Happy Ever After (3 page)

During lunch, Mum took charge of feeding the twins and she and Dad discussed their plans for the rest of the weekend.

“I've got a lot of hats to get started on so if you could take the children to the adventure playground, James, that would be great,” said Mum. “Oh, and we'll need to get the house cleaned and the ironing done at some point too.”

“Right-o,” replied Dad. “So much for relaxing over the weekend.”

“As for tomorrow, Grandpa, Granny Bumble and Honey are coming for lunch. If you do the veg and the meat, I'll make the dessert. One of us will need to pop into the General Store to get a few bits and pieces as well,” Mum went on.

Even though there was nothing unusual about this conversation, it made Poppy feel sad. Her mum and dad talked like they were running a business together – it wasn't anything like the way Sally and Sol talked to each other. Maybe something was wrong. In fact, Poppy realized
that
it was very unusual for her parents to do anything together other than make plans and organize everyone's time.

After they had cleared up lunch Mum put the twins down for a nap and went off to her studio to start work on some hats.

“Poppy, why don't you go and play in your room while the twins are sleeping,” suggested Dad. “We'll go down to the adventure playground in an hour or so.”

“OK, Dad,” agreed Poppy.

But instead of going to her room she ran upstairs – there was something she wanted to find.

Chapter Three

POPPY CLIMBED THE
wobbly ladder that led into the attic and then turned on her torch. The attic was stuffed full with furniture, suitcases, old toys and boxes, all of which had labels on them. There was a box full of Christmas decorations, another containing curtains, one with dressing-up clothes and yet another labelled
HALLOWEEN STUFF
.

At first Poppy couldn't see what she was looking for, but when she moved some of the boxes out of the way, she soon found it. It was her parents' wedding box. It was incredibly beautiful – and big. The lid was decorated with silk flowers, pearly beads and sparkly crystals. Poppy couldn't wait to look inside.

She carefully lifted the lid and shone the torch into the box. It was an absolute treasure trove. Mum's beautiful lace wedding dress was carefully folded with lavender tissue paper. Poppy gently unwrapped the dress and held it up against herself. She imagined how excited Mum must have felt on the morning of her wedding when she put it on, with Granny Mellow helping her. Mum must really miss her mum. Poppy certainly couldn't imagine life without
her
mum.

Then Poppy lifted another layer of tissue paper to reveal two bundles of letters and cards, one tied with lavender ribbon, the other with blue ribbon.

Wow!
she thought.
These must be Mum and Dad's love letters. That's so romantic!

The ones in the bundle tied with lavender ribbon were all addressed to “Sweet Lavender”, while those tied with blue ribbon were to “Darling James”. Poppy suddenly wondered why Mum and Dad never called each other by those names any more. She put the bundles down without reading the letters: even though she would have loved to, she knew that it would be wrong – these were private.

The final thing Poppy discovered in the box was a photograph of Mum and Dad on their honeymoon. As in their wedding photos, they both looked very happy, as if there was just the two of them in the whole world.

Poppy packed everything back up neatly and climbed down the ladder, realizing that it was probably time to go out with Dad and the twins.

She usually really enjoyed going to the adventure playground with Angel and Archie
but
today she was preoccupied. She couldn't stop thinking about all Mum and Dad's wedding stuff and how much they had seemed to love each other then, just like Sally and Sol; nowadays things were somehow different. The more Poppy thought about it, the more worried she became. She recalled family events – Dad was forever saying things like, “Don't tell Mum, she'll be cross with me!” or “It's up to Mum.” She could tell from his voice that Dad respected Mum's ideas and opinions very much and wanted to please her. Poppy's dad was softer than her mum, but Mum was more organized – and
very
kind when you really needed her. Together they made a perfect team.

Poppy loved them both equally and she knew that they loved her and the twins very much as well. But she was very worried that they didn't love each other any more.

She hardly slept a wink that night thinking about her parents and was very pleased to see Honey at lunch the next day to talk over her
problems
with her best friend. Together they decided that they had to do something – but what?

Chapter Four

THE FIRST MONDAY
of the school holidays began with the excitement of Sally and Sol's wedding invitation arriving. This, coupled with Poppy's chat with Honey the day before, had made her feel a lot happier. Plus she was trying to come up with a plan to make everything better between her mum and dad –
and
Sally's special holiday craft classes were beginning that morning.

Poppy and her friends met for their class at the entrance to the Village Hall and were let in by Sally. They were all very excited: not only did they adore their craft sessions but they couldn't wait to hear more about Sally's wedding plans.

“Listen up, everyone,” said Sally as they settled down at their places to start knitting their multi-coloured pencil cases. “I've got something to tell you. Sol and I have been talking about the details of our wedding. He has chosen his best man – which made me realize that I'd better think about my flower girls. I wondered whether to have one or two, but the problem was I couldn't decide
which
one or two I wanted to ask – and that's because I want
all
of you to be my flower girls!”