Rachel’s good mood curdled. Kath. In her blanket ignoring of Oliver’s calls, she’d somehow forgotten that Kath might try to get hold of her. It seemed so obvious now – how could she not have imagined that Kath would want to have her moment of absolute rage?
‘Is that all Freda wrote?’ Her voice wobbled. ‘Kath, calling about Oliver?’
Megan nodded, her eyes wide as saucers.
‘Did she say she’d call back?’
‘I don’t know. Freda said she gave her the kennels’ number, in case she wanted to try you here.’ Megan looked guilty. ‘I didn’t tell her any names, you know, when I, um, filled her in on your break-up. I don’t think she’d have made any association. She probably thinks Oliver’s a dog.’
Rachel swallowed. Thank goodness for that. The thought of kindly Freda’s face when she realised she’d been sympathising with an Other Woman was too shameful to contemplate.
‘Listen, I can call her back and tell her you’re not here,’ said Megan. ‘We can block her calls!’
‘No,’ said Rachel, bravely. ‘If she calls again . . .’
It’s part of your punishment, she told herself, even though she was terrified. You’ve got to speak to her. She probably needs to yell so she can move on. It’s the least you can do.
Megan saw her discomfort and changed the subject. ‘Oh, and George called – wanted to know if you’re allergic to pheasant?’ She grinned. ‘I take it you’re seeing him for another dinner?’
‘I am. At the weekend.’
Megan clapped her hands together in delight. ‘Go, you! Looks like everything’s really starting to happen, eh?’
Rachel’s incipient smile faltered. So long as she could keep her past well out of her future.
16
Zoe didn’t normally take her lunch hour, preferring to book clients through and finish early so she wouldn’t be rushing for Spencer and Leo, but today she made sure Hannah knew she wasn’t around for any walk-ins, and almost power-walked down the high street to get to the surgery for one o’clock.
Her plan had been very clear in her head on the way – she was going to take Bill some tulips from the market stall near the salon to say thanks for the Red Cross act and then go – but once she actually arrived at the desk, something weird came over her, and she couldn’t quite get her words out. Or at least, not in any order that made sense.
‘So you don’t have an appointment?’ Lauren the receptionist clarified, her head tilted helpfully on one side. Behind her, Zoe could see Lulu curled up in a basket in the corner of the office, watching everyone with sharp black eyes that missed nothing. ‘You want to see Dr Harper? But not for an appointment?’
‘Um, yes,’ said Zoe. ‘These are for him.’ She held out the flowers, and as she spoke, she could hear how stalkerish that sounded, and began to backtrack in embarrassment. ‘Actually, I suppose I could just leave them with you . . .’
Lauren shook her head vigorously. ‘No! No need, he’s just with his last patient before lunch. Why don’t you take a seat and he’ll be out in a minute? He needs to take Lulu out for a walk.’ She gestured affectionately towards the dog. ‘Doesn’t he? You’re about ready for your walk, aren’t you?’
As she spoke, Zoe spotted a male figure entering the back of the office, and from Lulu’s instant reaction – ears pricked, up on her neat paws – it was obviously Bill.
She felt something twitch nervously inside her stomach, and almost wished she hadn’t come. How clichéd did it look? Turning up to give him flowers? He’d just been polite, she told herself. She was making something out of nothing.
But before Zoe could change her mind and slink off, Lauren had accosted Bill. ‘Dr Harper? There’s someone to see you in reception!’
He looked up, and Zoe’s butterflies went into overdrive. Oh, God, how Mills and Boon – he had an actual stethoscope round his neck. He scanned the reception across the desk then, when he spotted her, sitting there with her knees clamped anxiously together in her unfamiliar skirt, his expression changed from puzzled to a smile of recognition.
Don’t say anything stupid, she warned herself. Just keep your brain engaged at all times.
Bill was coming out through the office door now, with Lulu prancing next to him, heading straight for her. Zoe pressed her lips to check her lipstick was still roughly where she’d put it, then smiled, hoping there was none on her teeth.
‘Hey, Lulu, look who it is!’ he said to the dog, with a nod towards her. ‘Your new hair stylist! I see the lump’s gone down! Have you come to be checked out?’
‘I’m fine! I mean, I’m a bit wonky and I’m off the marathon training, but I seem to be managing!’ gabbled Zoe. ‘Hi, Lulu! How are you? Been rolled over by any big dogs lately?’
Oh shut up, Zoe, she thought.
She distracted herself with a moment’s ruffling of Lulu’s ears.
‘We’re just off for a walk round the block,’ said Bill. ‘Do you want to join us? Um, unless you’re here to see someone?’
Zoe looked up, straight into Bill’s brown eyes. His keenness to see her was now mixed with a spot of embarrassment, and it just made him even more handsome. ‘No, actually, I came to give you these.’ She held out the tulips, red with yellow streaks, a bit like her own hair this week, after the trainee’s session. ‘Just to say thanks. For looking after me. It messed up your Saturday but I really appreciate it.’
Bill looked genuinely taken aback. ‘My pleasure. And I don’t think anyone’s ever given me flowers before. That’s so kind of you. Look, why don’t you walk us to the park and back? I can see how your mobility is. You’ve obviously worked out the quick way to get private treatment on the NHS.’
‘That would be great.’ Zoe grinned.
Limp a bit, said a wicked voice in her head.
Zoe had to hold Lulu while Bill rushed into Shackley’s greasy spoon to get them a cup of tea each, and she couldn’t help feeling that she was being assessed in the manner of a suspicious mother-in-law. Lulu sniffed her legs delicately and circled around her, peeking up from under her curls, and standing quite still when Zoe tried to pet her.
‘Can you smell Toffee?’ Zoe asked, to make conversation. Talking to dogs no longer bothered her. She got more conversation out of Toffee than she did out of Spencer at the moment. ‘He’s smaller than you. Not so fashionable. You’d like him.’
‘Like who?’ Bill handed her a polystyrene cup.
‘Toffee. My puppy.’
‘I know who Toffee is.’ Bill sounded as if he hadn’t forgotten, which was either true, or a skill doctors learned, thought Zoe. ‘How’s he coming on? Eaten any more house plants?’
Zoe felt a tiny thrill that he’d remembered her horror stories from the weekend.
‘Almost. It’s the discipline I have trouble with,’ she sighed. ‘It’s like Megan at the kennels says, I just don’t have that commanding voice. I have to keep practising saying “No”, like I mean it.’ She put her hand out, and barked, ‘No!’ so sharply Bill jerked his cup back in shock, spilling tea over his jacket.
‘Sorry! Oh, my God, did you burn yourself?’ Zoe turned to him, aghast, and began patting him down with her napkin.
‘I’m fine, fine.’ He grinned. ‘What’s an outdoor coat for, if it can’t take some outdoor action? Shall we?’ He set off walking towards the park, and Lulu fell into step between them.
‘So, are you walking the dogs again on Saturday?’ he asked.
‘Probably. Between you and me, Rachel and Megan are doing me a bargain rate on the daycare, so I feel like it’s the least I can do. And I really like it, to be honest. It’s good training for when Toffee’s old enough and I’ll have to control six stones of prime Labrador.’
She turned her head and caught Bill looking at her, with an interested sort of expression on his boyish face.
‘You’ll have to come out with us,’ he suggested. ‘Get Lulu here to teach Toffee to walk like a show dog.’
‘I’d love that! I bet she would t
oo! Are you two going on Saturday?’
‘Definitely.’ Bill made a huffing noise. ‘Even if I didn’t want to, which I do,’ he amended, ‘I wouldn’t have a lot of choice. My best mates, Johnny and Nat, you know, the couple who’ve fostered the Basset hound, are signed up for the full morning’s walking. It’s Nat’s new obsession. She’s a born-again dog owner. Seriously. It’s all she talks about now.’ He grinned. ‘I guess I’m probably as bad, though.’
‘They do take over your life,’ agreed Zoe. ‘Everyone at work keeps telling me horror stories about how I’ll never leave the house again, how he’s this massive tie. But I like it! I’m always taking Toffee places – Megan’s given me a socialisation checklist – and I’ve met loads of new people.’
‘Tell me about it. It’s like you turn into this magnet for everyone in the country who’s ever had a poodle or a Lab or whatever.’ Bill let Lulu trot ahead a little, so they could admire her perfectly straight show walk. ‘Doesn’t it feel like you’re in a kind of club – it’s definitely easier to talk to someone when they’ve got a dog with them. I mean, you already know how much you’ve got in common.’
There was a brief pause between them that flickered with unspoken words, until Zoe broke it with a stream of gabbling.
‘Oh, totally, and there’s the fresh air aspect too! Until I had that total disaster with Bertie I was just thinking how nice it was to be out there walking with the dogs, and letting my head clear completely! It was the first time all week I’d had a moment to myself, don’t you find that? You can just have some proper space.’
‘Yes,’ said Bill. ‘I know exactly what you mean. The only downside I’ve found – like just now – is that you can’t meet up for lunch and walk the dog at the same time.’
They were in the park now, alongside the fountain with the cavorting granite mermaids. Lulu was doing her best to ignore the sniffing of a rather forward Yorkshire terrier, and as Bill stopped to shoo him away, he met Zoe’s eye, and she realised he was struggling to look casual.
‘I mean,’ he went on, ‘unless you know a spot two dog owners might be able to . . .’ He was turning pink now, with the effort of not making a big deal of things. ‘Um, meet for a drink after work?’
‘Oh. After work?’ Zoe shook her head, sadly. ‘School nights are completely out for me, sorry.’
‘Of course, you’ve got Toffee,’ Bill cut in, before she could explain. ‘Stupid of me. Lulu’s OK to leave, but yeah, you can’t really leave a puppy for the evening.’ He smiled. ‘But you’ll be at the walking club on Saturday?’
‘Absolutely,’ said Zoe before she had a chance to think.
Zoe only started to feel properly bad as she was leaving the salon to pick up Spencer and Leo from school. The lingering warmth of chatting with Bill, and the prospect of seeing him again on Saturday, had lasted through her boring afternoon of highlighting, at which point her conscience had started throbbing like a big spot.
Somehow, she hadn’t told Bill she was the mother of two children. Again.
Back at home, making tea for those two children, her tingling lunchtime walk felt a long, long way away.
‘Muuuum!’
The familiar sound of a Spencer–Leo quarrel jolted her right out of her daydream. Spencer’s howl was only just louder than Toffee’s renewed barking. He didn’t need to move from the sofa to be heard, either.
‘Mum! Leo’s teasing Toffee with my Dalek and he’s been sick on the sofa!’ he announced, sounding more annoyed at the mess than any distress caused to the dog.
‘Spencer let Toffee pee on the sofa! Spencer didn’t do his pee rota!’
‘Leo is a little bastard!’
Zoe’s mouth dropped open with outrage. She put her mug down and was in the sitting room in a flash.
‘What did you just say?’ she demanded, grabbing a pukey-looking puppy off the cushions. ‘And what have you been doing with Toffee? Who was supposed to be taking him out to the loo?’
She looked between her two sons, who immediately stared down at their shoes, mutinously. But Zoe wasn’t going to be beaten on this one. When it came to Toffee’s house training, she wasn’t going to be a pushover – not just because of her rapidly deterioriating soft furnishings, but because of the little dog who was trying so hard to learn the rules.
Zoe pointed to the alarm clock set up on the mantelpiece, and the star chart next to it, another of Megan’s suggestions to get the boys involved in Toffee’s training. ‘Spencer, look, it was your turn! You were supposed to take Toffee out to the loo at five.’
‘I was watching something,’ he shrugged, and Zoe felt more than annoyed.
‘How would you like it if I locked the bathroom door when you needed a wee?’ she demanded. ‘Toffee’s only a baby. He needs to go out every hour, on the hour. We talked about this, didn’t we?’
Spencer shrugged again and Zoe grabbed the remote control.
‘No more television until six,’ she said, turning the set off.
Toffee squirmed in her hands, and she put him to her shoulder, so he could see over the top. His body was warm, and he was nearly too big now to be carried around easily.
The boys groaned but Zoe held her ground.
‘I’m really disappointed in you,’ she said firmly. ‘I thought you were going to look after Toffee properly. Not treat him like a toy.’
‘I’m going to my room,’ said Spencer, defiantly.
‘Good,’ said Zoe. It took her a second to realise Spencer had out-foxed her again.
17
Compared with Rachel’s first numb days at Four Oaks, when her aimless mood had made the clocks stop ticking in the spare room, the time started to fly past.
She didn’t miss her old routine as much as she’d thought she would: the blur of frenetic daily meetings, followed by time-wasting evenings, treading water until the precious Thursday night with Oliver (his ‘gym’ night). The sneaking around had made her weeks oddly lopsided. Professionally, Rachel had a bursting contacts book, but her lonely evenings and weekends echoed with silence, so she’d stuffed them with shopping and yoga classes and anything else that made her feel busy.
Now, Rachel’s day started at seven-thirty in the morning, when Megan left a cup of tea outside her room, and finished at eleven at night, when she turned in, exhausted by miles of dog walking and talking to unfamiliar people about the relative merits of Staffies versus collies. Rachel’s sponge-like mind soon refilled itself with dog facts and training tips, where she used to store London restaurants and sample sales. Slowly but surely, the dogs began to inch their way into her ‘non-dog-person’ heart; when the fifth dog left the kennels in the arms of loving new owners – Flash, the shy and scruffy little Westie – she realised her eyes were streaming, along with the openly weeping Megan and Freda.
With Megan or Freda at her elbow all day, she had no time to think about Oliver, but Rachel allocated one hour in the early evening for wallowing in her private misery. Megan thought it was sweet the way she wanted to spend time walking Gem on his own, to bond better, but she couldn’t hear Rachel as she circled the orchard and the huge fields around the house, railing at herself, at Oliver, at the unfairness of the human heart, but mainly at her own stupidity. The first week, it had taken an hour to get through her monologue of regret and recrimination. By the end of the month, she found herself using the last twenty minutes to wonder more about Dot and Felix or how she was supposed to pay the electricity bill.
One drawback of life in Longhampton, however, was that her mother now knew exactly where to find Rachel, and she could no longer pretend she was ‘in a meeting’ as she had in London, especially since Megan and Freda were more than happy to put Val through.
Rachel was sitting in the kitchen with Natalie, brainstorming fundraising ideas, when Val called for ‘an update’.
‘There’s nothing to update you on, Mum,’ said Rachel, rolling her eyes apologetically at Natalie. ‘Unless I can interest you in a Schnauzer?’
N
atalie grimaced back. She’d been there since just after feeding time, with Bertie in tow. Either she had a burning desire to help Rachel work out ways to fund the kennels, or else she had nothing better to do with her time.
‘Of course I don’t want a Schnauzer, Rachel. What did the estate agent say about the house?’ Rachel could hear Hoovering in the background, and wondered if Val was multi-tasking or if her dad had now been dragooned into housework.
‘He said it was a nice house, but it needed a lot of work doing to it. Something about structural underpinnings.’ Rachel’s brain had zoned out at that point, while she argued internally about whether she wanted the house to be worth a fortune, so she could maybe buy something somewhere else, or worth nothing so she wouldn’t be liable for an enormous tax bill.
‘And what does that mean?’
‘I don’t know. He’s sent off the valuation to the solicitors’ and I’ll get the bill in the post. No, I don’t know when,’ she added before Val could ask. ‘But Gerald Flint says you can have the Acker Bilk albums for Dad. Apparently they’re not likely to affect the final valuation one way or another.’
‘Rachel says you can have your Acker Bilk albums, Ken.’ The vacuum cleaner was turned off. ‘What? Your father says he’d like a word, Rachel. Here you are.’ There was a muffled exchange, which included the words ‘proper coffee’, and then Rachel’s dad came on the line.
‘Hello, Dad,’ said Rachel. She hoped he wasn’t going to say anything about her resignation. Val hadn’t taken the news well in their last call. She had sounded bewildered, as she had every right to be, given Rachel’s apparent decision to give up the career ‘she’d sacrificed her thirties for’ to run a kennels.
‘How are you, love? Coping OK?’ Ken sounded concerned. Rachel hoped he wasn’t going to give her his ‘whatever you do, we’ll be proud of you’ speech; it always reduced her to tears.