Page 39 of Eden's Comfort Kitchen
‘Caitlin, I’m?—’
Whether they’d been cut off or whether Caitlin had simply had enough of the conversation Eden didn’t know, but she never got to finish her apology. She could tell that the call was over.
Even though Eden was feeling resentful at Caitlin’s tone, she couldn’t help but admit that her sister might have a point. Difficult as it was going to be, she’d have to contact her dad sooner or later. Eden had imagined she was doing him a favour by being out of his sight, but perhaps she was mistaken. What if she was making it worse for him, not better? And she wanted to hear his voice desperately, and she hadn’t realised how much until Caitlin had put the idea into her head. She missed him. She missed home and her life there, and she even missed her spiky sister.
But that life was in her past, and even if she contacted her dad, it wasn’t going to change. She didn’t think she could go back to it as if nothing had ever happened, and the fact was she didn’t want to. She liked it here in Sea Glass Bay, where nobody knew what sort of woman she really was, where she could pretend to be someone good and where people believed it. Her reinventionwas already underway, and she wasn’t about to give that up. Maybe she’d go back home one day, but not until she’d done something she could be proud of, something that her family could be proud of too.
She glanced at her phone, left sitting on the table as she placed her mug down. She’d promised to call her dad tonight, but now that Caitlin’s voice had faded, the idea seemed daunting.
She took a deep breath and dialled the number. A few words of reassurance was all it needed, right?
It rang and she waited, but when there was no answer and she had to cut the call, she couldn’t decide whether she was disappointed or relieved. She decided to send him a text, just to let him know there was no emergency and made plans to try and catch him again over the next couple of days.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The following day, Eden decided to make some calls to see if she could get any donations for the kitchen – either food or money or anything else that could be spared – and then she’d go into town to get some of her own essentials. Perhaps Livia would be free for half an hour at lunch – although Eden was becoming conscious of the fact that she was beginning to rely on Livia’s company a lot and wondered whether she ought to give her new friend some breathing space. The thing was, Livia was such brilliant company, and she had such a way of making Eden feel instantly better, just by being there, that it was an easy thing to say but far less easy to do.
What was strange as she walked the high street was how she was suddenly noticed. A few people had started to recognise her in the past week simply because they’d perhaps got used to seeing her around – after all, this was her third week in Sea Glass Bay and most holidaymakers would have been gone by now, and she’d been hanging around the ice-cream parlour a lot, not to mention her job at the Dolphin, of course. But that had been quite low-key, where today it seemed as if she got stared at wherever she went, and she didn’t quite know what to make of it. One or two people who’d been at the dinner the previous nightstopped her to say hello and tell her how much they’d enjoyed it, which was lovely. But many people she’d never seen before seemed to know who she was – at least, they paid her a lot more attention than she’d expect from a stranger.
‘Morning!’
She smiled in acknowledgement as the fourth person she didn’t know spoke to her in the space of half an hour.
At the mini market, which was as close to a proper supermarket as the bay had, Eden was picking up some teabags when someone tapped her on the shoulder.
She turned to see Ralph smiling at her.
‘How did it go yesterday?’
‘Brilliant! All the things you told us to do worked like a dream. I think everyone really enjoyed it too.’
‘I think you might be right about that – I’ve been stopped three times today by people saying how nice it was. Not just because they got fed, but because they got the chance to chew the fat with neighbours they don’t usually have time to talk to. It was quite an event, by all accounts. In fact, I might have to come down to the next one myself.’
‘You’re always welcome,’ Eden said, feeling a bit bemused by the praise. She hadn’t done anything special, though she was glad to hear her event had created such a buzz.
‘So you’re ploughing ahead with more of them?’
‘Yes. I wasn’t sure people would want more, but it seems that they do. I’ve been stopped a few times today too. And…well, it’s probably my imagination, but I feel like’ – she lowered her voice, feeling silly for saying it – ‘I’m gettingnoticed…’
Ralph laughed. ‘Of course you are! Everyone’s talking about it.’
‘But how do they know…? Well, how do they know who I am?’
‘Just because they never said anything before doesn’t mean they haven’t noticed you. And now they’ve got even more causeto pay attention. I wouldn’t be surprised,’ Ralph continued, ‘if you don’t have more people than you can handle at the next one.’
Eden looked at him in vague panic. ‘Do you think so? What should I do? I didn’t want the booking system because I didn’t want to put people off, but?—’
‘Don’t worry! If you’ve got a few extra, then I’m sure you could squeeze a few more chairs in for them somewhere. And if you’re really packed out, then you’d just have to say first come first served and send them away.’
‘I wouldn’t want to do that – it kind of defeats the point of opening it in the first place if I have to turn people away.’
Ralph shrugged. ‘If I were you, I’d get some idea of numbers in advance. You’ve got a Facebook page?’
Eden nodded.
‘Use that to ask people to let you know if they plan to come. If it’s looking a bit hairy, you might need to rethink some things.’
‘Like what?’
