Let's Call The Whole Thing Off

Reasons why you should never, ever, read your best friend’s diary (even if it has fallen to the floor, pages open oh-so temptingly…):

 It’s morally indefensible.

 She would never trust you again.

 You probably know it all anyway…

So what harm could the tiniest peek do…? Answer: Lots! The best reason for never reading your best friend’s diary:

  You might just find out something you really didn’t want to know!

Learning her fiancé, Ed – the guy she’s supposed to marry this weekend! – is having an affair with her best friend, is a devastating bombshell for bride-to-be Anna. Confused, hurt and absolutely livid, she hops on the first train to anywhere-but-here in need of some serious soul searching.

Can she ever forgive Ed? Who is Anna ‘sans Ed’? And more importantly, should she go through with the wedding or should she just call the whole thing off?

Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off

Jill Steeples

Copyright

HQ

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2014

Copyright © Jill Steeples 2014

Jill Steeples asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

E-book Edition © June 2014 ISBN: 978 1 472 07428 7

Version date: 2018-06-08

Also available by Jill Steeples:

Desperately Seeking Heaven

Jill Steeples lives in a small market town in Bedfordshire with her husband and two children.

From an early age she fell in love with the fabulously funny romances of Jilly Cooper, and vowed, one day, she would have a go at writing one of her own.

Jill loves writing short stories, particularly those with a twist in the tail, and her work has appeared in popular women’s magazines around the world and in a number of charity anthologies.

Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off is her second novel.

Contents

Cover

Blurb

Title Page

Copyright

Booklist

Author Bio

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Excerpt

Endpages

About the Publisher

Chapter One

There are 101 reasons (listed below) why you should never, ever, read anyone’s personal diary, especially not your best friend’s diary, even if said item just so happens to fall off their bedside cabinet laying open all those pages of hastily scribbled blue ink in a tempting array.

I took a deep breath …

It is a morally indefensible thing to do.

This is my bestie, for Christ’s sake. If she’d wanted me to know the stuff in there she would have told me.

I probably know all the stuff in there anyway.

My best friend trusts me implicitly.

I wouldn’t do anything to betray my friend’s trust.

I am not the sort of lowlife person to even consider such a thing.

I would be incensed if anybody did the same thing to me.

I know everything there is to know about my friend. She knows everything about me. We share absolutely everything. Best friends. Forever. Together.

It’s probably full of boring everyday stuff. Went to work. Had pizza. Got drunk.

So if I know it all anyway, have lived through most of it with her anyway, listened to the work woes, shared the pizza, got drunk along with acquiring my very own version of the T-shirt, then does it really matter about those other ninety-one trifling reasons?

No.

So what possible harm could the tiniest, sneakiest peek do?

I took another deeper breath and picked up the diary …

Sunday 31 March

Feel crap. Crap, crap, crap. My head is in a constant state of fuzziness, my thoughts banging against my temples and I just don’t know what the hell to do. I feel sick the whole time, I’m not eating and I’m not sleeping. Only five days to go! Oh god! Just kill me now. What will I do? How will I get through it? I feel so totally alone, there’s no one I can talk to and yet half of me wants to shout it from the rooftops. Put it right out there and … and then what? It’s hopeless. And Anna is just so fucking happy. It’s not fair.

My legs gave way beneath me and I sank down onto the bed, reeling from the spikiness of the words, the emotion jumping off the page and slapping me hard across the face. What the hell did it mean? My eyes scanned the neatly looped handwriting, trying to make sense of something that could have been written in Swahili for all the sense it was making. My heart thumped against my chest, my hands clammy.

Nothing on the page was recognisable as being about Sophie. There was no sign in the torrent of words of the happy-go-lucky, vivacious girl I’d shared a flat with for the last three years. It was like reading the thoughts of a stranger. My quirky funny friend had done a bunk. Either that or she’d turned into a manic depressive overnight. Or had her mind and body taken over by an alien.

Only five days to go? What was that all about? I was counting down the days in an excitable, couldn’t-wait way, but Sophie was talking as if she was preparing for her own funeral. Unease spread through my body, reaching the tips of my fingers and toes. Tears brimmed in my eyes and I blinked them away. Why shouldn’t I be happy? It was meant to be the happiest time of my life. And I’d thought Sophie shared that happiness. Wasn’t that what best friends were meant to do? But Sophie, for reasons known only to Sophie, was choosing this moment of all moments to throw a hissy fit, to act like a prima donna because … because of what? Was she jealous? Was that it?

I closed the diary shut, a shudder prickling at my skin. Holding it at arm’s length I put it back carefully on the bedside cabinet as though the whole thing might explode in front of me. Which it might. Along with our friendship.

If Sophie hadn’t wanted to be chief-sodding-bridesmaid then all she’d had to do was say so.

***

Reason number ninety-something or other for not reading your best friend’s diary – although to be honest I was way past caring now –would have to be: You might just find out something you really didn’t want to know.

And the danger with that is when you do find out whatever it is you didn’t want to know there’s no way of undoing that knowledge, of stuffing it back in the box and slamming the lid shut. It was out there, hovering like an ugly wart over my shoulder.

And now I’d have to say something, put it right out there, as Sophie had said, but how could I without her finding out that I’d been snooping around where I shouldn’t have been.

Oh by the way, Sophie, that whole bridesmaid thing? Don’t worry about it. I mean, if you’d really rather not, then I quite understand. I mean, it must be a real drag for you wondering how you’ll manage to get through such a tiresome event, having to take on the responsibility of looking after me on what should be the happiest day of my life. Let’s just forget about the whole thing, shall we?

It just didn’t make any sense.

Maybe it was the dress. Thinking about it, Sophie had been distinctly underwhelmed when she’d tried it on. She’d twirled around self-consciously in the fitting room of the bridal shop, looking glum.

‘It’s a bit purple, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, perfectly purple, it looks gorgeous against your blonde hair and your lovely skin. Crikey, Sophie, you’ve lost so much weight. What’s going on?’ I’d grabbed hold of the excess material in a fistful at the back of the dress. ‘It’ll need taking in.’

‘I’ve stepped up my sessions at the gym. Need to look good for your big day, don’t I?’

‘You’d look good with a paper bag over your head.’ I sighed, distracted by six small lilac lovelies who were swooshing in and out of the curtains of the changing cubicles, whooping with delight.

‘Girls! Settle down. You need to behave like proper princesses when you’re wearing your special dresses. Sophie will be your Fairy Godmother, but she might turn into the Wicked Witch if you’re too naughty. Isn’t that right, Sophie?’

Sophie had nodded with a scowl, adopting her witch persona a bit too convincingly, looking as if she didn’t care what the hell they did.

Maybe it wasn’t the dress.

Perhaps it was the kids. Sophie was an only child. She had no experience of looking after little ones. And my cousins and second cousins were cute, but a bit like live grenades, they needed constant monitoring and careful handling. If Sophie was worried about controlling the mini terrorists then why hadn’t she said something? We could have come up with a plan.

No, none of it made any sense whatsoever.

**

I raced down the stairs, poured myself a glass of water from the tap and then paced up and down the kitchen. I’d never really paced before and the kitchen was tiny so it didn’t take a lot of pacing, but some situations needed concentrated pacing and this was one of them. There was a nervous energy pumping around my veins that I needed to get rid of.

That morning I’d woken up feeling so happy and excited and nervous, knowing I was a step closer to my big day. There was still so much to do: dresses to collect, the florist to contact, hair and make-up appointments to confirm, legs to wax, last-minute honeymoon shopping for bikini no. 4 just to be on the safe side and dozens of other calls to make, but now all I had running through my head was Sophie’s plaintive it’s not fair.

What wasn’t fair?

A sense of doom lodged in my heart and I had a feeling it had no intention of moving out anytime soon. I took another glug of water, a steadying breath and taking the stairs two at a time raced back up to the bedroom.

Grabbing the diary, my eyes devoured the words on the first page that fell open.

Friday 16 February

What an amazing day! We went to the park and walked round the lake holding hands like a proper couple and it all felt so normal and lovely. And we didn’t talk about the ‘situation’ because he told me not to and I knew it would only end in a row and I didn’t want that to happen, not today. I just wanted it to be special. And it was! We came back and fell into bed and stayed there for the rest of the afternoon. God, he makes me laugh that man! It just feels so right when we’re together, as though we were made for one another. And the sex is like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. I can never imagine tiring of his firm, hard body and those sweet, insistent kisses of his make my toes curl in delight. He’s always so hungry for me and it just makes me feel so wonderful and beautiful. Like a goddess! Aargh, he takes me to heights I didn’t think possible.

Oh, well, that made perfect sense. Relief seeped out through my shoulders. A man! It would have to be a man. A sex god to boot. Typical! My fingers fast forwarded a couple of pages.

Monday 19 February

The bastard! I can’t believe it! He called round today and told me it was over. WTF! After last week as well, when I thought we’d reached a new understanding and intimacy. We can’t carry on because it isn’t fair on me (!) and as much as he adores me there isn’t anything else he has to offer. Funny how he’s suddenly developed a conscience. Gave me a load of crap about how it was only ever meant to be a bit of fun and falling in love wasn’t part of the plan. But it’s a bit too late for that now! I love him more than any man I’ve ever loved and I know he loves me too. I told him I was prepared to wait, but he said ‘No’, he couldn’t do it any more. And then he told me straight – he was never going to leave her and I’ve got to get used to the idea – we have no future together. My heart is breaking. Not sure how I’ll ever get over this.

Oh God, poor Sophie. A broken heart explained everything. The loss of weight, all that mooning around, her lack of interest in anything bridal. No wonder she was dreading the wedding. Clearly she’d got herself involved with some toerag, a married toerag at that, and he was giving her the run-around. And all this time she’s been keeping this huge secret to herself so as not to burden me in the run-up to my special day. That was just like Sophie, thinking of others first. What a sweetheart! Probably all the talk of marriage and lifelong commitment had brought home to her just what she was missing out on.

Of course it seemed unfair. I had my Happy Ever After to look forward to, but what did Sophie have? A bit of afternoon delight when it suited her fancy man. And however good he was in the sack, it couldn’t be worth all the sneaking around, the lies and the hurt. She probably felt miserable that she couldn’t bring him along to the wedding. That she couldn’t show off her new man to all her friends, but no doubt he went running back to wifey at the weekends. And now, despite all his promises, he’d dumped her for good. But for goodness’ sake, what was she doing with a married man in the first place? Wasn’t that regulation No. 1 of the girls’ club – no married men?

Had I really been so preoccupied with the wedding that Sophie had felt unable to confide in me? I stretched out my arms behind me, my hands resting on my best friend’s bed as I looked for answers in the Artex ceiling.

I cursed inwardly. If only I’d picked up on the signs earlier and had the chance to sit down with Sophie and counsel her on the futility of dating a married guy then I might just have been able to make her see sense and all this heartbreak could have been avoided. Okay, I’d been manic busy these last few months, but never too busy to listen to Sophie’s problems. We’d always been there for each other and now I felt absolutely dreadful! Like the worst friend in the world. In all my bubbling excitement for the big day I’d completely neglected my friend’s needs.

I would have to talk to Sophie, coax it out of her, hold her hand while she told me all the gory details about this man and their torrid love affair. And then, being the good friend I’d failed to be lately, I’d make it up to her by seeing her through these next few weeks (barring the honeymoon, of course, although I would make an effort to counsel her by text). Yes, I’d help her get the no-good scumbag out of her system once and for all.

The diary felt heavy in my hands. I really ought to get on and make some of those phone calls, but now I knew about Sophie’s troubles I had a moral responsibility to make sure she was okay. She’d sounded completely and utterly distraught in that last entry and unrequited love can do funny things to you, can tip you over the edge. I didn’t want Sophie to do anything stupid.

I just needed to check. Make sure she was absolutely okay.

Tuesday 12 March

Mmmm, mmm. Only twenty minutes today, but when they are the most exciting moments of my week, what does it matter!? No, scrub that, the most exciting moments of the last month, the last year, my entire lifetime! My insides are still zinging with excitement and my legs, oh God, I’m not sure they can even function any more. They’re all wobbly, a bit like my heart. Xx

Oh good grief, Sophie! What’s happened? One minute it’s off, the next it’s on. What on earth are you doing? Why, why, why? You’re such a glutton for punishment. (What exactly is the guy doing to you to turn your legs to jelly?)

Hurriedly, I ran my fingers back through the pages.

Friday 9March

I knew it! He turned up on the doorstep looking dreadful, really awful, standing there with dark rings around his eyes and I just couldn’t turn him away. All my anger and disappointment disappeared at the sight of him and all I felt was complete relief that he was back again. I’m sure my heart literally swooned. We fell into each other’s arms and oh, he made soft, sweet love to me and it was as if we’d never been apart. I’m not sure what it means for us, what we’ll do, but none of that matters now. All that matters is that he’s back.

Why did you have to fall for it, Sophie? I punched my clenched fist down on the bed in frustration. He turns up on the doorstep with puppy-dog eyes and in an instant you’re eating out of his hand again! This wasn’t the Sophie I knew; the independent, vivacious, self-assured woman who wouldn’t take crap from any man. What was she doing putting her life on hold for the sake of a two-timing rat? It was obviously why Sophie hadn’t been able to confide in me. She probably felt ashamed that she’d got herself in so deep and knew that I’d give it to her straight, tell her she was acting like a complete and utter fool and the sooner she got the creep out of her life the better.

Thursday 15 March

He bought me a present! A solid silver trinket box in the shape of a butterfly. He knows how much I love butterflies. It’s so beautiful and I’ve put it on my bedside cabinet where I can see it. I’ve doused it with his aftershave as well just to have his delicious scent around me. Every time I look at it I’m reminded of him, although that’s not difficult because I think about him every single moment of the day. I just can’t get him out of my head and all I’m doing is counting down the minutes until I can get to see him again, although Lord knows when that will be now!!! Oh God, I don’t know how I’ll get through these next few weeks. He said he’s got to lie low, he’s got too much on and it’s far too risky for us to meet, but when it’s all over then we can pick up where we left off, that’s if I want to. If I want to!? NO!! I don’t want to. Doesn’t he get it? I don’t want to be someone he picks up and drops off just when he wants to. But what can I do? The alternative is far too horrible to even contemplate. Those weeks without him were the worst time of my life. I can’t live like this and yet I can’t live without him. I love him too much. I want this whole horrible situation to end. I don’t know why he can’t just come to his senses and call the whole thing off…

It was like picking up the final piece of the jigsaw but still being unable to fit it into the picture. I leant over and picked up the butterfly box, my fingers tracing over the intricate design. I pulled off the lid and raised the trinket to my nose, that familiar scent sending a stabbing pain to my chest, my stomach into free fall and bile rising at the back of my throat. My breath came in heavy, laboured motions. For a moment, I thought I might actually forget how to breathe. That I might stop doing that whole breathing thing, there on the bed.

He can’t really love her. Not if he can’t give me up. I just don’t understand it. It won’t last, I know it won’t. But he insists on going through with it. My only hope now is that she gets run over by a bus or that she has a sudden blow to the head and decides that she wants to join a nunnery. Or maybe she’s struck by Cupid and meets her soul mate who’ll whisk her off into the sunset. Sigh. To be honest, the nunnery is looking like my best option. Whichever. I’ll be waiting for him at the other side. However long it takes.

Furiously I hurled the silver box across the room, the lid parting company with the base and ricocheting off the wall, before spinning onto the carpet. I took a deep breath and returned the diary to its spot on the cabinet, before standing up, my legs wobbly like Sophie’s had been, but for entirely different reasons. My breathing laboured, I leant down and picked up the silver box, reuniting it with its lid, the familiar scent making me retch. I replaced it very carefully next to the diary.

Chapter Two

Somehow, despite my wobbly legs, I made it downstairs, ignoring the palpitations in my chest and the ringing in my ears until I realised that what I thought were brain cells playing Space Invaders in my head was actually a phone. Somewhere. Outside of my head, demanding attention.

I snatched up the handset, only registering at the last moment that I wasn’t sure if my mouth still worked. What if it was Sophie or, worse still, Ed? What words were there?

‘Hello?’

‘Oh hi, Anna, it’s Louise Bailey here.’ The woman chirruped, actually chirruped, like an annoying little bird.

‘Sorry?’

‘Louise Bailey from St Michael’s Manor. How are you?’ What did she have to sound so goddam happy about? Chirrup, chirrup, chirrup. ‘Not long to go now. You must be so excited?’

‘What? Oh yes.’ The slow realisation of who this annoying woman was spread through my veins as my mouth operated on auto-pilot.

‘I just wanted to confirm the final numbers for Saturday. I think we’d pencilled in three hundred.’

Oh shit. Oh bum. Oh bust.

I scrabbled for the ‘folder’, flipped open the cover and looked at the papers clipped to the front. A lifetime’s work. Well, not really, but at that moment it seemed that way. Eighteen months’ work, at the very least. The list of names ran over three pages, some had ticks against them, others had been scratched out and at the top I’d circled the magic number in red.

‘Two hundred and eighty-two,’ I said more to myself than to the tweetering bird on the other end of the phone.

‘Two … hundred … and … eighty … two,’ repeated Birdie, as though she was announcing the winner of the Golden Globe. ‘That’s fabulous. Well, just to reassure you that everything is in hand at this end. We are very much looking forward to welcoming you and Ed to the Manor this weekend and making sure your special day is as wonderful and memorable as it can possibly be. Now, if there’s anything else you need, any worries you might have, then just feel free to ask. We are here to help.’

‘Help?’

‘Yes. If there’s anything, absolutely anything, then you only need ask.’

I thought about it. She was so frigging organised and efficient. She probably had a section in her wedding bible for ‘dealing with cheating intendeds’. A master plan for such eventualities, but I had a feeling I was way beyond anyone’s help now.

‘The doorbell,’ I heard myself say.

‘Sorry?’

‘The doorbell. It’s ringing. I need to go.’

‘Oh right, yes, of course,’ Birdie said, losing some of her tweet. ‘I’ll let you go. And we’ll look forward to seeing you at the weekend.’