Now and Then Friends (34 page)

There was space at the center, enough when they'd been small to crouch or kneel, and now simply to sit, heads ducked low, knees tucked in. In other words, not very comfortably.

“So,” Rachel said after a few seconds of scrambling into position. “What's going on? I get the symbolism,” she added. “We're back under this damn bush. Back to being friends. Yay us.”

All right, so it had been an obvious, over-the-top gesture. But still. Claire wanted it to mean something to both of them.

“Yes, we're under the bush,” she said. “And I just wanted to . . . to say—”

“You don't need to say anything,” Rachel cut across her. “Look, Claire, it's okay you're leaving. You need to live your own life. I get that. I'm not angry or hurt or anything.”

Claire peered at her for a moment, blinking in the gloom. “What do you think I dragged you out here to say?”

“That you're sorry you're leaving, but . . . ?”

“I'm not leaving, Rachel. I don't want to leave. The truth is, I came over the other day because I wanted you to tell me to stay. Old habits die hard and all that.”

“You're staying?” Rachel looked flummoxed.

“I'm staying and working in the post office shop and, if the offer is still open, joining Campbell Cleaners.”

“But . . .”

“I didn't see the text you sent,” Claire explained, “before I spoke to you. Not that it actually makes a difference. I should have just said what I felt, what I wanted. I thought I'd learned that much at least, but apparently I hadn't. Just like I should have said it twenty years ago.” She took a deep breath, unable to see the expression on Rachel's face in the shadowy interior of the rhododendron. “I know we were just kids and it's old history and all the rest of it, but I should have fought for our friendship. I know that now. I always knew that.”

“I should have too,” Rachel said, trying for a smile. “I should have said something. It wasn't all your fault, Claire.”

“I don't want to make the same mistakes now. I want it to be different. For us to be different.”

Rachel wrapped her arms around her knees. “Well, I actually want to be different too. Not so bossy and bitchy.”

“You bossy?” Claire smiled.

Rachel laughed, shaking her head. “It stinks under here,” she remarked after a moment. “I think a dog must have pooed somewhere.” Rachel gave Claire a direct look. “So are you serious about the cleaning thing?”

“Absolutely, if you're serious about letting me in on it.”

“Yes—”

“Then it's settled.” Claire held out her hand. “We can shake on it, or we can get out of here and go have a proper drink down at the Hangman's Noose.”

“Drink, definitely,” Rachel said, but after they'd scooted out from under the rhododendron, dusty and dirty and definitely worse for wear, Rachel pulled her into a sudden and surprising hug. “I've missed you,” she said, her voice choking a little, and Claire returned the hug, felt the answering emotion tighten in her chest.

“I've missed you too,” she said, and after a brief, hard hug, they pulled away, sniffing self-consciously.

“Right, we're sorted, then,” Rachel said.

“Yes,” Claire answered. “Sorted.”

“Well, that took long enough,” Rachel said, rolling her eyes and smiling. “Only about twenty years.”

“Better late than never,” Claire said, and laughing, she slipped her arm through Rachel's. “Now let's go have that drink.”

The wind was picking up a little, the sun glinting off the sea that sparkled in the distance as arm in arm they headed back down the school lane.

Readers Guide

Q. In what ways did the Cumbrian setting inform these characters as you were writing
Now and Then Friends
?

A. Having lived in an isolated village like Hartley-by-the-Sea, I know the impact of such a place on your psyche, both for good and bad. When I first moved to Cumbria, I struggled with some of the aspects of the region that the characters in the book also struggle with—the rainy weather, the lack of anonymity, the sense of remoteness. I learned to see the benefits of all these things, and I think my characters do as well—with time and effort!

Q. As an American living in England, did you experience any “outsider” moments that helped you relate to how Claire might have felt returning to Hartley-by-the-Sea after so many years away?

A. Yes, I have had many outsider moments, whether it is simply using the wrong word or not observing a traditional British custom (such as not eating birthday cake at a party—you wrap it in a napkin and put it all squashed in the party bag!). I've learned to laugh about it, and when I'm not sure what the protocol is, I say so up front. Just recently
I had a funny conversation with friends about the differences between British and American English, and we all laughed a lot at the differences that seem minor but still matter.

Q. The theme of sisterhood is so rich in this novel. Do you expect that Claire's personality would have been different if she had had a sister to share things with growing up, as Rachel did with Meghan?

A. Having a sister myself, I well know the joys and difficulties of that sibling relationship! I think Claire felt very isolated by her partial deafness and many illnesses during her childhood; in some ways Rachel acted like a big sister to her, helping and protecting her. Perhaps if she'd had someone at home to do that, she wouldn't have become such good friends with Rachel.

Q. Do you feel that early-childhood friendships can last well into adulthood? How do the changes we experience as we develop our adult selves impact these friendships?

A. I think childhood friendships can last when the people involved keep in touch and grow together. This didn't happen for Rachel and Claire until they reunited; even though they feel they were always friends, I think they had to develop a separate friendship as adults.

Q. How was the experience of returning to some familiar faces from your previous Hartley-by-the-Sea book in this novel? Did you enjoy giving readers another glimpse into Lucy's and Juliet's lives in
Now and Then Friends
?

A. Yes, I feel quite at home in Hartley-by-the-Sea, and the characters seem more real, their lives richer, with each story. It's always nice to follow up with characters from previous books, and I hope to include Lucy and Juliet (and Claire and Rachel) in the next book.

Q. Do you have any rituals in your writing day?

A. Grabbing as much time as I can! As the mother of five young(ish) children, it can be hard to find time to write. I find it most efficient to write in short bursts and then take a five-minute break before starting again. A cup of tea does not go amiss, either.

Q. As an author, what things most inspire you?

A. I'm inspired by what I see around me, whether it's a simple human interaction or a crisp sunny morning. I tend to get ideas while I'm walking my children to school or the dog in the local woods, and then let my subconscious untangle the knots. I think inspiration is everywhere if you are of a mind to look for
it.

1. What did you most enjoy about
   Now and Then Friends
   ? Who was your favorite character? To whom could you most relate?
   
2. Why do you think Claire and Rachel were drawn to each other as children? Does Rachel's response to Claire upon meeting her again seem understandable to you?
   
3. Claire struggles with feeling adrift in life and allows other people to manage her life. Can you relate to her predicament at all?
   
4. Rachel's relationship with her sister, Meghan, is fraught, due to the family struggles they had growing up. Have the issues your family had while you were growing up affected your adult relationships?
   
5. Why do you think Claire and Rachel stopped being friends in primary school? How did they both contribute to the end of their friendship?
   
6. Now and Then Friends
   has a colorful cast of secondary characters, including Andrew West, Dan Trenton, Abby Rhodes, Emily Hart, Rob
   Telford, and Eleanor Carwell. Which of these characters did you enjoy reading about the most? Who would you like to read about in his or her own story?
   
7. Is Rachel justified in her actions toward Lily regarding her choices of subjects?
   
8. What do you most like about Hartley-by-the-Sea? What would you find the most challenging about living there?
   
9. Do you think Rachel made the right choice in leaving university to come home? Do you understand her reasoning about not wanting to “settle”?
   
10. How does Claire help other people in the village, such as Dan Trenton and Eleanor Carwell?
    
11. How do you think Rachel and Claire both grow and change through the story? How do they help each other to do this?
    
12. Which part of
    Now and Then Friends
    resonated the most with you? What will you remember about the book long after you've read it?
    

Continue reading for a preview of Kate Hewitt's

RAINY DAY SISTERS,

Lucy and Juliet's story. Available
now!

Lucy Bagshaw's half sister, Juliet, had warned her about the weather. “When the sun is shining, it's lovely, but otherwise it's wet, windy, and cold,” she'd stated in her stern, matter-of-fact way. “Be warned.”

Lucy had shrugged off the warning because she'd rather live anywhere, even the Antarctic, than stay in Boston for another second. In any case, she'd thought she was used to all three. She'd lived in England for the first six years of her life, and it wasn't as if Boston were the south of France. Except in comparison with the Lake District, it seemed it was.

Rain was atmospheric, she told herself as she hunched over the steering wheel, her eyes narrowed against the driving downpour. How many people listed walks in the rain as one of the most romantic things to do?

Although perhaps not when it was as torrential as this.

Letting out a gusty sigh, Lucy rolled her shoulders in an attempt to ease the tension that had lodged there since she'd turned off the M6. Or really since three weeks ago, when her life had fallen apart in the space of a single day—give or take a few years, perhaps.

This was her new start or, rather, her temporary reprieve. She was staying in England's Lake District, in the county of Cumbria, for only four months, long enough to get her act together and figure out what
she wanted to do next. She hoped. And, of course, Nancy Crawford was going to want her job as school receptionist back in January, when her maternity leave ended.

But four months was a long time. Long enough, surely, to heal, to become strong, even to forget.

Well, maybe not long enough for that. She didn't think she'd ever forget the blazing headline in the
Boston Globe
's editorial section:
Why I Will Not Give My Daughter a Free Ride
.

She closed her eyes—briefly, because the road was twisty—and forced the memory away. She wasn't going to think about the editorial piece that had gone viral, or her boss's apologetic dismissal, or Thomas's shrugging acceptance of the end of a nearly three-year relationship. She certainly wasn't going to think about her mother. She was going to think about good things, about her new, if temporary, life here in the beautiful, if wet, Lake District. Four months to both hide and heal, to recover and be restored before returning to her real life—whatever was left, anyway—stronger than ever before.

Lucy drove in silence for half an hour, all her concentration taken up with navigating the A-road that led from Penrith to her destination, Hartley-by-the-Sea, population fifteen hundred. Hedgerows lined either side of the road, and the dramatic fells in the distance were barely visible through the fog.

She peered through the window, trying to get a better look at the supposedly spectacular scenery, only to brake hard as she came up behind a tractor trundling down the road at the breakneck speed of five miles per hour. Pulling behind her from a side lane was a truck with a trailer holding about a dozen morose and very wet-looking sheep.

She stared in the rearview mirror at the wet sheep, who gazed miserably back, and had a sudden memory of her mother's piercing voice.

Are you a sheep, Lucinda, or a person who can think and act for herself?

Looking at those miserable creatures now, she decided she was
definitely not one of them. She would not be one of them, not here, in this new place, where no one knew her, maybe not even her half sister.

It took another hour of driving through steady rain, behind the trundling tractor the entire way, before she finally arrived at Hartley-by-the-Sea. The turning off the A-road was alarmingly narrow and steep, and the ache between Lucy's shoulders had become a pulsing pain. But at last she was here. There always was a bright side, or at least a glimmer of one. She had to believe that, had clung to it for her whole life and especially for the last few weeks, when the things she'd thought were solid had fallen away beneath her like so much sinking sand.

The narrow road twisted sharply several times, and then as she came around the final turn, the sun peeked out from behind shreds of cloud and illuminated the village in the valley below.

A huddle of quaint stone houses and terraced cottages clustered along the shore, the sea a streak of gray-blue that met up with the horizon. A stream snaked through the village before meandering into the fields on the far side; dotted with cows and looking, in the moment's sunshine, perfectly pastoral, the landscape was like a painting by Constable come to life.

For a few seconds Lucy considered how she'd paint such a scene; she'd use diluted watercolors, so the colors blurred into one another as they seemed to do in the valley below, all washed with the golden gray light that filtered from behind the clouds.

She envisioned herself walking in those fields, with a dog, a black Lab perhaps, frisking at her heels. Never mind that she didn't have a dog and didn't actually like them all that much. It was all part of the picture, along with buying a newspaper at the local shop—there had to be a lovely little shop down there, with a cozy, grandmotherly type at the counter who would slip her chocolate buttons along with her paper.

A splatter of rain against her windshield woke her from the moment's reverie. Yet another tractor was coming up behind her, at quite
a clip. With a wave of apology for the stony-faced farmer who was driving the thing, she resumed the steep, sharply twisting descent into the village.

She slowed the car to a crawl as she came to the high street, houses lining the narrow road on either side, charming terraced cottages with brightly painted doors and pots of flowers, and, all right, yes, a few more weathered-looking buildings with peeling paint and the odd broken window. Lucy was determined to fall in love with it, to find everything perfect.

Juliet ran a guesthouse in one of the village's old farmhouses: Tarn House, she'd said, no other address. Lucy hadn't been to Juliet's house before, hadn't actually seen her sister in more than five years. And didn't really know her all that well.

Juliet was thirty-seven to her twenty-six, and when Lucy was six years old, their mother, Fiona, had gotten a job as an art lecturer at a university in Boston. She'd taken Lucy with her, but Juliet had chosen to stay in England and finish her A levels while boarding with a school friend. She'd gone on to university in England, she'd visited Boston only once, and over the years Lucy had always felt a little intimidated by her half sister, so cool and capable and remote.

Yet it had been Juliet she'd called when everything had exploded around her, and Juliet who had said briskly, when Lucy had burst into tears on the phone, that she should come and stay with her for a while.

“You could get a job, make yourself useful,” she'd continued in that same no-nonsense tone that made Lucy feel like a scolded six-year-old. “The local primary needs maternity cover for a receptionist position, and I know the head teacher. I'll arrange it.”

And Lucy, overwhelmed and grateful that someone could see a way out of the mess, had let her. She'd had a telephone interview with the head teacher, who was, she realized, the principal, the next day, a man who had sounded as stern as Juliet and had finished the
conversation with a sigh, saying, “It's only four months, after all,” so Lucy felt as if he was hiring her only as a favor to her sister.

And now she couldn't find Tarn House.

She drove the mile and a half down the main street and back again, doing what felt like a seventeen-point turn in the narrow street, sweat prickling between her shoulder blades while three cars, a truck, and two tractors, all driven by grim-faced men with their arms folded, waited for her to manage to turn the car around. She'd never actually driven in England before, and she hit the curb twice before she managed to get going the right way.

She passed a post office shop looking almost as quaint as she'd imagined (peeling paint and Lottery advertisements aside), a pub, a church, a sign for the primary school where she'd be working (but no actual school as far as she could see), and no Tarn House.

Finally she parked the car by the train station, admiring the old-fashioned sign above the Victorian station building, which was, on second look, now a restaurant. The driving rain had downgraded into one of those misting drizzles that didn't seem all that bad when you were looking out at it from the cozy warmth of your kitchen but soaked you utterly after about five seconds.

Hunching her shoulders against the bitter wind—this was
August
—she searched for someone to ask directions.

The only person in sight was a farmer with a flat cap jammed down on his head and wearing extremely mud-splattered plus fours. Lucy approached him with her most engaging smile.

“Pardon me—are you from around here?”

He squinted at her suspiciously. “Eh?”

She had just asked, she realized, an absolutely idiotic question. “I only wanted to ask,” she tried again, “do you know where Tarn House is?”

“Tarn House?” he repeated, his tone implying that he'd never heard of the place.

“Yes, it's a bed-and-breakfast here in the village—”

“Eh?”
He scratched his head, his bushy eyebrows drawn together rather fiercely. Then he dropped his hand and jerked a thumb towards the road that led steeply up towards the shop and one pub. “Tarn House's up there, isn't it, now, across from the Hangman's Noose?”

“The Hangman's—” Ah. The pub. Lucy nodded. “Thank you.”

“The white house with black shutters.”

“Thanks so much, I really appreciate it.” And why, Lucy wondered as she turned up the street, had he acted so incredulous when she'd asked him where it was? Was that a Cumbrian thing, or was her American accent stronger than she'd thought?

Tarn House was a neat two-story cottage of whitewashed stone with the promised black shutters, and pots of chrysanthemums on either side of the shiny black door. A discreet hand-painted sign that Lucy hadn't glimpsed from the road informed her that this was indeed her destination.

She hesitated on the slate step, her hand hovering above the brass knocker, as the rain continued steadily down. She felt keenly then how little she actually
knew
her sister. Half sister, if she wanted to be accurate; neither of them had known their different fathers. Not that Lucy could really call a sperm donor a dad. And their mother had never spoken about Juliet's father, whoever he was, at least not to Lucy.

Her hand was still hovering over the brass knocker when the door suddenly opened and Juliet stood there, her sandy hair pulled back into a neat ponytail, her gray eyes narrowed, her hands planted on her hips, as she looked Lucy up and down, her mouth tightening the same way her mother's did when she looked at her.

Two sleek greyhounds flanked Juliet, cowering slightly as Lucy stepped forward and ducked her head in both greeting and silent, uncertain apology. She could have used a hug, but Juliet didn't move and Lucy was too hesitant to hug the half sister she barely knew.

“Well,” Juliet said with a brisk nod. “You made it.”

“Yes. Yes, I did.” Lucy smiled tentatively, and Juliet moved aside.

“You look like a drowned rat. You'd better come in.”

Lucy stepped into the little entryway of Juliet's house, a surprisingly friendly jumble of umbrellas and Wellington boots cluttering the slate floor along with the dogs. She would have expected her sister to have every boot and brolly in regimental order, but maybe she didn't know Juliet well enough to know how she kept her house. Or maybe her sister was just having an off day.

“They're rescue dogs—they'll jump at a mouse,” Juliet explained, for the two greyhounds were trembling. “They'll come round eventually. They just have to get used to you.” She snapped her fingers, and the dogs obediently retreated to their baskets.

“Cup of tea,” she said, not a question, and led Lucy into the kitchen. The kitchen was even cozier than the hall, with a large dark green Aga cooking range taking up most of one wall and emitting a lovely warmth, a circular pine table in the center, and a green glass jar of wildflowers on the windowsill. It was all so homely, so comforting, and so not what Lucy had expected from someone as stern and officious as Juliet, although again she was acting on ignorance. How many conversations had she even had with Juliet, before that wretched phone call? Five? Six?

Still the sight of it all, the Aga and the flowers and even the view of muddy sheep fields outside, made her spirits lift. This was a place she could feel at home in. She hoped.

She sank into a chair at the table as Juliet plonked a brass kettle on one of the Aga's round hot plates.

“So you start next week.”

“Yes—”

“You ought to go up to the school tomorrow and check in with Alex.”

“Alex?”

Juliet turned around, her straight eyebrows drawn together, her expression not precisely a frown, but definitely not a smile. “Alex Kincaid, the head teacher. You spoke with him on the phone, remember?”
There was a faint note of impatience or even irritation in Juliet's voice, which made Lucy stammer in apology.

“Oh, yes, yes, of course. Mr. Kincaid. Yes. Sorry.” She was not actually all that keen to make Alex Kincaid's acquaintance. Given how unimpressed by her he'd seemed for the ten excruciating minutes of their phone interview, she thought he was unlikely to revise his opinion upon meeting her.

And she was unlikely to revise hers; she already had a picture of him in her head: He would be tall and angular with short-cut steel gray hair and square spectacles. He'd have one of those mouths that looked thin and unfriendly, and he would narrow his eyes at you as you spoke, as if incredulous of every word that came out of your mouth.

Oh, wait. Maybe she was picturing her last boss, Simon Hansen, when he'd told her he was canceling her art exhibition.
Sorry, Lucy, but after the bad press we can hardly go ahead with the exhibit. And in any case, your mother's not coming anyway.