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Paige’s phone buzzed on the table.
Seb: Yeah I’ll email something over in the morning? X
Paige: Fab thank you x
Paige looked up and Melanie was looking out the window. Something told her Melanie was looking as far away from Paige’s phone as possible.
Could it be . . . ?
‘Seb is Bailey’s sister. She did all the graphic design at Sophie’s wedding.’
Melanie’s face lit up. ‘Oh yeah, I’ve seen her on Sophie’s YouTube, right?’
‘Probably,’ Paige said.
‘She’s gorgeous.’
Paige nodded. Seb was gorgeous, but there’d never been anything there between them on the few times they’d met, and Paige suddenly felt the desire to explain all this to Melanie, but didn’t know how. Professional, she reminded herself. She needed to remain professional.
‘Anyway, she’s going to send us over something in the morning, then we can try and write something ourselves?’
‘Sounds good,’ Melanie said, but Paige could tell her smile was forced and she had no idea what or how to make it better. In a professional way of course. But then some niggling feeling made her explain further.
‘Seb is just Bailey’s sister. Not a partner or ex-partner.’
Melanie nodded; Paige could see the scowl disappearing. And there was nothing at all professional about the way that made Paige feel.
Chapter Twenty-One
Melanie
Melanie stirred in her bed, and she knew without even opening her eyes that it was around three in the morning. If she opened her eyes it was game over, she’d be awake. The trick was to keep her eyes closed and try to stay still, and then it was just hoping she would fall back to sleep again.
It didn’t work.
Again.
She groaned as she turned to grab her phone from where it was charging next to her bed. Sure enough: 3.45 a.m. She opened her schedule for the day. She was opening Lulu as usual, and Sunday was one of their busiest mornings so that was fun. She checked the to-do list, and her brain immediately began to spin; had Louisa ordered the stock that needed replacing from the inventory? Was her sister going to parents’ evening later this week? She also needed to get Cleo’s latest rota. They needed to sort out these reviews and find out what was going on. Actually, what they really needed to do was start planning for next season’s Instagram walls, no that could wait until the art thing was done. Maybe she could get one of the artists in to do one of her walls? Yes. She added that as a possible to-do. And her eyes caught on the one to-do that was all in capitals.
“DO NOT SLEEP WITH PAIGE IT’S NOT WORTH IT.”
Melanie sighed and gave up on the idea of going back to sleep. Instead, she turned on the lamp on her bedside table, reaching for her glasses as her eyes could only take so much strain. She grabbed her iPad and began making notes and writing lists. After about an hour she finally put her iPad down, making sure her app synced with her phone. There had been a lot of new interest about the art mural, so Paige had clearly been doing her bit, and she had ticked it off the list. It made Melanie smile.
But then she sat in bed, the lamp still on, the outside world still dark, and everything felt really quiet. She looked around her room and saw the boxes that littered the edges. She really should unpack, but she didn’t want to see the reminders of what her life had once been. When surrounded by another person’s noise, their breathing, their singing, their comments, their grumbles, their shouting, and worse their silence. Melanie knew there were parts of being in a relationship that she missed, and parts that she really hoped she would never have to deal with ever again. The micro-aggressions that chipped away a tiny chunk at a time, the bad feeling, the belief that it had been all her fault. That she hadn’t been good enough to keep the relationship going, that she hadn’t been enough to stop her from cheating.
But just for a moment her bed felt a little too large, and her flat a little too quiet.
She imagined herself at Paige’s. The place where she’d immediately felt at home, felt the warmth. Melanie went to lie back down and her eyes drifted shut, as she let herself imagine for a moment what her life might be like with someone like Paige beside her. All right not someone like Paige, but Paige herself. She smiled softly as she sunk further into her duvet, her body cocooned, still, rested and peaceful.
So, of course her alarm went off on her phone and her eyes opened back up again. It was time to start the day. Great.
The lack of sleep wasn’t new and so Melanie cracked on, doing her morning tasks, getting herself ready for the day, going for a run, and going into work early to see where they were up to with the inventory. They had most of the stuff, but the last lot of avocados they’d taken went off too quickly. She made a note to send someone out as soon as the shops were open to try and find some.
She’d had time to sit down and really study the bad reviews and noticed there was a cut and paste pattern about them. Then figuring there was still nothing more she could do about that, she’d made the mistake of looking at the bookings over the month and realised reservations were dropping. The day carried on from there. The avocados had all turned, and nary an avocado could be found and Cleo had not been able to get cover so Melanie was waiting tables and taking orders when what she really needed to be doing was one of the million tasks on her list.
So, it was of very little surprise when Melanie crashed into a customer as they shot back on their chair, and she managed to get hollandaise sauce all down her pencil skirt, and so far, hadn’t had chance to change. But the more it dried the worse it looked.
Some of her customers were going hard on the bottomless brunch and they were nearing their time limit, not to mention getting a little too bolshy, and Melanie just knew she’d have to deal with that too.
