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I reach down and cuddle him, silencing his cute mispronounced words and tell him to ‘shush.’ I’ve worked too hard to shatter the illusion already.
“Auntie? Must be the husband's sister. That explains why she looks like that, and not like the awful mother.” I straighten to my full, accentuated, height as the snooty voice behind me pulls every muscle in my spine tight. Turning slowly to face the bitter woman, I take my sunglasses off and let my gaze roam over her. I smirk when she squirms a little in her Mary Jane shoes.
“Excuse me, were you discussing my sister just then?” She stutters but before she can finish her sentence I hold my hand up to silence her. “Actually, I neither care nor need to know anything that comes out of your overinflated and cheap botoxed mouth.” A collective gasp rings around her followers and I roll my eyes at them all. “I actually pity you. You’re what? A thirty-something year old woman who is so insecure she pumps chemicals and poison into her face to make her look younger? Which, by the way, hasn’t worked. I’d give you late forties. And that’s me being generous.” Her mouth drops open, her eyes are wide and bulging, but I’m not done yet. “You’re not comfortable in your own skin, unlike my sister, who is ten times prettier, classier, and better than all of you put together. You’re nothing but a bunch of sad old mean girls and I actually feel sorry for all of your children.”
I place my glasses back on and flip my hair over my shoulder again. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I'm going to spend the weekend with my niece and nephew whilst my sister and her husband are in the South of France for the weekend. Do you all know where your husbands are this weekend? I bet their secretaries are very well looked after, aren’t they?”
Turning on my heels, I bump straight into Scarlet, who high fives me whilst shouting, “Yes Auntie Phoebe.”
I usher her and her brother out of the school and into the car and blow a shaky breath out. “Shoot, kids, you weren't supposed to see that. Please don’t tell your mum.”
“Oh please, Auntie Phoebe. They deserved all you said and more. They’re horrible to mum all the time. Even their kids are ashamed of them.” Scarlet snaps her seatbelt on and dumps her bag in the footwell.
“I don’t even know what happened,” DJ sighs out and Scarlet giggles and helps strap him into the car as well.
“DJ, it’s probably better that way. Scarlet, put these in that bag for me please.” I hand her Ivy’s shoes and wiggle my toes as I put my comfy converse on. I sigh in relief as the throbbing in my big toe eases. “The person who invented high heels is definitely a man,” I mutter and giggle as DJ scrunches up his face in confusion.
“Because they don’t wear them so they don’t know how uncomfortable they are,” Scarlet, the font of all knowledge, informs her five year old brother.
A surge of love overwhelms me and I smile goofily at them both. Scarlet is almost eleven and has the beauty of her mum and the confidence of her dad. She's a fierce but sweet force to be reckoned with and I absolutely want to be her when I grow up. And DJ is still in that younger kid phase. He doesn’t understand everything but he doesn’t care either. He likes what he likes and always makes my heart happy when I’m around him. Honestly, my bestie gave birth to the most amazing babies in the world.
“Can we go for ice cweam?” DJ asks and Scarlet sits a little straighter in her seat.
I pull away from the curb and glance in my rearview mirror at them both. “Sorry kiddos, I’ve got to drop you with Uncle Frowny Face today.”
“Ah man, that sucks. All he ever talks about is the restaurant. And the last time we stayed with him, he made us wait there for hours.” Scarlet folds her arms over her chest and slumps back down in her seat.
“And he's so bo-wing,” DJ grumbles and I stifle a laugh.
“He never used to be boring. He used to be the funniest out of the lot of us,” I tell them both, leaving out the thought ‘albeit he would do most things with that gorgeously annoying frown on his face.’ He wasn’t always as closed off and obsessed with work as he is now though. I don’t think he even cared too much about the restaurant when we were growing up.
But when we lost Reg unexpectedly to a heart attack five years ago. And it changed all of our lives. Freddie took it upon himself to step into his footsteps and finish making the restaurant a roaring success. And he has. He’s just received a Michelin star and was featured in a very classy magazine as the hottest restaurant in London. He’s sacrificed everything to succeed, even relationships with the people he loves more than anything in the world.
It makes me so sad but also really bloody angry. He has this amazing family—sisters who adore him, a mum who cherishes him, and a niece and nephew who idolise him. And his sister’s best friend, who would swap her surname for his in a heartbeat. But the restaurant comes first. And it seems that's a factor even the kids have picked up on. And one I wish I could change more than anything.
CHAPTER TWO
Freddie
“I’ve told you before. The jus goes on the meat, not scattered around the plate. We didn’t get a fucking Michelin star for serving sub par pub food soaking in gravy. Fucking fix it!” My head chef glares back at me. He knows how to do his fucking job, it’s why I hired him in the first place, but I don’t give a shit. He bites the inside of his cheek as his eye twitches at me, desperate to shout back and put me in my place. But he doesn’t, he wouldn’t. Because he’s a fucking professional. He just glares at me as I storm out of the kitchen and into the front of the empty restaurant.
Gold embellished lights are turned up to their brightest, showcasing the pristine white of the walls and gold touches on the tables, but even the serene atmosphere I created isn’t taking the edge off my mood. I run a hand over one of the starched white table cloths and straighten the spotless gold cutlery as I head toward the floor to ceiling windows to cast my gaze over London. While the aesthetic of the restaurant is stunning, it bears very little resemblance to the business I inherited. Becausealthough the name remains the same, I’ve changed nearly everything behind it completely.
The kitchen was the first to go, smashed all to hell by my bare hands. I didn’t want to be reminded of him laying on the floor, clutching at his chest, his face grey and sweating, gasping for breath which he used to rasp out ‘look after my girls.’ Surrounded by rubble, I expected to feel better., Like I could smash the memory away from my brain just by gutting the fucker down to the studs. But the ache and emptiness was still there.
I hated tearing down his vision, his dream, but I also knew if I wanted to make sure my mum and sisters had a roof over their heads after he died, I’d need to make drastic changes. I got rid of the dark walls, wooden beams and dim lights. Intimate, is what he called it. Dungeon-esque is what I saw whenever I walked through. I better utilised the space we already had—fitted floor to ceiling windows on the side that looked out onto the River Thames and added a terrace for our diners to eat Al Fresco. Little touches that helped us secure our status as one of the best in London.
My dad would be proud, I know he would, and so am I. But I’d rather he were here instead. Working side by side with me in a little dungeon-esque restaurant, making enough to be comfortable but never enough to be complacent. Carrying on the plan we’d had since I was a little boy.
Together.
Instead, I’m here alone, the pressure of living up to him and our dreams outweighing anything else. A flash of Ivy and Lola’s faces enter my mind but I shake them free. Only to be replaced by images of my mum and my niece and nephew. The family that I adore but am missing out on as well. This time I dig my thumbs into my eyes and force the images to fade away. They’re reminding me of what I want and not what I should be doing.
As quickly as they go they’re replaced by an image that's harder to get rid of. One that plagues my dreams and haunts my thoughts on a daily basis.
Phoebe.
My sister's annoying best friend. And the only woman I’ve ever wanted to share my name with. She’s always been there. Living next door to us. At my sister's graduation. The other one's wedding. When babies were born and loved ones died. She's always been a part of them. She’s apartof the family to everyone else, but I want her tobemy family. The one I can call and rely on. The one who’ll have my back through thick and thin. The one I go home to after a long day at work and just be with.
