among the wooded slopes and beyond that the sea, azure-blue sparkling with white-crested waves.
Sitting down on the terracotta-tiled floor, nicely warm already, she slipped a leg each between the bars, letting them dangle, swinging each leg in opposition, with the sheer pleasure of being able to do nothing but please herself and pretend that she was almost in mid-air. It had almost been so long, she’d forgotten the simple and unique pleasure of the sun kissing her limbs. She leaned back on her arms, tilting her face upwards, like a flower.
‘Carrie! Carrie! Over here?’ Jade’s excited voice came from the terrace. ‘There’s a pool down here and everything.’
She waved lazily, wondering quite what ‘everything’ entailed.
‘You’ve got to come down and see it. Mum’s made breakfast and there’s an outdoor table. Come on.’
With a sigh Carrie hauled herself to her feet. Plenty of time of peace and solitude in the next few weeks.
‘Good morning.’ Angela, of course, had laid the table. Before Carrie even sat down, her sister picked up a cafetière brimming coffee, the grounds at the top almost frothing over the lip of the glass.
‘Coffee,’ groaned Carrie, ‘that smells amazing.’
She sniffed and clutched the cup to her. ‘Bliss. Did you sleep well?’
‘Ish. I woke up early. Strange bed.’
‘Carrie, Carrie come and see the pool.’ Relinquishing her coffee and charmed by her niece’s sudden childlike enthusiasm, she joined her at the poolside. For once Jade didn’t have a scrap of make-up and was still in her pyjama shorts and vest top. She looked her age for once, without that world-weary smartarse cynicism she often adopted.
‘Isn’t it awesome?’
Carrie laid an arm across her shoulder and took in the view, the pool in the foreground, with its red-and-white stripy, padded sun loungers and the low, lean lines of the house in the background. ‘Absolutely. Awesome.’
Replete with croissant and coffee, Carrie sat on the edge of the pool, her legs stretched out in the sun watching Jade dipping her toes in the water and shrieking with the cold and begging her to come in.
After breakfast, they settled in the sun loungers, sticky with sun cream, smelling slightly of coconut. Jade plugged herself into her phone, lying prone on one of the sun loungers, in outsize Jackie Onassis sunglasses, holding the screen up to read out periodic text messages of sheer envy from her friends. Delighted with the stash of cookery books she’d commandeered, Angela sat in the shade with a note pad, scribbling things down and occasionally tearing off a strip of paper and tucking it into the pages and asking random questions, such as ‘Have you ever had duck à l’orange?’ and ‘What do you think of bouillabaisse?’
‘Did you know Kim Kardashian has three hundred and eighteen pairs of shoes?’ announced Jade, reading from the screen on her phone. ‘That’s mad.’
Carrie tried to concentrate on next year’s drama text, wondering how on earth she was going to interest her Year 10s of the political depths of the play and the tragic characters of Mother Courage and her children, when they were more concerned with the antics of a mad American family, rich idiots in one of London’s wealthiest suburbs and has-beens in a pretend jungle.
‘Eeuw! That bloke from Towie got a new tattoo on his you-know-where.’
The day set a pattern of lazing on the patio by the pool, occasionally retreating into the kitchen to get more soft drinks.
Over dinner, cooked by Angela, as happy in the kitchen as out by the pool, they talked about their plans for the rest of the week.
‘The lovely thing about being here all this time, is there’s no rush to do anything,’ said Angela. ‘I don’t feel the least bit guilty for not going off and exploring.’
‘We’ve got to go to some of the famous places, though,’ said Jade. ‘I want to tell my friends I’ve been to St Tropez. Do you think we could blag our way onto one of those big yachts?’
‘I doubt it very much,’ said Angela, putting a bowl of salad on the table, alongside a platter of garlic-cooked prawns gleaming pink in their shells.
‘Mmm, those smell heavenly.’ Carrie’s stomach let out a yowl of support, making Jade and Angela giggle.
‘Sorry.’ She rubbed at her middle.
‘Sounds like Chewbacca on heat,’ said Jade. ‘What’s the plan for tomorrow?’
Angela and Carrie exchanged a quick glance.
‘Let’s play it by ear and see how we feel,’ suggested Angela. ‘We’ve got this lovely pool and it’s so peaceful. I’d quite like to chill for a few days. Perhaps we can go out somewhere the day after tomorrow. Maybe explore Gassin. It’s supposed to be beautiful.’
After dinner Jade plugged herself into her phone
‘You going tomorrow?’ asked Angela, sotto voce, even though Jade couldn’t possibly hear.
‘Yes, I thought I’d leave early. I’m more worried about finding somewhere to park than finding my way. I’ve got my phone.’
‘That’s all you’re worried about?’ asked Angela, her eyebrows almost taking off. ‘What if the film crew isn’t there?’
Carrie swallowed, that was about the only thing she wasn’t worried about. If the film crew didn’t turn up, then her worries stopped right there. She wouldn’t have to worry about looking like a crazy fan, trying to blag her way through minders, security people or some clipboard official in charge of cordons. She wouldn’t have to worry about what would happen if she did get through. She wouldn’t have to worry about someone passing her message on to him. And if, after all that, she got that far, she wouldn’t have to worry about what to say to Richard on the phone if he called her.
She gave the butterflies in her stomach a stern talking to as she crept along the hall. They had absolutely nothing to get in a tizz about. Now all she had to do was pray that she could leave the house before Jade woke up and she had to answer any awkward questions.
Of course, no one paid the least bit attention to her prayers.
‘Carrie, wait! Where you going?’
She’d taken two scant steps out of the front door. Her heart sank like lead weight plummeting to the absolute depths of the ocean. Seriously? Was someone having a laugh?
‘I thought I’d pop out for an early-morning drive, perhaps bring us some fresh croissants back.’ Carrie kept walking, the car keys in her hand. ‘Quick explore.’
‘Great idea. I’m starving. Get me to la boulangerie. That’s French for bread shop isn’t it? Ooh they’ll have chocolate croissants. Pain au chocolat. I’ll come with you.’ Jade stooped down and slipped on her flip-flops and padded down the steps.
‘You don’t
