After the One by Cass Lester (novels for students .txt) 📗

another shift in the pub, or more accurately, endless, never-ending shifts in the pub, kept the fantasy pinging back. Not to mention the thought of having to face Tara if she didn’t at least explore the idea.

So, early on Monday morning, Charley googled ‘How to run a business’. There were pages of sites, littering the internet, offering advice with headings such as ‘Fifteen Steps to Start your Own Business’ and ‘Ten First Steps Towards a Successful Business’. One site had whittled it down to a mere ‘Seven Steps’. So, maybe it wasn’t as hard as she feared…

Twenty minutes later she was convinced it was even harder. Way harder. The titles of those allegedly simple steps were bad enough: ‘Choose your Optimum Business Structure’ and ‘Develop your Brand’. Statements which left her baffled and daunted, while the heading ‘Understanding Legal Issues’ was genuinely alarming. Worse, the advice was totally conflicting, with one website telling her to start by writing a business plan, while another said it was the thing to do last, after you’ve ‘made sure you’re compliant and you’ve got your business image in order’, whatever the hell that meant. But it was the official government website that scared her off most: ‘As a sole trader you’re personally responsible for your business’s debts’, it informed her gravely.

Clearly, setting up a business was way more financially perilous than Tara had realised. Mustering up every ounce of courage, Charley called her, determined to put a stop to the idea. Fat chance – this was Tara she was talking to.

‘Okay, so I’ve looked into it and it’s too difficult, and too—’

‘No, it’s not,’ cut in Tara.

‘How do you know? You don’t run a business,’ countered Charley.

‘Baz does.’

‘Again, you don’t.’

‘Nisha does.’

‘Nisha’s got a degree!’

‘So?’

In the end Tara bullied Charley into promising to at least talk to Nisha before she came to a decision.

‘Of course you could run a shop!’ Nisha exclaimed, before knocking Charley sideways by adding, ‘But that’s not to say that you should.’

‘Why not?’ asked Charley, taken aback.

‘Is this your idea or Tara’s?’ asked Nisha bluntly.

Charley fessed up that it was initially Tara’s idea. ‘Has she already mentioned it to you?’ she asked. She wouldn’t have put it past her.

‘No, it was just a hunch.’

‘The thing is, I kind of like the idea,’ Charley went on, ‘and I can sort of see myself doing it.’

‘It’ll be exhausting, working flat out, seven days a week, and even then, hard work alone won’t guarantee success,’ Nisha warned.

It wasn’t the work, or even the risk of failing, that was frightening Charley. It was the financial jeopardy, so she asked, ‘Is it too risky?’

‘Depends.’ Nisha’s reply was pragmatic as ever. ‘If you have to invest money you can’t afford to lose, like say mortgaging your flat to finance it, then, yes, it’s too risky. But if you’re just putting some of your redundancy money into it, and you don’t mind writing that off if you have to, well, that’s a lot less risky.’

‘So, do you think I should do it?’

‘I think you should do what you want to do. You’re undoubtedly more than capable of running a shop – but I don’t think you should do it just to please Tara!’

‘I’m not,’ Charley assured her firmly, and honestly, as the seductive image of her serving a crowd of happy customers, with the credit card machine bleeping away, flipped into her mind again. Bringing herself back to reality she asked Nisha cautiously, ‘Heard anything else from Jay?’

Nisha sighed. ‘No. It’s all gone very quiet. My solicitor is sending him a letter reminding him the court order is legally binding and that he’d have justify challenging it.’

‘Does that mean he can’t ask you for more money then?’

‘Sadly no. But she said a legal letter might frighten him off.’

‘Will it?’

‘Maybe, he always was a bit of a wuss.’

‘Sounds like it’s worth a try.’

‘Definitely.’

‘Fingers crossed then!’

‘Yup. Although it’s difficult to cross your fingers and type,’ Nisha joked.

Charley laughed. ‘Actually, can I just ask you something, for Pam? Do you think she’d be in a stronger position if she moved back into her house? To make a claim on it, as it were?’

There was a brief pause. Then Nisha said, ‘No. At least I don’t think so. I didn’t get to keep the flat because I was living in it. It was only because I could buy out Jay’s share, well, very nearly.’ Then she added with a laugh, ‘Why, is it driving you crazy living with your mother-in-law?!’

‘No!’ replied Charley, not entirely truthfully.

Chapter Fifteen

After the abortive raid on her house with Charley, Pam was still short of clothes. But wild horses wouldn’t have dragged her back there, not if there was even the slightest chance of the other woman being there, so she called Zee and asked her to go instead.

‘Come with me,’ coaxed Zee. ‘You don’t have to go in.’

‘Absolutely not! She might be there – Barbara.’

‘Don’t be such a coward! We can park in the next street. And then we can have coffee in town somewhere afterwards.’

It was very tempting. Too tempting to resist. Pam was thoroughly bored of being cooped up at Charley’s, although she felt like a spoilt brat admitting it. She was used to having an entire house with much larger rooms, and most of all, she missed her garden. Here she had no vegetable patch to tend, no shrubs to prune, no flower beds to weed, and it only took five minutes to push the little electric mower round.

She’d picked Zee up and then driven to her old home, parking up just around the corner. Handing Zee her keys, overnight bag and a list of clothes, she said, ‘If the case isn’t big enough, there’s another one in the wardrobe.’

‘Won’t be long,’ said Zee getting out. Then as an afterthought she popped her head back into the car, ‘Any message for Geoff if he is there?’

‘Nothing repeatable!’

‘Ha!’ retorted Zee and then she sobered. ‘And what about if her car is there? What shall I do?’

‘Let