Christmas at The Heartbreak Cafe (Lakeview Christmas Novel) (Lakeview Contemporary Romance Book 7) (5 page)

“
I
’ve been laid off
.”

Heidi stared at Paul across the kitchen table. “What do you mean you got laid off? When? Is this a joke, like that thing with the credit card? If it is, it isn’t very funny, and I do not appreciate being teased.”

Her husband just stared at his plate in silence. “Oh Paul," she lamented, trying to think back to anything that could have pointed to this coming. Was it the regional manager’s visit that he had obsessed about? Maybe it was the closures of other branches throughout the city. Paul had talked constantly about how all these huge changes in the banking industry following the credit crash would eventually mean lay-offs and redundancies.

“They just didn't need me anymore," he said stoically. "I don't think there was anything I could have done or said.” He seemed resolved but uncharacteristically quiet. She barely recognised the man who was so often full of life and laughter.

“How could they not need you? You’re an area manager. You’ve been at that bank since you were twenty-one. This is ridiculous, Paul. It really is.”

“There’s more.” His voice lowered and his head still pointed downward as he avoided eye contact with her. He reminded Heidi of a scolded dog, or one who knew that he was about to get in trouble. “We’re in a lot of debt.”

“We will just have to find you a new job of course,” she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken. “Our savings will hold us over until you find another, better paying position.” Her voice changed to optimism. She needed to believe it, for her own sake.

“That’s the thing Heidi, there are no savings. We used our savings money to buy all the rental properties, but it seems I leveraged them too high to make all the repayments and … bottom line is the bank is repossessing everything.” He met her gaze. “And I mean everything.”

“Repossessing what? The rental properties?” His silence led her to a stark realisation. “The house, this house? No, Paul! Not our home! Amelia has lived here since birth. We have raised her here. We have made a home here. I will not part with this place.”

“Honey, I’m sorry. I really am. But I have been looking at the numbers for a while now, and if we want to hold onto this place, we have to make serious cuts — and fast. Miriam has to go. The renovations are off. We’re going to have to think about selling a car or two in the meantime just to make the next repayment. I’ve been trying to keep things going for as long as I could by using rental income from the investment properties to pay off this place, but with the layoff …I’m not sure what to do now.”

“You can't be serious!” She panicked. This house was her crowning glory. It was everything she had ever wanted. Now that, along with their entire lives, was under threat. And all the rental properties in the village, their hometown to be repossessed? She couldn’t stand it.

“Listen," he said tentatively, "one of my old golfing buddies has been interested in this place for years. When I was let go, he approached me and asked me about it again. Maybe we should consider selling. The equity would hold us over for a while at least.”

“Paul, no, please! Think of Amelia. We cannot do this to her. We cannot do this to
us
. We have to make things work without selling the house.” She pleaded with him, her voice breaking as tears pooled in her eyes.

“Like I said, I’ve tried everything and there is nothing else we can do. We’re behind on all the rentals and if we can’t make the mortgage repayment, which we won’t be able to with none of us working, the house will eventually have to be sold anyway. We have to let Miriam go straight away too. If we don’t get a handle on things soon, we will not be able to stay on top of our bills for much more than two or three weeks with my redundancy package.” His voice was firm. This was it. He needed to tell Heidi that. He needed to make her know that this was the only way.

“I just don’t understand.” As she sat, wordless in their beautiful kitchen, her husband gently kissed the top of her forehead, brushed the hair out of her face, and turned to leave.

“I know you don’t." His resolve melted into what Heidi could only describe as guilt. It looked like it was overwhelming him. "I am sorry that I cannot make this perfect for you sweetheart. All that I have ever wanted was to give you and Amelia the world, and I have failed you. I am never going to stop being sorry about this. But you have to know that if there was any other way, I would have found it. It just … is what it is.”

“Okay." Her voice quivered as she struggled to find an answer for his world-rocking confession. But Heidi really had no other words for him. She had no way to express the feelings she had without making it worse for him. This was going to have to be her battle. It would be too much to make Paul feel more guilt he didn’t deserve.

With her one worded response, she was alone.

Paul quietly left for his study, closing the grand french doors behind him. She listened to his soft and slow footsteps as he walked to his leather lounge chair, a chair that had belonged to his father years before. He turned on the room’s 40 inch flatscreen television, lowered the volume, and faded into the background.

Upstairs, Amelia was already in bed asleep. The long day of creche and then play with the nanny had worn her out, and she quickly fell asleep soon after Paul had come home from work. For the first time since her daughter was born, Heidi was grateful for the silence. While she had spent every moment thankful for the laughter, the shrieks, the cries, and even the occasional tantrum, having this moment alone to process everything was a gift.

Heidi got up to clear her and Paul’s plates and dishes. As she passed the patio doors, the view of her back garden came into view. All those past barbecue and garden party memories, with Paul on the grill, Amelia in her arms, and friends and family gathered around her came flooding back like a cruel joke.

This was not the time to be nostalgic or attached, Heidi decided. This was her reality. This was her life. She had to accept it one way or another. Paul knew what he was talking about, and if he said the house might have to be sold, then it might have to be sold. There was no use trying to solve it.

The helplessness broke her down. It crumbled her heart and dulled her mind. She went about housework mindlessly. She picked up Amelia’s toys from the living room, cleaned the kitchen countertops, and tried to hum along to a song on her radio as she prepared her clothing and accessories for tomorrow.

Tomorrow
, she told herself, channeling Scarlett O’Hara, one of her favourite movie heroines,
I will awake from this nightmare. I just have to get through tonight. Tomorrow will be better and brighter. Tomorrow will be all right.

W
hen Heidi awoke
at six the following morning, Paul was already gone. It was a familiar sight. She rarely woke up to him still being home unless it was a rare day off or he was sick. He had always strived to be first in the office long before his subordinates arrived.

His absence when she awoke gave Heidi a bit of a jolt.
Maybe last night really
didn’t
happen
, she thought to herself. She sprang out of bed, grabbed her robe, and headed to the bathroom in hopes of starting her day on the right foot.

When she came out and began to get dressed, the familiar voice of her husband coming from the hallway creeped in through the half open door. “I am so sorry Miriam. We never wanted this to happen. We never even saw it coming.”

“I understand, Paul. I really do.”

“As soon as we can hire you back, we will. We just don’t know when that will be.”

“I will really miss Amelia.” Heidi could hear Miriam fighting back a sob as she said her charge’s name out loud.

“Please feel free to stay in the house as long as you need to.”
Or at least for as long as we’re allowed to keep it
, Heidi thought mournfully.

“That’s not necessary but thank you. I can stay with my sister until I find myself another placement. Would you be comfortable with writing me a recommendation?”

“Certainly. If there is anything else you need, just let Heidi or I know.”

“How is she doing? Is she taking the news okay?” Heidi yearned to run down the stairs and hug Miriam. How lovely that instead of focusing on her ending job, she seemed to genuinely care about how Heidi was handling the big news. She wished she had appreciated her more.

“Not well, I’m afraid.” Paul’s voice had become a whisper as if he suspected Heidi could hear him. “She cried in her sleep last night. I knew it was going to be tough, but I could never imagine it would break her this much.”

“I am sure she will recover soon. Heidi is strong-willed but always manages to land on her feet. Don’t count her out.”

“Thanks, Miriam. Again, if you need anything…” his voiced trailed off as they moved from the downstairs living room into a different part of the house.

Reality again hit her like a ton of bricks. This was her new life. No nanny. No cleaner. No manicures. No trips to Dublin to high-end stores. Heidi made a mental list of everything she would need to get done immediately from cancelling her next hair appointment to rescheduling the Lakeview Mum’s Club meeting. She would also have to return the Christmas gifts she had purchased—the watch and ties for Paul and the endless amount of clothing and toys for Amelia. And all of her new clothes of course, including the beautiful Dolce & Gabbana dress she’d planned to wear at the café Christmas party.

The thought of Christmas without gifts or maybe even a home rattled her to the core. Being bankrupt was not how she had envisioned it. Luckily, Amelia would still be young enough to forget this Christmas. Years from now she wouldn’t remember the lack of a tree or the missing presents. She would forget about the un-RSVP’d parties.

Ella’s party came again to Heidi’s mind. Amidst all this new stress, she had forgotten about her lies to the other mothers about her hosting it and her meetings with Ella where she had discussed decorative choices and how everything would be staged. All of that seemed like a million years ago now.

But suddenly, it dawned on her: Paul had been talking about the rental properties being repossessed. One of those properties was the very building in which the café was leased. The thought racing through her mind, Heidi hurtled down the stairs and into her husband’s study. He sat at his imposing, wooden desk looking over his stacks of paperwork. As she entered, he barely looked up at her or acknowledged her presence. “Paul!" she cried breathlessly. "Are you closing down the café?”

“What? What are you talking about?” He studied her quizzically. She had never asked about his business in the past and rarely showed interest in the properties he picked up or the stocks he chose, other than to boast about them of course.

“The properties the bank want to take. Is one of them The Heartbreak Café?"

"The
what
?" he asked, still wildly confused.

“You know, Ella’s place,” she clarified. “Is it part of the repossession order?"

Paul looked down at his paperwork and shuffled through a pile. At the bottom of the stack, he pulled out a cream coloured, official looking envelope and handed it to her.

“Yes, Heidi. The café building is being repossessed. I’m sorry.”

T
he days
after receiving the eviction notice were the hardest ever for Ella.

In the midst of attempting to plan the party with little help from a now absent Heidi, she also had to mourn the loss of her business privately. She could not bare to break the bad news to her staff, all of whom were depending on her to get them through the expensive Christmas period. She would have to keep the news to herself until she could find an appropriate moment to tell the others.

So Ella made a plan. While her staff discussed prepared the menus for the Christmas party and served their regular customers, Ella continued to plant the idea that she was nearing retirement. That way, she would feel less of a failure and more like this time was coming anyway. She had hoped the idea of retirement would be a softer blow than forceful closure. At least it was then in her power and not at the hands of some banker.

It started with an innocent lie to Colm as they started the baking of hundreds of snowman shaped shortbread cookies that would be offered at the party.

“I'll tell you one thing: I will not miss
this,
” she commented.

“Miss what?” Colm didn’t even look up from his work.

“Ah, you know," she said, pointing towards the ovens. "The hassle of baking the same thing over and over again, day after day. When I retire, I plan on having others bake me goodies.” She attempted to make herself sound exasperated at the thought.

In truth, she loved the process. She relished in combining ingredients, preheating the oven, the scent of slowly baking food, and the occasional taste of fresh batter. It reminded her of her first days in the old kitchen with her father-in-law in charge of teaching her the ins and outs of bakery goods. It reminded her of her husband and his insistence that he try the first of everything she baked.

As hard as it was for her to lie to her staff, it was even harder to talk to some of her favourite customers. One by one, she would casually mention it. It started with her friend Ita who was a notorious gossip. She knew that if Ita caught on to her retirement, the rest of the town would be in talks of it for the rest of the week.

“Ita,” she’d casually interjected as she poured her another cup of coffee, “Do you know of anyone around here who works with people in finding post-retirement activities?”

“Here in Lakeview?” Ita’s wheels were slowly churning, Ella could tell by the gleam in her eye and the annoying urgency in her voice. “Other than golfing, I doubt it. The way we treat our senior citizens these da—”

“No I’m not interested in golf. Maybe volunteering or something like that. In any case I need to do something to entertain myself once I finish up here.”

“I suppose so…” Ita was looking at her, the wheels in her head slowly turning and her voice now had a shake as if she was given a secret key. No doubt she was making a mental note of who in the town to break the news first.

As Ita left in her haste, Ella realised that this was the beginning of the end. This was how her “retirement” started. That word stung the more and more she thought of it. Her father-in-law would have never retired. Her husband would have put his foot down at the thought. She attempted to cough back the disappointment and anger at herself. But this was her only option, wasn’t it?

C
ome noon
, the café had emptied. The place was uncharacteristically quiet for lunchtime. The only customers so far this morning had been Ruth, a few passing tourists, and a couple of the local teenagers sneaking out of school for a lunch run. She went in back to help Colm to prepare afternoon pastries, yet she had a feeling that the rest of the day would also be atypically quiet.

Her ruse must have done the trick. Of course the word had spread like wildfire. Ita wouldn’t be able to resist telling everyone she ran into. No doubt she had stopped into Rich Rags, the boutique up the road, the hair salon, and several houses of her friends and neighbours.

By now, she estimated that at least half of the village had received some word that Ella was retiring.

In the quiet and the calm, she went out back to her office beside the kitchen as Colm quietly chatted and went about their day none the wiser. She should start packing things up, she told herself, but she instead decided to sort through the stacks of invoices and bills, time sheets and staff notes, and the couple of random menu mockups she had begun to compose for January. She began to tear through the pile like a madwoman on a mission. Her rubbish fin filled up quickly with the bits of pieces she found disposable. Within minutes, her tiny workstation had become completely clear of the familiar and comforting clutter.

All that was left to do was to make a moving to-do list. There would be equipment to sell, things to move and staff to let go. It all felt so overwhelming and daunting, yet she knew she couldn’t ignore it for long. Christmas was less than two weeks away and then she would have only another few days throughout the holiday period to get the place clear and empty for the café’s end.

As her list began to add up, a knock came at the door. It was urgent, forceful, and familiar. Colm typically let himself in, but this person insisted on knocking. Whipping her eyes and clearing her mascara from her face, she replied “Come in.” She kept her back facing the door. She would hate for anyone to see the mess she looked.

“Ella, when were you going to tell me?” The voice was firm, yet soothing. Ella swivelled in her desk chair, meeting Joseph's eyes.

Without speaking a word, she stared at him for a few seconds, maybe even minutes.

He looked tired and worn. She couldn’t imagine how she appeared in that moment to him.

As time passed, she attempted to speak but was wordless in her response. She couldn’t do more than to stare in his icy pools of blue irises and to study the way his greying hair shone in the desk light. Goodness he was a handsome man.

He waited though. He kept his hands firm on the doorknob as if he would need to make a retreat at any second. He too couldn’t help but survey Ella and the way that she looked small and wounded. Her cast still on, her body bent over the desk, her pile of paperwork carelessly tossed in the black bin next to her. He wanted nothing more than to kneel down next to her and to hold her hand.

“Joseph. I’m so sorry.” She began to sob. Her voice quaked and rattled. She had forgotten to tell him. She had forgotten that her old friend and most loyal customer should know first. Not that he needed to, but she had wanted to tell him. She had wanted to tell Joseph everything.

With her cries, he moved next to her, gently placing his one arm on the top of her heaving back as the other grabbed the chair next to her. He sat down quickly, facing her directly. His hand casually rubbed her shoulders and her neck.

“Ella, Ella. Please, please stop crying. Let’s just talk. Just tell me what you are thinking, what you are doing?”

“What I am doing? I am not doing anything!” Her outburst took him aback. He had never seen her act this way. He felt as if he should spring into action, yet she was giving him no direction.

“But, I heard you were retiring and closing down the café. Is that true? If it is, it’s okay…. it’s exciting. A big step but you would probably lo—”

“No, Joseph, I’m not retiring. I’m being evicted.” Ella hadn’t planned on telling anyone the truth, yet here she was confessing all to Joseph. Maybe it was the way he touched her tenderly or how he faced her head on. She couldn’t help herself as she went on to explain how she received the estate agent’s letter, and had no other option but clear out. How she had lied to Ita and Colm to soften the blow on everyone.

“Why couldn’t you tell everyone the truth? Maybe it would help you keep the café?”

“I just couldn’t. Look at me. I don’t ask for help. I
give
help. For thirty years I have helped people in this town find jobs, mind their children, sort through their marriage problems, take in their abandoned animals. Yet I wouldn’t dream of asking a thing of anyone. Gregory would have never let me ask for help. He always said ‘Our problems are our problems.’” Until she had said it, she had forgotten that her husband had always lived by the unwritten rules that those who stepped into the café were allowed to share their problems while those working in it would keep theirs private. It kept up a mystique and the charm.

“You cannot live your life like that. I know that you want to keep this café. I know that you would never, ever retire—much less to go take up
golfing
.”

He was right of course—but that didn't change her resolve. “This is how it is, Joseph. This is how it has to be. It breaks my heart to have to close but I have no choice. The Heartbreak Café is finally living up to its nickname.” Just as he was so certain that he knew her well enough to keep her from retiring, Ella was certain of what she had to do.

“Come on. Let’s just talk this through. You could talk to the estate agent, find out if the bank might let you stay on as a sitting tenant or something. We can come up with a plan.” His genuine want to help was admirable, but Ella knew better.

She shook her head. "There is no ‘we’ in this Joseph. This is
my
café, and
I
will decide how I want this to end." She looked away from him, not daring to meet his gaze, which she knew would be wounded by her stalwart rejections. "I'm sorry, but I need to be leaving now. The afternoon crowd should be coming through and I am a bit short-staffed.” She slowly stood, her weight leaning onto her stick. He stood too, towering over her.

“I’m sorry Ella. I didn’t mean to imply anything. I just want to help you. I want to make sure that you are okay and that this is what you really want.”

“What I really want is to get out there and serve my customers while I still have any. Are you staying?” She couldn’t help but to offer some hospitality for his troubles, but by the way he looked at her, she could sense that Joseph was hurt by her refusal to allow him interject himself in her affairs.

“No. I’d better get back to work myself. I will see you tomorrow though. And the next day. And the next. I will be here till the very end or until you ask me to leave.”

He stared down at her as he placed his hand on her cheek. He rubbed his rough thumb over where her face had turned a glowing pink. Using the tip of his finger, he brushed a tear from the tip of her eye. And without a word more, Joseph opened the door, and walked back out to the café floor.

Ella stood in the dark corner of her office touching the place where his hand had been. She hadn’t been touched there by anyone else in years. It was so personal and intimate that it took her several moments to recover. But in those passing seconds, she realised something else deep and real.

For the first time in decades, she thought she might be falling in love.