Somehow, she managed to get through a meeting about a forthcoming conference and had a few minutes to grab a coffee. She took it outside into the hotel grounds when Steph’s name flashed up on her screen. For a second, she wondered if Connor had already told her about the engagement, even though he’d seemed so hesitant … but he’d never do that.
Then she wondered why Steph was calling in the middle of the school morning.
‘Hello, hon … sorry to call you at work.’ Steph sounded strange, distant.
‘Steph? Where are you?’ she asked. ‘Out in the playground?’
‘Playground? No – I’m not in the playground. I wish.’ There was a long pause. ‘I’m outside the surgery and I have some news. And I’m sorry, hon, but it’s not good.’
‘Oh my God. Is it one of the girls?’
‘No. No, thank God. No …’
Lottie remembered the silence as much as her sister’s words. It was heavy and ominous, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.
‘Hon, I don’t know how to say this because I haven’t even had time to take it in myself. It’s not the twins; it’s me. The GP’s really worried. She thinks I might have cervical cancer and—’ Lottie heard the wobble in Steph’s voice. ‘I’m trying to stay positive but I can’t lie. W-what if I never see my beautiful girls grow up?’
Reeling from the shock, Lottie had had to tell her boss she was feeling unwell and needed to leave. She’d driven to Steph’s, scraping her car on a dry-stone wall along the way, but she hadn’t cared. It turned out Steph had been having worrying symptoms for a while but hid her fears from Lottie, thinking everything would be OK. She’d tried to comfort Steph, had broken the news to their parents, before collecting the girls from school, pretending all was well.
She’d held her greatest fears back, stemmed her tears and bottled her emotions for Steph’s sake and to reassure the twins. All she wanted was to fling herself on Connor, be held and soothed and let everything out.
That was what partners were for: to be there in sickness and in health, for better and for worse.
The last thing Steph needed to deal with was Lottie’s ruined love life, so she kept her heartbreak secret and lied, saying she’d told Connor she was staying the night with Steph – not that she could face the thought of their empty house anyway.
There was no way she intended to tell Connor about Steph either – what if he thought she was trying to play the sympathy card? She was too proud for that. He’d severed their connection so brutally and suddenly, she felt he had no right to any part of her life.
She told Steph, and everyone else including her parents, who had enough to worry about with Steph and their granddaughters, that she and Connor had mutually decided to split up. Connor was happy to go along with it. So while Steph had been going through her treatment, Lottie bottled up her own pain, telling herself it was a pinprick next to the avalanche of worry Steph was dealing with. She wept secretly in the dark of the night, and every tear she shed made her feel guilty.
Now, looking down at Connor’s card, she remembered the previous Christmas when she’d promised Steph she’d look after the girls, if the worst happened.
It had been a mixed blessing to stay so local to home after her split with Connor. They’d sold their little house and Lottie had stayed with Steph. Although her place was small for the four of them now the twins were bigger, at least it meant she could lend a hand with the childcare while Steph was going through months of gruelling radiotherapy and chemotherapy.
The treatment had left her sister mentally and physically exhausted and she’d had to take sick leave from her job as a teaching assistant. To help even more, Lottie had taken several weeks off after leaving her job at the hotel in early August and before starting at Firholme in September.
When Steph had first called her with the news she’d been sent by her GP for a biopsy after some worrying symptoms, Lottie had hoped that it would be a false alarm and that the problem would be quickly solved. The opposite had been true. It had taken almost two months of scans and biopsies for Steph to be properly diagnosed and nearly two more for her treatment to start.
Now, six months after Steph’s treatment had ended, things were looking brighter. Lottie was settled in her new job at Firholme, and Steph was back at work as a teaching assistant although she was often exhausted and had to have regular check-ups at the hospital. The treatment had also brought on an early menopause with its mood swings and tiredness, on top of the ever-present fear of the cancer returning. Despite all this, Lottie was amazed by her sister’s determination to make the most of every moment for the sake of her twin daughters.
Likewise, Lottie had decided to make a fresh start and had jumped at Shayla’s offer of the Firholme job. It was still close to Steph’s house and she’d immediately been made to feel welcome. She loved her new role, and when Connor left Cumbria, gradually she’d begun to heal from the split.
Lottie glanced at his card one more time, and a new resolve filled her veins. That day, when Connor had walked out and Steph had called about her cancer, had been the worst day of her life but she had to look to the future and hope. She’d pull out all the stops to make sure that Firholme stayed in business and that this
