‘You’re one of us now!’ Darcy says.
‘What are you all doing in here?’ I look around the room. All of my friends from Ever After Street are huddled in the big staff kitchen, sitting on benches, tables, or the units themselves. It’s like an impromptu surprise party, and from the smirk on Bram’s face, I’m guessing he’s responsible for it.
Ali is at the table with a kettle and a pile of teacups. ‘Bram showed me how to make sparkly Wonderland tea. It seems like the perfect way to celebrate. Cheers!’
He holds up a cup of glittery tea in a toast and everyone else does the same.
‘You did it, Cleo.’ Sadie pats me on the shoulder as we slip further into the room and Ali beckons us over for a teacup each that he’s already sprinkled with edible glitter.
‘I didn’t…’
‘We’ve had fun.’ Mickey cuts off my weak protest. ‘And we’ve helped secure the absolute perfect tearoom for Ever After Street. It was totally worth making over a hundred vol-au-vents for.’
‘You and Bram have worked harder than anyone. It’s your win, Cleo, and it’s well-deserved. Cheers.’ Lissa clinks her teacup against Mickey’s as Ali hands one each to me and Bram.
‘Shouldn’t you be with the wedding party?’ Darcy asks him as we head towards one of the picnic-table style benches, weaving past Imogen and Joshy, and Franca knocks her shoulder against mine with a smile.
‘I’d rather be here with you lot,’ he says with a shrug, making me smile at his simple honesty again. Life would be so much easier if more people had Bram’s honest approach to it.
‘I see why…’ Darcy raises an eyebrow at our joined hands.
‘Thanks, everyone.’ Bram lets me sit down first, and when I do, he flops down beside me and rests his head on my shoulder. His blue hair is held down with styling product, but the ends at the back of his neck are making a break for freedom, so I let my other hand play with them and goosebumps rise across his skin. ‘I know this was about The Wonderland Teapot, but you’ve all helped to make my little sister’s big day really special, and my whole family appreciate that, even if my father has a tendency to go about things in the wrong way.’
‘We were doing it to help our Cleo,’ Mickey says.
I’ve never been anyone’s ‘our’ anything before and it soothes my frazzled nerves more than the hot tea. I hit it off with the Ever After Street girls from the moment Marnie introduced me to them when she was organising the book festival last year, and it feels like they’ve become true friends over the past few months.
‘As soon as we met, we knew you belonged here in one way or another. I’m just glad you found the perfect way. Congratulations, and here’s to many happy years of spreading Wonderland sparkle on our little street.’ Lissa lifts her teacup to toast me too.
I’m getting choked up as I try to think of what to say to get across how much their kindness means, from gathering here to congratulate me to giving up so much of their time this week to help with the wedding catering. I swallow hard and take a deep breath. ‘I can’t thank you enough for all your help. There’s no way I could have pulled this off without every single one of you. You’ve all gone so far above and beyond that I can’t even wrap my head around it. None of you will ever have to pay for a cup of tea again. I owe you all so, so much, from right now and back to the very beginning. I know it was one of you who persuaded the council to look at my application, even though it was received after the cut-off point.’ My money has always been on Mickey or Lissa, they’ve both worked here for years and are likely to have some sway with the bosses, and Lissa is always at the head of any protest and backing any underdog. I give them both a knowing look, but neither owns up, and nor does anyone else.
‘So what’s the first thing you’re going to do now it’s yours?’ Franca asks.
‘Take on your first employee, presumably.’ Marnie nods towards Bram, and I can feel his face shifting into a smile where his cheek is leaning on my shoulder.
I turn my head and murmur against his forehead. ‘What do you say, will you be my Mad Hatter on a more permanent basis?’
He lifts his head and grins at me. ‘Depends. Do I get cake for breakfast every day?’
‘Whether I say yes or no, you eat cake for breakfast every day anyway!’
He laughs and squeezes my knee. ‘Then I’ll be your Mad Hatter for as long as you want me to be.’
The others all do a collective ‘awwww’, and I’m grinning so widely as I clink my teacup against Bram’s and we both take a sip. He leans his head back on my shoulder, and I sink down a bit lower to make him more comfortable.
The butterflies turn into small, flying, fire-breathing dragons at the thought of being responsible for employees now too. I don’t know much about running a business and now I’ve got to earn enough of an income to cover the rent and pay other people too. And how can I ever be Bram’s boss? He’s un-boss-able. And surely I’ll need to take on someone else as well. We’ve had plenty of times where the tearoom has been too busy for the two of us to keep up with. ‘At least I can fire employees too now, and the first thing I’m going to do is fire Tabby.’
‘She’s hilarious,’ Marnie says. ‘I don’t think she’s ever even seen Alice, never mind read the book. She only seems to know one line – off with their heads!’
‘She might not be a fan of reading or Alice, but at least with her gone, we’ll know there will be no more sabotage incidents.’
Everyone sits forwards in anticipation of gossip, and I tell them about the salted muffins and spicy brownies that, contrary to popular belief, have not been caused by gremlins. ‘None of you know for sure if she was offered the tearoom before me, do you?’
‘Offered the tearoom…?’ Lissa asks in confusion.
I explain about Tabby’s plans for a wellness retreat on Ever After Street. ‘Mr Hastings apparently gave the tearoom to someone else and then changed his mind and rescinded the offer. Any of you know who that was? I’d like to know I’m firing her for a reason…’
A wave of clueless shrugs and head shakes go around the room. No one seems to know what I’m talking about, but I didn’t really expect them to. It’s the sort of thing Mr Hastings would keep to himself.
And then one voice cuts through the bamboozlement. ‘I thought it was you, Bram.’
Every eye in the room turns to Joshy, who looks surprised by the sudden attention.
‘Didn’t you leave the carousel to take over the tearoom? Isn’t that why your father hired me?’
‘No, to help me with the tearoom,’ I correct him. Joshy’s young, he’s got his wires crossed…
…But Bram instantly sits up. Rather than lazy and languid, he’s now as stiff as a robot that hasn’t been oiled.
And just seeing him look that uneasy sets off a swirling squall of a thunderstorm inside me.
‘Wait, no, that’s not right, is it? On the first day…’ I think back and it gives me a sudden and overwhelming urge to put as much space between me and Bram as possible. I slide along the bench so hard that I nearly fall off the other end as I turn the thoughts over in my head. ‘The first day, you’d already left the carousel. You said your plans had fallen through but they’d hired your replacement, so you were at a loose end… That’s why you were available to play the Mad Hatter…’
I watch his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows. He looks around the room before looking at me, but his eyes flick away the second we make eye contact. It’s probably the first time I’ve ever seen Bram lost for words, and it leaves me with the foreboding kind of goosebumps. A haunting chill. The ‘this cannot be happening’ feeling of being in a horror film. It can’t be him. He can’t have been lying all along.
‘At the interview, Mrs Willetts asked your father about “something”, and he said it wouldn’t be a problem. When you handed me your phone on that first morning, he said, “good luck with it”. I thought it was just sarcasm, but it wasn’t, was it? In both instances, he was talking about you.’ I shake my head, trying to clear it, but the thoughts are swirling so loudly that it’s like being inside a spinning washing machine. ‘It can’t be you. Of all the people who could’ve been offered that tearoom, it can’t be you. Tell me it’s not you, please.’
He sits forward and goes to run a hand through his hair, but realises it’s stuck down so slides a hand across it instead and pulls awkwardly at the back of his neck. ‘Any chance we can have this conversation in private?’
