Summer at the Dog & Duck by Jill Steeples

Author:Jill Steeples [Steeples, Jill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aria
Published: 2017-03-31T04:00:00+00:00

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After the high drama of yesterday, it came as a huge relief to know that today was my day off. To be honest, I’d not been terribly good in making use of my free days and usually just stayed at home, before getting roped into whatever was going on at the pub. Today I was determined not to let that happen.

I knew my stress levels had been building, making me feel tired and out of sorts for the last few days now, and I couldn’t blame that entirely on Max Golding. If Mum was here she would have told me to slow down, to get a few early nights in and to look after myself properly. It was easy to forget those simple things without your mum gently chiding you with her concern.

What advice would she be giving me now about Max?

‘Don't let him mess you around.’

‘If he’s not being straight with you then walk away.’

‘You don’t deserve to feel second best.’

I could hear her voice in my head and would agree one hundred per cent with her sentiment, but I knew it wasn’t as straightforward as that. The events of yesterday played on my mind and I mulled them over, trying to see if I could make more sense of them now. Maybe I’d overreacted to Sasha’s news, feeling unnecessarily threatened by the unexpected discovery that she was pregnant, my shock only heightened by Katy’s presence, who had whipped up my confusion with her constant questions. Maybe I was building this up into something much bigger than it actually was. I just needed to take a step back from it all today.

Upstairs, with my hair wrapped in a towel from my shower, I padded over towards the window and looked out over the beer garden. The sun filtered through the clouds casting a warm glow over the enclosed space. A few weeks ago, Dan, Rich, Andy and I had put in a mammoth cleaning up session. We’d pressure-washed the tables, chairs and benches, repainted the walls a warm cream colour, pulled up the weeds, trimmed the climbing bushes, installed some patio heaters and replaced all the cushions with new candy-striped ones. The blankets in the basket by the door to the garden, for those nights when there was a cold nip in the air, had been replaced with some new cosy ones too. A raised decking area had been installed at the back of the yard to provide more seating and with Polly’s beautiful hanging baskets and the tall ferns in the patio containers providing bold and striking relief, it made for a warm and welcoming space. The barn at the back of the patio, where we held our open-mic nights, and private parties, looked so pretty with the wooden boxes of bright red geraniums outside. I felt so proud of the wonderful space we’d created and relished the thought of how busy it would be soon with all our visitors over the summer. With it being totally empty

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