Page 61 of The Night Before Christmas
And then she bumped into Andrea, who’d had to put up with Sophie’s wafting about and general lack of common sense for an entire week. She looked tired too, and practically bear-hugged Felicity the minute she saw her, in a very unusual public display of affection.
The centre was a hive of activity. It seemed she’d picked the wrong moment to go away as they’d had phone call after phone call in her absence and the cages in the dog den and the cat nursery were now all completely full. It was bloody noisy in there too after her (mostly) peaceful time away, but she felt her heart gently warming as Andrea took her round and introduced her to some of the new arrivals. There were two bulldogs from the RSPCA, who had been neglected and starved and needed round-the-clock little-and-often feeding, three new cats including an ancient deaf white cat with only one eye –‘Hit by a car, they think. She’s super sweet. We’ve called her Little Miss Bump,’ said Andrea, wryly – and four lop-eared rabbits who’d been left outside the front door in a cardboard box on Friday night (‘Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton Tail and Whatsit’). They were currently occupying a makeshift run in the corridor and seemed to be living their best lives as Sophie was absolutely smitten and kept sneaking them carrots.
She had missed her favourites of course, and they were delighted to see her too. Bobby Charlton leapt at the bars of his cage in his eagerness for a cuddle, Freddy didn’t even growl when she walked in, and tiny Holly looked like she had grown three inches in the last week. Both Holly and Gennie were looking really strong, and Felicity was shocked at how much she had missed them.
‘This is why I never take a holiday,’ she whispered, nose to nose with little Bobby, taking in the digestive biscuit smell of his paws as he wriggled. She didn’t regret it really, of course, but this place truly felt like home.
And when Andrea and Sophie asked her if she’d had a good time, she didn’t quite know what to say. In some ways, yes, there was some healing, some closure. It had been very moving to see the house in real life after all this time. But the encounter with Adam had left her feeling peculiar. What had happened to him? He was a bit pathetic, and it was strange to see him in such a state. Had he really said he wanted her back? Was he serious?
She didn’t even know where to begin with that. No sane person would ever contemplate going back to him, would they? Not after everything. Tiffany ring or not.
The ring.
There was a thought.
What happened to the ring? Did she leave it at the pub? When had she last had it? Did she throw it out of the window after all? Felicity couldn’t remember. She made a mental note to search the flat when she got home. She felt a bit shocked that she hadn’t thought about it for over a week but hopefully that was a sign of her impending liberation.
It was a nice ring. She might like to try it on again. But it wasn’t on her nightstand, not behind the bed, nor down the side of the sofa, nor in any of the places she usually liked to drop important things. Maybe her subconscious had decided to ‘misplace’ it for her own good. Returning it would mean seeing him again, after all, which seemed to be becoming more and more dangerous.
She did manage to find her mother’s paperweight in a shoebox at the bottom of her wardrobe and decided it was time it went on display. The ruby red glass was striking and when she placed it on her mantelpiece the shape of it refracted light from her lamp around the room like a rainbow. It made her smile.
Something else was missing too. There was still no message from James. No text, nothing, and Andrea hadn’t even mentioned him. Felicity tried to tell herself this was perfectly normal but really his absence had been like a huge elephant – or penguin, maybe – in the room all day long.
What had happened? Where did he keep disappearing to? It was all very mysterious. She felt really guilty about letting Adam get into her head and so she’d already decided she needed to do something about the whole Penguin Man situation when she got back from her holiday – but now she couldn’t quite put her finger on what or how to make it right. Instead, the worry just nagged, nudged and niggled at her insides, and when she finallyslept her dreams were lurid and unsettling. She woke with a start at 6am and sent him a text message she knew she would probably regret later even though it was as breezy as she could make it under the circumstances.
Hey you, just got back from the trip and I’d love to see you, hope you are doing okay, give me a shout when you are free, hope you’re okay F xx
Damn. Said ‘hope you’re okay’ twice there. This is why you should never send an impulse text.
When her alarm buzzed at 7.30am she immediately checked her phone but there was no reply.
It’s still early,she told herself.
‘What the hell did you do to Adam?’ said Bex without preamble when they finally met for coffee a couple of days later.
Felicity slid gingerly into the booth beside her, clutching her huge mug of peppermint hot chocolate. Man, she loved the winter.
‘What do you mean?’ she said, blowing on its surface and poking at the marshmallows with one finger.
‘Well, I saw him yesterday and he’s in bits. Absolute bits. I was tempted to take him home and adopt him, I’ll be honest.’
‘You should,’ said Felicity, wryly. ‘He needs taking in hand.’
She looked up in time to catch a slight flush creeping across Bex’s neck. Bex quickly moved her scarf to cover it, but she was a nanosecond too late.
‘You want to take him in hand!’ said Felicity, and as she said it, it made perfect sense. Bex and Adam. How had she never seen it before?
Bex looked down at her coffee. She tapped a sugar packet an excessive number of times before she finally ripped it and tipped it into her latte. She stirred it ferociously, staring straight ahead of her. Felicity waited patiently, feeling faintly amused for some reason. When Bex finally spoke, though, it was little more than a whisper, and it shocked Felicity to her core.
‘Been there, done that,’ she said.
‘I’m sorry, what?’ said Felicity, leaning in.
‘I said, I’ve been there, done that,’ said Bex, a teeny bit louder, taking a sip of her drink and giving her friend a sideways look.
‘You never…?’ Felicity’s eyes widened and her stomach dropped all in the same moment.
What the hell…?
