Lottie was pleased to see Steph looking brighter, and with a smile on her face glammed up ready for an evening out. Tonight almost felt like it had before Steph had been ill.
‘It’s completely fabulous and I love the hair.’
‘The salon worked wonders with it,’ Steph said.
‘Your dress looks great with those shoes we got in Kendal.’
Steph lifted the hem to show her silver sandals. ‘I don’t know how I’m going to dance the night away in them but who cares?’
‘You will be OK, won’t you?’ Lottie asked. ‘Don’t feel you have to boogie all night because of me. When you’re ready to come home, you will say?’
‘Of course I’ll say if I need to but at the moment, I’m raring to go …’ Steph hugged her. ‘I just want some normality for one night, even if at midnight, I’ll be like Cinderella and everything will go back to the way it really is. No matter what the future holds, I want tonight to be like the old days.’
Lottie felt her eyes prick with tears.
‘Do not, repeat, do not cry! You’ve so much mascara on for a start.’
‘I know.’ She let Steph go and smiled.
‘That’s better. Now is there any chance I can borrow that black furry wrap you used to have?’ she asked. ‘If you still have it.’
‘I do have it … or at least I don’t remember getting rid of it when I moved out of Connor’s. It’s somewhere in the cubby hole though. I don’t think I’ve unpacked it since I moved here.’
‘I can go and hunt for it, while you get dressed.’
‘In that dress?’ Lottie shook her head.
Steph planted her hands on her hips. ‘God, you do sound like Mum.’
‘Yeah and you know I’m right. I’ll go. My make-up and hair are done and I can get changed afterwards. Neither of us want to be poking round a dusty cupboard in our glad rags. I think I know which box it might be in. You wait here.’
Lottie padded along the landing and opened the cubby hole, which was actually a box room-cum-storage cupboard under the sloping eaves. It wasn’t even big enough for a single bed. The naked bulb hanging from the ceiling illuminated the cardboard boxes that had stayed largely undisturbed since she’d moved out of the two-bedroom house she’d shared with Connor the previous year.
Lottie opened the cupboard less and less; really only as the seasons had changed and she’d needed boots and coats.
There was so much stuff she didn’t use now. Clothes, tennis rackets – Connor had persuaded her to have lessons but she’d loathed it, hitting the ball everywhere except into the court. Two bodyboards leaned against the wall. They’d bought them back from the Cornish holiday. Lottie had really enjoyed catching the waves but Connor had hated being dumped under water so they’d never used them again. Somewhere in the depths there was a yoghurt maker, a canteen of cutlery and a vintage china tea set from his auntie, which Connor had wanted to throw on the dump. Lottie loved the tea set but there wasn’t room in the kitchen and she hadn’t yet hosted any afternoon teas.
These mundane items were a reminder of a lifestyle she’d left behind. A couple’s life, a life that had been full of cosy plans, some big but many small. Yet wasn’t it the small details that knitted people together so closely and made lives so hard to unpick?
Lottie couldn’t imagine Keegan bodyboarding even if she was an Aussie … but she could imagine her playing tennis, in a chic dress and pristine white trainers … Maybe this was another reminder that Keegan and Connor were meant for each other, despite Connor’s misgivings.
It was crazy to think he’d been having second thoughts about the wedding because of Lottie. The ‘tenderness’ he’d shown her before he’d been a git towards Jay must have sprung from guilt. She’d searched her conscience ever since, to see if she’d offered Connor any hint whatsoever that she still had feelings for him. She was sure she hadn’t but in future she resolved to try doubly hard not to encourage him one little bit.
His wedding to Keegan had to go ahead and it had to be perfect.
She ducked her head to enter the cupboard. The box with the faux fur stole, of course, was right at the back, but fortunately not underneath any other stuff. Squeezing deeper inside, she opened the lid and saw it on top of the box, along with a black ballgown she’d once worn to a tourism awards ceremony. She’d helped her hotel win a silver hospitality award that night. In fact, she’d first met Shayla at the awards do, which had led to her eventually being offered her current role. Some memories weren’t all bad.
She went back to her room and handed the wrap to a delighted Steph, who went downstairs to wait for her.
Lottie could have worn the black ballgown to tonight’s party but this was an evening to look to the future so she’d splashed out on a midnight-blue midi-dress spangled with teeny silver stars. It had a high neck and long sleeves and looked good with some velvet heels that would probably be agony within half an hour. The dress had a Gothic air to it that she felt was in keeping with Firholme, so she’d decided on some marcasite chandelier earrings she rarely had the chance to wear.
After adding a slick of lip gloss, and a spritz of perfume, she made her way down the narrow staircase, one hand on the bannister for support.
Steph had been taking a selfie but stopped when she saw Lottie walk in.
‘Oh my. You look like a knockout. That dress – the hair. Your eyes. Is this Lottie?’
Glowing with pleasure – and relief – at Steph’s reaction, Lottie
