Jennifer Joyce - The Little Bed & Breakfast by the Sea

Mae was halfway across the yard when her phone started to ring again. She paused and, answering the call, headed back towards the crate.

‘Mae? It’s Shirley. Shirley Robertson.’

Mae reached the crate, but didn’t sit. ‘Shirley? Is everything okay?’ Shirley and her family were due to arrive for their stay later that afternoon, but had they arrived early? Mrs Hornchurch knew they were due, but Mae’s neighbour couldn’t be expected to wait in all day on the off-chance they’d show up a few hours sooner than anticipated, so perhaps the family were camped out on the B&B’s doorstep, waiting to be let in.

‘Oh, love, no,’ Shirley wailed. ‘It’s my Len. He had a bit of a stumble lugging the suitcase downstairs this morning so we’ve been stuck in A&E ever since.’

Mae gasped. ‘Is he okay?’ She was fond of the Robertson family – they’d been among her first paying customers when she’d turned her grandparents’ house into a bed and breakfast and she looked forward to their annual visit.

‘Nothing a plaster cast and rest won’t sort out,’ Shirley said. ‘He finally got an X-ray and he’s broken his ankle. The rest is just superficial cuts and bruises.’

Mae sank onto the crate now and placed a hand on her chest. ‘That’s a relief.’

‘Yes,’ Shirley agreed. ‘But the thing is, we’re having to cancel our holiday. I’m so sorry to do this at the last minute. I feel so terrible. We all do.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ Mae said. ‘The important part is that Len gets better. You’ll give him my love, won’t you?’

‘Of course. And we’ll be back next year, for sure. I’ll bring the cases down myself!’

‘Take care of Len – and yourself, of course. I’ll see you next summer, fit and well.’

Mae sat for a moment after she’d ended the call. She was glad Len was okay – broken bone and bruising aside – but she couldn’t help worrying about the empty rooms she was now left with, which left her with an icky feeling of guilt that she could have such selfish thoughts when a lovely man like Len Robertson had taken a tumble down a flight of stairs. But those unoccupied rooms represented lost earnings. She’d had to turn people away because she was fully booked and now she wasn’t.

Mae’s eyes widened as she realised all was not lost. There was a woman sitting in the pub who was in desperate need of a room and Mae now had two going spare for a couple of weeks. Gasping, she shot up from the crate and scuttled back into the pub, scanning the room as she propelled herself behind the bar.

‘Where is she?’ she wailed, eyes darting around the room. The seat the woman had nabbed earlier was now vacated.

‘Who?’ Corinne asked as she popped behind the bar with an armful of empty glasses.

‘The woman in the dungarees.’ Mae pointed at the empty seat.

‘Oh, her.’ Corinne slipped the glasses onto the side and bent to open the dishwasher. ‘She left a few minutes ago.’

‘Do you know who she is?’ Mae asked, already trying to work out how to track the woman down before she set up camp with a newly purchased tent.

Corinne shook her head. ‘I’m pretty sure I’ve seen her around town but I don’t know her name.’

Bollocks , Mae thought as she scurried towards the pub’s door. Big, sodding hairy bollocks!

Chapter Five

Willow

Willow took her change from the bed and breakfast lady/barmaid and wandered over to an empty seat, placing her glass down on the table and taking out her phone to check for any messages from either the builders or Ethan. There was an uncomfortable feeling in her gut, as though there was a small but hefty bowling ball in there, clogging and silently damaging her insides. She tried to ignore the feeling, knowing if she paid it too much attention it would take over completely and send her into a panic. So far, with the distraction of her mission to find accommodation, she was coping with the catastrophe, but she knew once she stopped and really thought about the situation she and her husband were now in, she would fall to pieces.

Falling to pieces wasn’t usually Willow’s style. She could be cool, calm and collected at the worst of times, thinking rationally about the bigger picture instead of giving in to dread. When her caterers had cancelled at the very last minute on her wedding day, phoning just minutes before she was due to have her hair and make-up done with news of a faulty fridge and ruined food, Willow hadn’t flapped. She’d been momentarily disappointed she wouldn’t get to enjoy the menu she’d planned weeks in advance, but she knew it was only food. Good food, but food all the same. Marrying Ethan was the important part, the part making her heart race and her hands jitter, so she’d let the lack of catered food slide as she slipped her phone into her pocket and sat on the hairdresser’s chair. Later, once she was Mrs St Clair, Willow led her guests to the seafront, where she and Ethan bought them the most delicious fish and chips, which they ate on the beach. It had been a chilly evening, but everyone said it was the best fish and chips they’d ever eaten and Willow remembered the day with fondness. The smell of battered fish and salt and vinegar-drenched chips filling the pub now reminded her of that day. Everything will be okay, the aroma reminded her. She and Ethan would sort everything out. This was a tiny blip they’d maybe laugh about one day.

Or maybe not. Only time would tell.

She checked her phone again. Still no word from Ethan. She wasn’t too surprised or worried about the lack of contact under the circumstances, but hearing from him would have offered a little bit of comfort and gone a long way in preventing her from teetering over the edge.

Placing the phone on the table, she took a sip of her drink, swallowing hard against the miniature bowling ball, which had crawled stealthily to sit in her throat.

‘Fancy a chip?’

Willow placed her glass back down on the table and glanced first at the bag of chips being proffered and then its owner sitting at the neighbouring table. He was perhaps in his early thirties, with smooth, brown skin and closely cropped black hair, and when he smiled – as he did now, while pushing the bag of chips ever so slightly closer to Willow – he displayed an enviable row of neat, white teeth.

‘No, but thank you.’ Willow didn’t think she could manage it. The lemonade had been battle enough.

‘Are you okay?’ he asked, removing the chips – and the strong vinegar scent that tickled Willow’s nose – and placing the bag on his own table. ‘You look… sort of stressed.’

Understatement! Willow was this close to weeping, right there with a pub full of witnesses.

But no. Deep breaths. Deep, calming breaths.

Everything will be okay.

‘Are you a doctor or something?’ Willow asked, and he smiled again.

‘Not for humans.’ He wiped his hand down the thigh of his jeans to rid it of any grease and held it out to Willow. ‘I’m Alfie Michaels, the local vet.’

‘Ah.’ Willow shook the hand. ‘You’re the one I need to speak to about a stable.’

‘Sorry?’

Willow laughed. ‘Sorry, bit of an in-joke. There’s no room at the inn – or the local B&Bs – so I was hoping a stable would be free. Oh, excuse me…’ She pounced on her phone as it sprang into life, but it was neither Ethan nor the builder and she didn’t recognise the number on the screen.

‘Hello? Is that Re-Create?’ a male voice asked once she answered.

Willow pushed the bowling ball to the very back of her mind as she switched to business gear. ‘It is. This is Willow speaking. How may I help you?’

‘It’s Malcolm Kershaw?’ The man on the other end of the line posed the name as a question, as though Willow might be familiar with it. ‘We’ve been exchanging emails about the bed?’