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‘You’re right. But what do I do? I can’t quit.’
‘You can’t quit. But you’ve got all your art mentorship stuff going on, you’ve got your art gallery dream that sustains you through all these shit times, and it sounds like you’re getting something nice on the side as well...’
‘I haven’t even told you yet!’
‘Told me what?’ Candace shouts back.
‘About my time away with Jack. In the Lake District—at his cottage.’
‘Oh my god, this is so exciting. I need all the details, Leyna!’
‘It was so amazing. We toured all around Keswick and Ambleside and, you are not going to believe this, but he owns a couple of restaurants there.’
‘A couple of restaurants,’ Candace repeats.
I nod. ‘I know. It’s crazy, right?’
‘So crazy!’
‘But there were problems with the restaurants, so we did a little stakeout and watched them from afar.’
‘What? What sort of problems?’
‘No idea. He said they were losing money?’
Candace leans back in her chair and stares at me. ‘So, you really like him,’ Candace states—it’s not a question.
‘He’s not bad...’ I shrug, smiling.
‘I know he’s better thannot bador you’d have left by now. You need to focus all your energy on those things that make you happy—like Jack and your Bonnie and Clyde role-playing fantasies. Hey! Not judging. Ignore everything else and let Lorna live in her messed up little world of obsolete class rules.’
‘You’re so right. You always know what to say to make me feel better,’ I say truthfully. ‘I just don’t see how I go from where I am right now to owning an art gallery.’
Just then Candace fishes something out of her purse. ‘I knew I’d been saving this for a reason.’ She hands me a tiny piece of paper that says,All will become clear in due course.
‘You keep hold of that. Fortune cookie wisdom always comes true!’
‘If you say so.’
We both laugh.
‘Now go make a date with your man,’ Candace says.
I absolutely love Candace, but she could be a real pain in the arse—because she was almost always right. ‘Yes,’ I say dejectedly. ‘Being with Jack makes me happy. I should ask him out again.’
‘Look, I have a suggestion. Start out with something simple. Why don’t you ask him out to dinner and take it from there?’
‘A lunch date,’ I muse out loud, a plan already forming in my head. ‘A secret rendezvous at the Botanic Gardens.’ I grin.
‘Watch out. Cinnamon’s back.’
––––––––
THE FOLLOWING DAY,after a full day at the office, with Lorna now in a permanently sour mood and no sign of Jack whatsoever, I decide I’m not going to wait around any longer.
That evening, I fill a bag and head over to Jack’s place. I know he is still at work because he has a late meeting which I noticed in his online diary and he will probably head to the pub afterwards like he usually does on a Wednesday. So I use his spare key and let myself into his place. I know he hides one by the back door under a plant pot, just the way he did for the cottage in The Lakes. Jack was surprising in many ways, I smile to myself, but entirely predictable in so many others.
He’s going to get a little surprise when he returns home this evening after I take a long, hot shower in the en-suite that adjoins his bedroom.
