The Sudden Departure of the Frasers by Louise Candlish Read Free Book Online Page A

and me.’
    This dismayed Caroline; you could see it in the slow slide of her half-smile, a perceptible withdrawal of warmth.
    ‘Would you like to come in for a coffee?’ Christy said, forgetting they were both on their way out, her own errand involving a trip to the hardware store on the Parade for light bulbs.
    ‘Thank you,’ Caroline said, ‘but I need to dash. I’m just picking up my youngest from school. He’s in kindergarten and finishes a bit earlier than the other two.’
    ‘Is it a local school they go to?’
    ‘Yes, Lime Park Primary, just behind the Parade.’
    ‘I’m going in that direction, as well. Maybe we could walk together and you can fill me in on the local gossip?’
    This Christy said quite playfully and yet the other woman looked startled, almost insulted, by her suggestion. Suddenly she was digging in her bag and extracting a set of car keys; she had been going to walk (and why wouldn’t she, the school was ten minutes away?), but now she’d decided to drive.
    ‘You’re based at home, are you?’ she asked, apparently not entirely incurious.
    Christy smiled. ‘No, I’ve just been off work this week to unpack and get the utilities sorted out. I thought I might need to do some decorating but the couple before us left the house in such perfect condition there’s nothing for me to do.’ When Caroline failed to react, Christy continued to voice her thoughts, forgetting this was not always the most successful basis for conversation: ‘We’re not online yet, either, and my phone doesn’t get a very good signal down here so I feel a bit cut off. I can’t wait to get back to work, to be honest. The street feels so dead. There’s no way I could do this full time …’ Too late she heard how the words might have sounded and felt her cheeks flush. ‘I didn’t mean … Well, maybe you don’t work and I didn’t mean it how it sounded.’
    A week out of the office and already she was a gibbering idiot.
    ‘Excuse me, but I certainly
do
work,’ Caroline said, frowning rather fiercely. Her voice rang clear and confident in the quiet street, audible surely to anyone with an inch of open window. ‘I have three children under eleven and if
that’s
not work then I don’t know what is.’
    ‘Of course. I only meant –’
    ‘Real work, eh? A contribution to the Exchequer, something in the interests of society and not for my own selfish hormonal ends? Yes, I know what you
only
meant. Well, future taxpayers don’t raise themselves, you know.’
    ‘I …’ Christy’s face burned. She was not sure how this could have escalated so rapidly. Was this one of those unfortunate situations when you find yourself bearing the brunt of someone’s pre-existing frustrations? Had Caroline been criticized before and not had the opportunity to defend herself? ‘I’m sure you’re right,’ she said apologetically. ‘Forget I said anything.’
    But Caroline only looked at her with exasperated disbelief, as if she could not credit that
this
was what had emerged from number 40. ‘You think very differently from Amber, I see,’ she said, as if that settled it.
    ‘Amber?’ In her confusion it took Christy a second or two to place the name. ‘Oh. I didn’t ever meet –’ she began, but it was too late, Caroline had turned from her to point her key fob at a nearby Mini, the lights of which began to flash as the locks released. Christy wondered how a family of five could fit into the tiny cabin, but thenshe remembered the enormous Audi on the drive. She and Joe had never owned a car in their lives, let alone two.
    ‘Bye,’ Christy called after her. ‘Another time, maybe?’ But the question was obliterated by the angry crunch of the car door closing.
    Oh dear, she thought. So far she wasn’t seeing much evidence of the open-armed community she had so confidently expected of Lime Park Road. But there were plenty more fish in the sea, she told herself, and the law of averages dictated they