The Honey Queen. Cathy Kelly

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СКАЧАТЬ the front desk with her glasses on, scanning the appointment book when Opal walked in.

      ‘Hello!’ said Bobbi, looking up delightedly. Then, with a canny look at her friend’s face, she added: ‘What’s up?’

      Bobbi could read Opal’s face like a map.

      ‘Well …’ began Opal.

      ‘Come through.’ Bobbi abandoned the appointment book. ‘Let’s have tea. You can tell me what’s happening in private. Caroline,’ she called to a stylist, ‘take over the desk.’

      The back room was decorated in the same pretty pink brocade wallpaper as the rest of the salon. Bobbi had seen the inside of too many places where the staffroom looked as if the owner didn’t care about where the workers had to sit for their breaks.

      ‘Let’s make it pretty,’ she’d said. ‘I want the staff to see how important they are to the business.’

      Three years previously, when the salon had last been redecorated, the staffroom had undergone a complete transformation too. There was a big couch in one corner. One of the young beauty therapists was sitting there now, muttering on the phone in a language Opal didn’t understand.

      ‘Right, pet, how are you?’ Bobbi went straight to the kettle while Opal put down her handbag and sank into one of the chairs at the table. ‘Didn’t think I’d see you today. What’s happened?’

      Opal found the gold envelopes in her handbag and handed them over.

      ‘This is what’s wrong,’ she said. ‘I don’t know, I just have a bad feeling about the wedding. Not about Liz – she’s a lovely girl, no question of that – but the wedding itself …’ Opal sighed. ‘I’m not sure I’m able for it. Miranda’s making it into such a production that you’d swear nobody ever got married before. We had “hold-the-date” cards in December, then there was weeks of discussion about bridesmaids. According to Brian, Miranda flew herself and Liz to London for their dresses – I haven’t even looked for one, and the wedding’s just round the corner. Now this. Gold envelopes that cost a fortune.’

      Bobbi placed a cup of steaming tea in front of her friend and passed her the milk and sugar. ‘We’re down to custard creams,’ she said, handing over the packet of biscuits. ‘The chocolate ones have all run out. There was a bit of a crisis early on this morning.’

      She looked in the direction of the distressed girl on the phone.

      ‘Boyfriend trouble.’

      Bobbi always knew what was going on in her staff’s lives. She lowered her voice so the girl on the phone in the corner couldn’t hear. ‘Poor Magda, she’s been going out with this dreadful, dreadful lout who treats her like muck. She gave him the boot yesterday and this morning she’s in floods of tears because he turned up outside the flat last night roaring drunk and yelling, “Take me back, I promise I’ll change.”’

      ‘Oh no,’ said Opal, feeling the girl’s pain as if it were her own.

      All her life, people had told Opal to stop being so sensitive to everyone else’s problems. Freya was the only one who said: ‘Opal, stay exactly as you are – it’s what makes you so special.’

      ‘Here I am complaining about a silly wedding and that poor thing’s miles away from home—’

      ‘Now, Opal, there’s nothing you can do for Magda. I had a pot of tea with her. I opened the chocolate biscuits and I told her what her mother would tell her if she was here instead of in the Czech Republic: that man will bring her nothing but trouble. But despite all of that, she’s on the phone to him now. Going back to him. You can only tell a girl so much. I don’t know why the loveliest girls always find the worst men, but they do. Anyway, between the jigs and the reels, the chocolate biscuits went. The custard creams aren’t bad, though.’

      Bobbi sat down with her own tea, took a bite of biscuit then set it aside to examine the gold envelopes. ‘Oh hello,’ she said, examining the copperplate writing on the front. ‘These must have cost a bob or two. Clearly they’re not skimping on anything.’

      ‘They have the money,’ Opal said.

      ‘Just because you have the money doesn’t mean you have to let everyone know you have the money.’ Bobbi’s tone was scathing.

      She looked at the third envelope and got it in an instant. ‘Even Meredith’s one is addressed to your house,’ she said. She kept flicking. ‘And David’s and Steve’s. That was a low blow.’

      ‘I thought so too,’ said Opal. ‘It’s as if—’

      ‘—as if she’s saying, You lot are common, low-class muck and all of you come from the wrong end of the city. I get it,’ said Bobbi grimly.

      ‘I shouldn’t let it upset me so much,’ Opal went on, ‘but it did. I thought I’d come down and tell you and you’d make me feel better. Because I’m so angry and it’s wrong to be like that. If you’re angry, you put anger out into the universe …’

      Bobbi reached out and held her friend’s hand. ‘Pet, I’d say the Dalai Lama would feel the urge to slap Miranda’s smug face if he spent any time with her, so stop feeling guilty about it. Concentrate on how wonderful it is that Brian’s getting married. Once he’s done it, they’ll all be marrying. Think of how often you worry about the three of them and why they haven’t settled down.’

      Bobbi deliberately didn’t mention Meredith here. If there was any sign of Meredith settling down, they knew nothing about it and Bobbi was aware just how hurt Opal was to be cut so efficiently out of her daughter’s life.

      She went on: ‘Liz is a wonderful girl and she and Brian adore each other. But you have to face up to the fact that her mother is a complete cow – there’s no point in beating around the bush here. Nothing ever pleased that woman in her life and you can bet she won’t be happy till she’s upset someone about this wedding. Let’s just decide here and now that it won’t be you or Ned, right?’

      Opal nodded.

      ‘We’ll get your dress sorted and make you look a million dollars. I’ll be looking a million dollars too. We’ll show Madam Miranda that we might not have been born with silver spoons in our mouths but we know how to enjoy a day out.’

      ‘Yes,’ said Opal, ‘that’s what we’ll do. It’ll be a great day, and then life will go back to normal.’

      ‘Not quite normal,’ Bobbi pointed out. ‘She is going to be your fellow granny, remember that. As soon as Brian and Liz start having children, the granny wars will be under way, you versus her. And, let’s face it, the girl’s mother gets the most time with the grandchildren.’

      Opal’s sweet face fell again.

      ‘I shouldn’t have said that,’ Bobbi muttered. ‘It’ll be fine. Do you think Meredith will come to the wedding?’ she asked, desperate to change the subject.

      ‘Heavens, I don’t know. I was talking to her a couple of weeks ago and she sounded very busy, you know, going to art fairs and things like that.’

      ‘Hmmm,’ said Bobbi meaningfully. ‘With all the travel she does, you’d think she’d make it down this way once in a while.’

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