A Perfect Cornish Summer
‘Better get back to work. We’re behind.’
‘And whose fault is that?’ said Stefan, shaking his head.
‘OK. I get the message.’ Sam tied a plastic apron over her white overall, washed her hands again and pulled on a fresh pair of gloves. In the kitchen area, Stefan resumed preparation of the pie cases, while Sam focused on the fillings. She was serving the spring menu at the moment and offering a choice of four flavours including two vegetarian and two meat. They used nothing artificial and she insisted on high-quality ingredients such as locally milled flour, local meat and fish, and the fresh vegetables grown in abundance in the mild Cornish climate. Even the quality pie tins were an investment. Sam knew her pies might cost a bit more than a mass-produced chain version, but she was adamant they were worth it and so far, her customers had agreed.
Competition in the artisan and street food industry had grown massively since Sam had started the business but she was proud of her product and loved coming up with new recipes to tempt hungry customers. So what if she had to work all the hours to survive? She was quietly proud of having grown the business.
She thought back on the weeks she’d spent helping to convert the horsebox into an eye-catching van that was a fixture on local market days, events and festivals throughout the year. She changed the menu to suit the seasons, and in summer, offered cold quiches, pies and savouries alongside pre-prepared salads. She even had some bookings for quirky weddings and evening parties and she loved devising a special pie to the couple or birthday person’s own requirements.
There was no event that evening so Sam and Stefan spent the day filling, lidding and egg washing pies, all by hand ready for their next event the following day. The time flew by and while Stefan took a lunch break, Sam called Zennor to talk about the news and the removal and redesign of the posters. She wished they hadn’t added Kris’s name in the first place, but every cloud had a silver lining because the bad weather earlier in the day meant that the other committee members hadn’t managed to post even half the leaflets. Ben and Zennor offered to remove as many as they could in their lunch break and after work, Drew had promised to join them.
Sam had tried her hardest to think of how they could get another headline name at short notice but was too busy with work to do anything more than mull it over in her head. By the end of the day, she’d resigned herself to running the festival without a big name and using local chefs – it would certainly be a lot cheaper, but not the ten-year anniversary celebration they’d been hoping for. She was cleaning down the kitchen with Stefan when Chloe rapped on the back door. Through the glass, Sam could see her waving her hands in the air and grinning like the Cheshire cat. Sam threw a used piece of paper towel in the bin and opened the door.
Her friend burst into the lobby like an excited spaniel. ‘You will not believe what I’ve come to tell you. It’s amazing.’
‘What’s amazing?’
Chloe held up a finger. ‘Now wait, you have to guess.’
Sam was weary after a day of climbing ladders, making pies and crushing disappointment but she couldn’t help but be infected by Chloe’s enthusiasm.
‘The festival has been given a lottery grant to fund it for the next zillion years?’
‘No … but it’s almost as good.’ Chloe smiled. ‘Go on, guess.’
‘Aidan Turner has agreed to open it by emerging from the harbour wearing only a mermaid’s tail?’
‘In your dreams. And he would have to be a merman, but, sadly, no. Try again.’
‘I can’t. I’m too knackered so please, please put me out of my misery.’
‘I’ve got another chef for the festival! And he’s massive – and cheap!’ Chloe did a jazz hands pose. ‘Ta da!’
‘Wow. That is amazing. It’s a bloody miracle. It’s fantastic! You’re a star …’ Sam rocketed from the depths of despair to sunny skies in the course of ten seconds. ‘How did you manage that?’
‘I thought you’d be pleased! I phoned a colleague in my events company for help and she’d worked with him at a big TV food show and said he might help. I couldn’t believe he was available, but it turns out he has links to the local area that go way back—’
‘Who is it?’ Sam demanded and a micro second later, icy little fingers plucked at her skin. No. It couldn’t be … it wasn’t …
Chloe burst into a grin, and actually jigged around on the spot with delight.
‘It’s Gabe Mathias!’ she trilled. ‘Can you actually believe that? Much better than Kris Zachary. More famous, and he’s Cornish!’
Sam’s stomach turned over. Every hair on her stood on end. With a massive effort she forced a smile to her face. ‘Gabe Mathias? Wow. Wow … wow …’ she kept saying like a toy dog whose batteries were running down.
She was just so shocked … so horrified; the penny had started to drop the moment that Chloe had mentioned local connections. God, why hadn’t Chloe found someone else? Sam would have welcomed anyone, anyone else with open arms. In fact, if they’d asked SpongeBob SquarePants to headline the food festival, rather than Gabe, she’d have snapped him up in a trice.
Chapter Three
@PorthmellowChick: Festival posters are up. Kris Zachary’s coming. I love his shows. #summerfestival
Chloe seethed with doubts as she trudged up the steep road that led to her apartment. Oh dear. Had she done the right thing in asking Gabe to take over from Kris?
She’d assumed Sam had enough on her plate, and had been thrilled when her contacts had led to the actual Gabriel Mathias stepping in as star chef at such short notice. In fact, she hadn’t been able to believe her luck. He was well-known, well-respected – solvent – and let’s face it, extremely easy on the eye. His Mediterranean recipes, Greek heritage and Cornish background seemed like a dream combination for the festival. In fact, hadn’t he even been born in Porthmellow?
She couldn’t understand why the festival had never booked him before. Perhaps he’d been too expensive – although his agent had said he was willing to do them a ‘good deal’ that wouldn’t be as pricey as Kris Zachary. It had all sounded almost too good to be true – and judging by the look on Sam’s face, perhaps it was. There was definitely an air of panic behind Sam’s expression of surprise. Oh … bugger.
Too late now. Chloe dropped her keys in a ceramic jar on the kitchen counter top. It was pale blond wood, free of clutter, just like the rest of the apartment. Whitewashed walls with a few well-chosen pieces of art from local galleries. The Crow’s Nest was perched high above Porthmellow at the top of a captain’s house that had been converted into three smaller flats.
It was quite a climb up from the harbour, but it kept her in good shape and its nooks and crannies were the total opposite of the neo-Georgian pile she’d shared in a leafy Surrey suburb with Fraser, her ex-husband.
Chloe had bought the Crow’s Nest after she and Fraser had split and had it completely renovated before she’d moved in. The plastic turf on the terrace had been ditched in favour of wooden decking, and the stone wall replaced by glass so she could see over the rooftops of Porthmellow towards the harbour and open sea. She did feel as if she was sitting on the bridge of a ship, gazing down on the comings and goings of the harbour and with a grandstand view of the waves.
She’d kept the cheesy Crow’s Nest name: it was rather fun after all, and she definitely needed a bit of fun. Besides, she knew her Hannah would love the name … at least she hoped she would. Chloe wasn’t sure about anything as far as her daughter was concerned and with the way things were between them, it was unlikely that Hannah would ever see the flat anyway.
Chloe liked her kitchen and her home to be immaculate, with nothing out of place. She hadn’t always been like that. Before Hannah had gone to uni she’d been more than happy to live amidst the chaos of daily family life. Shoes discarded in the hall, school books and magazines littering the sitting room, a hamster’s cage on the dining table, and Hannah’s room resembling a junk shop.
Since she’d moved to the Crow’s Nest, it made her anxious to have a thing out of place in the apartment, or a hair out of place on her head. She knew a shrink would say it was her way of bringing order to the chaos in her personal life and she didn’t care. It was her way of coping with the loss. She missed her ex still, and even though he’d had an affair with the barista at the office coffee shop, she still harboured an idea that he might come crawling back to her, apologetic and reformed. She knew that was unlikely and she should forget about him but she was only human. She missed Fraser’s company, before his affair, they’d been happy enough. For all his faults he was a good if over-protective father, funny and for most of their marriage, a loving husband.
Most of all, she missed Hannah like an organ that had been torn out of her body.
Chloe sank onto one of the kitchen stools as a fresh pang of guilt seized her.
Sam had asked her again about Hannah that morning and once again Chloe hadn’t been quite honest in her reply. In fact, she hadn’t been honest with any of her friends in Porthmellow. She hadn’t exactly lied to them, but she certainly hadn’t told the truth either.
Because the truth was too painful to admit. Hannah wasn’t a Fresher. She’d actually left university the previous year and was now living in Bristol with her boyfriend, Jordan, and their baby – Chloe’s granddaughter – Ruby. Neither Sam, nor any of the committee members knew she was a granny. She couldn’t face talking about the situation. It was too raw and bizarrely, Chloe also felt ashamed of it. Everyone around her seemed to have close bonds, especially Zennor and Sam. Even though she’d heard on the grapevine that they were estranged from their older brother and that Sam might empathise, she still couldn’t bring herself to talk about her own family problems. She might break down or act unprofessionally. It felt like something she had to deal with herself so she buttoned it up and put on a front.
She poured a glass of iced water from the chiller and took it out onto the balcony. The drizzle hadn’t quite stopped, though she didn’t much care. On the horizon, a shaft of light had pierced the pewter clouds and lit up the angry waves.
Although it didn’t make her feel any better to see the sun, she couldn’t help thinking of how much Hannah would enjoy the view. Her daughter always loved Cornwall, and they’d spent many happy holidays in Porthmellow right up until Hannah had gone to university.
Ruby would love the beach, she was just getting to the age when the sand would be fascinating. Chloe allowed herself a moment to picture her granddaughter – just over ten months now – clutching her granny’s hand while paddling in the sea. She would sit on the beach rug she’d bought in the hope that Ruby would visit, Ruby letting sand trail through her chubby fingers … Ruby giggling and Hannah wiping ice cream from her daughter’s mouth. Later, while Ruby slept in the cot that Chloe had bought for the spare bedroom, she and Hannah would make jiaozi dumplings together and share a glass of wine on the terrace while the sun set over the headland.
However, her fantasy seemed more ridiculous than ever. Hannah knew that Chloe had moved to Cornwall, but it had made no difference. Hannah had responded briefly that she didn’t want to have any contact with either her mother or father and they were to leave her alone. Only that morning, Chloe’s latest email had come back with a terse line saying; ‘Don’t try to contact me, Mum.’
So Chloe had thrown herself into organising the festival not only for the good of the town, or to make new friends, but to blot out the agony of being estranged from Hannah and Ruby, who she’d never met. People thought she was privileged and had a perfect life. If they knew the truth, they might say she hid her inner self and the pain behind her veneer of clothes and make-up and designer interiors.
That would have been far too simplistic. What had happened between Chloe, Fraser, and Hannah was more complicated. It was like a gold chain that had rusted and knotted and tangled until it was now impossible to undo.
However, helping with the festival was one aspect of her life she could control, and she was determined that the chaos of her own family life wouldn’t ruin that.
Chapter Four
Gabe’s PA strode into the office above his London restaurant, brandishing a tablet. ‘Hey, Gabe. What’s this in your online diary?’
Gabe braced himself. Suzy was on the warpath and Gabe couldn’t blame her.
‘Why have you blanked out a month in your diary with the words Porthmellow Festival?’ she asked.
‘I won’t be away for the whole month, just the festival weekend. I just wanted to make sure you knew I might have to make a few re-adjustments to my schedule.’
‘Gabe. I love you to bits but you might have run it by me first. You have a meeting with a publisher in Scotland the weekend of this festival.’
‘I thought this was more important.’
‘Really? A little Cornish knees-up?’
He smiled. ‘A, it’s not little. B, it’s in my hometown. And C, they’d booked Kris Zachary as star chef.’
Suzy opened her mouth then shut it and opened it again. ‘Ahhh. I see. So, you wanted to go riding to the rescue on your white charger?’
He grinned. ‘Something like that. The call came from a friend of a friend too. I could hardly turn it down.’
‘You find it easy to turn most things down. I thought you’d cut your ties with Porthmellow. I always had the impression you felt you owed the place nothing. You told me you never go to the place now, even when you visit your parents.’
Suzy was correct. Gabe hadn’t set foot in Porthmellow since his parents had sold the chip shop. They lived in the countryside ten miles away now and on his regular visits to them he had no reason to go back to the town itself. No matter how much his heartstrings had tugged, or how strong his curiosity to see Sam Lovell again, any sentimental or romantic feelings had been blown apart after Sam had thrown him out of the house the night that Ryan had been arrested. In the months afterwards, he’d not exactly had a warm reception from some of the villagers. He’d been spat on and called a ‘grass’ and much worse. They had no idea of the impossible decision he’d had to make and he couldn’t tell them.
After over eleven years, he’d thought he no longer cared … then the call had come from Sam’s deputy, Chloe, via a mutual friend. While Chloe hadn’t explicitly mentioned that Sam had asked him to step in, Gabe had wondered if she might – just might – have suggested his name. Perhaps Sam was holding out an olive branch.
‘What’s so special about this festival, then?’ Suzy asked, cutting into his thoughts. ‘It must mean a lot to you.’
‘Like I said, I didn’t want to let down a friend,’ he said, being deliberately vague about who that friend was. ‘Besides, anything I can do to get one over on Kris bloody Zachary is fine by me. Rumour has it that two of his suppliers will go bust because he’s been cooking the books and I’ve already had calls from some of his staff who are out of a job. Most of us in the business knew he was on the fiddle so it was only a matter of time before he was caught. I don’t want the people at this festival to suffer too, so this is my small way of helping out.’
Suzy raised a perfect eyebrow. ‘So, you do have a heart. You’re not the ruthless super chef that everyone thinks.’
‘I’m just a regular Cornish bloke who loves his food. Haven’t you read my PR, Suzy?’
Suzy laughed. ‘I wrote some of it, Gabe.’ She sighed. ‘I’ll get on the phone and grovel to the publisher and rearrange your stay in Edinburgh.’
Suzy left, leaving Gabe pacing his office. When the call had come from Chloe Farrow, via a hotelier friend, he’d been ready to refuse … Porthmellow Festival. He’d seen it grow year on year to become the well-regarded event it was now. He’d heard good reports of it, although he’d never been. Once or twice, he’d wondered why no one had ever asked him to take part. Then he’d answered his own question. He was hardly one of Porthmellow’s favourite sons and most of all, there was no way he would ever be invited to any event run by Samphire Lovell.
This Chloe, who’d said she was deputy chairman of the committee, hadn’t sounded local which meant she might not know the history between him and Sam. She’d been so charming and breezily unaware of what had gone on that Gabe had been swept along. He shook his head, recognising that Sam would never have asked him for anything ever again. It was wishful thinking on his part to think she was behind the invitation.
This realisation brought the powerful emotions of the past flooding back: anger, bitterness, determination to show that he’d moved on, was a new person now. This festival would be the perfect way of demonstrating that.
Gabe opened the browser on his computer. He clicked on a page he’d bookmarked after Chloe had called.
Gabe picked up his phone. ‘Suzy?’
‘Yes, Gabe.’
‘Um … Can you do me another favour?’
‘That’s what you pay me for,’ she said.
He smiled to himself. ‘What’s my schedule looking like over the next four or five weeks?’
‘Four or five? Er … hang on.’
He waited while she hummed and ahhed then she said, ‘There are a few meetings here in London. An after-dinner speech you agreed to do in Birmingham.’
‘Besides that. Anything really vital?’
‘Not really vital … apart from running the restaurants, of course. Can I ask where this is going?’
Gabe ignored her sarcasm. ‘You know that new offshoot I was thinking of buying in the south west.’
‘The one in Brixham or Salcombe? Actually, I’ve had the agents on asking for a decision on the Brixham restaurant. They have another offer on the table.’
‘Tell them to accept the rival bid. I’ve got another idea.’
‘Wow. That’s two in one day.’
Gabe laughed. ‘I’m on a roll. I’ll send you the details of the restaurant later. After you’ve phoned the agents, would you mind finding me a place to stay in Porthmellow for a couple of months? Not a hotel. I need my own space. A short-term rental if there is one. Holiday cottage or something like that. Make sure it has a great kitchen.’
Suzy let out a squeak of horror. ‘A couple of months! You want to disappear off to Cornwall for months.’
He smiled to himself. Suzy was a great PA, but one of those types who thought civilisation ended at the M25. ‘I can do most of my work things online and drive or fly back here for anything else. Porthmellow’s not the moon, you know.’
‘I don’t know. I’ve never been.’ She sighed. ‘I’ll get onto it but it won’t be easy. Finding a place for that long in prime holiday season … I’ll do my best, but you might end up in a caravan.’
‘I don’t really mind what it is as long as it’s close to the village. Pay what you have to.’
Gabe put down the phone. A mix of fear and exhilaration coursed through his veins, but he couldn’t deny the truth. Despite all the ill feeling and bad memories, when it came to the crunch, he didn’t have the heart to let down Porthmellow in its hour of need – and certainly not Sam.
Chapter Five
@Pastyking: This festivul is crap. More feckin’ grockels. #summerfestival #wasstoftime
Sam rolled her eyes as she scrolled through her Twitter feed. There were always going to be some folk who weren’t into the festival spirit. It did take over the town for days, after all. Parking could be a nightmare and the streets were packed with visitors from all over the country. However, if people were going to troll the festival, she thought, she at least wished they could spell.
She shoved her phone in her bag, determined not to read any more social media posts for the rest of the day and closed the cottage door behind her with a sigh of relief. It had been a long day, starting at dawn in the rain, working hard at Stargazey topped off with Chloe’s bombshell about Gabe headlining the festival.
She walked into the sitting room where Zennor was cleaning out the guinea pig palace. The pigs themselves were snuffling around the floor, wheeking in delight while Zennor scraped their dirty hay into a bag. Sam had to smile at the contrast of the yellow Marigolds with her sister’s outfit: DMs, leather leggings, a tutu and their mum’s floppy felt hat.
Colt-like and slender, Zennor affected an eclectic, ‘trolley dash round the charity shop’ look. She could throw on a bin bag and still look cool, thought Sam.
Sam tossed her bag on the floor and collapsed onto the sofa with a huge sigh.
‘How are Harry and Gareth this evening?’ she said as she placed a cushion on her lap and scooped Gareth onto it, feeling his soft black and white fur under her fingers. He was a shy and delicate soul, but he let her stroke him and uttered little yips of pleasure
Zennor smiled. ‘OK. Harry’s lively enough, but Gareth seems down in the dumps.’
Sam stroked his head with her fingertip. ‘Aww, Gareth. What’s up?’
‘Harry suddenly decided he didn’t hate cauliflower leaves anymore and that he had to have Gareth’s leaf so he nicked it from right under his nose. Gareth just stared at Harry as if he’d been mugged. Which he had. Harry didn’t even eat the leaf. Naughty Harry,’ Zennor raised her voice. ‘That was so rude. I don’t know if Gareth will ever get over it.’
‘Poor Gareth. He’s too nice to mug Harry back, aren’t you, sweetheart?’ Sam lifted Gareth up and blew him a kiss and caught Zennor smiling smugly at her. Sam sometimes joked about the pigs being a nuisance and smelly, but Zennor knew she adored them. It was strange how soothing it could be to watch them zooming round the living room or chewing a carrot at the end of a tough day. If only her own life was that simple … she was still reeling from the news that Gabe was to star in her festival and wondering how to tell Zennor.
‘Anyway, let me chuck out their crap and wash my hands and I’ll fix the mojitos. I bloody need one after the day I’ve had,’ said Zennor.
Not as much as me, thought Sam, while Gareth squeaked contentedly in her lap and his brother, Harry, a peach-blond stunner of a pig, whizzed through his play tube on the carpet. The two pigs lived in harmony most of the time and no wonder as their home and toys were palatial compared to the rest of the cottage. They were actually the fifth and sixth pigs since Zennor and Sam’s mum had passed away.
Sam remembered Brad and Angelina – two gorgeous long-haired creatures who’d had to be kept separate in the end because they were always either trying it on with each other or fighting. They were followed by Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde who’d got on surprisingly well. Sadly, for the Lovell sisters – but probably happily for the pigs – they’d expired within two days of each other.
Zennor had wept for ages after every demise while Sam fetched the trowel and prepared another plot in the guinea garden of remembrance at the rear of the cottage. Each little grave was marked with a different shell arrangement, designed by Zennor, to suit the departed pig’s personality. Zennor had threatened to dig up the skeletons if they had to move, not that Sam could ever see a day when they’d leave Wavecrest Cottage. Too many memories, happy and heart-breaking, were woven into the fabric of that house. Wavecrest was as much a part of them as a bone or vital organ.
Zennor’s re-entry into the room was marked by Mexican-style whoops from Sam as she weaved her way between Harry and the guinea pig toys with a glass in each hand.
‘Right. Mojito time! With actual mint from Mum’s herb patch. I thought we’d have fajitas for dinner. I’ve prepared the veg and salad. I thought you wouldn’t want to cook after a day at Stargazey.’ She glanced at Sam. ‘Everything OK?’