Romance for Cynics

Lucy had barely kicked off her boots at her grandmother’s back door and entered the kitchen when she knew something was drastically wrong.

Gram baked every morning. If Lucy gardened to forget her husband, Gram baked to remember hers.

She supplied local cafés and schools and the local homeless shelter. Baking was Gram’s thing. So to enter the kitchen Lucy had grown up in to find Gram sitting motionless at the dining table with a stack of documents spread before her? As unforeseeable as Cash’s girlfriend-for-a-week proposal.

‘Gram, what’s wrong?’ Lucy pulled up a chair next to her grandmother and reached for her hand, its icy clamminess making foreboding slither through her.

Gram shook her head, the tears trickling down her cheeks as terrifying as her dazed stare fixed on the documents.

Lucy reached for the top one, surprised when Gram’s fingers clamped on her wrist and dug in with surprising strength.

‘Don’t.’

That one word held so much sorrow and pain and devastation, Lucy felt tears burn her eyes.

‘Gram, please, you’re scaring me—’

‘I could lose everything,’ Gram murmured, pushing the papers away so fast they scattered on the kitchen floor. ‘I loved your grandfather but by goodness he was a selfish bastard.’

Lucy stared, shock rendering her incapable of speech. Gram had adored Pops, who’d died twelve months ago. And in all the years they’d raised her, she’d never heard Gram utter one bad word about him.

Lucy had been amazed at how well Gram had handled his death, how pragmatic she’d been. And while she’d seen Gram shed tears at the funeral and afterwards, she’d never seen her look so fiercely angry or blatantly upset.

Lucy laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. ‘Tell me what’s happened.’

Gram finally raised grief-stricken eyes to meet hers. ‘I could lose the house.’

Lucy heard the five words but couldn’t comprehend them. She’d lived most of her life in this house, since her parents had been killed in a car crash when she’d been a toddler.

This cosy cottage in Footscray, one of Melbourne’s working-class suburbs, had been filled with love and laughter and food. Her friends had flocked once news of Gram’s lamingtons and jam tarts and lemon slices had spread, and her grandparents enjoyed being surrounded by young people as much as she revelled in the attention of being smothered with love.

Gram had often told her the story of how Pops had surprised her with the house as a wedding present and Lucy loved the romance of it all. Probably why she’d fallen for her own version of Prince Charming, with Adrian whisking her to live in his palace after they’d married. Pity her prince turned into a toad. But Gram had lived here for almost fifty years. How could she lose the only home she’d ever known?

‘I don’t understand.’ In fact, Lucy didn’t understand much of what had happened today. Tears blurred Gram’s eyes again and she blinked several times before continuing. ‘I’d hoped to avoid telling you any of this, love, but I don’t know who else to turn to.’

Lucy gripped Gram’s hand tight. ‘You’re starting to really worry me, Gram. Tell me everything.’

Gram dragged in a breath and let it out slowly. ‘Your grandfather had a gambling addiction. I didn’t know ’til after he died and the debts started rolling in.’

For the second time in as many minutes, Lucy stared at Gram, dumbstruck.

‘I paid off most of them from our life savings and his small superannuation payout, but now this...’ She picked up the sole remaining document on the table. ‘Your grandfather remortgaged the house to the tune of fifty thousand dollars. And unless I can start making repayments...’

Gram ended on a sob that galvanised Lucy into action. She wrapped her arms around Gram and hung on for dear life, letting her own tears fall. Tears of betrayal, of sadness, of disappointment.

Pops had been her idol. The kind of man she wished Adrian had been like. Moral. Upstanding. Dependable.

To discover it was all a lie was almost as devastating as learning the truth about Adrian’s indiscretions.

When Gram’s sobs petered out, Lucy gently disengaged. ‘It’s okay, Gram, I’ll help.’

‘I’m not taking money from you,’ Gram said, her frown fierce. ‘You’ve got your own mortgage and business. I won’t have you running into financial troubles because of me.’

‘Then we’ll sell this place and you can live with me—’

‘No. A young woman needs her independence and how will you find your own happiness with an old woman crowding your space?’ Gram’s mouth twisted in a mutinous grimace. ‘I have my pride and I’m not leaving this house ’til I’m taken out in a wooden box.’

Lucy only just caught her added, ‘Which may be my only option.’

The thought of Gram doing anything drastic chilled her blood and she grabbed Gram’s upper arms and gave a little shake. ‘I don’t ever want to hear you talking like that. You’re a fighter. You inspired me to fight for what was right with Adrian. You taught me how to survive upheaval and sadness.’

Lucy swallowed the huge lump of emotion clogging her throat. ‘You’re all I have left.’

Guilt clouded Gram’s watery gaze. ‘I’m sorry, love, that was a stupid thing to say. ’Course I’d never do anything silly.’

‘You better not.’ Lucy glared at her for good measure. ‘So if you’re too bloody stubborn to move in with me and you won’t let me help pay your mortgage, what are we going to do?’

‘Got a spare fifty grand lying around?’ Gram joked, trying to alleviate the hopelessness of the situation.

And in that moment, Lucy remembered where she could get her hands on a sizable amount of cash, almost enough to clear Gram’s debt and keep her house safe.

‘Actually, I just might.’

Gram started, then waggled her finger. ‘Don’t you dare even think of approaching that no-good son-of-a-bitch ex-husband of yours to ask for the money.’

Lucy snorted. ‘Gram, we’re desperate, but not that desperate. It’s been nine years since I’ve seen Adrian and I intend to keep it that way.’

‘Good.’ Gram tilted her head to one side, studying her. ‘Then where are you going to get that kind of money?’

‘I’ve got a plan,’ Lucy said, with a sinking heart.

Sadly, it involved backtracking on her adamant stance to not be Cash Burgess’s fake girlfriend for a week, and seeing if she could coerce him into throwing another twenty grand into the coffers to remodel his garden.

‘Is it legal?’

‘Barely,’ Lucy said, with a wry grin.

‘Luce...’ She’d heard Gram’s warning tone so many times as a teenager, it made her feel gooey inside to hear it now.

‘Gram, trust me. You’ll be the first to know what’s going on once I get everything sorted.’

‘You’re a good girl, Luce, always have been.’ Gram patted her cheek. ‘I just wish I could’ve preserved the memory of your grandfather for you.’

Touched by her grandmother’s concern considering the betrayal she must be feeling, Lucy smiled. ‘Nobody’s perfect, Gram. Pops must’ve loved you, and me, very much to try and hide his addiction from us. Does it hurt? You bet. Was he selfish in dumping all this trouble on you? Absolutely. But nothing can taint how much he loved us.’ She took a deep breath. ‘He taught me so much. You both did, and I love you for it.’

Gram swiped at her eyes again. ‘Damn waterworks. You’ve set me off again.’

Lucy sniffled. ‘Dry your eyes. I have a hankering for your signature lemon tart when I return so start baking.’