Did You Miss Me? by Sophia Money-Coutts

Author:Sophia Money-Coutts [Money-Coutts, Sophia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2021-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

IT DIDN’T HAPPEN INSTANTLY, but around day ten of nursing duties and tea making, I realized I’d settled into home life. As had Dad. He was niftier on his crutches and could get to the downstairs bathroom and back without shouting. At night, he settled into his chair like an emperor and off we went to the pub.

When Jack and I were kids, Dad took us with him on Saturday evenings for a pint of fizzy lime cordial and a packet of Skips. As a teenager, I worked there for a few months after leaving school to make some cash for my travels with Luce and Colin. But until now, I’d never fully appreciated the significance of the place for Dad, for Roy, and various others who staggered in every evening and nodded or waved at one another.

Since living in London, I’d become used to fancy pubs where they served wasabi peas that made my nose sting, but being back here for such a stretch made me appreciate the comforting familiarity of the Duck. It wasn’t posh, the food remained inedible (potentially dangerous), and if you’d asked Terence for a ramekin of wasabi peas he would have thrown you out. But that didn’t matter to the Northcliffe locals. For them, it was a kind of church.

I felt awkward about crashing Lucy and Mike’s date night and making small talk since I didn’t know him very well, but Luce summoned me with a hand, smiling across the tables of regulars.

‘Left Mum at home, total bedlam. Both of them shouting the place down but too bad. Can’t tell you how desperate I was for a night out,’ she said as I sat at their table.

London Nell would have scoffed at the idea that an evening in the Duck was ‘out’. Instead, I smiled and asked if Jimbo and Bonnie were all right.

Luce batted a hand in the air and took a swig of her wine. ‘They’re fine, alive. Let’s not talk about them, let’s talk about you. I never get the chance to see you properly. Mike, go to the bar and get a bottle. I think we’ll need one.’

‘I’m OK,’ I said quickly, looking at my soda water. ‘I don’t drink during the week. Gus and I have this… rule.’

‘What?’ screeched Lucy. ‘I never get to see you and I want to celebrate. A couple of glasses won’t kill you, plus it’s Friday tomorrow.’

I glanced over my shoulder at Dad, red-faced and roaring at a joke of Roy’s. At least I hoped it was a joke and not his blood pressure. ‘Go on then, yes please.’

‘Great. Mike, the bar.’

Mike stood and saluted her. The size difference between them made me smile: Lucy was as short as a leprechaun while he was tall, with a barrel for a stomach and a wild, Hagrid beard. I’d been invited to their wedding a few years earlier but couldn’t go. It was shortly before I’d been promoted to senior associate and I’d had to work through the weekend.

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