Summer at Little Beach Street Bakery (16 page)

‘Happy un-birthday!’ chorused everyone, and Polly showed off her bracelet for Kerensa and Reuben to admire.

Kerensa looked at Reuben, then he brought out a bag from behind the champagne bucket.

‘What?’ said Polly.

‘Well, Reuben got you a birthday present too.’

‘It’s not my birthday!’

‘I told him not to,’ said Kerensa. ‘I am staking my claim here and now and saying that I have a separate gift for you. That you can have IN SEPTEMBER.’

Polly looked inside the bag. It was pale blue, from Tiffany’s.

‘He’s such a show-off,’ hissed Kerensa. ‘I am totally embarrassed by him and everything he stands for.’

‘But the shame turns you on, totally, a little bit,’ said Reuben.

Polly had never seen a real Tiffany’s box before, although she recognised the iconic wrapping, of course.

‘My goodness,’ she said. There was a bag tied with a ribbon, then a box done up with the same dark blue ribbon. Inside there was another, smaller blue velvet bag with a drawstring, and inside that something wrapped in tissue. Polly was laughing now. ‘This is like pass the parcel,’ she said. ‘I ought to be handing it round.’

She opened it, and gasped.

This charm bracelet was solid platinum. Apart from that, it was absolutely identical in every single way to the one Huckle had given her.

‘Reuben, you PUTZ!’ said Huckle. ‘Man, what is WRONG with you? Why did I even tell you? This was my big thing! You knew this was a big deal for me.’

Polly just stared at it, completely confused.

‘It was a great big deal,’ said Reuben, nodding happily. ‘Huckle buying you a really nice present. I figure you like Huckle’s one – and who isn’t going to like it, it’s a great idea – so I reckon you like mine too. And you know, one day you wanna wear silver, one day you wanna wear platinum, right? So you got the option. Just like one day girls wear blue things, one day they wear black things.’

‘Thank you for summing up the history of fashion so well,’ said Kerensa.

‘One day you have your lovely bracelet from Huck, next day lovely and much more expensive bracelet from your friends Reuben and Kerensa. I am basically a genius.’

‘You doof!’ Huck was saying. ‘You knew this was a totally special thing for me!’

‘I told him it was a stupid idea,’ said Kerensa.

‘Hey, man,’ Reuben looked the closest he could to wounded, which on his perpetually cheerful, entirely freckled face wasn’t very. ‘I just thought you had such a good idea, man. For once in your life. So sue me.’

Polly came over and kissed him on the cheek.

‘I love it,’ she said. ‘You were right about how much I’d love it. And having two is absolutely brilliant. So it was a genius idea, thank you very, very, very much.’

‘Seriously, you like it?’ said Kerensa. Polly kissed her too.

‘I love it. But give me my other present as well, on my real birthday.’

‘I suppose it can be back-up for when you lose the first one,’ conceded Huck.

‘I’m not going to lose the first one!’ said Polly. ‘All I’m losing this year is jobs.’

She told them the whole story, to sympathetic noises from Kerensa. Somehow, telling it whilst sitting outside in the sunshine, wearing two beautiful bracelets, one on each wrist, with Huckle and her friends there, Neil happily asleep and recovering, the sun on her back and a second glass of pink champagne in her hand, it didn’t feel quite so bad. Until she got to the end.

‘So now I am basically, not to put too fine a point on it, screwed. Hey ho!’

She took another slug of pink wine.

‘I am quite tempted to stay here for the rest of my life drinking this. Would that be all right?’

There was a long silence, long enough that Polly lifted her head and looked around.

‘What? I was only kidding, you know. Mostly kidding.’

Kerensa shook her head. She was looking at Reuben.

‘You want to tell them?’

‘No,’ said Reuben.

‘You want me to tell them?’

‘No,’ said Reuben, pouting out his bottom lip.

‘Someone has to tell them.’

‘It’s been in the papers,’ growled Reuben, getting up to go and poke at his lobsters.

‘What’s been in the papers?’ said Polly. The papers came late to Mount Polbearne – on windy days not at all – and between that and how hard she worked, and the slowness of their Internet connection, Polly had got out of the habit of reading anything other than the
Western Mail
or, if she was being entirely honest with herself, sometimes looking at pictures of celebrities on tabloid sites.

‘I’m going to tell them,’ hollered Kerensa.

Reuben shrugged. ‘I don’t care, you know.’

‘I know.’

‘I don’t care if you want to leave me now.’

‘Fuck off!’

‘What?’ said Polly, jerked out of her reverie into wakefulness. ‘What’s going on?’

Kerensa looked at Reuben.

‘I’m not leaving you, so tough shit.’

‘Why are you not leaving him?’

‘Well, because I’m just not.’

Huckle leaned forward.

‘Guys, could you tell us now what’s up? Or otherwise leave us a trail of sinister clues that end at the Louvre or something? Either way.’

‘I’m hungry,’ said Reuben.

Polly was suddenly terrified that there was something wrong with one of them. Surely not. There couldn’t be. Not when they’d just got married and were starting their life together. Her heart was in her throat.

‘What is it?’

Kerensa rolled her eyes.

‘Well, enjoy the champagne,’ she said. ‘Because we really need to get through this cellar.’

‘You’re moving?’ said Huckle.

‘Oh yes,’ said Kerensa.

Reuben was expertly popping a lobster into the pot.

‘How? Why?’ said Polly.

Kerensa glanced over.

‘Well, as it turns out, we also have news,’ she said. ‘Because SOMEBODY – and you may decide for yourselves which one of us you think it was – has decided to invest all of their money. All of it, please note. Not some of it in spread investments and some of it in government bonds and some of it under the bed and some of it in beautiful property. Nooo. All of it.’

Polly watched Kerensa and Reuben carefully.

‘Every last penny… in a series of
Star Wars
sequels.’

‘Oh, they’re coming out!’ said Huckle. ‘I’ve heard about them.’

‘No,’ said Kerensa, in measured tones. ‘Those are the licensed ones you’ve heard about, the ones that George Lucas is doing. You haven’t heard about our ones. The Jar Jar Binks spin-off trilogy.’

Everyone fell silent.

‘You’re not serious,’ said Polly.

‘Oh, very serious,’ said Kerensa. ‘And the Jar Jar Binks musical – opening directly on Broadway, by the way, none of this touring and building up a show from scratch, oh no…’

She downed her glass, and refilled it again.

‘Oh, and the line of Jar Jar themed restaurants in capital cities across the world.’

Huckle turned to look at Reuben.

‘THIS is what you’ve been away doing?’

‘Hey,’ said Reuben, crossly. ‘They say you’ll only ever make money doing something you love.’

‘Yes, something you love that other people love too,’ said Huckle. ‘Like Polly making a loaf of bread. Or Kerensa making a… conference organisational strategy.’

‘That was nice of you to pretend to include me,’ said Kerensa.

‘Thank GOD,’ said Polly.

Everyone else looked at her.

‘What are you talking about?’ said Kerensa. ‘This is a horrendous disaster.’

Polly shook her head.

‘I thought… I thought somebody was sick, or somebody was going to die, for God’s sake, after last year… I mean, seriously, it’s only money.’

‘So speaks someone who’s never had any,’ said Huckle, wryly.

‘Reuben can just go invent something brilliant like he did the last time. You’ll get it back.’

‘It’s not just money,’ said Kerensa. ‘It’s actually negative money. It’s actually more money than we really have.’

‘But I thought you had all the money.’

‘That was before somebody tried to mount a two-hundred-and-forty-strong-cast Broadway production,’ said Kerensa. ‘Was it me? I can’t remember.’

‘What are you going to do?’ gasped Polly.

‘Well, I’m already back at work, which, frankly, I’m extremely relieved about, as there’s only so much swanning about the world on room service one can take.’

Reuben looked a little gloomy. Kerensa’s expression became a little cheerier.

‘And I shall take Reuben as my fuck toy.’

Reuben perked up.

‘Kerensa!’ said Polly.

‘What? What? Would you rather I threw myself off a bridge shouting “No, no, I shall kill myself just because I married a total idiot”?’

‘No,’ said Polly.

‘I’ve still got my flat. He can sit in the corner of it doing computer things. And sex things. And apologising to me every ten minutes.’

‘Seriously, man, it’s all gone?’ said Huckle gently.

‘I’ve sold this place to a Russian oligarch with a nine-strong security detail, Kalashnikovs and an army-issue helicopter,’ said Reuben, waving his arms. ‘Actually, I liked him.’

Polly looked around. She was suddenly sad. They’d had so much fun here, in this crazy place. It was where she and Huckle had shared their first kiss. Where they’d celebrated Tarnie’s life; where she had come after she’d taken Neil to the puffin shelter. She would miss it. Huckle, sensing what she was thinking, came over and rubbed her neck.

‘God,’ she said. ‘It’s… it’s really hard luck.’

‘Still,’ said Kerensa, ‘I’m slightly less frightened about my sister killing me for her inheritance.’

‘Yeah, but Dahlia is psychotic, though,’ pointed out Polly, who had Dahlia previous. ‘She was trying to kill you way before you met Reuben.’

‘Oh yeah,’ said Kerensa. ‘I thought she said it was an accident, those stairs.’

Polly shook her head.

‘Nothing is ever an accident with Dahlia.’

‘True.’

‘So,’ said Reuben, indicating to the sous chef, who brought over four perfect plates of fresh lobster ceviche, ‘let us eat, drink, be merry and forget our troubles.’

Huckle looked slightly embarrassed.

‘Okay, or let’s drink to Huckle, who doesn’t have any troubles.’

‘Meanwhile,’ said Kerensa, ‘I have to go out to work and stop buying handbags while having a sex toy trapped in the sitting room who doesn’t know how to use a bus pass.’

‘I will totally invent a better bus pass,’ said Reuben darkly.

Polly raised her glass.

‘Oh lord. To all of us.’

 

 

Polly had never eaten ceviche before. It was kind of raw lobster with lime and chillis and some sort of salad cream stuff, and it was the most incredibly delicious thing she thought she’d ever tasted. The sous chef rushed to top up their glasses with an ice-cold Chablis, and Polly felt herself getting slightly fuzzy in the hot sun. It really didn’t feel like anything could ever go wrong, even though things were patently going horribly wrong. They toasted one another again, and when Kerensa asked what she was going to do about the bakery, Polly just shrugged and took another slug of wine. As the afternoon grew hotter, they all tore into the sea, its delicious freshness an absolute balm. Polly lay in the bouncy, salty water and stared at the sky. As usual there were some pesky seagulls circling overhead; even being rich couldn’t keep them out. Although of course Reuben wasn’t rich any more. Nobody was.

Reuben and Kerensa already appeared to be getting slightly amorous in the water, which Polly absolutely had no interest in witnessing. Instead she let the waves take her where they would, drifting down to the edge of the bay, just underneath the house, which was a big futuristic cube with a round balcony at the front, designed to make you think of the Starship
Enterprise
. Or, as Reuben had said, Tony Stark’s house, seeing as he and Tony Stark had so much in common.

She was a long way away from the others now. Huckle liked to go for it when he was swimming. It seemed like a natural element for him; he could move his powerful shoulders and cut through the water with ease. Generally Polly didn’t really like putting her head under the water, and she was always a bit worried that something would bite her toes. But today, hazily bobbing up and down, she felt like it didn’t matter quite so much any more; that she was perfectly content as she was, at one with the water, happy and free. Getting lots of sleep had helped. A couple of glasses of fizz, too. She reflected on her friends’ terrible news. It would, she knew, be a shock for them. But on the other hand, Kerensa had always done well at her job, and was used to working for whatever she had. And Reuben had started out doing computer things in his garage; there was no reason why he couldn’t go back to that. He liked showing off his money, but he wasn’t obsessed with it. And they genuinely did love each other, she knew. Thank God Reuben hadn’t married one of the beautiful popsies that used to hang around trying to catch his eye and his credit card. Chances were she’d have disappeared faster than the ice in the champagne bucket. Or, Polly thought, maybe just hung around for the oligarch. Perhaps popsies came with the territory, like built-in washing machines and centralised vacuum cleaner systems and surround-sound stereos.