AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Mia shook her head, and Charlie turned to smile at her. “Your evening getting any better?”
Mia shrugged. “Not sure yet.”
“Going to depend on the exhibition?” Charlie finished his pint with one last draw and reached for the untouched drink Joe had left behind, resolving to take this one slower.
“I think that part’s pretty much a forgone conclusion.” Mia’s smile had slipped, and Charlie felt a desperate urge to put it back somehow.
“Really?” He tried to sound upbeat. “I got the impression everyone’s waiting to see what they’ve got to offer. They’re not sold yet.”
“Mmm.” Mia fingered the stem of her wineglass.
“You don’t agree?”
She looked up and caught his eye. “They’re desperate, Charlie. We all are. This casino doesn’t just mean more tourists, it means more jobs. They’ll pretend they’re not sure, that they’re holding out, but every single one of them is secretly praying this might be the thing to saves them. I’m not even sure I should be trying to convince them it’s a bad idea.”
“Maybe the exhibition will be a flop,” Charlie suggested, but Mia didn’t look convinced.
She was, in fact, looking at the door again. Charlie turned to see what had caught her attention, and saw Becky and Tony making their way over to the bar. It was taking them some time; a number of locals wanted to stop and congratulate them, by the look of things.
“I’m sure the exhibition will be a roaring success,” Mia said, and Charlie knew he wasn’t getting her smile back that night.
* * * *
By Wednesday night, the evening before Becky and Tony’s exhibition, Mia had developed a permanent headache from trying to think of a way to help Walt and save the Coliseum.
“Upstairs with you,” Ditsy had said as they’d shut up the shop that evening. “Take a long bath, have a glass of wine, relax and get an early night. You’re not going to change the world before morning.”
Mia wasn’t entirely sure that meant she shouldn’t try.
Still, she’d done as she was told, and now she was clean, smelling of lavender bath oil, and cozy and comfortable in her pajamas and slippers. Her headache was finally receding, she had a glass of chardonnay on the coffee table and a crocheted throw blanket Ditsy had given her one Christmas draped across her knees.
And she still hadn’t found a way to save the cinema.
Sighing, she grabbed Ditsy’s book off the coffee table. Maybe some irrelevant love advice from the fifties might help. At this point, Mia was willing to take inspiration from anywhere.
Cracking it open at a random page, Mia read the first entry aloud. “B. Never go to bed angry–it makes for furious dreams.” Not particularly helpful. Still, she read on.
My husband and I, the writer announced, a little pompously, never go to bed without a few sweet words, and an ever sweeter kiss. Nothing makes the morning brighter than going to bed feeling loved.
Which was all very well for the author and her husband, but less helpful for a single girl struggling to save a cinema.
She flipped forward through the pages, pausing at H–The home really is where the heart is!–, P–Patience is an underrated virtue–and U–The most important thing about love is that it must be unconditional–before putting the book aside with a sigh.
Whatever help Ditsy expected her to find in the book, it clearly wasn’t to do with saving the Coliseum.
As she sat staring out of her window at the darkened Aberarian skies, her phone rang, and she answered without looking at the screen. “I’m relaxing, Ditsy, I swear.”
“No you’re not,” Charlie answered, and Mia sat up straight, blanket falling down to her waist. “I can hear it in your voice.”
“Ditsy’s been nagging me,” she said, tucking the blanket more securely around her.
“So I gathered.” Charlie sounded amused. “She called me to ask me to check up on you. Had a theory you might still be stressing out.”
“I’ve been relaxing! I’ve had a bath, I’ve read a book, I’m putting my feet up on the sofa.” Mia leaned against the arm of her chair and pulled her feet up, so she wasn’t technically lying.
“And I bet you haven’t stopped worrying about tomorrow’s exhibition the whole time.”
Mia didn’t have an answer that wasn’t a lie for that one, so she stayed quiet.
On the other end of the line, Charlie gave a low laugh. “Get some sleep, Mia. I promise you whatever battles you want to fight will still be there tomorrow.”
She was tired, Mia supposed. And she needed to be well-rested if she was going to come up with a constructive argument against Becky’s casino. “Yeah, all right. I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Of course.” Charlie’s voice was husky, and she wondered briefly where he was before she decided she didn’t want to know. If he was in bed alone, she didn’t care, because they were just friends. And if he was in bed with Becky...then she really didn’t want to think about it.
“Sweet dreams,” Charlie said, and hung up.
Mia flipped Ditsy’s book open one last time, and it landed on T. “Trust,” Mia read, “is the bedrock of any relationship.”
Well, Mia trusted Charlie was having a great time with his ex-girlfriend. And she trusted Becky to break his heart any time now.
She wondered what that said about her relationship limestone.
* * * *
April Havers was looking happy, something Mia thought was a particularly bad sign.
“I don’t think I
’ve ever seen her smile before,” Mia muttered to Ditsy as they pushed past the knots of people outside the church hall, all discussing the exhibition inside.
Mia had insisted on waiting until after lunch before they visited the display, determined not to seem too interested or concerned.
They’d held out until eleven-thirty.
“Come on,” Ditsy said, grabbing Mia’s arm. “Let’s go find out what all the fuss is about.”
Inside, the church hall was almost unrecognizable. Gone were the usual trestle tables and plastic chairs. Even the old yellow and orange curtains had been taken down, allowing light to flood in through the high windows.
The white of the exhibition boards glowed in the sunlight, all leading to the center of the room, where a white foam model of Aberarian as it could be stood proud on its pedestal.
Mia ignored the posters, pictures and plans and headed directly for the 3D model. Obviously everyone else had already seen it, because her path was clear. She reached out and rested a hand on the glass covering it, looking down on the whitewashed future of her hometown.
The white foam board made the scruffy seafront neat and bright. The tumbledown guesthouses and hotels currently standing comfortably crumbling on the Esplanade were given sharp corners and stability.
And the row of empty shops leading up to the Coliseum were all merged into one, keeping the impressive vintage entrance of the cinema, and relabeled in white-on-white letters Champion Casino.
Mia turned away, finding Ditsy standing beside a poster promising new jobs for the young people of Aberarian and ‘incentives’ for local business owners.
“We’re screwed,” Ditsy murmured as Mia read over her shoulder. “Casino or not, any moral stance is going out the window when people see the extent of the development.”
“Then we’re going to have to come up with a better offer.”
Chapter 7
Charlie shifted in his seat, waiting for Mia to arrive. The meeting wasn’t due to start for another ten minutes and already the church was full. People were perched on windowsills, standing crushed against the wall and even sitting in the aisle. But he’d kept two empty chairs in the front row, between himself and Magda, just waiting for Mia and Ditsy.
