After the One Read online

  After the One

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Cover

  Table of Contents

  Start of Content

  for my mates

  who’ve laughed with me and cried with me

  and who laugh at me and despair of me

  Chapter One

  Some days the fates have really got it in for you. When Charley Taylor woke up on Thursday 16 April, with a leaden, flat weight squatting heavily in her stomach, she knew it was going to be one of those days. But then 16 April was always one of the worst days of the year for Charley, one of a handful of days when, instead of leaping out of bed with her usual verve, she wanted to stay put, pull a 10-tog security blanket over her head and hide from the world. All told there were eight duvet-hiding days in Charley’s year, the others being, in date order: 8 August (her wedding anniversary), 22 September (her birthday), then Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year’s Eve and Valentine’s Day.

  And then there was 25 February, aka the worst day of the year.

  So, on this particular Thursday morning, all Charley wanted to do was hibernate with a pack of chocolate digestives until it was Friday. But it was gone seven o’clock and she had to get up and go to work, because, regardless of the date, and regardless of little things like births, marriages and deaths, life goes on.

  If Charley had known how the day was going to pan out, and particularly the fact that she was actually only going to be in the office for about ten minutes, she would have hunkered back down and spared herself the monumental effort of slapping on a smile, holding it there and dragging herself into work. But not being in the privileged position of being able to predict the future, she bullied herself into getting out of bed.

  ‘Come on, you… Get up, make up, go to work and do the day.’

  Throwing off the duvet, Charley slung her legs out of bed, crossed the room and yanked open the curtains, only to be confronted by a soggy grey day as dull as ditch-water, with rivulets of rain running down the cold windowpane. It was in stark contrast to the photo on the bedside table where Josh, wearing Bermuda shorts and a suntan, with his shades pushed back onto his beach-scruffy hair, stood against the backdrop of an azure-blue Ibiza sea. He was grinning broadly at her, as was his way.

  ‘You’re not missing much,’ she informed him, brightly. ‘It’s not exactly another day in paradise.’ Then, almost as an afterthought, she added, ‘Happy birthday.’

  If he’d still been here to celebrate it, she’d be cooking him a birthday breakfast right now. The thought momentarily stopped her in her tracks and she stood, adrift in her memories for a while, until, with an effort, she brought herself back to the present.

  You know how to do this, just make like it’s an ordinary day, she told herself, padding barefoot into the bathroom. It’ll probably turn out a lot better than you think.

  She looked at her reflection in the mirror above the sink. It gazed back at her, gloomily, so she pulled a silly face at it. A thirty-one-year-old woman with long dark curly hair escaping a lopsided scrunchy, and with tell-tale smudges of yesterday’s mascara round her eyes, made a face back. Charley wondered which one of them she was trying to convince.

  Despite Charley’s commendable optimism, the morning kicked off to a pretty lousy start. Her car, which had seen better days – and a good many of them before she’d even owned it – decided that today was the perfect day to break down. She’d barely pulled away from the kerb, when an alarming, and almost certainly expensive, rattling erupted from underneath.

  ‘Bloody hell!’ she swore and immediately manoeuvred back to the side of the road again. It sounded horribly like the exhaust was threatening to fall off, but she wasn’t going to get out and clamber underneath to have a look, not in a work skirt and white shirt, that was for sure. She’d have to call the garage, again. Her heart sank; the last time the car broke down, less than six months ago, they’d been adamant it wasn’t worth fixing.

  ‘It’s knackered, love. You want to trade it in before it dies completely.’

  She knew they were right, but Josh had given the car to her, so she’d told the garage to go ahead and fix it anyway.

  The mechanic had been admirably reluctant to rip her off. ‘Honestly, it’s going to cost a fortune, love, it’s not worth it,’ he’d protested.

  Nevertheless, she had insisted. ‘I’m just not ready to change cars yet,’ she’d explained.

  It wasn’t that Charley was allergic to change, more that she avoided it like the plague. Losing Josh had torn into her life like a savage storm, leaving her shipwrecked, cast away on a sea of loss. Astonishingly, life had gone on, and somehow, she was expected to carry on without him. Her instinct, her coping mechanism, had been to grasp hold of the things that had remained, and nail them down in the desperate hope of providing some sort of stability against the endless, buffeting waves of bereavement. Her car, their flat, her job, even the bloody broadband supplier, had all become her mooring posts.

  Charley got out of the car, locked it and decided to worry about it later. Not least since her immediate problem was getting to work on time. A swift glance at her phone told her there’d be a bus in about five minutes, but she’d have to leg it. Kicking off her heels and clutching them, and her bag, tightly into her body, she hurtled down the road, her stockinged feet splashing through cold, gritty puddles. Could this day get any better? She turned the corner, panting heavily, her blood pounding in her ears. Taking advantage of a sudden break in the traffic, she went to dart across the road, but missed her footing. She stumbled off the kerb and pitched forwards. Her bag and shoes flew out of her arms and landed in the middle of the carriageway.

  ‘Bloody, bloody hell!’

  Charley scrabbled frantically to grab her things before they, or she, got run over, but as she retreated to the undignified safety of the gutter, there was a sudden squeal of brakes and a bloke on a bike screeched to a halt inches from her.

  ‘Are you all right?’ he asked, clambering off his bike and putting a hand out to help her up.

  ‘Yes, I’m fine… thanks,’ Charley assured him, but attempting to stand sent a sudden shooting pain into her ankle, taking her breath away.

  The man put out his hand to steady her, his face clouded with concern. ‘Are you sure?’

  Bracing herself, Charley tentatively tried her ankle again. Although the pain made her wince, it was bearable and she could just about put her full weight on it.

  ‘Honestly, I’m fine. Nothing’s broken, but thanks for stopping.’ She gave the man a slightly sheepish smile.

  He smiled back, warm and easy. ‘You’re welcome. You’re sure you’re okay?’

  She nodded, and he climbed back onto his bike and rode off, no doubt happy to have done his good deed for the day.

  * * *

  Charley was still naively hoping she might make it to the bus stop in time until, with impressive comic timing, the double decker smugly whooshed passed her, adding insult to injury by liberally spraying her with filthy water, and completely drenching her tights and skirt.

  ‘Bloody, bloody, bloody hell!’

  There wasn’t another bus for half an hour, so now she was going to be late. She’d have to call in. She dug her phone out of her bag and stared at it numbly. The shattered screen looked like it had taken a gunshot – the image behind it reduced to a mass of meaningless multicoloured pixels. Charley closed her eyes. Oh, for crying out loud, could this day get any worse?

  As it turned out, yes it could.

  Cold and soggy, and by now very late, Charley hobbled into work desperate for a pee, a chair and a hot coffee – not necessarily in that order – and ready to amuse her colleagues with her disastrous start to the day. But to her surprise, the office was deserted. Her boss shot out of his office so promptly it occurred to Charley that he’d actually been lying in wait for her.

  He regarded her for a brief moment, as if taking in the sodden state of her, then, apparently choosing to ignore it, said, ‘Ah, Charley. Can I have a word?’

  It’s probably fair to say that when the silver spoons and golden opportunities were handed out, Charley wasn’t at the front of the queue – a position that was fine by her since she’d
never believed that money made anyone happy. The pursuit of wealth had never been one of her life goals, which was fortunate because she hadn’t exactly embarked on a gloriously high-flying career. She worked as an admin assistant, the admin assistant to be absolutely accurate, for a failing letting agency in an increasingly less-than-sought-after area of Bristol. Originally, the agency’s next-door neighbours had been a Boots and a Ryman’s, but now the office was marooned by a bus lane and double yellow lines, and found itself perched dismally between an anonymous vape store and the Dragon Inc. tattoo parlour.

  So perhaps it shouldn’t have come as a surprise to her when, after a stumbling start, her boss had said, ‘I’m truly sorry, Charley, really… but I’m going to have to make you redundant.’ But it had. Well, more of a shock than a surprise, really.

  ‘Redundant?’ Charley repeated flatly. The word hung in the air between them, perhaps because she simply refused to let it in and give it room in her brain.

  It turned out that a property developer had offered him a buyout deal that was simply too good to refuse. Frankly, any buyout would have been too good to refuse, thought Charley, looking around at the grubby decor and outdated furnishings, but she said nothing and concentrated on not letting her emotions show.

  ‘I’m going to retire,’ he told her apologetically.

  ‘Good for you!’ said Charley, somehow managing to give him a cheery, sincere smile.

  In all honesty she couldn’t blame him for taking the money, she doubted the agency was even paying its way any more, and besides, he’d treated her more than fairly over the years, very generously giving her time off when she’d needed it after Josh died, and not hassling her to return until she was ready. He was a decent boss and a good man, and she genuinely wished him well, despite the small, sick waves of anxiety that were beginning to rise up inside her. She realised he was speaking to her.

  ‘I’ll pay you to the end of the month. And you’ll get redundancy,’ he was saying. ‘But if you want to leave today, well, right now, even, I’ll understand. I mean there’s no point just sitting it out I suppose—’ he trailed off, clearly dying with embarrassment.

  ‘No. Probably not,’ agreed Charley, giving him another smile.

  Limping over to her desk, she belatedly realised her colleagues’ desks were already bereft of personal belongings, a detail that had escaped her notice earlier. They’d obviously decided to ship out sooner rather than later, too. It was like the Marie Celeste.

  Numbly, Charley started to pile her stuff into her bag: the ‘Today Is Going to Be Awesome’ mug her mate Tara had given her, a coaster that read, ‘Be The Reason Someone Smiles Today’, and a photo in a cheap pine frame from Ikea – the one of Josh and her standing on the Rialto Bridge with a gondola in the background, on their honeymoon. She had asked an American tourist to take it for them on her phone, and now there they stood, forever smiling and radiating happiness, raising glasses of fizz to the camera.

  What the hell am I going to do? she asked Josh silently. He continued to beam broadly at her, which wasn’t much help frankly, so she picked up the landline on her desk and called Tara.

  * * *

  The Reception of the Avalon Indulgence Spa and Conference Centre, where Tara worked, was, in Tara’s humble opinion, grotesquely pretentious. Vast, overly ornate gilt mirrors posed against garish purple-and-black flocked walls, and enormous cream leather sofas, with cheap gold fittings, lounged on a mock-marble tiled floor.

  On duty, sitting behind the massive cream faux-leather covered desk, Tara heard her mobile ringing in her handbag. Technically, she wasn’t meant to take personal calls on Reception, but at this precise moment, her pimply young line manager was leaning over her shoulder scrutinising her screen minutely, or rather insultingly, to check Tara’s ability to input the most basic customer details into a bog-standard spreadsheet. So she just couldn’t resist. Not long out of university, with a smart new suit and a shiny new Business Studies degree, Tara’s boss had the leadership skills of a minor dictator, the people skills of a sociopath and the mental capacity of a bread-maker. He took himself very seriously, which was interesting in itself, because nobody else did.

  Taking pleasure in flouting the petty authority he so enjoyed wielding over her, Tara picked up her bag and took her phone out with a flourish.

  ‘No private calls on duty,’ he said, literally wagging his finger at her.

  ‘Unless it’s an emergency,’ she reminded him, with a sickly-sweet smile. A glance at the screen revealed a number she didn’t know. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to take this. It’s my daughter’s school,’ she lied.

  Her manager hovered nearby, blatantly trying to listen to her call, undoubtedly to check if it really was an emergency, but all he heard was Tara saying, ‘What!’, followed by ‘When?’, and then, ‘What do you mean as of now?’, and finally, ‘Don’t panic, I’m coming round straight after work.’

  Chapter Two

  It was just after four when Tara pitched up at the bottom of the concrete steps leading down to Charley’s garden flat.

  ‘Sorry, I had to pick Monnie up and find someone to take her to Brownies,’ she said, pausing in the doorway long enough to give Charley a hug. Following her friend through to the kitchen, she presented her with a Wild Fig and Vanilla scented candle, because she never arrived empty-handed, and then she fished a chilled bottle of Prosecco out of her tote bag.

  ‘Thanks, but I’m not exactly celebrating!’ laughed Charley.

  ‘So?’ Tara retorted, who had an unshakable belief in the restorative qualities of a bottle of fizz. Well, they both did. ‘Never underestimate the power of Prosecco’ was their maxim. ‘And, anyhow, you should be,’ said Tara, helping herself to the flutes from the cupboard before turning to Charley and adding, ‘You didn’t even like your job.’

  ‘True,’ admitted Charley, ‘but that doesn’t mean I didn’t want it.’

  It was no secret Charley had only taken the job in order to move to Bristol and live with Josh. At the time it was meant to be temporary, so that she could pay her share of the mortgage and the bills until she could find something better. And then afterwards, after Josh died, Charley had stayed put because it was safe, secure.

  Tara opened the bottle with a satisfying phup! and poured the wine with an even more satisfying fizzzzzz. Handing Charley a foaming glass she headed into the living room, where they both sat on the sofa, kicked off their shoes and put their feet on the coffee table in one well-rehearsed, synchronised move.

  ‘You were wasted there and you know it.’ Tara raised a challenging eyebrow at Charley, defying her to contradict her. ‘This is the fates telling you it’s time to move on, find something better.’

  ‘It’s not the moving on that worries me, it’s the moving out I’m trying to avoid,’ replied Charley. ‘There’s the slight issue of the bills, and the even bigger issue of the mortgage!’

  Tara waved a dismissive hand at Charley’s problems. ‘You’ll easily find something else,’ she said, taking a slurp of her Prosecco. ‘Seriously, don’t rush into the first job that comes up, Charley. Look around.’

  ‘That’s easy for you to say. You’ve got good old Baz supporting you; I haven’t got a good old anyone supporting me.’

  Tara looked at her over the top of her glass. It was unlike Charley to make a comment like that, she wasn’t someone who begrudged another’s good fortune, or harped on her own misfortune, for that matter. Chalking it up to Charley feeling a bit low, Tara deployed her usual rallying tactic. ‘Come on, you! Look on the bright side! You’re getting a redundancy payout, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then this is a brilliant opportunity to do something else. Something you really want to do.’

  ‘What, like you do?’ said Charley sarcastically, and Tara felt like walloping her with a cushion.

  ‘No! Actually, yes! I hate my sodding job, you know I do. But it’s mornings only, term-time, and it fits round Monnie, so I am doing what I really want to do.’

  Charley raised her eyebrows.

  Tara ignored the implied jibe and persisted. ‘If you could do anything you wanted, anything at all, what would you do?’

  Charley watched the bubbles fizzing upwards in her drink. Anything at all? she asked herself. Well, apart from turn the clock back…