Sugar Secrets…& Conflict Read online

  “Music?” she said dubiously, thinking that Ollie was referring to the radio station she’d tuned in to this morning.

  “Yeah! Maybe you should remind him that there’s a great record shop next door. Tell him the staff are very helpful.”

  Finally, Anna got it. It was Monday – Matt’s day for running Slick Riffs – alone.

  “Have you got George Michael’s last album? No, not the covers album! I didn’t say covers, did I? No, the one before that!” Ollie barked, mimicking the rude customer’s blunt way of talking.

  “Mmm, well, I don’t think I’d wish that bloke on anyone in a hurry, specially not Matt today,” smiled Anna, her spirits rising as she saw how normal and nice Ollie was being. “He’s nervous enough, with the responsibility of Nick leaving him in charge all by himself.”

  A silence suddenly fell between them with only the popping of the bacon under the grill to break it. Anna hadn’t meant for her words to come out that way – she didn’t want to remind Ollie that Matt was busy doing the job that he normally did.

  Feeling momentarily flustered, Anna stepped back and peered out into the café – but as she already knew from the absence of any bell tinkling above the front door, there were no other customers to see to as yet.

  “Funny, isn’t it?” said Ollie softly. “You and Matt, both being in charge…”

  “Listen, Ollie,” said Anna quickly, feeling her cheeks redden slightly at the awkwardness of the situation. “I just wanted to tell you something. It’s just… well, I’ve been thinking…”

  “Uh-huh?” he replied, his eyes as wide and hopeful as a child’s.

  “It’s just that I – I think you should do the Battle of the Bands thing. I mean, I fixed it – you can have Saturday off.”

  “Really?!” said Ollie, so excited that he didn’t notice the slight smell of burning coming from under the grill. “But how will you manage? Irene hasn’t changed her mind, has she?”

  Anna took a deep breath, pictured point number 18 on the list in her book – Take a chance on someone – you could be surprised… - and hoped she wasn’t about to make a huge mistake.

  “It’s not Irene, Ol. It’s, urn, just that Cat’s going to come in and help out.”

  “Cat!” Ollie exclaimed incredulously. “Cat? Didn’t she once come into the kitchen and say how great it was that Nick let us watch the telly while we worked – when she was pointing at the microwave? And does she realise that aprons don’t come in designer labels?!”

  “Don’t…” Anna groaned, rolling her eyes. “I’m trying not to think about this too much or I might just panic and change my mind. Just shut up and be grateful.”

  “Course I’m grateful! In fact, I’m this grateful!” said Ollie enthusiastically, rushing over to Anna and scooping her up in a bear hug.

  “Ollie! Put me down!” squealed Anna. “And look at the grill – the bacon’s burning!”

  “Uh-oh,” muttered Ollie, putting her down and rushing over to try and salvage the breakfasts.

  Anna smoothed her apron back down after her unexpected cuddle and did a quick check out front again.

  “So, will it be all right with the competition people?” she asked Ollie, who was throwing out the burnt rashers and starting again.

  “Huh?” blinked Ollie, glancing round at her.

  “Well, with you pulling out; telling them you couldn’t come. Will it be OK just to tell them you want your place back in the finals?”

  At her question, Ollie shrugged and looked a little shamefaced.

  “Well… I hadn’t actually cancelled it with them…”

  Anna blinked for a second, her feeling of bonhomie beginning to evaporate.

  Still, I guess you can’t blame him for not getting around to phoning and letting them know The Loud were pulling out, she reasoned to herself. Sweet as he is, he’s just a typical boy, after all; burying his head in the sand and hoping it’ll all magically be all right.

  “Well, at least you’ll be able to tell the rest of the boys now that it’s all back on,” she said cheerily, trying to hang on to her positive vibes.

  “Aha – ha – harummphhhh…”

  The strange grunting noise Ollie had just made was supposed - Anna realised – to be some kind of a laugh. Only it wasn’t very convincing. And the embarrassed expression on his face didn’t exactly scream ‘funny’ either.

  “Ollie?” she ventured, frowning ever so slightly. “What’s up?”

  “It’s just— ah, hell, I’m no good at lying, Anna,” said Ollie, dropping his head to one side and looking at her pleadingly. “Truth is, I already phoned Joe, Billy and Andy yesterday and told them it was all back on.”

  “What?” yelped Anna, unable to believe what she was hearing.

  “Well, I just figured that we could get around it somehow – that something would come up,” Ollie babbled, “and hey – look! It has! So everything’s OK, isn’t it? Isn’t it?”

  Out at the front, the awkward customer and his friend stopped their conversation mid-flow as the almighty clatter of a plate smashing vibrated from the kitchen.

  “Runny eggs… weak tea… waitress who drops plates… that’s it. Next time, we find a new café for breakfast,” muttered Mr Grouch.

  CHAPTER 16

  MAYA’S MIND WORKS OVERTIME

  “And then she threw a plate at him!”

  Kerry hadn’t even attempted to pin back her overenthusiastic curls this particular Tuesday afternoon – they sprung out to the side and dangled prettily around her neck as she recounted her story to Maya. She was so caught up in what she was saying that she was only dimly aware of Marcus the Siamese cat lazily reaching up and pawing at the longest tendril from the comfort of her lap.

  “Wait!” said Maya, holding up her hand and interrupting Kerry’s account of what had happened between Ollie and Anna the day before. “Anna threw a plate at Ollie? Are we talking about the same Anna? ‘Cause the Anna I know wouldn’t hurt a fly, even one that was coming at her with a machine gun!”

  “Well, she didn’t exactly throw it,” said Kerry, retracting her tale. “It more kind of fell, when she waved her arm to one side and knocked it off the work surface. But she was screaming at him!”

  Distracted from the conversation, Maya suddenly bolted upright from the chair by her desk, stretched her long slim neck and turned her head in the direction of the ringing phone.

  Kerry stayed schtum, watching her friend and wondering what it was that had gripped her attention so much. It also occurred to her that Maya – frozen in that particular position – reminded her of a meerkat she and her kid brother Lewis had ogled at in a zoo a couple of years back.

  “Mayyyyyyaaaaaaaaa! It’s for yoooooooo!” came the call from downstairs, in the lilting Irish voice of Brigid, who looked after the Joshi children – though Maya, with her 27-year-old boyfriend, hardly included herself in that statistic – until their parents got home from work.

  “Back in a sec, Kez,” said Maya, scooting quickly out of her bedroom.

  “No problem. Oh, ye-owwWWW!”

  Kerry’s head jerked to the side as Marcus finally got hold of the temptingly dangling curl and pulled hard with his claws.

  “Hello?”

  Maya didn’t know why she said that and in such a ‘who-is-this?’ tone – Brigid had already mouthed to her that it was Alex on the line. But something inside was making her hold back; just like she felt he was holding something back from her.

  “Maya, it’s me. How’s it going?”

  “Hi, Alex. Yes, I’m fine.”

  No I’m not, she corrected herself silently. I’m not fine. I’m the one who’s always doling out advice to my friends and here I am, completely confused about how to handle what’s going on in my own relationship!

  “Hey – one more exam tomorrow and then you’re back out in the real world!”

  “Yes, I suppose so.”

  “Bet you can’t wait!”

  “Mmm.”

  “I know I can
’t!”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So… how’s the studying going?”

  “It’s all right.”

  “Not doing your head in then?”

  “No, not too much.”

  “Maya – is something up?”

  “No,” she lied. “Why, should there be?”

  “I don’t know – you just don’t sound like you. In fact, you sounded like this when I spoke to you on Saturday too.”

  “Well, I was fine then and I’m fine now.”

  “It’s just that this is going to be a pretty short conversation if we carry on like this…”

  Maybe it wouldn’t be if you gave me a clue about what’s really happening with you and Holly, thought Maya treacherously, gripping the phone so hard her knuckles were white.

  After Sonja’s revelation the previous Friday, Maya had been desperate to hear from Alex. To hear his explanation of why he’d taken his ex to the Railway Tavern without even telling her he planned to do it. That’s what really bothered Maya; at a pinch, she could just about have coped with Alex taking an old flame out, but only for a very good reason and only if she knew it was happening in advance. The fact that he’d said nothing to her made the whole situation reek of secrecy.

  Although how could that be? she’d tried to reason with herself on Friday evening, awaiting the familiar teatime call from her boyfriend. If Alex wanted to be secretive about Holly then he wouldn’t take her to a place that’s full of my friends…

  But if she was starting to doubt her own worries and see them as over-reaction on her part, they soon returned tenfold as the hours dragged by and the phone never rang. Pure pride had stopped her from picking up the phone herself and dialling Alex’s number.

  It had taken till Saturday lunchtime for him to call: bright and breezy and full of apologies about getting caught up at a work’s leaving do that started when the college closed for the evening and carried on into the night. When it came to explaining Holly, Alex told Maya that she’d phoned him out of the blue on Thursday night, saying she was bored and could she tag along to see this band he’d been banging on about at the house party earlier in the week.

  ‘“Course, I hadn’t planned on going, since you were stuck at home,” Alex had said casually. “But then I thought, why not? Maya wouldn’t want me to miss out on seeing The Loud just ‘cause she couldn’t!”

  You want a bet? Maya had thought, listening to his words.

  And that was it, as far as discussion about Holly went. No matter how Maya had tried subtly to push him during that conversation on Saturday, he’d resorted to bland, non-informative scraps about the evening; how Holly thought the band was great, especially the slow numbers; how Matt seemed to be distracted and kept messing up the sound.

  None of what he said fulfilled Maya’s need to know how they got on together; whether Holly was as attractive to him as she once was; whether he was as attractive to her as he once was; how they left each other at the end of the night. Did they agree to go out together again? Did he give her a kiss, even just a so-called friendly one?

  It was these kind of questions that had rattled through Maya’s mind the last few days, making her more resentful and less chatty every time he called.

  “Maya? Are you still there?”

  “yes,” said Maya, coming out of her reverie.

  “Are you sure you’re all right? Has something happened with your parents over the last couple of days? Has Sunny upset you again and you just can’t speak about it on the phone?”

  Can’t you understand that it’s you that’s upsetting me? And if you can’t sense that, then maybe you’re not the person I thought you were…

  “Alex, I’m OK. Look, I’ve got to go…”

  “Listen – you’ll be back at photography club tomorrow, won’t you? And we can go out together after that and talk about whatever’s bothering you. All right?”

  Maya felt overcome by a wave of irritation; he was talking to her like a teacher, not a boyfriend.

  “Right. Well, I’ve got to go. Speak to you later.”

  With his startled “Uh, bye!” still ringing in her ears, Maya stomped back upstairs, her head thumping with images of him and this faceless girl together. This girl he had so much in common with.

  After all, she thought bitterly, her hand thudding down on the banister, they have the same group of friends, similar jobs, are round about the same age…

  From the corner of her eye, Maya saw the door of Sunny’s room move slightly and heard a floorboard in her sister’s room creak. Sunny was obviously up to her usual tricks, listening at the door for any juicy titbits. But Maya was too down to care much.

  Pushing open the door to her own room, Maya gave a little gasp; she’d totally forgotten that Kerry had come round to visit her.

  Or rather offload her worries – which Maya just wasn’t in the mood for all of a sudden.

  “Was that Alex?” asked Kerry, trying not to wince as Marcus purred contentedly and kneaded her thigh with his needle-sharp claws.

  “Yes,” nodded Maya, going back over to her seat at the book-strewn desk.

  “What’s he saying?”

  “Nothing much,” Maya shrugged.

  “Is he missing you?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Oh.”

  Kerry looked a little put out at Maya’s sudden coolness. Like the rest of the crowd, she felt in awe of Maya at the best of times, and in the rare moments when Maya seemed to be in a bad mood, she was almost intimidating, especially to someone as easily ruffled as Kerry.

  In the face of Maya’s mood change, Kerry wondered if she shouldn’t just make her excuses and leave. But Maya had seemed quite pleased to see her when she’d first arrived and, after all, Kerry really wanted her friend’s opinion and advice on the Ollie and Anna situation. So she decided to take up where she left off before Maya’s phone call had taken her away.

  “Anyway, like I was saying, I don’t think Ollie meant anything by accepting the place in the finals behind Anna’s back. He was just so desperate to be at that comp—”

  “Kez, doing anything behind someone’s back is totally out of order. It’s just about the nastiest thing anyone could do to a person!” snapped Maya, muddling up her own problems and fears with what was going on in her mates’ lives.

  “But Ollie wouldn’t deliberately set out to hurt anyone!”

  “Maybe… maybe not,” shrugged Maya. “Listen, Kerry, I’ve got a pile of work to get on with.”

  Kerry was taken aback. She had, she realised, just been dismissed.

  Lifting Marcus from her lap – by carefully loosening a couple of his claws from his grip on her jeans – Kerry hurriedly got up to leave.

  “I’d better go…” she said in a small, breathy voice, before grabbing her jacket and scurrying out of the room.

  Angry at Alex and angry at herself for not knowing what to do and taking it out on poor Kerry, Maya picked up the nearest book and hurled it at the wall, where its spine cracked, sending reams of pages fluttering down on to her bed.

  And, unlike Anna and the plate, there was no mistaking Maya’s raging outburst as purely accidental.

  CHAPTER 17

  HEALING HANDS

  Anna glanced over automatically as the bell above the café door tinkled into life.

  “Hi,” said Sonja without any warmth in her voice as she breezed over towards where Anna stood, taking a couple of customers’ orders.

  Uh-oh, thought Anna, checking out her friend’s unsmiling face.

  “Hi, Sonja. I’ll be with you in a second,” she replied, turning back to complete her order.

  “Don’t bother. I’m just after Ollie. Is he through in the back?”

  “Um, no,” said Anna, trying to ignore the edge in Sonja’s voice and finish scribbling on her pad. “It’s his turn for a late shift. He won’t be in till eleven.”

  “Well, could you give him a message, please?”

  “Sorry about this,” Anna apologis
ed to the two women at the table. “OK, Sonja, what is it?”

  “Tell him to give me a ring and let me know what the arrangements are for Saturday.”

  Anna blinked at her stony-faced friend, who looked every inch the ice maiden with her Scandinavian blonde looks and frosty expression. She was obviously talking about the Battle of the Bands competition.

  “All right, Sonja, I’ll tell him,” she nodded, turning her attention back to her customers. “And did you want any bread with that?”

  “Yes, that would be—”

  “Yeah, you see, I want to be there on such an important day for the lads,” Sonja interrupted in barbed tones. “And I want to show Ollie that some of his friends support what he’s doing!”

  The two women stared after Sonja as she flounced out of the End, but Anna kept her gaze resolutely glued to her order pad.

  This, she thought, the penned words on her order pad dancing in front of her eyes, is getting too much…

  Anna’s hand hovered over the phone then flopped back down in her lap.

  Thinking about it, she didn’t want to call Matt and burden him with what had happened with Sonja. He was wound up enough by the situation and she’d had a hard job persuading him not to make an issue of it, and not to pull out of his band commitments, either at tomorrow’s regular Thursday night gig or at Saturday’s competition. Much as she appreciated his support in all this, Anna didn’t see any benefit in putting more of a chasm between them all.

  Suddenly, she remembered that he was working tonight anyway, DJing at a birthday party in a country hotel a few miles away.

  “Maybe Owen,” she murmured to herself, thinking of her faraway brother. His easygoing assurances were bound to make her feel better.

  Her hand reached out for the phone once more, but she snatched it back again.

  “Hey, Anna, why are you sounding so down?” she said aloud, imagining how their conversation would go.

  “Well, I’m down because your girlfriend Sonja, who you love very much, was a bit of a bitch to me today!” she answered herself.

  Anna flopped back down on her sofa and sighed. What was going to happen? Was her network of friends all going to break up? Did this spell the end of everything?