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

But, and I know it’s selfish, it saddens me, because then I’ll lose her, and I’ll lose her connection with Josh. Her memories of him. Their past lives together.’

‘It’s not selfish,’ broke in Zee gently. ‘We can’t stop ourselves loving people. But I suppose it’s like loving any child, we have to love them enough to let them go.’

No, thought Pam. Somehow it’s not the same, but she couldn’t immediately articulate why.

They walked on in silence for a while. As they approached College Green, at the bottom of the hill, they both watched a little girl, dressed in a pair of sunshine-yellow cotton dungarees and white sandals, run around between the trees with her arms outstretched like a windmill. Her mother, who was probably about Charley’s age, Pam reckoned, ran to catch up with her and, sweeping her off her feet, swung her up into the air. The child squealed with delight, and suddenly, it hit Pam harshly that if Charley did have a child, it wouldn’t be Josh’s, and it wouldn’t be her grandchild. She’d have no right to expect to be part of its life.

Although she genuinely wanted Charley to be happy and fulfilled, and not to be lonely for the rest of her life, up until now she hadn’t grasped that Charley’s future would unavoidably confine Josh to the past.

Chapter Sixteen

The words HOW TO RUN A BUSINESS stared down at Charley from the top of the flip chart where Tara had written them in bright red pen. Tara had summoned Nisha and Angie round to Charley’s on the Sunday afternoon, so they could all get behind her and help her draw up a business plan. Charley had baulked at the idea to start with, but Tara had threatened to frogmarch her to the pub and make her resign on the spot if she didn’t agree. And since Charley wouldn’t have put that drastic deed past her, she had capitulated. Now she was hovering with mugs of tea for everyone and watching Tara in her element – bossing everyone around.

‘Angie, you sit on the sofa because you’ll never get up off the floor…’ said Tara. Angie sank her now very pregnant self onto the sofa. ‘And Pam, you can sit next to her…’

‘Because?’ challenged Pam with mock offence. ‘You think I’m too old and decrepit to sit on the floor?’

‘Er…’ Tara appeared momentarily lost for words.

‘Because you’re revered and respected,’ said Angie, bailing Tara out, and patting the seat next to her.

Nisha perched herself elegantly on the arm of the sofa, openly amused by Tara bossing everyone around.

‘Charley, grab a cushion and sit where you can see the flip chart,’ ordered Tara, and Charley did as she was told. ‘Right. Where shall we start?’ asked Tara, turning questioningly towards her.

‘Um…’ Charley felt like a rabbit caught in the headlights. There was an uncomfortable silence during which everyone turned to look at Charley, and she instantly clammed up, intimidated and acutely aware that all of her mates were cleverer than her. They all had degrees for a start, and Tara had an MBA for crying out loud. How was she supposed to know how to run a business, wasn’t that what they’d all come round to help her do?

When Charley didn’t offer anything, Nisha cleared her throat and said, ‘Draw up a business plan.’

Tara wrote that on the chart. ‘Next?’

Nisha looked pointedly at Charley. ‘Come on,’ she prompted cheerfully, ‘It’s your business. We’re all happy to help, but we can’t run it for you!’ The lightness of her tone took the sting out of her words, but Charley could still feel everyone’s eyes all fixed on her.

Her mind went a complete blank and she blurted out the first thing that came into her head. ‘Er… find a shop?’ Then she immediately cringed, thinking that since all she’d done was state the most blindingly obvious thing, everyone would think she was stupid.

But nobody seemed to and in fact Nisha was nodding at her encouragingly. ‘Absolutely. That’ll be one of the first priorities, and it’ll be crucial to find the right one.’

Tara wrote: ‘Find the right shop’, underlining the word ‘right’ three times, and Charley began to relax a little, because if Nisha said she was right, then maybe she wasn’t a complete idiot. Now that Charley had broken the ice, Tara was immediately bombarded with ideas, a good many of them from Charley herself whose confidence grew every time something she said was written on the chart with equal weight and importance as everyone else’s words of wisdom. Tara scribbled furiously, underlining things, circling others, switching pens, adding a forest of asterisks and arrows. When they finally came to a halt, they’d filled about twenty scrappy, chaotic pages, which Tara ripped off the chart and laid out on the floor.

Casually, Nisha stood up, ‘Right. Let’s pull all this together.’ Tactfully nudging Tara aside, she picked up one of the marker pens and held it out to Charley, subtly handing control of the meeting to her along with the pen. Even Tara couldn’t miss that hint, so she sat down.

‘Go on, Charley,’ said Nisha, ‘It’s your business plan.’ Reluctantly, Charley took the pen. ‘Don’t look so anxious!’ Nisha laughed, sitting herself back down on the arm of the sofa. ‘You’ve got this, Charley.’

Charley took a deep breath and uncapped the blue marker pen and wrote: ‘BUSINESS PLAN’ on the top of the next clean sheet, then she began to gather all the chaotic points together logically. By the end of the afternoon she was in possession of a six-page business plan, numbered, bulleted, and prioritised in three different colours, which she had literally written herself, and which, essentially, she completely understood. She wasn’t sure whether to be reassured or downright bloody terrified.

‘Well done, Charley,’ beamed Pam.

‘Absolutely. Yes, well done,’ echoed Nisha, and it was Charley’s turn to beam.

‘See, I said you could do it,’ gloated Tara. Angie merely rolled her eyes at Charley.

Item one on the business plan was