Page 25 of The Bookshop Ladies

‘It’s grown on them, I suppose,’ he said and glanced towards Joy once more. ‘A bit like Margot over the years.’

‘Be sure to tell them that there is a huge stock of all her other works, won’t you?’

‘Yes, yes, of course,’ he said and lingered for a moment as if there was something else, but Joy had disappeared behind some shelves in the Cold War section.

‘I think he likes you,’ Robyn said after he had gone.

‘You shouldn’t tease women of a certain age.’ Joy nodded to the pile of Margot’s books by the register as if to emphasise the point.

‘I’m not teasing you, I’m serious, I think he likes you.’ Robyn smiled. ‘He hardly ever came in here until you arrived and now he’s our best customer.’

‘It might be that he wants to support his niece or just that he’s developed an interest in current affairs.’

‘And radical feminist poetry?’

‘Stranger things have happened, but he certainly hasn’t fallen for me.’ Joy said the words with such emphasis that Robyn was taken aback.

‘Joy, you are a fine-looking woman, and there is a full life stretching out ahead of you.’ Joy had told Robyn on that first morning that she was widowed.

‘But I…’ Joy stopped and her eyes filled with tears before she wiped them away with a crumpled tissue. ‘I guess so, but I think I’ve already had my fair share of happiness, Robyn. My husband was the love of my life and I couldn’t imagine how he could be replaced.’

‘Of course not, which of us would ever want to be replaced? But it doesn’t mean you can’t make room in your life for new people, new experiences and new relationships,’ Robyn said and, all the while, she was thinkingand I should know, I’m a fine one to talk.

‘Oh, I don’t know. I think this dog is too old to learn new tricks,’ Joy said and turned back to her work again.

Perhaps it was a good thing that Robyn’s phone rang at that exact moment.

‘Hey you.’ It was amazing how even just hearing Kian’s voice made Robyn feel a little lighter. ‘What are you up to this weekend?’

‘Not much, I have a new novel on the bedside table I planned to get through but otherwise…’

‘Great, you can still do that. I thought I might swing by Saturday afternoon, stay until Sunday?’

‘Sure, we can make dinner together.’ Neither of them were exactly brilliant cooks but Kian had a habit of bringing ingredients with him that were unexpected, so meals were always interesting.

‘Okay, or we can go out? I have someone I want you to meet…’ He kept talking, but Robyn had stopped hearing what he was saying because she knew instantly it must be a girl.

‘Fine,’ she said eventually, after he had explained he would arrive late because he had a paper to finish and wanted to avoid traffic on the return journey. It would be a flying visit, just a few hours. But then, she thought, even a few hours could be enough to break her heart. After all, it had only taken one sentence for her to feel as if her world had cracked along its axis.

After that, it was as if there was no point pretending that her day’s work held any meaning. Twenty minutes later, she told Joy she had a headache and asked her to close up the shop when she left. All Robyn was fit for was a darkened room and a quiet evening.

The dark room didn’t help. Her headache was not a migraine or even proper tension, just complete and utter despair. She wasn’t sure how she knew it, but she felt certain somehow that Kian had foundthe one.

She wasn’t entirely stupid, she always knew this day would come. After all, just because she had been in love with him for what felt like forever, didn’t actually mean anything. Kian had no clue. He treated her like the younger sister he’d never had.

In the end, she went into the kitchen and poured herself a large glass of chilled white wine. She needed to put that time out of her head.

It was after eight o’clock that evening when Robyn lifted her head from the book she had fallen asleep over. The sound of footsteps gingerly taking the stairs and a gentle tap on the sitting room door made her catch her breath. She wasn’t expecting anyone.

‘Hello?’ Joy put her head around the door. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t mean to disturb you, but I just thought, if you felt so rotten, you wouldn’t want to cook and I made extra so…’ She held up a small casserole dish, covered over with a tea towel.

‘That’s really kind of you, but I feel like a complete fraud now, I’m much better.’ It was almost the truth, if she took out the feeling part; there was no headache, just utter devastation at the idea that Kian was bringing a girl to meet her at the weekend.

‘You look better, but still a little…’ she settled on ‘peaky.’

‘Do I?’

‘Look, I’m not going to pry, but I think that you got bad news today with that phone call from your friend and I just wanted to say…’

---