Page 105 of My Kind of Happy

‘Oh, er, I hadn’t thought about a prize.’ As far as I was concerned I was already the winner: I got to sell all these excess flowers and spend the day with Sam.

‘How about … I dunno, the loser buys dinner?’ he said casually.

There was a beat of silence while I processed this and tried to work out whether there was a subtext here or whether it was simply wishful thinking on my part. But then he went slightly pink.

‘I know, sorry.’ He held up his hands. ‘Forget I said that. Why on earth would you want to spend even more time with a bitter and twisted old misery guts? But how about I promise not to say a single word about Pandora? And a girl has got to eat.’

‘True,’ I said pretending to think about it. I slipped my hand out from under his and reached for my mobile.

‘What are you doing now?’

‘Winning.’ I twinkled my eyes at him and scrolled until I came to the number for the Wisteria Cottage Flower School. I pressed call. ‘Fiona? Hi, Fearne Lovage here, just wondering if you’d be able to use three dozen avalanche roses? Cancelled order. I know. Very annoying. Two dozen? Absolutely. Fantastic! I’ll get my driver to bring them over.’

I sorted out the details, negotiated a price which pleased us both and ended the call.

‘Your driver?’ Sam said, impressed.

I giggled and handed him a piece of paper with Fiona’s address on it. ‘I’d hurry if I were you, I’m winning already.’

Sam got to his feet, shaking his head in amusement. ‘Sneaky, Very sneaky.’

Within a couple of hours my blood pressure had almost returned to normal. I was still knee deep in flowers but the friendly banter I had with Sam all morning had made the situation infinitely more bearable. He hadn’t been lying when he said he was good at selling. Even before he set off with the roses to Fiona’s flower school, he’d managed to sell two of the biggest arrangements to a football club. He also spread the word about our newly-created buy one bouquet, get a second half-price offer through his contacts which included his cricket team friend, the journalist, who had two thousand followers on twitter. Meanwhile I put in a call to Victor, who kindly managed to resell three boxes of spray roses to another of his customers in Derby.

As soon as Sam had gone, I dismantled some of the other arrangements and repurposed the flowers to make smaller, more saleable ones. Before long the phone was ringing with brand new customers putting their orders in for two bouquets. My heart was singing and even though my back was stiff and my fingers were sore from having them in water on and off for so long, I was euphoric and my cheeks were aching from so much smiling. At noon, I popped Scamp on his lead and took him for a quick leg-stretch on the green.

Scamp spotted a West Highland terrier he knew called Archie and went off to say hello and I took my phone out. I’d texted Laura earlier to tell her about Edelweiss, now I ought to let her know that the day wasn’t a disaster at all. My call went to voicemail, I left her a message telling her about mine and Sam’s challenge and seconds later a text appeared from her.

Can’t talk at the mo, taking Dad to hospital. Glad it worked out. And VERY excited that Sam is helping you. Loser buys dinner? Sounds like you win either way. GO FEARNE! Xx

Oh? Hope he’s OK?

Yep. Routine stuff apparently. Tell me more about SAM???

Glad to hear it, give him a kiss from me. Sam is … gorgeous *sigh*

I KNEW IT!!

I’m falling for him big time. But the timing is all wrong.

Forget timing, forget soul-searching. Go for it. Life’s too short for anything else, honey.

But what about his wife?

EX WIFE. You are overthinking this. Do what makes you happy. Got to go. Will call you later. Big hugs x

My heart gave a little leap when I read this one. Perhaps she was right. Maybe I could just relax and see where it went. As Freddie would say: we get to choose who we love. I had a feeling that my heart had already chosen Sam.

By three o’clock, I realised I’d hardly stopped smiling all day. Somehow, the very worst day had turned into one of the very best and at the heart of it was the fun I’d had working with Sam. Between us we’d created and delivered more flowers today than I imagined the shop had ever done in its five-year history. I’d also learned a valuable lesson about securing payment upfront for large orders – if I even bothered chasing corporate business in the future, that was. Right now, I was revelling in the happiness that our flowers were giving our customers; seeing someone’s joy when they buried their face in one of my bouquets was such a good feeling. Nina had been spot on about that.

‘I’m winning, aren’t I?’ Sam was keeping score on a piece of paper. ‘Admit it. I am Sir Alan’s apprentice.’

‘Is Rosie’s last-minute order for tonight’s baby shower on there?’ I hid my smile, knowing it wasn’t. ‘It’s in the cold store waiting for you to deliver when you have a moment.’

Sam muttered under his breath about cheats and then sucked in air. ‘OK, fine, you’re currently ahead by a whisker.’

‘I’m just glad we’ve sold them. The main thing I was worried about,’ I said, tying raffia around some flowers headed for the bistro in Chesterfield where Sam used to work, ‘was not having enough money to pay the next rent instalment.’

‘Oh, yeah,’ he replied straight-faced. ‘Having that dreadful Sam Diamond chasing you for money is the pits.’