Summer at Blue Sands Cove

4. Breaking point

4

Breaking point

‘You don’t snore, love,’ Lisa Clelland said, absently stirring her coffee with an easy smile on her face. ‘Well, not that much. Your father and I would just shut the door if you were trumpeting too loud.’

‘Trumpeting?’

‘Oh, I’m only having a joke. It’s because you sleep on your back. If you sleep on your side you won’t snore.’

‘Is that medically proven?’

‘That’s how I fixed your father. Whenever he started to roar I just pushed a couple of pillows against his back and rolled him over. It’s a genetic thing. All depends on the shape of your little dangly bit.’

‘My what?’

‘Your uvula. That thing in the back of your throat.’

‘Is that what it’s called? I literally never wondered.’

‘That’s it. Can’t do anything about it, unless you have it cut out, and no one wants to do that, do they? Exercise and healthy living help. You don’t drink or smoke anymore, do you?’

‘I’ve never smoked and I don’t have any friends to drink with.’

‘Well, that’s a blessing, perhaps.’ Lisa stood up. ‘You don’t have any friends? What have you been doing these last few years?’

‘Mostly working to pay my extortionate mortgage.’

‘Well, if you will insist on living in the city. Life’s much cheaper out in the countryside. More relaxing, too.’

‘I live in Downend. It’s about as far out of the city as it’s possible to be without actually being out of the city. I’m a stone’s throw from the ring road.’

Lisa chuckled. ‘Still inside the city walls, then. Just make sure you get as much fresh air as you can. Anyway, I’d better get back to work, love. Have a good afternoon.’

As Grace watched her mother walk out of the café and head downhill towards the bank where Lisa worked, she took a deep breath and looked at her watch. Her shift started in twenty minutes. It was Friday. Friday afternoons were the worst.

With a regretful glance through the window at the boutique shops that lined Park Street down towards the Waterfront, she picked up her bag and headed out.

Three years she had worked in Jones’s, the big, open plan café-bar at the top of Park Street, overpriced to meet its overpaid and under-mannered clientele. Wealth did funny things to people, making them obnoxious and entitled, condescending to those who scurried at their proverbial feet, providing the services which greased their jet-setting lifestyle. And booze on top of wealth could make people unbearable.

By personal choice, Grace only worked daytime shifts, but Friday afternoon was when many of the customers enjoyed a lunchtime tipple.

It was packed as usual when she arrived. Feeling more reluctant than she had in months, she was already in a bad mood before she began her shift, but within a few minutes of whistles, snapped fingers, and phone-number requests, she was like a volcano with a top about to blow. As she carried a tray of complicated coffee-based drinks out through the kitchen doors, she caught the eye of her manager, Don.

Be good, his eyes said.

She was halfway across the floor when someone tugged on her skirt. A group of suits sat around a table, menus in hand.

‘Hey lassie,’ said the nearest man, an older, balding guy. ‘s*x cossies, please. Straight.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Lassie, s*x cossies, please, when you have a minute.’

Grace felt her cheeks burning. The man’s face looked innocent enough, but those of his companions wore pained expressions, as though his attempt at a joke had been perceived as a bad idea but no one dared to say.

‘Lassie?’

A switch flipped. ‘I’m not a dog, and I’m not some costume-wearing p********e,’ she snapped.

And before she could stop herself, the tray turned in her hand. Four large coffees cascaded down over the man, lumps of marshmallow and chocolate rolling down his suit like the debris of a landslide.

From behind her came a sharp cry. ‘Grace Clelland! In the office … now.’

I got suspended for a month without pay.

Ouch.

Turned out the guy had just had vocal cord surgery and they were celebrating his return to work.

Double ouch. What are you going to do?

Not sure.

Hang on a minute.

The phone buzzed with an incoming call. Grace clicked receive and a moment later Joan’s jovial face filled the screen.

‘Hello lovely, my fingers are getting tired. Tell Auntie Joany about everything.’

‘Did you dye your hair?’

Joan’s chubby fingers flicked orange strands against her phone’s camera. ‘Do you like it? Sand orange. But let’s not talk about me. Things don’t sound good.’

‘My life is coming to an end. I’ve got enough savings for a couple of months, but that’s about it.’

‘What are you drinking?’

Grace held up the glass. ‘Australian Merlot. Two for one in Tesco.’

‘Planning for the future, that’s a good sign. You’re not giving up just yet.’

‘Not until the day after tomorrow at least.’

‘Come on, you know you have a get-out clause. Without Ben I really need someone in the café, and if you won’t help then I’ll have to hire some other school kid. Usually I get a bunch coming in at this time of year asking around but these days they’re all YouTubers and Instagrammers. No one wants to spend a summer serving ice-cream unless I pay them double minimum wage. Come on, Graceful, you know you want to.’

‘Half of me does, but you know how it is. I’m supposed to be making something of my life. I can’t go back to sitting on the beach every night and drinking in the Low Anchor. Those were good days, but those were teenage days. I’m twenty-eight now. It’s different for you because you actually own the café. It’s your business. For me it would just be a summer job.’

Joan gave a slow nod. ‘Technically it’s Mum’s café, but we’ll let that slide.’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘What I think you mean is that there’ll be more talent in the jobseekers queue in Downend than in the ice-cream queue at Blue Sands Cove?’

‘Hardly likely. But I’m not into picking up a sixteen-year-old kid.’

‘Grab a granny nights were always fun. Remember how we laughed when Tim Pascoe tried to pull your mum?’

‘Oh my, he had no idea.’

‘Good days, Graceful. And times have changed. We don’t get the kids here anymore, not now it’s so cheap to go out to Spain or France or wherever. It’s all families, old people, and couples. Quite sedate really. And it still rains all the b****y time, so me and you can sit around and read the books on the rack, drink coffee and talk about the old days.’

‘Sounds nice.’

‘I miss you, Graceful. You’re my best friend. I tried filling that void with a few of the locals, but no one fits. No one’s nearly as fun as you. I was that desperate I even went to the cinema with Becky Rendle once, and you can imagine how that went.’

‘She talked the whole way through it?’

‘Talked? She shouted. You’ll never guess who she’s married to now. Anyway, come on, Graceful. I miss you.’

‘I miss you too.’

‘Come on.’

Grace took a swig of her wine and topped up the glass from the bottle. To her dismay, she only had a little left at the bottom.

‘I’ll think about it,’ she said, already thinking about it a lot.