The Year of Taking Chances (34 page)

Max looked worried, as if he might have said too much.
‘Of course, if you really want to have the test, then I’ll go with you,’ he assured her.
‘And we’ll cross any
bridges when we come to them, right?’

‘Seriously?
You mean it?’

‘I mean it.
We made this happen together.
We’ll see it through together as well.
Okay?’

Don’t cry.
Do
not
cry.
You are forbidden to start blubbing.
She swallowed hard and tried her best to control herself.
‘Okay,’ she said with a watery smile.
‘Thanks.
Let’s both have a think about it and decide in a few days.
I realize this is a lot for you to take on board.’
She blew her nose, feeling better than she had done in
weeks.
After all her worrying, this meeting had been so easy.
If only she had plucked up the courage earlier!
Then a smile quirked her mouth.
‘By the way,’ she said.
‘What’s
with the beard?’

He looked startled at the question, then stroked it defensively.
‘What do you mean?
Don’t you like it?’

‘I .
.
.
I didn’t say that.’

His eyes twinkled and suddenly he was Max again, the man she’d fallen head over heels in love with back in the autumn.
‘You hate the beard, don’t you?
Admit it.
You hate the
beard.’

She giggled.
‘I don’t
hate
it, but .
.
.
’

‘Tell you what.’
He took her hand in his.
Oh, he had lovely hands, she thought, suddenly feeling as swoony and fluttery as a teenage girl.
Strong and manly, with long, shapely
fingers.
‘I’ll do you a deal.
I’ll shave my beard off if we can go out together again.
Just lunch, nothing heavy.
Just .
.
.
getting to know each other again.
What do you
think?’

She looked at him, so handsome and lovely in his shirtsleeves, even with that ridiculous tuft of hair on his chin.
Her lips were just forming the shape to reply, ‘Hell, yes’ when she
remembered the last time they’d met, the female colleague on his lap, twining her arms around his neck.
Not so fast, she told herself.
‘I thought you were seeing someone else?’
she asked.

He looked taken aback for a moment, then shook his head.
‘What, Mia?
No.
That was a bad rebound decision.
A two-week fling.
She’s moved on to the finance director now.’

Saffron breathed out the last bit of tension that had been coiled up inside her.
‘In that case, lunch would be lovely,’ she said.
‘I’d really like that, Max.’

The imminent arrival of her guest prompted Caitlin to contact a charity that collected unwanted furniture, and two men rolled up that afternoon to load their van with Jane’s old mahogany
table and chairs, one of the armchairs and the huge Welsh dresser, which had all been gathering dust in the dining room for weeks.
With the living room still in use as their workplace, she could
now rearrange the dining room as somewhere for her and Saffron to sit in the evening.
It would make a change from perching on her bed with the laptop and a glass of red wine on her own every
night.

Up in Jane’s bedroom, she put a jug of creamy narcissi on the mantelpiece, clean towels neatly folded on the bed and opened the windows wide to let in the chilly spring breeze.
Then she
decided to empty the chest of drawers, so that Saffron would have somewhere to put her clothes, filling yet another charity bag with Jane’s tops and trousers, unused packets of tights and
bedsocks.
The bottom drawer was a mish-mash of ancient swimming costumes, pyjamas, a box full of old jewellery and .
.
.
Caitlin’s hand paused in mid-air as she saw the stack of small
leather-bound books at the back of the drawer.
Diaries?

She hesitated for a moment before taking them out – even glancing over her shoulder, as if Jane might walk in and catch her snooping.
Jane had been a private sort of person after all.
Perhaps Caitlin should honour that privacy and put the diaries straight in the bin, unread.

Yeah, right, she thought in the next second.
Like anyone had that kind of willpower.

She picked up the first one – 2004, more than ten years old – and flicked through the pages, feeling a twist of sadness at the sight of her mum’s familiar spidery handwriting.
What secrets did these pages hold?
From the sentences that caught her eye, though, it was fairly pedestrian stuff:

Caitlin came to the end of the diary, to find Christmas shopping lists scribbled on the back cover and various jottings, including a diagram of Jane’s spring-planting plans.
She was just
about to close the book when something occurred to her and she flicked back to the entry for New Year’s Eve.
Her mum had always loved her New Year’s resolutions, hadn’t she?
What
had she promised to do this time?

The last entry was a full one:

A sob burst from Caitlin’s throat and she had to look away from the pages, the words almost unbearable to read.
Oh,
Mum
, she thought, the room blurring as tears filled her
eyes.
It was like discovering a secret message, an apology – as if Jane had guided her to the diaries right when she needed to read this page most.

Caitlin closed the diary and sat back on her heels, a wry smile on her face.
So much for New Year’s resolutions.
Her mum had never stopped becoming choked up at Bruce Springsteen songs
(Steve’s favourite), and the vegetable patch had long since turned into a flower-filled border.
As for her main resolution .
.
.
well, clearly she hadn’t managed that, either.
But
she’d wanted to.
She’d had the best intentions about doing so.
And she’d loved Caitlin so much that it was love, not thoughtlessness, that had held her back.

Caitlin pressed the diary against her chest and took a long, raggedy breath.
‘Thanks, Mum,’ she whispered.

Saffron arrived the next day, just in time for lunch, and over slices of flaky spanakopita and salad – Caitlin was fast becoming the Larkmead Deli’s most loyal
customer – she, Gemma and Caitlin shared their news: the continuing success of Hourglass Designs, Saffron’s delight at having left her job and then, best of all, the gossip about
Max.

‘So – you’re dating?
You’re back together?’
Caitlin asked hopefully.

Saffron looked as if she was fizzing inside.
‘We’re not exactly
dating
,’ she replied.
‘It’s all very tentative so far, a few chaste kisses and that’s
been it.’
She giggled.
‘It’s a bit weird really, we’ve done everything the wrong way round.
Now it’s as if we’ve started completely over – first dates and
getting to know each other; even though: hello, I already happen to be pregnant with his baby.’
She rolled her eyes.
‘My mum doesn’t know whether to be disapproving or
thrilled.’

Gemma frowned.
‘Hang on a minute, though.
I thought he was dating someone else?’

‘That was just a fling, apparently.
They’re not together any more.’
Saffron could not have looked happier to be divulging this information.
Her smile could hardly have been
broader.

‘So it’s full steam ahead for you guys then?’
Caitlin asked, pouring glasses of elderflower pressé.
‘He’s in it for the long haul?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ Saffron replied.
‘I don’t think he knows yet, either.
But we’re going to muddle along for the time being and see how it goes.’
She
shrugged bashfully.
‘I really like him, you know.
I liked him from the start.
And for him to say, “Let’s not have the amnio” – this might sound weird, but it actually
felt really romantic.
And brave.
And strong.
I mean .
.
.
Who knows what’s going to happen?
It’s all still completely up in the air.
But right now I feel positive about the future.
We’re having a baby, we’re in it together and he’s a good person.
I don’t think he’s going to bail out on me.’

Gemma hugged her.
‘That all sounds pretty bloody great,’ she said.
‘I’m pleased for you.’

‘Me, too,’ Caitlin said.
‘Good for you both.
And it’s fab to have you back here with us, too.
Maybe we should go out tonight?
Toast the Dream Team being together
again?’

Saffron smiled.
‘That would be lovely,’ she said.
‘Hey, and I can pass on Bunty’s regards to Bernie, too.
She still talks about him a
lot.
’

‘Sounds good,’ said Gemma, ‘although I’ll need to make sure my mum can babysit the kids.’
She speared a cherry tomato and popped it into her mouth.
‘I know,
why don’t you two come over to mine for dinner tonight?
That way we get to hang out for some of the evening, and hopefully Mum won’t mind holding the fort afterwards, so we can go on
for a drink.’

Dinner!
Whoops.
In all her bedroom-clearing kerfuffle, Caitlin hadn’t even thought about actually feeding her new guest – let alone a pregnant guest, who would need superhealthy
nutritious food, and plenty of it.
Left to her own devices, she was used to existing on bowls of porridge, apples and whatever the deli had in that day.
The cupboards were bare, she realized with a
jolt.
Some hostess she was!
‘Well, if you’re sure .
.
.
’ she said, with the guilty relief that she might just have got away with it.
She would go out first thing and do a massive
Tesco run, she promised herself.

‘That would be great,’ Saffron said.
‘I’d love to meet your kids.’

‘That’s settled then,’ Gemma said.
‘I’m afraid the decor at our place hasn’t moved on very much since you were here at New Year, but if you can ignore the
Anaglypta and disgusting carpets, there’s plenty of food up for grabs.
Does seven o’clock sound okay?’