a side order of bloody mindedness. And even if he is freezing my sorbets, I’m still determined when it comes to Laura’s flat he’s not going to get whatever completion he’s after.
He picks up my reticence and changes tack. ‘Actually I need a home entertainment space. That would be a great addition to any penthouse.’ If he knew how ‘Hugh Heffner’ he sounds, he might not say that.
As for Plum, she’s left us to it and gone off on a hike right past the kitchen and she’s already halfway across the dining area beyond. Much longer, she’ll be a dot on the horizon. ‘Hey, is that a cat?’ She’s always been the same, in situations like this she can be such an embarrassment. ‘Talk about adorable. Come and see his eyes, Clemmie, they’re completely China blue.’
Far from resenting the intrusion, Charlie’s lapping it up. ‘That’s Pancake, my mum’s Ragdoll, and she’s actually a girl. She’s staying for a couple of nights while my mum’s away.’
However frosty I feel towards Charlie right now, when it comes to a pale fawn fluff ball, my reservations go straight out the window. Despite my heels skidding across the polished boards, I run the length of the room. As I arrive panting next to Plum, my insides squish. ‘Wow, how cute are you?’ Obviously, I’m talking to the cat here. No question, Pancake’s adorable, especially when she looks up from the grey wool designer cushion she’s curled up on and allows us to scratch her head. ‘So how do she and Diesel get on?’
Charlie pulls a face as he sidles up to us. ‘They have their moments. So long as Pancake stays in her sun patch, Diesel leaves her alone. Lucky for me, she doesn’t move much.’ He sniffs. ‘Now you’ve got this far, why not let me show you the rest? Then you’ll understand how well the top floor would work as one space.’
I ignore Plum’s imploring look. ‘Sorry, we really do have loads to do.’ Drinking Darjeeling with a barefoot neighbour in my kitchen is bad enough. Being exposed to his bed linen and his waterfall bath taps is a bridge too far. Especially when he’s so blatant about coveting my bit. And that’s before we get to how hot he is. I set my sights on the distant door and start to march, and three steps later I hear Plum shuffling behind me, then the thump of Diesel’s tail on the rug as I storm past him.
Charlie’s calling after us as we spill out onto the landing. ‘Any time you’re ready for the sorbets help yourselves … the door’s always open. Feel free to use the ice maker too.’ One man and his industrial fridges. You have to laugh at guys and their gadgets, even when they are saving your proverbial bacon. It goes without saying I’d rather be using any other freezer in St Aidan.
As we reach the kitchen, Plum grins at me. ‘What a nice man, he’s left us the chocolate brownies.’
As I sink my teeth into my third slice, I can’t help feeling I’m being bought here. ‘Nice guy my bum. If he’d said about making this flat into a bloody gaming room earlier, I’d have taken the damn sorbets somewhere else.’
Plum laughs. ‘You know that’s bollocks, Clems.’
And the annoying thing is, she’s right.
In Laura’s flat. Laura’s Lovely Sorbets Evening
Soft scoops and quiz nights
Monday
Two hours later, it’s all hands on deck for the mermaids. The plan is for Nell to meet up with the Sorbet Singles at the Surf Shack, then bring them along the beach and up the stairs altogether. Sophie’s dashing in and out to the balcony, rearranging cushions, enthusing about the sunset, trying to be the first to see the group arriving. Because that’s how driven and ‘in charge’ she is. And Plum and I are sloshing gin into big jugs, prodding sorbet dishes, and running from window to window in between squeezing lemons and slicing limes. ‘Nice dress,’ Plum says, trying to distract me as she clinks ice cubes into glasses. ‘And I love the lippy.’
I’ve swapped my navy and white office spots for my favourite floaty flowers. And for my lips I’ve ignored the clash with my hair and picked my cranberry rose to complement the jewel colours of the flat. And it’s ‘matte all-day’, because something tells me this is going to be a very long night. But I’m so scared, I reckon I stopped breathing at least half an hour ago. ‘Cool dungarees,’ I croak back, checking the lines of waiting bowls and glasses on the table for the hundredth time, and shuffling the waiting baskets of mint leaf and fruit garnish. Even though she has more pairs of overalls than there are days of the year, Plum’s the only one who can tell the difference. Obviously, the nuances are in the rips and the paint stains. I pinch myself one final time to check that I’m not in the middle of a bad dream. ‘This really is happening, isn’t it?’
Plum comes over and pulls me into a hug so tight her dungaree buttons make imprints on my boobs. ‘Don’t worry, Laura’s sorbets are amazing. It’s all going to be fab.’
Then Sophie’s shouting from the living room. ‘They’re here! Go, go, go! Pop the soda and bring out the fizz!’
I know I’m the drinks person. But when I have the first tray loaded and pick it up the glasses are rattling so badly due to my shaking that Plum takes pity and wrestles it from me.
I’m patting her back as I follow her through into the living room. ‘Oh my gosh, we forgot music.’
She grins at me over her shoulder. ‘Chill, Clemmie. Put on your vintage French mix, say “Hi”, then as soon as everyone’s got drinks we’ll make a start on the sorbets.’
Which is how I end up waving an endless stream of strangers in through the door, blinking at the blur of names as they file past. Did I really hear Dakota? And marvelling at their chorus of ‘Wows’. All to the accompaniment of Charles Trenet singing ‘Boum!’.
‘Great tune.’ Nell’s waggling her eyebrows as she comes up the rear, translating as she squeezes in behind a hunk in a Hawaiian shirt. ‘When our hearts go “boum”, love wakes up. The way everyone’s hearts are banging after all those stairs, this could turn out to be a very amorous evening.’
I can’t take the credit. ‘It’s a total lucky fluke.’
‘No such thing.’ She lifts a Gin Fizz from Plum’s tray as she wedges herself in the only spare square millimetre between my favourite velvet chair and the patchwork sofa. ‘And here’s to a great evening.’
As a measure of how full the living room is, a game of Sardines would seem like a luxury. I wriggle my way back to the kitchen trying not to notice how many toes I step on along the way, then begin scooping sorbet into glasses. We’re serving three courses, the first in plain glasses, the next in a variety of pretty glass bowls, and the third in Laura’s colourful selection of tea cups. I’m concentrating so hard on getting my scoops even that somewhere between the tenth scoop of blurry red strawberry, and the fortieth scoop of ice green mint and cucumber I actually forget to worry. By the time I’ve added teaspoons and a sage sprig to all of them, I’m almost enjoying myself. The second I finish Sophie whisks them onto trays, and she’s off.
By the time I’ve collapsed against the work surface, and gulped down a glass of soda, she’s back again, with an encouraging smile.
‘You can tell by the silence how well the sorbet’s going down. I’ve opened the balcony doors to let the breeze in, but roped it off so people don’t wander out.’ She pulls down the corners of her mouth. ‘I know Charlie’s being a sweetheart with his ice-maker, but he won’t want singles gatecrashing his quiet evening in.’
I join her by the kitchen doorway and together we peep out at the guests. A woman with cropped blonde hair, a teensy waist and a yard of bare midriff snakes her arm around the Hawaiian-shirted shoulders of the guy I saw coming in. As she leans towards his sorbet spoon with her mouth wide open, I grin at Sophie.
‘I guess it very much depends