A Good Result by Marg McAlister

Author:Marg McAlister [McAlister, Marg]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2016-04-08T22:00:00+00:00

Back at Jim Beggs’ cafe, his wife Maureen was feeling more mellow than she had for months.

Maybe years.

She had stayed in Coffee, Cakes & Crepes that morning for a good hour, drinking coffee until she buzzed and sampling Viv’s cupcakes, and talking to that nice Georgie woman from America.

She felt normal. If this was what retirement felt like, she was determined to get some of it for herself. If Jim wanted to work himself into the ground to save a dollar, let him.

In two more months, she would be sixty-five, and she wasn’t working a day beyond that. She didn’t care if they were poor—and why would they be, when they had that nice little duplex over in Kingfisher Avenue, and their house? They could live off the rent from the duplex and sell the cafe. The land must be worth a bit, even if the building was old and in need of repair…and she did have her mother’s money, although the will had stipulated that Jim wasn’t to see a red cent.

He’d be furious. More than furious.

Naturally Irene Wilson had been agog to find out what was going on, the minute she walked in and saw Maureen in enemy territory. When Maureen refused to say why she was at Coffee, Cakes & Crepes and not at work, Irene had dragged Janet across the road at the first opportunity to ‘put in an order for lunch’, as though anyone couldn’t see through that.

She’d been back in ten minutes, none the wiser, after Jim had fobbed her off with the new backpacker kid.

When Maureen finally returned to work, her husband turned his back on her, and didn’t speak a word right up until the time he stomped out of the door to go and play golf, leaving her with their new recruit.

Right now the backpacker was efficiently making cappuccinos for a couple of tourists. Maureen looked at him thoughtfully. Now that she’d committed to Adele’s quilting group, she needed to organize Monday mornings.

“Anton?”

He turned and flashed a wide smile. “Yep?”

“How long are you planning to stay in Yamba?”

He shrugged. “A few months, maybe? I need to save some money before I travel again.”

Maureen beamed at him. A few months, perfect. After that she’d be retired and past caring what Jim did with the cafe.

“Can you work every Monday morning? Say, eight through until midday?”

“Sure.”

Maureen thought about it for another thirty seconds, and hastily revised the time frame. “No, let’s say until one-thirty.” One thirty would give her a chance to have lunch with the women in the group.

“Whatever.” He expertly jiggled the milk jug, making a pretty design on the top of the coffee.

How did people do that? Lissa had tried to show her, but she had messed up.

Well, she had a barista class coming up on Sunday. Only now, she wasn’t going to hide it from Jim.

It was liberating, not caring what he thought or said any more.

And if he did carry on? Well, she’d just keep her mother’s money and go and start again.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.