Sisters Behaving Badly

Maddie Please

Description

Brand new from the #1 bestselling author of The Old Ducks' Club
'A glorious romp that readers will adore. Maddie's warmth and humour will put a smile on your face' Judy Leigh

Sisters Kitty and Jenny haven’t spoken since a very disappointing Carvery lunch. Kitty, sixty-two, thinks Jenny is turning grey. Jenny, sixty-six, thinks Kitty needs to grow up!

So when both sisters inherit a farmhouse in rural France, it gives them the perfect chance to heal the rift between them. Except the farmhouse is a wreck, the garden is terrorized by a flock of chickens, not to mention a donkey with a serious flatulence problem!

Kitty is determined to enjoy herself, especially when she meets gorgeous French builder, Leo. Ooh la – la! And Jenny finds the fully stocked wine cellar helps enormously with missing horrible husband Paul – hic!

And as the two sisters begin to repair their fragile friendship, they discover that being bad is actually very good for the soul.

Escape to the French countryside for a laugh-out-loud feel-good adventure with the #1 bestselling author of The Old Ducks' Club

Sujets

• Policier & Thriller
• Thriller
• Mashups
• Feminist
• Siblings
• World Literature
• Humorous
• Women
• Coming of Age
• Adventure (Guyana)
• Friendship
• Contemporary history
• Dating
• Romantic Comedy
• Sibling
• Travel
• General officer
• Woman
• Feminism
• The Women
• General
• Holiday
• Adventure
• Contemporary
• Topic
• Family Life
• Romance
• Fiction
• Satire
• France
• Europe

Informations

• Publié par: Boldwood Books
• Date de parution: 16 novembre 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781801621267
• Langue: English

Extrait

SISTERS BEHAVING BADLY



MADDIE PLEASE
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


Acknowledgments

More from Maddie Please

About the Author

About Boldwood Books
For Teddy and Mabel, with much love xx
1

I thought I was ridiculously early that morning, but my elder sister was already there. Of course she was. Jenny had probably never been late for anything in her life and to be honest, I’d hardly ever been early.
I saw her before she clocked me. She was walking towards a row of seats in front of the plate-glass windows overlooking the sea. Still apprehensive about this meeting, I was semi-lurking behind the queue for the café. At first glance it looked as though she hadn’t changed a bit since we last met. Still the same smooth, bobbed salt-and-pepper hair; the trim, precise figure; the same measured expression. Even the way she pulled her bag behind her was familiar and at that moment, slightly annoying. How could someone who was just walking and pulling a small suitcase irritate me? Perhaps after everything that had happened, all the time that had passed, my early start and several disturbed nights – thanks to my constantly partying neighbours in the flat above mine – I was just on edge.
I paused, hoping things between us would be better now, after all these years apart. The last time we’d met hadn’t gone well at all: a tepid carvery lunch followed by a blistering row. And then some door-slamming (Jenny) and flouncing (me).
I glanced over to where Jenny was now sitting, looking out of the window at the boats and the seagulls and for a moment was sad that she wasn’t bothering to look for me. Why wasn’t she looking for me? Perhaps she wasn’t anticipating our trip with much pleasure either. What a strange frame of mind for us to be in, considering we were about to go off on a sort of holiday and would be living together for the first time in – how long was it? Forty years? Perhaps thirty-eight? Where had the time gone?
Well, I was younger than Jenny but that didn’t mean I couldn’t be more mature, and I was suddenly desperate to start the healing process, the explanations, the apologies. Perhaps it was up to me to break the ice. I took a deep breath, put a smile on my face and went over to join her. She was sitting very straight in her seat, her ankles neatly crossed, wearing a flowery dress and one of her many ghastly, hand-knitted cardigans. Nothing had changed there, then.
‘Hi, Jenny,’ I said, my throat giving an annoying croak that made it sound as though I was about to burst into tears. Actually, I did feel as if I might start crying. This was a moment I had thought about for a very long time.
She looked up. ‘Hello, Kitty.’
That used to make us both laugh not so long ago. It had started every letter, every email. I can’t think of the number of make-up bags, backpacks and T-shirts with that slogan Jenny had given me as presents in the past. But it had been nearly six years since we had met in person; a lot of water had gone under a lot of bridges. Still, you would think she might show a bit more reaction to the fact that we were meeting up at last. I felt very emotional, if I was honest.
I’d missed her so much. I hoped that she had missed me.
She half rose from her seat and we shared an awkward, rather mechanical hug. I sat down on the other side of the table that still bore the smears of when it had last been carelessly wiped, crumbs in the corners. I wasn’t house-proud but I bet I could have done a better job than that.
The seat was slippery with polish and I thought about sliding down under the table to make my sister laugh, but at my age I might not have been able to haul myself back up again without a complete loss of dignity. So I didn’t. Gone were the days when I could get up without sound effects.
Jenny hadn’t appreciated my sense of humour in recent years, anyway. Perhaps that had been part of the problem. I sometimes think I have foot-in-mouth disease.
‘How are you? Good drive down to Plymouth?’ I said.
Now that the first awkwardness was over, I was excited, pleased to see her, hopeful that we could mend bridges.
She, on the other hand, sounded quite composed.
‘Fine, thanks. Only about forty-five minutes from home. You?’
I nodded. ‘Yes, so easy. Train straight through from Bristol to Plymouth and then I got a taxi from the station.’
‘Great,’ Jenny said. She pushed her glasses up her nose and looked out of the window again.
Oh God, it looked like this was going to be hard work, but I’d never been one to give up easily.
She did look older, which I suppose was to be expected. Her hair was greyer now, same as mine. Her face was a bit more lined. To a casual observer we would have looked exactly what we were: a pair of middle-aged, middle-sized sisters going off to France on the ferry together.
Her blue eyes behind the sensible, metal-rimmed spectacles were expressionless. I turned to see what she was looking at. Drake’s Island, perhaps. Some dull concrete buildings on the dockside. A man in a high-vis jacket driving a forklift truck. None of it looked that interesting.
It didn’t feel at all comfortable; the atmosphere was possibly worse than I’d expected. The ice needed a lot more breaking. Possibly with a pickaxe. Or some explosives.
‘How’s life? Okay?’ I said.
‘Fine, thanks. You?’ Jenny replied, flicking me a glance.
‘Yes, super, great, terrific,’ I gushed.
There wasn’t really anyone to mention that she would know. Chums from my latest zero-hour contract job at the estate agency. The noisy couple living in the flat above mine, who seemed to have taken up midnight clog dancing. My friends from the book club, who even now were ploughing gamely through some leaden book about death and disease in Guatemala.
Jenny sighed and flicked on her mobile. ‘Oh, well, that’s good. No more of your usual dramas, then.’
I clenched my teeth and didn’t reply to this barb but watched while she sent a text message and wondered if I could think of someone to text too. I suppose I could have sent another cheery message to Diana or Scarlett at work. To see how they were coping without me, although the property market was a bit stagnant and they hadn’t seemed to worry that I was taking so much time off. Or I could have sent a text to the neighbours, friends from the book group, but I’d already been in touch with all of them. I didn’t think they needed a blow-by-blow account of my day. Maybe to my ex-husband, Steve, but his new child bride was expecting any day now. I couldn’t think of anything that wouldn’t have sounded sarcastic and why would I contact him anyway? Perhaps at that moment he was gowned up in the delivery room, patting Leanne’s forehead with a damp cloth and feeding her ice cubes. Bastard.
Suddenly I was consumed with frustration and, as had so often happened in the past, I wanted to do something outrageous.
I wanted to throw my arms around Jenny and cry. Tell her how much I’d missed her. Suggest we all draw a line, forget what had happened between us. Remember the good bits. Apologise to each other. Make an effort. Laugh again. Reminisce about all the funny times we had shared. The excuses we had made for each other with our parents, our teachers. The scrapes we had got into and out of together.
But I did none of those things. I just sat there, fidgeted with my bag and wondered what we could talk about.
I decided on an easy topic, sure ground, the one she liked best.
‘How’s Paul? And how is Jason – I mean Ace?’
Years ago I’d taken her son Jason to see Ace Ventura: Pet Detective as a birthday treat and he’d been obsessed with the character, insisting on being called Ace from that day onwards and the nickname had stuck. It suited him, too; he was bright, cheerful and popular wherever he went. I liked him enormously. He was nothing like his father.
She gave a little smile and her face brightened.
‘Fine thanks. Paul’s busy with work. Accountants are always overwhelmed at this time of year. It’s the end of the tax year and all his clients are desperate for his attention. We haven’t seen Ace for a bit, although we text each other, of course. He spent Christmas in Scotland with some friends again, working at a homeless shelter before he went back to Nantes. Did you know he lives there now?’
‘What a great thing to do. And Nantes! Yes, of course I remember. How exciting,’ I said eagerly.
‘He’s teaching at the university,’ Jenny added proudly. ‘French and English history, his two passions.’
I widened my eyes. ‘That’s amazing. He’s only thirteen.’
Old joke. For a long time it seemed that Ace was the perennially overprotected child of two helicopter parents. Chinooks, probably, or at least Sea Kings. I for one was secretly astonished when he actually left home.
She gave a polite smile, scrolled through her photos and passed her phone across the table to show me one of Ace mid-laugh, standing with a load of his friends, one arm around a woman with green hair. By the look of things, he was in a pub and a lot more than half cut. There were Christmas lights behind him, twinkling among the whisky bottles. Good to see he was enjoying life. He had also grown a really unattractive beard, which was a shame as he was a nice-looking chap. I couldn’t understand this new passion for face fungus. But then I was probably out of the loop; I’d only just got to grips with ‘designer stubble’. My husbands might have turned out to be losers but at least they all knew how to shave.
‘How marvellous,’ I said enthusiastically. ‘He looks happy and you’ll both be in France for a bi