‘So,’ my aunt says quietly to me. ‘Do you like this Ben?’
I turn towards her but don’t look up from my knitting. I can already feel my face colouring. ‘He’s…’ I begin. ‘He’s nicer than I thought he was when he first arrived,’ I say hoping to make it sound neutral, but when I do look up at Miranda I can see that the neutrality hasn’t come across as I’d hoped.
‘Well that’s the first time I’ve seen you blush over a boy since you moved here,’ she says with a grin. ‘And Lord knows you had enough admirers over the summer.’
Both Miranda and Sascha keep insisting on this but all I could see was them pushing anything male towards me in some kind but ill-thought-out attempt to get me to get over Marcus.
‘Perhaps that’s true,’ I admit. ‘But don’t get too excited. It’s not like Ben’s a local or anything. I probably won’t see him very regularly – it might all just fizzle out into nothing. Besides, thanks to Eric he hasn’t even kissed me yet.’
‘He used to be a local,’ Miranda says. ‘So you never know.’
I can’t help smiling. ‘He did say he’d try to come back before Christmas.’
My aunt raises an eyebrow. ‘Sascha tells me that he’s booked a few nights at the hotel just before Christmas.’
That’s news to me. I look over at Sascha who is still trying to explain mindful management to Clara and Bessie.
‘Are you all just discussing my love life behind my back now?’ I ask.
Miranda laughs and my heart melts, forgiving her gossiping about me immediately because it’s so good to see her happy, to see her face more relaxed, less etched with pain – even if it is only temporary.
‘We just want you to be happy,’ she says.
‘You seem much better than you did on Friday.’
‘I told you it comes and goes and that’s normal at this stage.’ She reaches over and squeezes my arm. ‘We are doing OK, you know,’ she says. ‘And I promise we’ll ask for help when we need it.’
‘I’m sorry I didn’t come for lunch yesterday,’ I reply. I often go to my aunt and uncle’s bungalow for a late Sunday lunch while the café is quiet, but yesterday after Ben had left, I’d felt as though I needed to be alone for a bit while Abi looked after the café. Being alone had turned out to be a bad idea as I’d ended up thinking about what it was that Ben wasn’t saying and why he didn’t like Christmas much and that led me to think about Maman and all the Christmases she hadn’t wanted me with her and how I’d never had a chance to find out why.
And then I’d started to think about Marcus and by the time I went downstairs to help Abi with the afternoon teas I’d been feeling very sorry for myself. It was a feeling I hadn’t been able to shake even after Ben texted late last night to tell me he was back in London and was missing Sanderson Bay already, and even when he texted early this morning to tell me he was missing his Russian caravan tea and the person who made it for him.
I don’t tell my aunt about Ben’s texts. There is quite enough gossip and conjecture around my love life as it is. I don’t tell her that Ben works for Moby’s either. There’s no point upsetting her as it’s still very early days and I’m not sure anything will come of whatever it is that’s happening between Ben and me.
‘It’s fine, Ellie,’ my aunt says. ‘You don’t have to come every Sunday.’
‘I’ll be there next week I promise.’
‘So you’re on your own at the hotel until Friday?’ Lisa asks Sascha.
‘Not on my own,’ Sascha replies. ‘As Ellie has so kindly pointed out Celia, my darling mother-in-law, arrived this morning.’
‘Why didn’t you just tell Geoff that you were fine on your own?’ I ask, even though I know she needs the help.
She scowls at me. ‘Because Geoff would insist I wasn’t and his mother would insist I wasn’t and I don’t have the energy to argue with both of them.’ She pauses. ‘It’s so annoying because she keeps criticising the way I’m doing things but every single thing she’s criticised has been her beloved son’s idea.’
‘Why don’t you correct her?’ Lisa asks.
‘Trust me, it’s not worth it.’
Sascha glares across the café at nobody in particular and then pours herself another cup of ginger tea. When she gets haughty like this I can almost imagine what she was like as a corporate lawyer. Geoff, on the other hand, I struggle to imagine in his previous role in finance. Kind gentle Geoff with his too-long hair and his mindful management courses and his daily yoga practice (on the beach if the weather allows) could never have worked for one of those big multinational banks could he?
We all chat quietly about our Christmas preparations as we knit and I’m glad the focus has gone off me for now. Most of us will be staying in the Bay for Christmas – only Lisa will be going to her parents’ house just outside Hull.
‘I’ll be back for your New Year party though, Ellie,’ she says. ‘I won’t miss that!’
I grin at her. ‘I’m so excited for the New Year do,’ I say. ‘Excited and nervous though. I hope people will come.’
‘Of course people will come,’ Miranda says.
‘Won’t they prefer to go to the pub, though, like they usually do?’
‘I think a lot of people are planning to do both,’ Sascha says. It’s possible as I was planning the champagne tea to run earlier than Terry’s New Year’s Eve pub quiz. Perhaps I should talk to him about timings.
‘How many tickets have you sold?’ Lisa asks.
‘About half of them but I’m hoping more will sell nearer the time, especially to the people who have holiday homes here who tend to arrive on Boxing Day.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Sascha says. ‘You’ll sell all the tickets I’m sure of it.’
‘Maybe Ben will be here for New Year,’ Bessie says with a twinkle in her eye.
‘Well you’re the one who’s known him since he was a baby apparently,’ I reply. ‘Why didn’t you say you knew him when he first arrived?’
‘Clara and I thought we recognised him that first night but we couldn’t be sure,’ Bessie says. I can remember them nudging each other while Ben and I had been chatting that night. I’d thought at the time that they were planning to set us up, but now I wonder if they know more about Ben than I do, especially about why he and his mother left in the first place. For two people that are constantly talking about everybody else’s business, they can keep quiet when they want to.
We carry on chatting, without mentioning Ben too many times I’m glad to say, until my uncle arrives to pick up Miranda.
Around nine o’clock everyone starts to pack up their knitting and get ready to leave and I begin to clear away the tea things.
‘Do you mind if I go straight back?’ Sascha says as she comes up behind me. ‘I’m exhausted today for some reason and I’d better get back and see what my darling mother-in-law is up to.’
‘Of course I don’t mind,’ I reply. ‘And you’re exhausted because you’re eleven weeks pregnant.’