Nothing New for Sophie Drew: a heart-warming romantic comedy - Katey Lovell (best english novels for beginners .txt) 📗

impossible, because the version I knew had been accidentally broken fifteen years earlier – but still, the similarity was striking.

“Sophie.” Eve’s grip tightened on my arm until I could feel each of her fingers digging into my flesh. I imagined the small round bruises the size of five-pence-pieces that the pressure would leave on my skin. “It’s Mum’s bowl.”

I didn’t correct her. We both knew it wasn’t the actual bowl.

“I’ve got to have it,” she said, letting go of my arm to touch the bowl. “It’s ugly, but…” She ran her fingers along the rusty orange, olive green and tan pattern that followed the ripples of the fluted edge of the bowl.

“I know.”

The bowl was so retro it was untrue, but even looking at it I could taste Lucille McAndrew’s lunch offerings. Tossed salads dripping in balsamic vinegar, spiced lentil dahl, enough pasta to feed the whole street… for a moment I was a teen again, sat around the drop-leaf table in Eve’s dining room, being exposed to vegetarian foods my own parents would never have dreamt of serving without a side order of chicken or steak. It shocked me how an inanimate object could bring back such evocative memories.

“Let me buy it for you.” I reached into my bag to pull out my purse, before asking the woman how much she wanted for the bowl.

She asked for a nominal sum before telling us the bowl had been a wedding present.

“My mother-in-law gave it to us,” she confided, quietly. “It’s not to my taste but she told me it was a family heirloom. I’ve only kept it for the past forty years to be polite.”

“Won’t you get into trouble for parting with it now?” Eve asked.

“She died in March. It was a relief, in some ways. She never thought I was good enough for her son even though I’ve been working full time, raising four boys, running a home… She criticised me once for buying a birthday cake for my youngest’s tenth birthday – it was one of those caterpillar ones they sell at Marks, you know? He’d been dropping hints about that cake for months, so of course, I bought him one. ‘Shop-bought, Andrea?’ she’d tutted. ‘I always made cakes for my children. I always think you can taste the love in a home-made cake.’ Dale’s twenty-two now and he asks for that same cake every year. But with each birthday I remember how much that comment hurt.”

“We had a bowl just like this when I was growing up so it has nothing but good memories for me,” Eve said, hugging the bowl to her chest. “My mum would fill it to bursting and then anyone who was at our house at mealtime was welcome to dig in. She was the best cook.”

“She really was,” I agreed, my eyes misting over.

I offered the lady a note, but she didn’t take it, instead shook her head slowly. “You girls have the bowl, it obviously has a sentimental value. It wouldn’t feel right to take your money. Enjoy it, and make sure it gets used. It’s been at the back of our kitchen cupboard for goodness knows how long. Fill it up with some of your mum’s recipes.”

A lump rose in my throat at the kindness of the gesture.

Eve clutched the bowl like it was her firstborn child as she gushed her thanks, her delight in the object filling me with pleasure. It was worth the stinking hangovers that forced us out of the house and into the world to see her happy.

“Thank you so much,” I said. “You’ve no idea how much this means to us.”

“Oh, I think I do,” she said gently. “I could tell from the way you were pulled to it. You’re meant to have it.”

We said our goodbyes and shuffled along to the next table, chock-a-block with CDs of nineties artists I’d long forgotten and DVDs of popular comedy series. We passed a table covered with a jumble of children’s clothes that looked as though they’d seen better days, then came to another which displayed, amongst other things, a manky looking foot spa, a pineapple shaped ice holder and the world’s ugliest Toby jug.

As I reached for a simple glass vase to examine its condition, my hand skimmed that of a man. When I looked up I found myself once again face to face with Max.

I quickly drew my hand back towards my body, but the heat of my cheeks told me I was blushing.

“Sophie!” He sounded surprised, but he couldn’t have been any more surprised than I was.

“Max,” I managed, but although his name was about as short as they come I still fumbled over it. What was it about him that got me all flustered? “This is my friend, Eve,” I said finally. “I don’t know if you remember her from Johnny’s party?”

“By sight,” he said, with a radiant smile. “Lovely to meet you properly, Eve.”

I noticed him taking in the bowl as he offered his hand, probably wondering what possessed her to buy such an ugly, dated piece of tableware.

“You too.” Eve carefully juggled the bowl in the crook of her arm to accept his handshake. “It’s about time, Sophie’s always talking about you.”

I shot Eve a glare.

“Really?” His eyebrows rose above the upper rim of his glasses.

“Maybe not always,” Eve hurriedly corrected, the corners of her mouth twitching the way they always did when she got nervous. I continued to stare, prompting her to dig herself out of this hole. “Just a few times. Probably only once or twice, actually.”

“I thought you might have phoned,” he said, and the way he looked at me was so intense that it was as though he was looking right inside me, as though he could see my soul laid bare.

I liked him. A lot. If it hadn’t been for Darius taking up so much brain space I would have phoned him, for sure. But something in the back of my mind was sowing seeds of