The Way We Were by Marcia Willett Read Free Book Online Page B

expressively, ‘you should hear him with some of the customers, especially a couple of girls who were in just now.’
    â€˜Too much information,’ said Liv severely. ‘Go on, Chris. Back to the treadmill.’
    He shook his head mock-complainingly and went away.
    â€˜He's nice, isn't he?’ said Debbie, watching him cross the yard. ‘Great legs. It's a pity Val doesn't lighten up a bit. She makes real hard work of it.’
    â€˜It's early days,’ said Liv placatingly ‘Bit scary for her till it's all up and running properly. She'll be fine when she sees it's going to be OK.’

CHAPTER THREE
    2004
    After Liv had gone, Em pottered for a while in her greenhouse; tweaking up some weeds, pinching off unwanted leaders, thinning out a tray of seedlings. She relaxed in the humid warmth, liking the sensation of the crumbly earth between her fingers, and snuffing up the sharp, green, vegetal smell. All the while she was thinking about Liv. There had been a luminosity about her, as if she'd been lightly dusted with a glittering of happiness. Liv was usually good company; quick with a jokey response, intuitive, ready with some amusing little anecdote about her life. Yet this morning there had been an extra quality that had made the simple act of drinking coffee and eating cake a celebration.
    The obvious deduction was that Liv was in love. Pleased with this idea, Em began to invent the scenario, allowing her romantic imagination free rein; she pictured a handsome fellow coming into the café for coffee, chatting with Liv. coming back the next day. He might invite her to go for a walk on the cliffs, or to the pub for a drink, or to Rick Stein's. Perhaps he'd be a bit older than Liv, late thirties, mature but not stuffy. He'd been in a long relationship (no children), which had now fallen apart – not his fault, of course – and he was looking for a career change. Em fretted over this point for a while: he mustn't be unstable nor yet a stick-in-the-mud, and she couldn't quite decide what career he might pursue in Cornwall. Liv didn't want to leave Cornwall. Em pictured the handsome fellow: dark-haired, not over tall, with a nice twinkly sexy appeal.
    Realizing that quite unwittingly she'd cast Chris in the role of this desirable man, Em put down her little watering pot and went into the courtyard, sitting down again at the table feeling rather dismayed. Of course, she'd always been far too romantic. Quite suddenly she remembered how she and Tiggy had once laughed together on this very subject. Tiggy had told her how she'd longed for a tough, strong-jawed Georgette Heyer-type male to save her from her loneliness, and Em had described how, through all those years of aching boredom caring for her elderly aunt, she'd daydreamed of the handsome war hero who would rescue her.
    â€˜It worked for you, Aunt Em,’ Tiggy had said.
    And so it had: on a fine winter afternoon Archie had turned up at one of those interminable bridge parties so beloved by her aunt and she, Em, had fallen in love with him and he with her. She and Julia often discussed the possibility of Liv meeting someone and falling in love.
    â€˜Of course, nobody will ever be good enough for Pete,’ Julia had said. ‘You know how he adores Liv. I worry about her working so closely with Chris again after all these years, Aunt Em. I know she says it's all over but there's something so dangerous about the whiff of nostalgia, isn't there? Chris represents Liv's youth. Oh, I know she's only thirty-two but, even so, there's something special about the late teens and early twenties. And then, if you've had a fling with someone and they come back into your life, you might wonder if things would have been better if you'd stuck with them. Can you really be entirely indifferent to someone you've been to bed with?’
    Em hadn't answered; she had no experience to call upon. Neither of them had mentioned Angela Lisburne but Em knew