What If?
Shari Low
Contents
A Note From Shari
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Part II
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Epilogue
Acknowledgment
More from Shari Low
About the Author
About Boldwood Books
To my husband John Low,
Who started it all back in 1999 by pointing out that if I wanted to be an author, I should perhaps try to write something. I still hate it when you’re right.
But I love you and our family more than any words on a page.
You’re everything, always…
Shari x
A Note From Shari
Before you turn the page….
Thank you so much for reading this 20th Anniversary re-release of my first ever novel.
When I wrote it back in 1999, Britney Spears had just found fame with ‘Baby One More Time’ and nothing much was impressing Shania Twain.
Hugh Grant was trying to seduce Julia Roberts in Notting Hill and JK Rowling had just released Harry Potter’s third magical mystery.
There were only a few TV channels, DVDs were considered cutting edge technology and we’d never heard of political correctness.
Texting was relatively new and had yet to gain mass popularity and our mobile phones were mostly just used to – shock – talk to people. Oh, and international calls were so expensive it was cheaper to go to Benidorm for a week than to call someone there for a lengthy chat.
The internet was a novelty that made a screeching noise when you dialled it up, and you could make three cups of tea in the time it took to download a page. More importantly, given the story in this book, there was no google, no facebook, no twitter, and if you wanted to find someone you just had to hope that directory enquiries had their phone number, otherwise there was no way to track them down them other than going to their house and throwing stones at their window.
Or – like Carly Cooper – saying goodbye to your whole life and going on an international manhunt.
I really hope you enjoy this step back in time.
And I hope you fall in love with Carly, her pals and the story that started it all…
Much love,
Shari xxx
Part I
1 Millennium – Robbie Williams
Oh, bollocks.
I love that word. It has a ‘don’t mess with me, I’m a hormonal lethal weapon’ ring to it. I’ve been muttering it dementedly since I got out of bed this morning, because I can’t think of a single thing that’s right with the world today.
I reach over to refill the kettle, dropping the arm of my dressing gown in last night’s dishwater and knocking over my ashtray in the process. It’s not going to be one of my better days. Before you start reaching for the telephone to summon a counselling service to my kitchen, can I just say that I’m having a midlife crisis. I look and feel like Liam Gallagher after a night on the tiles and I can tell you in years, months, days and minutes how long it is since my last sexual experience. But, according to every reputable (trashy) women’s magazine, this behaviour is typical of a single female of my age. One who’s having a midlife crisis, that is.
Do you ever think, ‘What if this is all there is to life?’ Do you ever contemplate your lot and wonder why you’re not a supermodel in Milan? Or the director of a multinational corporation? What about married to an international business tycoon with homes in seven countries? For the purposes of this ponderance, I’m going to ignore that I’ve got forty pounds on any supermodel, I have no cheekbones, zero entrepreneurial skills, I’m a hopeless commitment-phobe and I couldn’t handle seven houses because I get irritated having to run the Hoover round my tiny flat.
But all that aside, look at me now. I’m sitting at my breakfast table alone, having called in sick to work with an ever more ridiculous reason (‘I stubbed my toe in the garden’ isn’t a bad excuse, except that I live in a third floor flat), with absolutely nothing to look forward to except a chocolate croissant and a long linger over the latest edition of Hello! magazine. I can’t help thinking, ‘What if this is it?’ What if this is the way my life is going to be until I’m having Zimmer races up and down the corridor of my retirement home, flirting with old men and cheating at bingo?
I suppose I owe you an explanation for this sudden outpouring of self-pity.
My name is Carly Cooper. I’m careering towards my thirties at terrifying speed, and I pay an obscene portion of my monthly salary to live in a studio-cum-cupboard in the desirable area of Richmond, near London. I arrived here from my native Glasgow via a multitude of countries, adventures and disasters (mostly due to Mr Rights who inevitably turned out to be Mr Couldn’t Be More Wrongs). I’m 5’8”, with long blonde hair (extensions), blue eyes (coloured contact lenses) and ample curves (in many of the non-supermodel places).
I earn a great salary doing a job I detest and therefore spend every penny of it doing things I enjoy to take my mind off work. I am officially a National Accounts Manager for one of the world’s largest manufacturers of tissue-paper products. Translated, this means that I persuade buyers of large multinational companies to sign annual contracts for the supply of their toilet rolls. Don’t laugh. There’s a future in toilet rolls. They’ll be here long after all this modern technology like CDs and carphones are on a scrap heap somewhere.
I’m officially enjoying the single life with no significant other to answer to. Believe me, to paraphrase Jerry Maguire, I absolutely know that I don’t need a man to complete me. I should just be content being a single, cosmopolitan woman of the world. But unofficially, off the record, and
