‘Well, if I send you the link she sent me. I think The Little Love Café could do well.’
A warm bundle of excited energy shoots up my spine. ‘Do you really think so?’
‘The closing date for submissions is next week and I think the winner is announced early May. If you win, you get national press coverage and I think the owner gets a cash prize.’
Phoebe flashes me her phone to show me the details. ‘This competition could give Frankie’s café the amazing lift it needs. He can also get some much-needed kudos for coming up with the idea of The Little Love Café. With Rose being so unwell, this is the type of boost he needs right now.’
Esme places her hand on my arm. ‘Plus, it will stop you worrying about Noah.’
Phoebe looks at me. ‘You’re worried about him?’
‘I feel like it’s history repeating itself. Him going to Ireland and promising to come back.’
‘You’ve got to believe in him, Alice,’ says Esme. ‘It sounds cheesy, but you are going to have to believe in love.’
Phoebe nods. ‘Turning the café around is your version of hiking to Base Camp Everest. That’s your mountain.’
CHAPTERTHIRTY-TWO
Waking up in the new flat is a different experience. Drifting in through my bedroom window are the sounds of waves barrelling onto the shore, an overexcited dog barking like crazy on the beach, a gang of noisy seagulls, a small child having a tantrum about wanting an ice cream and an exasperated parent telling them the shop’s not open yet.
There’s no rush as Jake is covering this morning. He was so sweet as he said Lucas and I should have the opportunity to enjoy our new home. I look at my phone. There has been no word from Noah. An uncomfortable feeling takes hold of me. In my head I hear Esme’s voice from last night,You need to believe in love.I need to believe that Noah will return, and we will finally be together after twenty years of disastrous relationships. It feels easier to say it than do it.
Thoughts about Dad and Mum creep into my mind. What happens if the rumours were true and Noah’s dad tells him the unthinkable – that he and my mum did have an affair before she died. My stomach performs a nauseating spin.
‘Mummy, can we build a den like we used to do…’ Lucas is at the door in his pyjamas. He stops mid-sentence. I know what he wanted to say. Before Scott came along, Lucas and I were always building dens in my bed. We used to have such fun sitting underneath a duvet propped up by my old pogo stick looking at his picture books and giggling with each other. Scott stopped the den building. He said it made a mess of the bedroom and Lucas should make them in his own bed. I stupidly went along with what Scott said.
Scott’s not here anymore,I remind myself. This new flat means Lucas and I can go back to our fantastic world of bed dens. ‘Let’s build a den, Lucas.’
He comes racing in and before long, he and I are building a den, comprising of my duvet cover, all our pillows and a clothes airer to give it height. Once it is finished, he goes to fetch a Batman book and we sit inside and read it together.
After we have showered and changed Lucas helps me unpack more stuff from the many boxes I’d stored at Dad’s house. A few were from my time living with Scott. My mind drifts back to when I’d first met Scott on a dating app.
Lucas was still little and we were living in a flat above one of the clothes shops in town. Pete and I had broken up for good and I found myself looking for love again. A girl I used to work with in Mick’s old beach café recommended a dating app she’d met her fiancé on.
Scott was handsome with sun-kissed blonde hair, a golden tan and an eye-watering athletic figure. Looking back, he reminded me of Noah. Initially I liked the idea of a long-distance romance. After a whirlwind romance, where one of us would go see the other at weekends, I was whisked away for a romantic weekend, and Scott asked if Lucas and I would go live with him in Surrey. Days later, Lucas and I moved into Scott’s fancy three-bedroomed house on the posh housing estate. He proposed two months later.
In one of the boxes is Lucas’s old school uniform from the primary school he went to when we lived with Scott. Lucas and Scott never bonded. I used to put that down to Lucas being ill so much. From the day we moved into Scott’s house; Lucas caught every bug imaginable. He was always ill and missed a lot of school. Every germ made a beeline for him: chicken pox, chest infections, a rampaging stomach bug, a persistent cough, and several heavy colds.
Holding up the school jumper, I look over at Lucas who is climbing over our new sofa. Since returning to Blue Cove Bay, he has had one tummy bug and that only lasted two days. The version of Lucas back then was very different to the one now hanging off the sofa and sticking his tongue out at me. The Lucas who lived with Scott and I was pale, sickly, and tired. I wonder whether that was because Lucas wasn’t happy back then. ‘Lucas, did you like Scott?’
The reply is instant. ‘No, Mummy.’
‘Do you like living here?’
He stands on the sofa and cheers. ‘Yes, can we go have an ice cream for breakfast?’
After a celebratory ice-cream breakfast, Lucas and I go for a walk along the beach. As he races to pick up shells from the sand and I watch the waves rush in and out, my relationship with Scott is still on my mind. On the surface everything seemed okay, but he wasn’t right for Lucas and me. I was always trying to fit in with a group of posh school mums who had produced an array of angelic children. They were never unwell and they never got caught rummaging through the purses and wallets of strangers.
Scott also used to make it difficult for me to come home and see Frankie and Dad. There would always be a problem with the car or a reason why I couldn’t visit. Perhaps Scott’s affair did Lucas and me a favour? We were not able to be ourselves with Scott.
Maybe what happened with Scott was a blessing? Maybe heartbreak is not meant to just hurt you, maybe it’s meant to show you that the person you think you love is not right for you. This is what it was doing with Scott. He wasn’t right for me, or Lucas and I know that now. Pete wasn’t right either although that took several years to fall apart. I take a deep breath of salty sea air and feel a little lighter inside.
The Little Love Café is busy when I join Jake later. Dad has taken Lucas to the cinema, so I don’t have to worry about childcare.
While Jake makes the drinks for table two, he listens as I tell him about the award. ‘If the submission is successful, we will be visited by a set of judges and then we would hear officially at the start of May.’
‘This sounds great, Alice,’ says Jake. ‘I just wish we could stop couples coming here to have a row. This morning, I had two arguing couples. One woman told her partner he could stick his engagement ring where the sun doesn’t shine. She then put it on social media and tagged us in.’
