A Pretty Beach Wish by Polly Babbington (scary books to read TXT) 📗

it was the latter, she pulled out a small tub of tuna and pasta and a can of soft drink and sat down at the kitchen table scrolling through her phone.

The follows, likes, and more surprisingly orders were still coming in thick and fast after the podcast broadcast of Where the Heck is Pretty Beach? had gone out the week before. Juliette hadn’t really known what to expect from it all, but she hadn’t thought it would have brought in actual orders, too. But it had, and she was loving all the new customers. There weren’t many people who celebrated Christmas in July, but by the looks of her orders streaming in from other parts of the globe, many of them listened to the podcast from the other side of the world about a tiny little town called Pretty Beach. Who would have thought?

The resulting social media and website activity was much, much bigger than she could have hoped for in her wildest dreams. Lucian had intimated that it would be; he’d even done a spreadsheet on it. She hadn’t really believed him - you just didn’t get the feel for it when you were sitting in his tiny little cottage with two microphones and a tablet. The whole thing recorded in there and all done via an app. It seemed all very surreal that their little chat would be broadcast all over the world. That people in far-flung countries would listen to them chatting in Pretty Beach and then follow it up by visiting her website and ordering her vintage Christmas decor. Mind-boggling.

Juliette was certainly not complaining as A Christmas Sparkle’s website traffic had leapt into a whole new arena and was continuing to hold steady, and social media follows were growing by the day. She’d had enquiries for styling for a Christmas shoot for a magazine in August which she’d accepted. And the owner of a luxury hotel in Cornwall had contacted her to see if she would be interested in sourcing and decorating the whole of his hotel for the start of their busy months of Christmas parties in November and December. She’d replied to that one plucking a wild figure out of the air for the quote for her time and he’d accepted it without query.

Juliette smiled to herself. Yep, she’d just fit that all in with being a single mum, a midwife with a heavy load, and worrying about a teenager away in Oxford.

She answered a text from Bella.

Just organising the date for when I’m coming back for the weekend.

Come whenever you like. Your room is here and waiting.

Shame we can’t predict the weather.

I know, it’s been threatening to pour down all day here. The sky is a beautiful pink this evening though. The Pretty Beach skies you like. I’ll take a pic and send you it in a minute.

Same here on the weather front.

You don’t need to let me know on what day you’re coming, though it’ll be better if I’m not on call.

I can’t wait to go out on the boat! You know how much I love it out on the water.

I said the same to Luke. I know you do.

So, it will be better if we plan it.

Actually, yes. It would be better if both Luke and I are off and we can spend the whole weekend on the boat together.

I’ll let you know then when I check the rota at work later.

OK darling, stay safe. Can’t wait for you to come down.

Thanks, Mum. Spk later. xxx

***

Juliette stood at the sink and slapped a huge blob of cleanser on her fingers and then dabbed it all over her face. In her pink dressing gown, she vigorously rubbed the cleanser in while the bath beside her ran. She’d poured in way too much of her favourite bubble bath, but it was doing exactly what she’d wanted - filling up with a frivolous amount of bubbles topping up the bath with softness.

She massaged the cleanser, pushing out the tension in her jaw and cheeks. Sometimes after a homebirth she thought the tension of making sure she did the best job she could ran all the way up to her face and settled right in the back of her jaw for the next few days.

Juliette looked at the face looking back at her in the mirror. When she examined it closely and saw the little lines, observing how it was beginning to look older, she often thought about her friend Leza whose job was getting rid of those pesky little wrinkles. She’d met Leza at the hospital and Leza now spent her days injecting the rich of Seafolly and Pretty Beach with things to make them appear as if they were ageless. She smiled to herself as she thought about it - she’d be needing a lot more than a bit of sagging before she let Leza anywhere near her.

She stepped out of her dressing gown, letting it drop to the floor, and climbed into the nearly overflowing bubbly bath, and looked out through the top of the window at the twilight and lights of Pretty Beach.

Five minutes later, she heard Luke’s car pull up outside, heard him open the front door, drop his case in the hall, and jog up the stairs.

He opened the door, stripped off the remainder of his clothes, letting them fall to the floor, and Juliette started giggling.

‘I knew you’d be in the bath. I could smell that bubble bath in the hallway.’

‘So, you started stripping off your clothes on the way up, did you?’

‘I did. I thought you might need some company in there.’

‘Not sure about that, Luke.’

‘You look tired. I’m assuming it was a long one.’

‘It was. Long, but uncomplicated.’

Luke walked over towards the bath. ‘How about the best doctor in Pretty Beach gives the best midwife in the country a foot massage? You look like you could do with one.’

‘I thought the best doctor