Page 8 of Slow Burn Summer

Best wishes,

Charlie

5

“Are you sure you don’twant me to come with you? I can close up here, it’s deathly quiet.” Liv looked up from her sewing machine when Kate appeared downstairs ready to head into London. “I can sit at a separate table and keep an eye, send you a discreet signal if you start the verbal diarrhea thing.” She drew a finger across her throat to demonstrate.

“Don’t even say it, you know I’ll be worse if I worry about it.”

“You can’t help it, it’s all part of your charm. Same as my barely concealed inner rage.”

Kate breathed in slowly, counting, holding, releasing again as per the meditation app she’d been using to try to foster calmness. “Besides, it’s not the kind of place you can just turn up and get a table.” She’d checked the restaurant online and studied the menu so as not to be caught out; reviewers often gloated about finally getting a table after months of impatiently waiting. “What does this outfit say to you?”

Kate gestured down at her slim black cigarette pants and cornflower-blue silk blouse. She’d gone with a ruby red lip too, for confidence.

“Successful author type does lunch. Can you walk in those boots?” Liv said, eyeing Kate’s black heels.

“Trainers ready, just giving you the full effect,” she said. “Is this lipstick too much?”

She’d bought the too-expensive lipstick not long after she’d broken up with Richard. The assistant had informed her the shade name was Ruby Slippers, in case she ever needed a refill. She’d cried as she left the shop and caught the train in the opposite direction to her old house, “no place like home” ringing in her ears. Today was the first time she’d actually felt able to take the lipstick from its fancy box and use it.

Liv stood to shake out the peacock-feathered bodice she was working on, a costume commission for a sci-fi fantasy movie.

“Hang on,” she said, taking the pins from her mouth. “Take this for luck.”

She slid their mother’s slim silver bangle from her wrist and added it to the similar one Kate always wore. They were their only keepsakes from their mum, one each, and over the years they’d fallen into the habit of doubling them up if either of them needed an extra shot of protection.

Kate touched it briefly, glad of the quiet, bell-like reassurance that had accompanied her through exams, her driving test, her wedding day. Job interviews too, if that was what today’s lunch could be classed as.

“I think I’m going to suggest Dalloway for my new surname,” she said, switching the boots for her trainers. “Kate Dalloway. What do you think?”

“Will you buy yourself flowers on the way home too?”

Kate shrugged into her coat. “I considered Havisham, but there’s no way I’m risking getting caught in a wedding dress ever again.”

“But you made such a beautiful bride,” Liv said.

“Because you made my dress, and walked me down the aisle, and helped me plan it all,” Kate said. “Everything about the day was perfect, except the groom.”

“You can’t write love off forever because of one bad apple,” Liv said, plucking a loose thread from the shoulder seam of Kate’s coat.

“Um, a twenty-year bad apple,” Kate said. “That’s a whole orchard of bad apples. It’ll be on theNews at Tentonight—national apple shortage declared due to one massive manky apple called Richard bloody Elliott. There will be a cider shortage and the nation will go after him with pitchforks.”

“I’ll be the one at the front with the really rusty one,” Liv said.

“I’ve never been big on apples anyway,” Kate said.

“Me neither. Not even in that cheap cider we used to drink as teenagers.”

“Especially not that cheap cider.” Kate shuddered. “God, I can taste it now. Fizzy cat piss.”

Liv opened the shop door. “Go, Mrs. Dalloway, take your leave.”

“Miss Dalloway, in my case,” Kate corrected, buttoning her coat to fend off the early April chill. “Wish me luck.”

“You don’t need it,” Liv said, leaning on the doorframe. “Remember, they need you more than you need them—Charlie Francisco needs to show you the money.”

Kate looked knowingly at her sister. “Been watchingJerry Maguireagain?”

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