‘Okay, so lunch next week then. You eat lunch at work, right? I’ll call you…’
Oh God. What was his deal? Did he feel bad? He obviously didn’t do this very often.
‘Er, yeah?’
‘Right, it’s a date then. I’m going to go now, let you get on with work and stop listening behind doors.’
Cassie sprang back from the entrance, cursing under her breath.
‘Nice mouth,’ he laughed. ‘See you next week! I left you something in the fridge.’
She stared at the door, head cocked to one side till she heard the front door open and close. She came out of the bathroom, heading to her bedroom to look out of the window. Looking out from behind the blinds, she saw him heading down her path. He looked like he was walking down a catwalk. Weird or not, Cassie did have to recognise that the man was an absolute hottie. Shame she wasn’t the type to do second dates. Or even first ones. Hell, having breakfast with him had been a first, even with Maria as a buffer. She was just admiring his butt wistfully when he stopped at the gate, turned and looked straight at her.
‘Shit!’ she said, jumping back behind the curtain. Sneaking a peek, she saw him blow her a kiss before walking off towards Westfield centre. Uber hadn’t quite hit the village yet. The villagers were still getting over high-speed internet arriving. Summoning a taxi with the click of a button was more than some of them could take, for now. Hopefully he wouldn’t go shooting his mouth off in the village about where he had spent the night. With Maria already in the spotlight, the last thing she needed was for people to think she was hanging around with random men. But as Cassie herself always said, the best way to get over a man was to get under another. It would have done Maria some good, something to take her mind off Arsy Darcy. As long as it wasn’t a regular thing. Maria wasn’t like that anyway. All she had ever wanted to be was happy and married.
Cassie watched Tucker walk away till he was out of sight, and then headed downstairs. It was like stepping into the twilight zone. It didn’t even feel like her house. She looked into the lounge. Same in there. He had cleaned up. Really cleaned. She could smell polish, cleaning sprays. Walking into the kitchen she was hit by a horrible smell. She gagged and headed to the window, throwing it open. What the hell had he done? She looked around and saw the bottle on the side. Bleach. The man was insane. She’d pulled Mr Mop. Every surface had been cleared, wiped clean. She could see her work surfaces for once. It felt like she had been robbed. Flicking her foot on the pedal bin, she only saw an empty bin liner. He had even taken the rubbish out. She looked in horror towards the now very shiny fridge freezer. He had even scrubbed the fronts of the damn appliances. Who knew what horrors awaited behind those doors. What would it be? A severed head? A ransom note?
She walked across the gleaming kitchen floor, pinching her nose against the smell of cleanliness around her, and curled her fingers around the metal fridge handle. Taking a deep breath, she opened the door.
Her fridge was mostly empty, aside from a bottle of wine in the cooler. It was always empty, which begged the question of where he had got breakfast from. In her alcohol-pickled stupor this morning, she hadn’t even realised that she didn’t own a tin of beans, let alone the makings of a full English. Had he been shopping? Oh, dear Lord.
On the bottom shelf was a package wrapped in tinfoil. When she opened it, she saw a ham salad sandwich, cut in half and placed neatly on a plate. On the top was a note, written on a small piece of paper.
Thanks for last night, and since I know you’ll probably say no to lunch, I made some for you.
Jesse Tucker
He had left his number, written there underneath his name. A stupid name at that. Who had a last name as a first name, anyway? Another reason never to call him. And she wouldn’t be eating his food either. Not a chance in hell. She shut the fridge door again and headed upstairs. She needed to get to the gym, try and get rid of this hangover. Hopefully the stink of her gym bag when she got back would mask the gross smells here. She just hoped Maria wouldn’t expect her to keep things like this. It was never going to happen. Who would want to live like this? Life was for living, not cleaning. Cassie headed out, grabbing her phone on the way past. A minute later, she came back and grabbed the sandwich, tucking it into her bag. If she got hungry later, she might as well eat the damn thing. No one would ever know.
The thing about ice cream that not enough people knew was that it had amazing restorative properties for the body. It soothed the soul, helped some sugar work its way around the sluggish body system when hungover, and cheered up the most melancholy of hearts. Since she no longer needed to fit into a wedding dress, or a honeymoon bikini, she felt that eating the emergency tub of Rocky Road from the icebox was allowed. It was the weekend after all, and it would melt anyway – since the whole shop was still down. It had been two hours, and even though the ‘open’ sign was flipped, no one had come into the shop. At this rate, next year she wouldn’t even have a shop to hide in. She sat on the floor, back against the countertop, legs pulled up to her sides as she balanced the tub on her knees. She could see her mother’s picture on the wall, and she looked at it as she did every day. In the years since she had passed, Maria had always missed her. When she’d signed for the shop, the first person she had wanted to call was her mum. When Darcy had proposed, Lynn and she had shed a tear or two about the fact she wouldn’t be there.
This time was different. Maria was broken, and she knew it. In her dehydrated, exhausted state, she felt the loss of her mother as though it were yesterday. She shovelled another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth and looked at her mother’s smiling face.
‘I miss you so much, Mum. I have so much to tell you, and I don’t even know what to do anymore.’ A sob escaped her lips, and she sucked in a shaky breath. ‘Darcy… Darcy left me, and I got drunk… and there was a man… and the business…’ She dissolved into sobs, shoving the spoon into the half-empty tub of melting ice cream. ‘I miss you so much. I really want to pull it together, but I don’t think I can this time.’ She heard a noise at the side of her, but ignored it.
‘I just need someone to be there for me, Mum, for once. Why does everyone leave?’
‘Huh-hum.’ There was that noise again. Maria looked to her left and, through tear-stained eyes, saw that the shop door was ajar, and in front of it was a very puzzled-looking man. Quite a good-looking one at that.
‘Oh, shit!’ She jumped up, throwing the carton to one side and standing up so quickly she got a post-alcohol head rush. ‘Oh, ow!’ She grabbed her head with both hands, trying to quell the lightning bolt that was striking between her ears. He went to step forward, placing his bag on the floor and closing the shop door. He flicked it to closed, and then just kind of stood there, watching her. Maria was suddenly very aware of the fact that she had been caught mainlining ice cream, looking like a bag lady and talking to a wall. She wiped her eyes ineffectually. Looking down at the floor, she saw that the discarded ice cream tub was now lying on its side, dribbling its contents onto the hardwood floor. It felt like a metaphor for her life, discarded and dribbling away.
She took another stab at wiping her face with sticky fingers.
‘I’m really sorry, can I help you?’
The man didn’t say anything for a beat. He just looked at her, an odd expression on his face. She looked right back, trying to figure out who this man was and why he was just staring at her.
‘I’m the electrician. Are you okay?’ He was looking at her as though he was expecting a gust of wind to whip through the shop and blow her away. In turn, seeing him standing there, among the beautiful silks and trains of the front display window, Maria couldn’t help thinking how strong he looked. He was dressed in a simple black T-shirt and workers’ trousers in a dark gunmetal grey.