Summer at Tiffany's Page 2

  ‘Cass? You OK?’

  She looked back at Henry, who was watching her with quiet calm, his hand by her elbow. She realized she had paused, mid-step into the car.

  ‘Of course,’ she said weakly, trying to laugh off his concern and sliding in beside Kelly.

  The door closed behind Henry with a thunk, his thighs warm as they pressed against hers, but the cold had already seeped into her bones and she gave a big shiver.

  ‘Ooh, someone just walk over your grave?’ Kelly winked.

  She couldn’t know how right she was.

  Chapter Two

  Three months later

  Morning had broken – the tuneful din of two hundred coal tits chirruping in the crab apple tree outside the open window told her so. She stirred fractionally, heavy-limbed and rested, as the breeze rippled over her bare skin like a breath, Henry’s hand in the nook of her waist; she felt his fingers spread as she stretched, her body firming beneath his inert fingertips before relaxing back into the softness he adored.

  Her eyelids fluttered open and closed several times like a basking butterfly’s wings, blinking the busy blossomed tree into focus. They never drew the curtains, and she didn’t need to be standing at the sash window to know that somewhere Breezy, Mrs Jenkins’s cat from the flat below, would be sitting watching and waiting for just one of the tiny spirited birds to linger a moment too long on the shaded grass.

  She could see the sky was already a promising blue, narrow drifts of clouds spinning into airy thinness as the sun began to get into its stride, and the dull roar of traffic on Embankment was already beginning to build. She sighed sleepily, used to it now.

  Another zephyr blew in, unsettling a sheaf of papers stacked loosely on a tower of books on the floor, several pages blowing free and settling on the coir matting like stepping stones. Her eyes wandered the room with bleary indolence. Heaps of clothes were piled along the footboard of the iron bedstead so that nothing could be seen of it; a picture they’d bought at the Affordable Art Fair in Battersea Park was still propped against the far wall, ready to be hung whenever Henry remembered to buy nails; the whisper-pink roses he’d bought for her the week before were still luscious and dewy on the chest of drawers; the powder-blue walls colour-matched the sky, at this early hour at least. Her eyes stopped at the photo on her bedside table, taken of her and Henry at Kelly and Brett’s wedding almost two years ago, the very hour they’d finally got together; it was their favourite photograph – her arms wrapped tightly round his neck, both of them laughing, eyes bright as tigers’ so that to the casual observer, it would have seemed it had been their wedding.

  She closed her eyes again, a smile on her lips. Home.

  That wasn’t to say it was perfect. The flat was far too small – even she would admit that now – but after a decade of being the chatelaine in a grand Scottish country house, she had fallen hard for the intimate charm of somewhere ‘cosy’ – her buzzword for everything good: log fires, Henry’s jumpers, a bubbling pot of chilli con carne – and when they’d first viewed it, she’d sworn to be the queen of edits. They would live minimally, she had declared; she didn’t want ‘things’ anyway; her divorce from Gil had shown her just how little comfort they provided when your world was dismantled bit by bit – my chair, my lamp, your mirror, my silver . . . And Henry proudly considered himself someone who prioritized experiences over possessions in any event (although that wasn’t to say he wasn’t dearly fond of his PS4 and the plasma that took up almost one wall in the sitting room and made her feel on Saturday afternoons that their flat was actually a box at his beloved Twickers).

  Their intentions had been sincere and well meant at the time, but it’s hard for two people to build a life together in only 800 square feet of prime London property, not to mention their mutual careers which came with unwieldy accoutrements. Henry’s, as a professional explorer, meant ice axes and crampons were stored beneath the sofa, and metres of fluorescent climbing ropes were loosely looped on nails tapped in along the picture rails round the tops of the walls. Cassie’s career, meanwhile, as co-owner of Eat ’n’ Mess, a vintage picnic company that put together old-school hampers for high-end society events, meant – in a reversal of Kelly’s Manhattan bachelorette apartment, where cashmere jumpers had been kept in the unused oven – there were baking trays in the shelving unit where her jeans should be, cake boxes instead of hatboxes; her make-up was kept in the cutlery drawer, and the kitchen had no table as such but a carefully stacked arrangement of wicker baskets that held Eat ’n’ Mess’s vast collection of mismatched porcelain tea sets and Welsh rugs, resulting in their ‘dinner parties’ – which actually meant plates on laps, sitting on upturned terracotta flowerpots (or, most prized of all, an upside-down large yellow bucket) on the fire escape – becoming as famous with the neighbours as with their friends.

  So yes, it was a tiny flat, but she still maintained it was a gorgeous tiny flat. The clotted-cream sitting room caught the evening sun, and on every one of their four windowsills there was a herb garden: Henry liked to have the basil outside their bedroom, as he said it reminded him of Italy and the time they’d almost, but not quite, got it on; he said he never wanted to forget how excruciating it had been to have her in his life but still just out of reach; The lavender, which reminded him of his mother’s garden, where they had got it on, was outside the bathroom; the camomile, which she used for tea and was one of their earliest love tokens, was outside the sitting room; and the thyme and rosemary were outside the kitchen.

  She loved it here. She loved him. Their messy, spilling-out-at-the-edges life was everything she wanted. Henry shifted beside her, his arm easily drawing her in tighter so that the small gap between their bodies closed and they touched from tip to toe again so that nothing – not even the breeze – could slip between them.

  Her eyes were just closing again when she caught sight of the time on her alarm clock beside the bed.

  ‘Oh crap!’ she shouted, sitting bolt upright. ‘Henry, we’ve overslept!’

  ‘Wha—’ he groaned sleepily as she threw back the duvet and ran starkers across the room towards the hall console, where her knickers were kept.

  How could this have happened again? It was the third time in five days. They had to start going to bed earlier. They were in their early thirties now, not twenties. They weren’t bright young things anymore. If either one of them had office jobs, they’d have been sacked ten times over by now.

  ‘Get up! You’re late!’ she yelled over her shoulder, wishing she had a chest of drawers like most normal people. It’d be easier to access in emergencies.

  Henry sat up, the white duvet falling back to reveal his beautifully cut shoulders and smooth stomach, although his face was hazy with sleep. Then he saw the time on the clock and wide-awake horror crossed his face too.

  ‘Oh shit!’ he hollered, leaping out of bed and almost immediately going flying on a stray sheet of paper that had drifted to his side of the bed. He grabbed the door for support, but that only swung under his weight, leaving him in an undignified half-crab pose above the bedside table. ‘Bloody buggery hell!’ he shouted crossly, righting himself and wondering if he’d pulled a muscle in his hip.

  ‘Here!’ Cassie said, throwing him a clean pair of boxers from across the room. Luckily, he’d already hung out his suit and shirt the night before and he was in those and straightening his tie before Cassie had found her clean shirt – the red lumberjack one – to go with her jeans.

  ‘Cass, come on,’ he said impatiently, snapping on the clasp of his watch. ‘I’ll have to go without you. You know I can’t wait.’

  ‘It’s OK. I’m done. I’m coming,’ she panted, tightening the double knots on her Converses and standing up. They both jogged across the room then to the front door.

  ‘You mean like last night?’ Henry grinned, with a wink, as he held the door open for her and she sprinted down the four flights of stairs. ‘Because that really was something . . .’

  ‘Shut u
p!’ she laughed.

  Everyone was waiting for them when they arrived eleven minutes later, with ninety seconds to spare.

  ‘Jesus Christ, you cut it fine!’ Archie said, wild-eyed, his red hair leaping like a lord – he badly needed a haircut – as Cassie and Henry shot into view on the westbound District Line platform at Victoria, the agreed meeting place. There must have been thirty or forty other men just like them – in suits and trainers – clustered around, waiting for the four minutes past eight. ‘Give a guy a heart attack why don’t you? I thought I was going to have to do this thing on my own.’

  ‘You’ll never walk alone, mate,’ Henry winked, patting him heartily on the shoulder.

  ‘It’s not the walking I’m worried about,’ Archie said, checking the tension on his red braces and loosening his tie. ‘I didn’t fancy asking Suze to be my running buddy.’

  Henry laughed, not least because his sister, Suzy – Archie’s wife – was wearing a face like thunder as she tried to hold on to her wriggling two-year-old daughter, Velvet, who was unfortunately in the throes of a biting phase and was eyeing the legs around her with particular appetite.

  The train pulled in to the station with a squeal of brakes, the doors hissing open as everyone spilled in, the carriages blessedly relatively empty as they went against the rush-hour traffic and headed out instead towards the suburbs.

  Cassie greeted Suzy with a kiss, easily taking Velvet from her as the toddler spied ‘Auntie Kiss-Kiss’ and settled peacefully on her lap.

  ‘Oversleep again, did you?’ Suzy asked wryly. She knew perfectly well why Cassie and Henry were forever sleeping past their alarm.

  Cassie mouthed a sarcastic ‘Ha, ha’ back to her as the train pulled out. It was carnage in the carriage as the panoply of men in suits and trainers dominated – some, led by Archie, began singing sea shanties (quite why, she didn’t know); others were jogging lightly on the spot, stretching their arms and necks – as the regular commuters looked on in puzzled but persistent silence.

  ‘God, it’s like the last train to Brighton in here,’ Suzy said, wrinkling her nose as the aroma of a McDonald’s breakfast drifted over. ‘Honestly, every year it’s the same and every year I swear never again . . .’

  Cassie tilted her head sympathetically. ‘Arch is so determined to make it, though. He tries so hard and it’d be terrible for you to miss it.’

  ‘He’s never going to make it, Cass,’ Suzy said in a low tone. ‘His idea of a training session is jogging down to the pub.’

  Cassie shook her head resolutely. ‘Nope. This is his year. I can feel it.’

  ‘Well, that’s one of us.’

  Cassie jigged her legs lightly, softly singing the theme tune to Sleeping Beauty to Velvet – her emerging favourite film – as the train rattled along the tunnel, rocking side to side in the blackness until the gradual whine of the brakes was heard, the iconic London Underground sign whizzing past the windows, indecipherable at speed, but gradually slowing like a roulette wheel so that she could make out ‘South Kensington’ in red letters.

  The doors opened again and most of the passengers on the platform took one look at the assorted bunch in shirtsleeves and trainers – some of whom were trying to raise a haka – and opted for the neighbouring carriages.

  ‘Right, well, nearly there,’ Archie said as the train started moving again. He put himself through some dubious stretching exercises before bounding over, his freckled hand gently rustling Velvet’s white-blonde hair. ‘Kiss Daddy for luck, Velvet?’ he asked, bending down, lips pursed in an impressive trout pout as he waited – and waited – for his toddler to comply.

  Suzy was just as reluctant, fussing with Archie’s bike clips instead, which he had attached to his trousers to minimize ‘wind resistance’, then adjusting his braces and checking he’d put Vaseline on his nipples. ‘We don’t want a repeat of last year, do we?’ she asked, before giving him a firm peck on the lips.

  ‘Ready, mate?’ Henry asked, rolling up his shirtsleeves and handing his jacket and briefcase to Cassie with a kiss. He pushed his index finger against the tip of her nose, his eyes lingering on her mouth, just as the train jolted to a complete stop. ‘Don’t move,’ he said with a wink, before turning and slipping through the mass of City-shirted backs to the doors.

  ‘As if,’ she sighed to herself, hugging his jacket tighter.

  With their customary hiss, the doors opened and the pack set off with a roar, sprinting onto the platform, arms pumping and ties flying. Cassie couldn’t help but get up with Velvet and watch them go. Henry was in the lead group, of course, racing up the stairs, which were positioned bang outside their carriage; Arch was bringing up the rear and looking like he’d got a stitch before he’d even reached the top. Within a minute they were out of sight, although not earshot.

  Cassie ducked back into the carriage. Having been overcrowded only seconds before, it was now empty and quiet, the remaining passengers settling back down with relief to their newspapers and smartphones, the new ones boarding hastily as the station attendant held up his paddle and blew the whistle.

  Suzy lifted the massive nappy bag, which was significantly larger than the toddler it served, off the seat she had ‘reserved’ and Cassie sat down again, handing over Velvet and carefully folding Henry’s jacket over her lap as the train pulled away. She checked his briefcase to make sure he’d remembered, in all the rush, his iPad, which contained his notes.

  ‘When’s the meeting?’ Suzy asked.

  ‘Nine.’

  ‘Nine? How’s he going to get back into town in time for that?’

  ‘He’s not. They’re doing it over breakfast at the Hurlingham.’ The private club was based on the outer boundary of Fulham, the Thames flanking it on one side, and was only two Tube stops further on from where this daft interlude was supposed to end.

  Suzy shook her head. ‘You are completely stark raving bollocksy-mad. I thought you said this meeting was the make or break for the Arctic expedition?’

  ‘It is,’ Cassie murmured, checking the iPad was actually charged.

  ‘And yet he thought it was a good idea to do his best Chariots of Fire impression half an hour beforehand?’

  Cassie smiled. They both knew this event was run to mark the anniversary of Bannister breaking the four-minute mile. It was usually scheduled for the date of the actual anniversary – 6 May – but Henry, as the organizer, had had to push it back a few weeks as he’d been travelling so much, pulling the team together and schmoozing the great and good of the political and environmental worlds who liked what he was doing. He couldn’t afford to cancel again on account of a meeting, especially with the expedition just around the corner now, which would take him out of the country again. ‘He reckons they’d understand if he’s late.’

  ‘He’d better hope they do. Isn’t someone else in the running for the grant?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s fine. This is just about being seen to be following correct procedure; the fact is, the whole thing’s been all but agreed.’

  Suzy paused, only slightly mollified. ‘Well, I personally think you’re loons.’

  ‘I know.’ Cassie instinctively reached across and stroked Velvet’s round cheek again. She really was a dreamy-looking child, inheriting her father’s dimples and her mother’s distinctive blonde hair and dark brown eyes. (It was on account of her rich, velvety eyes that she was known by her middle name and not her first, Clemency, or even her beloved antenatal nickname, Cupcake.)

  ‘You’re dead broody,’ Suzy smirked.

  Cassie whipped her hand away smartly. ‘I am not!’ she retorted, as though Suzy had said, ‘You’re dead ugly,’ instead.

  ‘So then . . . ?’

  ‘I’m simply hatching a plan to kidnap your delicious daughter and sell her to Vera Wang as a professional flower girl.’

  ‘Ha! Don’t think I haven’t considered it!’ Suzy gave a sharp laugh, but something in her tone vibrated in Cassie’s head like a tuning fork.

  ‘H
ow is work?’

  Suzy’s wedding-planning consultancy in Pimlico netted all the chicest, most cosmopolitan brides in one of London’s smartest quarters, although that also meant their demands were off the scale and Suzy was often run ragged in her quest to deliver them the perfection they sought. Yet she had seemed uncharacteristically mellow recently.

  There was a protracted silence as Suzy’s eyes roamed the carriage as though looking for spies. ‘Houston, we have a problem,’ she said finally, her eyes meek, for once, as they met Cassie’s.

  ‘What kind of problem?’

  ‘A problem that I hadn’t realized is as bad as it is.’ Suzy shook her head, distractedly playing with one of Velvet’s cowlicks. ‘You remember Archie’s last bonus at Christmas was pants?’

  ‘Yes.’ How could they ever forget? Suzy had rampaged like a wounded bull at the bank’s very clear message for her husband to push off, as Henry had taken Archie down to the pub to drown his sorrows.

  ‘Well, I thought it was just a matter of him making a few phone calls, you know? But I kid you not, he has more meetings with headhunters than he does with clients, and still nothing. The market’s dead and he’s stressed to the eyeballs.’

  Cassie couldn’t pretend she knew anything about the world of finance or what a risk-weighted asset was. ‘But people are still getting married, right? I mean, things are still good for you work-wise?’

  Cassie realized the train had stopped, the carriage emptying dramatically, and she glanced round to see where they were. Earls Court. Already? They had sailed through Gloucester Road without her even noticing.

  ‘Listen, I didn’t realize the scale of things with Arch. He’s been trying to keep it from me, and I’ve been so wrapped up in Velvet . . .’ She kissed her daughter’s head again, her eyes instinctively closing at the scent of her. ‘Well . . . I’ve been turning jobs down, trying to strike that famous work–life balance.’ She looked across at Cassie, her big brown eyes doe-like as Cassie saw fear in them. ‘I was trying to learn from my mistakes, for once. I didn’t want to be all strung out like I was before she was born, you know?’