see her there dressed in green, her hair in soft curls around her shoulders. He raised a giant arm, said, ‘Hi,’ and
retreated back into the kitchen before Floz could return the gesture.

Now Juliet could see exactly what Floz meant. He couldn’t have given Floz a shorter greeting if he’d tried. Well, that wouldn’t do. She would mend that bridge if it killed her.
She couldn’t have her friend and her brother out of sorts with each other.

Coco made up for Guy’s coldness. He bounced over to give Floz a big hug and passed her on for hello kisses to the rest of the Miller family and Steve.

‘Wonder how Piers is going to take the news of your impending change of circumstance?’ said Steve, nudging his champagne flute into Juliet’s glass of Eisberg.

‘I wonder,’ she said. She did not add that Piers, presently in London, had sent her a flurry of texts begging her to go out on a second date with him, and that she had replied that
she had been swept off her feet and proposed to – quite unexpectedly – by ‘an old flame relighted’ as she put it. She didn’t mention the pregnancy, that was perhaps
one detail too cruel to give to a man so obviously enamoured. And, also, best mentioned later on, formally, when discussing her maternity leave.

She giggled to herself, thinking that she had turned down Piers Winstanley-Black for Steve. She took a sly look at him whilst he was laughing with her dad and Coco.
How could I ever have
thought he was a knob?
He was so tall and big and solid and handsome, and his hand kept brushing her arm as if he liked the feeling of being constantly in touch with her. It was
knicker-meltingly romantic. She hadn’t felt as runny inside for any man – ever. Not even Roger in the beginning, when he made her sigh a lot with his corny lines snatched straight from
crap B films – though at the time they sounded macho and fabulous.

‘How’s the . . . er . . . courting going, Raymond?’ asked Perry, who was trying to be part of the twenty-first century but still found it a little odd to ask one man how he was
romancing another one.

‘Oh, Perry, I’ve found my soul-mate. We’ll be like you and Grainne one day.’

‘What about you, Floz?’ asked Grainne. ‘Have you found yourself a nice young man to settle down with?’

All eyes turned to Floz. Even in the kitchen Guy downed tools to cock his ear.

I did and I lost him and he came back and he died.

Floz swallowed hard and a glassy cast swelled in her eyes. Her discomfort was evident to all. Juliet leaped in to rescue her.

‘God, how embarrassing are parents? Let’s all sit at the table and await the food,’ she said, giving her mum a disapproving look.

Steve and Coco and Juliet exchanged knowing glances. Juliet was now 100 per cent convinced that Floz was having some secret man trouble. And she made up her mind to find out once and for all
what was going on in Floz’s life that was making her so depressed. Guy returned to plating up the sea-bass, wondering why Floz hadn’t answered the question and why everyone had hurried
to sit down. It would have been easy enough to say, ‘No, not yet.’ So why hadn’t she?