she muttered. There, standing by the sign for Great Portland Street Underground station, dressed in a badly fitting maroon blazer and a pair of fawn chinos, tie askew and looking as though he’d had a drink or two, either that or the photo had been taken after a very late night, was someone with a very familiar smile. Very familiar indeed.
Vivian Renton looked over her daughter’s shoulder and grinned. ‘That must have been taken when you went to that student conference,’ she said. ‘I remember you talking about some bloke you’d met there. What was his name?’
As Holly gazed at the picture, it all came back to her. Fifteen years ago, in her first year at university, she’d been a student delegate at a political conference in the capital. She’d been of a slightly different political persuasion back then than she was now, and far less sure of herself and her beliefs. Feeling like a fish out of water, she’d been flattered and charmed when a lanky, slightly geeky young man from Leeds University had started to talk to her and had shown her around, sticking by her side for the day’s conference and then into the evening event, which was being held at a Leicester Square nightclub. Happy to have someone to talk to, she’d been too shy to kiss him for more than a moment on the dance floor, but when he had rather haltingly asked to hold her hand as he walked her back to her hotel at the end of the night, she’d accepted. She remembered taking the picture of him at Great Portland Street, and smiling herself at his huge, attractive smile. He’d seen her back to the hotel, kissed her on the cheek and they’d swapped home phone numbers. Jolted rather more by him than she’d realised, Holly had been surprised when he’d called her at home during the Christmas holidays, but by then she was seeing someone else, so she’d drawn a line and not seen him again.
Vivian was still looking at the photograph in Holly’s hand, but she glanced at her face when she realised how stock-still her daughter had gone. ‘What is it, Hols?’
‘Can’t you see it?’ Holly replied. ‘I can’t believe I’d forgotten all about him until now. I mean, it’s been thirteen years since I graduated, and I haven’t given him a second thought until now.’
‘So?’ Vivian replied. ‘He was just some bloke you met in London, wasn’t he? I remember you talking about him after he rang you at Christmas. Nice, gentle Yorkshire accent, if I remember correctly. Very polite on the phone.’
‘Very polite in person, too,’ Holly murmured, remembering the sparkling brown eyes, the slightly sweaty palm held by her own and the chaste goodnight kiss. ‘And still is,’ she added unguardedly.
‘What do you mean? I thought you just said you’d forgotten about him. You never mentioned him again. Not to me, anyway.’
‘Er, Mum,’ Holly cursed as she felt her cheeks flaming. ‘The boy in the photograph… he grew up to be Charlie Thorpe.’
Vivian looked quizzical. ‘As in Charlie Thorpe, the new MP? Are you sure?’
Holly traced Charlie’s face in the photograph with a turmeric-stained fingertip. ‘Yup. I didn’t twig before when he came into the shop, but now I’ve seen this photo again it’s all coming back to me.’ To be fair, Charlie’s hairstyle had changed and he’d filled out a bit so that he wasn’t lanky any more, and he’d obviously ditched the glasses, too, but the sparkle in his eyes and that smile were instantly recognisable now she’d seen the photo again. ‘Charlie Thorpe is Lovely Charlie, who looked after me when I had no one to talk to at that conference.’
‘Well then,’ Vivian said. ‘Perhaps that’s something to mention to him if you bump into him again.’
Holly had said to her mother, in passing, that Charlie had come into the shop but not told her the exact nature of their conversation, as she was still a little embarrassed by it all. ‘I doubt he’ll have remembered me anyway,’ she laughed, putting the photograph back into the envelope. ‘After all, it wasn’t until I saw this photo that I realised we’d met before. And he’s probably met loads of women, er, people since then. It’s not even worth bringing it up. I’ll just look like an idiot.’
‘If you say so,’ Vivian raised an eyebrow. ‘But you never know… he might have thought of you all these years as Lovely Holly, just as you thought about him.’
Holly really did laugh, then. ‘Mum, there’s no way I’m ever owning up to that, especially now. And if you breathe a word of this to Dad or Rachel, I’ll burn the whole bloody suitcase!’
Vivian laughed too, well aware of her daughter’s legendary impulsiveness, and in no doubt that she was serious. ‘Fair enough. But perhaps it’s worth keeping that photo somewhere safe. After all, if he ever gets into the Cabinet, you could flog your story to the Daily Mail.’
‘Nothing happened, Mum,’ Holly said. ‘We held hands and he kissed me goodnight. Hardly grounds for an actual kiss-and-tell story, is it?’
‘Oh, the media can make a story out of anything these days,’ Vivian replied. ‘And you never know, it might pay the lease on your shop for a month or two.’
‘I own the place, remember?’ Holly replied. ‘Bricks, mortar, concept and execution, thanks to Grandfather. I don’t think I’ll ever need to sell that story.’
‘Still worth keeping hold of it,’ Vivian said. ‘But I must get back to Dad, anyway. He’s having one of his days.’
‘Is everything all right, Mum?’ Holly was aware that her mother had to deal with her father’s occasional bouts of anxiety and had done a lot to support them both over the years.
‘Oh, you know how he is,’ Vivian replied. ‘He’ll be out the other side by tomorrow morning. It’s just the anniversary of your grandfather’s death that set him off last night. He’ll be back on an even keel soon. He’s worrying about Harry’s latest check-up too, no matter how much Rachel tries to reassure him.’
‘Let me know if there’s anything I can do,’ Holly said.
Like many men of his age, Edward Renton internalised most things, resulting in darkish spells, but these were improving with every passing year now that his father, Holly’s grandfather, had passed away. Holly knew there were some things she’d never know about her father’s relationship with his own dad, had resigned herself to that years ago, but it didn’t make her mother’s life any easier.
Rachel was prone to the odd bout of anxiety herself, and Holly kept the encroaching demons at bay with a rigorous routine of yoga and meditation; she knew her mother did her best to keep her father afloat, too.
‘I will.’ Vivian hugged her daughter and then headed back out of the back door. ‘See you soon.’
As her mother left, Holly closed the lid on the suitcase and dragged it into her bedroom. There would be plenty of time later to go through its contents and see what else she’d stashed from her university days.
Placing the photograph of Charlie firmly to the back of her mind, she flipped on the kettle and made a cup of coffee to take back down to the shop to Rachel. She’d get the photo of her friends out later, scan it and upload it to Facebook. Not for the first time, she was thankful that smartphones didn’t exist when she was at university; there were plenty of memories, especially those concerning the sangria, that were best consigned to memory rather than the internet. And as for that sweet remembrance of the tall, awkward boy in London… that was definitely better consigned to the past.
8
After their initial encounter in the shop, Holly’s path didn’t cross with Charlie’s for a few weeks. She’d heard through the grapevine that, like a lot of Members of Parliament, he was spending Monday to Thursday in Westminster every week, with Friday as his constituency day, although she’d spent enough time learning about politics in her teens to know that this was often a moveable feast. She wasn’t surprised he hadn’t sought her out on his constituency days, really – she realised he must be absolutely up to his neck in work, establishing himself and setting out his stall as the new