Just Date and See

Portia Macintosh

Description

Join bestseller Portia MacIntosh for a brand new laugh-out-loud, feel-good read, guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

'Smart, funny and always brilliantly entertaining, every book from Portia becomes my new favourite romcom.' Shari Low

Billie is looking forward to a quiet, man-free Christmas. It’s just a shame her family doesn't feel the same way…

With a house full of unexpected (and unwanted) guests, Billie needs to find the perfect escape to get away from the chaos.

So when her dating app recommends a week of singles nights in her area, Billie decides that braving these events has to be better than making conversation with her dad’s new wife, dealing with her mum's mid-life crisis or witnessing her sister flirting with her insufferably arrogant next-door neighbour.

While this is definitely not the festive season she had planned, between disco bowling and boozy bingo, little does Billie know that she may find love this year after all - she'll just have to date and see...
Fall in love with the perfect laugh-out-loud festive read from top 10 bestseller Portia MacIntosh.

Praise for Portia MacIntosh:

'A hilarious, roaringly fun, feel good, sexy read. I LOVED it!' Holly Martin

'This is a heartwarming fun story, perfect for several hours of pure escapism.' JessicaRedland

'Super-romantic and full of festive spirit. I loved it!' Mandy Baggot

Sujets

• Vie de famille
• Relations familiales
• Mashups
• Holidays
• Siblings
• Humorous
• Women
• Coming of Age
• Men
• Friendship
• Contemporary history
• Dating
• Romantic Comedy
• Sibling
• General officer
• Woman
• The Women
• General
• Holiday
• Contemporary
• Topic
• Family Life
• Romance
• Christmas
• Fiction
• Humour

Informations

• Publié par: Boldwood Books
• Date de parution: 24 septembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781800487901
• Langue: English

Extrait

JUST DATE AND SEE


PORTIA MACINTOSH
For my family – who I love to spend Christmas with
CONTENTS



Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35


More from Portia MacIntosh

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Portia MacIntosh

Love Notes

About Boldwood Books
1

The house I grew up in is full of ghosts.
Well, not ghost-ghosts. I’ve seen plenty of scary things in my thirty-two years on this planet, but none of them supernatural, I don’t think. You know what I’m talking about, right? The lingering things that trigger memories; things that, to the untrained eye, don’t seem like things at all.
In the kitchen pantry, on the inside edge of the doorframe, there are the markings Mum used to make to document mine and my sister’s heights as we were growing up. To a stranger, these markings must seem pretty straightforward, but when I look at them, I remember how competitive Jess, my younger sister, and I used to be. Bizarrely, we always strove to be the shorter sibling so, when the time came for Mum to check our heights, we would always try to find ways to make ourselves appear smaller. It doesn’t make much sense to me now, although, funnily enough, Jess does still love to shrink away from things.
Take today, for example. Emptying Mum’s house – a large detached in the heart of picture-perfect suburbia – is a huge job. You would think my only sibling would be here to help but she’s MIA. I could give Jess the benefit of the doubt, perhaps she’s not here because it’s a difficult thing to do, taking all of Mum’s things out of the house that she lived in before either of us were born, loading them into the van that’s going to take them away. Perhaps that’s why she isn’t here. Of course, it’s equally likely Jess hasn’t turned up because she’s had a better offer. Either way, she should be here. It’s not fair to leave this all for me to do.
I’m currently emptying the fridge and the freezer out into black bags. Bloody hell, there’s a jar of Branston pickle in the back of the fridge that looks like it’s been there since I sat my A Levels. I’d imagine she got it for Dad, back when he was still around. It’s been a long time since he lived in this house, and even he is managing to find a way to linger.
With everything bagged up, apart from the single white chocolate Magnum I found, I drag the bags out into the back garden and place them in the wheelie bin. I unwrap my ice-cream and take an enthusiastic bite. It’s December, and chilly outside today – it’s cold inside too, given that there’s no heating on and all the doors are open. Either way, it’s a bit cold for ice-cream, but I’m starting to feel hungry from all the hard work, plus I can’t quite bring myself to throw chocolate in the bin.
There are a few things I’m keeping – not just chocolate. I’m taking some sentimental things from my old room home with me, as well as an impressive collection of boardgames amassed over the years, and an old Nintendo Wii that would otherwise end up on a scrapheap somewhere. It’s amazing how it hasn’t worn as well as the edition of Monopoly that Mum and Dad had before I was even born, but I’ll see if I can get it working one day when I’m bored, perhaps.
‘Hello, Billie,’ I hear an unfortunately familiar voice call out.
Now, there’s something I’m glad to be leaving behind.
I’m so close to the back door. I could probably ignore him, save myself from one last encounter with everyone’s least favourite neighbour, if I just pick up the pace.
‘Oi, Billie,’ he says, his voice much louder this time.
I may as well get it over with. After today, I’m never going to see him again.
‘Hello, Mr Baxter,’ I say, trying to mask a sigh.
Elliot Baxter has been a pain in the arse for pretty much as long as I can remember. He’s our seventy-something neighbour from up the street, except, because the road curves around, it means that his back garden backs on to ours. I thought sharing a garden with him was stressful. I can’t even imagine what it must be like to be next door to him.
Elliot just loves to complain, it’s his all-time favourite thing. Whether it’s because his neighbours’ dog does its business too close to the boundary fence or the kid with the ‘especially noisy bike chain’ who rides past his house, Elliot always has a problem and when Elliot has a problem, the whole street knows about it.
‘What’s up?’ I ask him, hoping he makes this quick. I’m really not in the mood.
‘Finally sold the house,’ he says. I can’t tell if he’s making a statement or asking a question, but I know it’s probably the former. There’s no way he doesn’t know. He makes it his business to know other people’s business and, let me tell you, it’s a full-time job that he works hard at.
‘Yep,’ I reply. The less I say, the less he has to work with.
‘New people moving in?’ he asks.
‘I would imagine so,’ I say – although, you know, that is typically the idea when someone buys a house.
‘The, er, the new people,’ he starts.
I raise my eyebrows expectantly, bracing myself for whatever Elliot is about to say next. He always has the same look on his face, he looks as though he’s just been slapped but he doesn’t understand why.
‘What are the new people like?’ he eventually asks.
‘Oh, I don’t know them,’ I reply.
‘But what are⁠—’
‘I’m really sorry, I need to go help the removal men,’ I insist. ‘All the best, Mr Baxter.’
Honestly, if that’s the last time I ever have to speak to him, then it’s not all bad news today.
I don’t give Elliot a chance to reply. I hurry indoors and up the stairs where I find one of the removal men in my old room.
It’s strange, seeing it being emptied, my memories slowly being stripped away, resetting the room for the next person who will occupy it. With every item that is removed, it’s like I hardly recognise it. It isn’t only my things that are being removed, it’s me.
‘You all right, love?’ he asks as he stacks boxes.
Inside those cardboard boxes are all the memories from my childhood, attached to various items. The good memories, the bad – speaking of which, the removal man has just revealed an ugly one, by rolling up the rug that used to be next to my bed.
I stare down at the ding in the wooden floor. Another ghost. It catches the removal man’s eye.
‘Oh, God, I remember that happening like it was yesterday,’ I tell him. ‘There’s only a year or so between me and my sister. Anything I got before her – or anything I had that she didn’t want until she saw me with it – made her so jealous.’
On this occasion in particular, it was my rainbow-coloured Beanie Baby rabbit that she decided she had to have, after previously mocking me for having such a childish toy. I don’t remember how old I was – but we were still quite young.
‘It all happened so quickly. I was lying on my bed when she came in and decided she was taking a toy from me,’ I explain, grabbing a small box, heading downstairs with the removal man. He does genuinely seem interested in what happened, unless he’s just being polite. ‘She tried to grab it from me – something she often did when she wanted something, and sometimes I let her – but there was no way I was going to give it up that day, so I kept tight hold of it. I don’t remember how long we struggled with it, probably not that long, although it felt like an epic battle at the time. Eventually, when she couldn’t hold on any longer, she let go, sending me back with a force that knocked the lamp off my bedside table. My sister scarpered as soon as she realised something might be broken. I averted my eyes, too terrified to look, terrified that the bedside lamp I’ve had for as long as I could remember – one that was my mum’s when she was a young girl – was broken and I could have cried with relief when, unbelievably, I finally looked down and it was absolutely fine. The floor, however, was not.’
‘That’s siblings for you,’ the man says through a smile. ‘You’d never think she was the type, talking to her now.’
‘My sister, what, is she here?’ I ask, surprised.
‘Yeah, she’s down at the van with Tommy,’ he replies. ‘Although they’re flirting up a storm. That’s why muggins here is doing all the work.’
‘Well, that does sound like her,’ I say with a laugh.
My smile quickly falls as we reach the front door.
‘That rug has been hiding that mark on the floor for maybe twenty years,’ I muse. ‘The day I dragged it across the floor, supposedly as a temporary fix, while I figured out what I was going to do about it, marked the start of this fear that Mum would find out. Eventually I would forget it was there, being reminded of it less often, no longer feeling that guilty burn in my feet when I would get in and out of bed each night. I hadn’t thought about it in years and years, until you uncovered it today, and it’s just hit me.
‘Mum is never going to know. She’s never going to discover it. It weighed so heavy on my mind, for so long. Mum loved her wooden floors, that’s why I was so scared of her discovering what had happened, and why I had to make out like I wanted the responsibility of cleaning my own room from a young age – which was not fun at all – but she’ll never know, she’ll never walk on her prized wooden flooring again.’
The removal man places the rug down in the garden and gives me a gentle pat on the shoulder, very much at arm’s length, but I’ve got a lot of time for men who are never quite sure if it’s okay to touch women – even if they mean well – so it’s appreciated.
‘I’m sorry, love,’ he tells me, his genuine sympathy apparent in his tone