Never Too Late by Cathy Kelly Read Free Book Online Page A

Evie and Rosie. It was freezing
    outside and, since the twelve-year-old Golf’s heater only
    worked sporadically, it was pretty cold inside the car too.
    That was it, she’d go to Evie’s. After the hellish day she’d
    had, it would be lovely to sit in her pretty sitting room in
    front of the fire and gossip.
     
    Then she remembered - Evie was at Simon’s office
    party. Shit. Sitting in the car staring blankly at the supermarket lit up with fairy lights, tinsel and overindulgent
    sprawls of fake snow, Olivia felt like crying. She must be
    pre-menstrual, she thought, searching blindly in her handbag
    for a tissue.
    Everything had gone wrong all week, finishing up with
    horrible Cheryl Dennis’s mince-throwing session on the
    last day of term. Now she was stuck with bloody Sheilagh
    and Cedric for the night. They wouldn’t go to bed until
    very late, while she, who had a mountain of quiches to
    bake the following morning, had to get up at six.
    Half an hour chatting with Evie would have cheered her
    up enough to cope. She blew her nose and thought of what
    her friend would say about the MacKenzie Seniors. Indeed,
    what Evie already had said about them: ‘Those people
    have no bloody manners - they need the short, sharp shock
    treatment. They’re so thick-skinned, it’s the only thing
    that’ll work.’ Her advice would be brusque now: Tell
    them you’ve got a lot to do so you’re going to bed early.
    Explain that they can look after themselves tomorrow
    and,’ Evie would pause for effect, her forehead scrunched
    up crossly, ‘tell them to phone next time they plan to stay
    with you. I don’t know why you can’t say it, Olivia. They’ll
    haunt you for the rest of your life if you don’t get firm
    with them sometime.’
    Dear Evie was so protective of her but she was right,
    Olivia was perfectly aware of that. Still, it was one thing thinking up all the tough things she’d like to say to her pushy, inconsiderate in-laws. It was another thing entirely
    actually saying any of them. And being so blunt would hurt
    Stephen dreadfully because he idolised his parents. Olivia
    wouldn’t hurt him for the world.
    ‘I’m home,’ she said brightly, dragging the first batch of
    shopping into the apartment. That was one of the huge
    disadvantages of high-rise living - it took several goes to
    lug the groceries up from the car park because the lift was
    too unreliable to get it to wait while she dragged six or
    seven bags to the front door.
    More than once, the lift doors had slammed shut on half
    of Olivia’s shopping as she struggled to drag the first
    instalment across the landing and in the front door.
    ‘It never happens to me,’ Stephen had pointed out when
    she’d complained about it.
    Olivia was too loyal to remark that he’d only done the big
    grocery shop once when she was in bed with bronchitis, so
    he was hardly an expert on the subject.
    Now she dumped the bags in the kitchen and poked her
    head into the sitting room where Cedric and Sheilagh
    were watching the news.
    Cedric was sitting ramrod straight on one couch, that
    day’s newspaper all over the floor, while Sheilagh lay prone
    on the other, looking like a giant, plump strawberry in the
    pink velour tracksuit that did nothing for either her hefty
    figure or her purple-tinged frosted hairdo.
    ‘I’m home,’ Olivia said again. ‘I’m just getting the
    shopping from the car.’
    ‘Oh, hello,’ said Sheilagh.
    Neither of them moved a muscle.
    Olivia turned to collect the second hundredweight of
    shopping.
    She’d just dumped it on to the kitchen floor when
    Cedric called out: ‘Did you remember to get a lemon,
    dear? You’ve none in the fridge and I love it in my tea.’
    Meaning, Olivia simmered, that you’d like more tea, with lemon this time.
    She gazed at the shortbread crumbs decorating her previously
    spotless worktops. For someone who claimed to be a
     
    martyr to her wheat and dairy allergies, Sheilagh certainly
    could put away