The over-enthusiastic librarian has her hand up a surprised looking crocodile puppet as Rachel arrives hot and flustered at the library. As the highlight of pre-school entertainment in this town, the tiny space is packed with fifty or more mums and dads and their wriggly offspring. Rachel attempts to park her double buggy by the door.
‘Can’t park there, love,’ insists a red-faced man with a bunch of keys on his belt.
‘Can’t I?’ says Rachel irritated.
‘‘ealth ‘n’ safety innit?’ he insists.
‘Right. Fine.’ Rachel can’t be bothered to argue and steers the buggy round to ‘Large Print’. She turns round to see that Alfie has escaped, while is sister is still calmly disembarking. ‘Lily, where’s Alfie?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Lily with a complete lack of concern.
‘Oh shit!’
A large lady in her sixties who is dressed like a duchess tuts loudly in Rachel’s direction.
‘Sorry, it’s just that I’ve lost my –’
‘Boo!’ Alfie jumps out from behind a Catherine Cookson display.
The woman is unimpressed. ‘This isn’t a crèche, you know.’
Rachel wants to respond but Alfie is tugging at her leg,
‘Let’s go and see Joe, Mummy.’
‘All right, darling. Silly old bag,’ mutters Rachel.
Lily giggles. ‘Silly old bag!’
The woman looks around and Rachel smiles trying to look innocent. ‘Bye!’
After a row of ‘sorry’s’ and side-shuffles, she reaches Sue and Christa and their respective sons, Joe and Roger. ‘What did I miss?’ she whisper to Sue.
‘Just a couple of ‘Bobbins’ and an energetic ‘Sailor Went to Sea’.’
The librarian, a bony woman of indeterminate age, is now handing out musical instruments. Alfie shakes his sleigh bell enthusiastically resulting in a glancing blow to Roger’s bemused face.
‘Alfie! Say sorry.’
‘Sorreeee,’ sings Alfie with a grin.
Roger looks unsure, but then joins in as Joe takes this as a cue for an impromptu sword fight.
‘Boys! Stop it!’ commands Lily. ‘I can’t hear the lady.’
The boys comply and Sue smiles, impressed. ‘Got her mother’s way with men, has she?’
‘I wish. Wait until I tell you what Steve’s got lined up for us.’
‘I’m hoping it’s an all expenses paid trip to 5-star luxury beach resort with hot and cold running nannies but from your face, I’m guessing not.’
‘Ok, mums, dads, boys and girls, are we ready to be jingle-jangle scarecrows?’
‘Tell you over a latte,’ says Rachel with a rictus, ready-to-sing grin.
Emma lets Ella take her by the arm like some doddery old dear and they make the short walk to Auntie Mabel’s, the favourite haunt for any day when they’re in need of a consolation doughnut or celebratory bun. Emma has always thought it a shame that there is no Auntie Mabel: The proprietors are Simon and his partner David and they happily dispense cake and wisdom as a favourite auntie would.
‘Ohmygod. David? Look at that face. Bad news, is it sweetie?’ says Simon as the bell above the door signals their entrance.
Emma lets out an enormous sigh in response and nods, adopting the look of a dejected child.
‘Oh my darling, bring those puppy dog eyes here. Uncle Simon will make it better.’ He embraces her and guides them to a table covered with a red check cloth and tomato-shaped ketchup bottle. ‘Here, have Audrey’s table. I’m guessing it’s two caps and two cheesecake?’
‘Simon, you’re as perceptive as a girl and yet such a loss to the female race!’ says Ella.
‘Ah but gorgeous girl, I am seriously high maintenance and would spend much longer in the bathroom than you. Apart from that and the aversion to fannies, you’d turn me in a heartbeat.’
Ella giggles like a schoolgirl. When Emma brought her mother here for lunch, Simon had her eating out of his hand and Diana kept trying to hook her up with David: ‘What a catch he’d be, Em!’ Emma didn’t have the heart to tell her, but luckily Martin came along and she had another prospective son-in-law to fix her hopes on.
‘Are we in full-scale “don’t be nice to me” mode?’ inquires Ella.
Emma looks up at Audrey Hepburn gazing down at them in that ‘yes, I am more beautiful that you could ever hope to be but I won’t make you feel bad about it and could actually be your best friend if we met’ way. ‘I think we are,’ Emma replies.
‘Right,’ says Ella feeling uncomfortable at the prospect of having to insult rather than hug her friend.
David appears with their order. ‘Here we go. I’ve given you a dollop of homemade vanilla ice cream as well. All on the house today girls.’
Ella sees Emma’s lip begin to wobble and ploughs in. ‘Who wants to publish that kind of fiction anyway?’
‘I do,’ says Emma. ‘Can’t you do any better than that?’
‘OK,’ says Ella unsure. ‘Well it won’t make us any money and will just be a pain in the arse to get off the ground.’
‘Now you sound like Joel.’
Ella looks crestfallen. Emma knows she’s just too lovely for this kind of thing. Then she surprises her. ‘Well you’re a crap editor and it will better off at another publisher.’
‘Ella, steady on!’
‘Sorry, you know I’m not much good at this game. How about “the author’s probably a tosser”?’
‘Actually, that might be true.’
Ella raises her eyebrows quizzically.
‘Well there are the rumours that he’s a ladies’ man and he did seem to enjoy watching me squirm during the pitch meeting.’
‘There you go then,’ smiles Ella, pleased to have found a negative for her friend to cling to. ‘That probably explains why he writes about relationships so well.’
‘Yes, all right. Aren’t you supposed to be telling me about how much better off I am without this man and his novel?’
‘Oh yes, sorry. Well it has its flaws.’
‘Like what?’
‘Well the title’s a bit girly.’
‘Girly?’
‘Yeah, I mean how many blokes want to read a book with a flower in the title?’
‘OK, it’s a viewpoint. What else?’
‘Erm, it’s too long?’
‘Too long?’
‘A bit’
‘Do you think Tolstoy would have created one of the masterpieces of fiction if his editor had told him War and Peace was a bit on the lengthy side?’
‘S’pose not. Do you think you would stop feeling sorry for yourself with a gob full of cheesecake?’
‘Good point.’
Despite a noble effort from Ella and two more pieces of cheesecake, Emma returns to the office with a heavy heart and even heavier stomach. Her phone shows two missed calls from Martin. She calls him back. ‘Lo?’ she says in a flat voice.
‘I