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Coming Home to the Comfort Food Café: The only heart-warming feel-good novel you need!
Debbie Johnson
‘Full of quirky characters, friendship and humour, you will devour this engaging and heartwarming novel in one sitting’ – Sunday ExpressWelcome to the cosy Comfort Food Café, where there's kindness in every cup of hot chocolate and the menu is sprinkled with love and happiness…When Zoe's best friend Kate dies of breast cancer, her whole world is turned upside down. Within hours, she goes from being the wacky neighbour who can barely keep a houseplant alive to a whole new world of responsibility when she realises she's guardian to Kate's 16-year-old daughter, Martha.Moving to the little village of Budbury in the West Country, Zoe hopes the fresh Dorset sea breeze and the gentle pace of life will help them heal.Luckily for them both, the friendly community at the Comfort Food Cafe provide listening ears, sage advice, shoulders to cry on, and some truly excellent carrot cake. And when Martha's enigmatic, absent father suddenly turns up, confusing not only Martha but Zoe too, the love and support of their new-found friends is the best present they could ask for…
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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins 2017
Copyright © Debbie Johnson 2017
Cover illustrations © Shutterstock.com (https://www.shutterstock.com)
Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017
Debbie Johnson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780008263713
Ebook Edition © September 2017 ISBN: 9780008263720
Version: 2018-09-24
Table of Contents
Cover (#uc6c5bf87-9b4a-5ae6-85c0-e9a323c6c116)
Title Page (#u5371c66b-5e13-536c-8fbe-dddd0f8b8a89)
Copyright (#u70552f7c-ab21-5f95-b013-f85e84260a1a)
Dedication (#u6e54e8b8-1942-5b56-b115-22f8856474bb)
Part One: Rebel Rebel (#u026a6e8a-4163-58e6-bc64-5fc3ce4bba0d)
Chapter 1 (#u8cc37f11-fa85-54c7-9145-27a983c2a946)
Chapter 2 (#ucf25f0d4-b2e0-5417-b00c-db86d8cf0e96)
Chapter 3 (#u93a17f14-5398-5693-9edc-ea37d7c92628)
Chapter 4 (#u4fb1462c-c518-5064-8cc9-b74e7cb06667)
Chapter 5 (#u65c682f1-a457-5456-8094-6cb2244a4ab0)
Chapter 6 (#u1315fc2c-628d-509f-9383-bf4aa55e2c99)
Part Two: Changes (#uc73709fb-4474-51f2-8fbe-cd007dc2d25f)
Chapter 7 (#ue872b679-fc5c-5c82-9eca-34cd09dbdd7c)
Chapter 8 (#u0271f94b-01de-57ee-9561-51360d37a465)
Chapter 9 (#ub9b5d5d8-9c82-5826-af4b-96254895499a)
Chapter 10 (#uddd1d0b1-d394-56b0-84af-47a402dc7700)
Chapter 11 (#uaf17fdb3-97b2-5eae-b01e-616d03159998)
Chapter 12 (#u057dcb6d-4ea0-51fe-99fd-db5ff6b06b69)
Chapter 13 (#u7d9a1ef4-736e-5503-ac8a-deb1f17872a1)
Chapter 14 (#ufeae38e9-e994-566a-b22e-02edae8eea03)
Chapter 15 (#u43eda737-cd04-5de1-8b3f-441a8acde275)
Chapter 16 (#u88affb70-bfbe-52d4-be29-db7b3adc4472)
Chapter 17 (#u9cc23025-771d-55b2-b8c1-12f9a939a617)
Chapter 18 (#ufd54d0e4-b181-5a5e-a910-ae309d76cb9f)
Chapter 19 (#u9da3729e-4a7c-54bb-ba98-07eec7c404b1)
Chapter 20 (#uab93dabf-841e-5f57-ac20-5b4954a658e6)
Chapter 21 (#ueb188b70-2af2-58d0-9f74-9829a838548f)
Part Three: Modern Love (#ud6d2316d-eb22-55c5-9a31-a0857537485c)
Chapter 22 (#ud656e509-5567-559a-a08c-c91122230321)
Chapter 23 (#u44f37b04-01db-54c5-8a08-e29e2fa1fc67)
Chapter 24 (#u0b06eb08-f676-52ef-850f-fdb49906d703)
Chapter 25 (#ua0c4f185-511a-5800-a067-1954766138ac)
Chapter 26 (#u4a14132d-9b89-552c-810e-5aff6d9b8f3c)
Chapter 27 (#u23ab3960-2aff-59c9-b250-a2c15f9b338f)
Chapter 28 (#u992be3d0-c3d9-59e0-9c83-99b787e75838)
Chapter 29 (#ued94068a-fc9e-5eb8-9200-46e473efafc7)
Chapter 30 (#ubb5fb9a8-27ef-56b6-8415-b9f97ceb5e04)
Chapter 31 (#u3aa83a29-af18-55ba-88c6-7aa2c2625582)
Chapter 32 (#ubabd2ef3-2672-5b7e-8b01-ba91cd99541e)
Chapter 33 (#u9af2a7af-8754-55b3-aca8-afb461717843)
Chapter 34 (#ucc849065-1aa1-5fbd-98e0-fb0bba782ebf)
Chapter 35 (#u8d7a382b-96dd-5ac3-8d71-8fddfe3ef0da)
Chapter 36 (#u90cffa8e-596c-5568-af45-1a79ee093c62)
Chapter 37 (#u5cf3e97e-c94e-55da-8d4f-08e4511d1b9c)
Part Four: The Woman Who Fell to Earth (#u0571e333-bc7e-5112-b765-9d6c98a60131)
Chapter 38 (#ud1653669-6363-5652-b8a5-256f703d8034)
Chapter 39 (#u497ca320-04d7-51f2-9af0-1b5ade76ce30)
Keep Reading (#ue81ea4f0-0230-59a2-9e46-1bdbf587a6d5)
Also by Debbie Johnson (#u55624307-65a5-580b-a553-e333466d9bcf)
About the Author (#u4453fe19-b9de-5289-979b-d73bfad3ec5b)
About HarperImpulse (#ue370672e-49db-5ff9-8a19-99ff79c9c816)
About the Publisher (#ue627f73f-1b2a-5db7-bf72-fb3bd9f56117)
This book is for Helen Shaw – the Greatest of all the Gingers!
PART ONE (#u7783cca6-a73b-5e79-a111-cc4cacd263eb)
Chapter 1 (#u7783cca6-a73b-5e79-a111-cc4cacd263eb)
Dear Zoe,
I don’t know why I’m writing this – a sudden fit of the black dog, I suppose. It’s one of the unexpected side effects of motherhood that nobody warns you about, the way your imagination can take hold of you like a Jack Russell terrier, swinging your mind about like a rag doll and leaving you in a crumpled heap of paranoia.
For some reason, tonight, I started worrying about what would happen to Martha if I wasn’t around. Well, I say ‘some reason’ – I actually know exactly what the reason was. Princess Di. I was up late doing some marking, and got sucked into this documentary – ten years since she died and all that.
It was seeing those boys at the funeral that probably did it – little Wills and Harry, trying to be all brave and grown-up and just looking like little lost souls wondering where their mum was. All I could think about was wanting to give them a big hug. I’m not exactly a raving royalist, but this is nothing to do with money or class, is it? Losing your mum – a mum who loves you to bits, like Diana obviously did with her babies – is a terrible thing.
Between that and the wine and the lateness, I just ended up in a bit of a mess. You should have seen me, babe – I was just a great big pile of tear-stained mush, hugging the cushions and shaking with grief for a woman I never met, and her motherless little boys. Weirdo.
After that, I lay awake for hours thinking about it all – and about you, and Martha, and what songs I wanted played at my funeral. I never did decide – I know it should be something dignified, but … well, we’re not that dignified are we, you and me? Never have been. I keep imagining it being something ridiculous like the Venga Boys, and everyone dancing to Boom Boom Boom as the coffin is wheeled out. Or maybe a bit of Pulp, so you could do Disco 2000 with all the actions.
Anyway. In the end, I decided to get up, and write this instead. Tomorrow, I’m going to package it up with some other paperwork, and go and see a solicitor and make a will. Not cheerful, but I think it’ll put my mind at rest. It’s the responsible, grown-up thing to do – not my specialist subject, but it needs to be done.
The main thing, of course, is Martha. Her dad’s on the other side of the world and she’s never even met him. My parents are uptight control freaks. The only person who loves her and knows her as well as I do is you, Zoe. I don’t know the legalities of it all, and whether you can leave someone a child in your will, like you would an antique ring or a complete set of Charles Dickens first editions. I’ll have to ask those questions, I suppose.
But whatever the answers are, I know, in my heart – my squished up, Wills-and-Harry-sodden heart – that she needs to be with you. You’re her second mum. I know you’d get her through it all, just like you and me got each other through our crazy childhoods. Nothing was perfect – but because we had each other, we survived. You can do the same for her, I know you can.
Hopefully you’ll never see this letter, Zoe. Hopefully, I’ll be around until we’re both 100, and wearing our dentures to Chippendales concerts and swigging gin in our care home. Hopefully we’ll be giggling away at how much we embarrass Martha, and reminiscing about when we could remember what day of the week it was.
But … just in case … I wanted to write this. I wanted to tell you that I love you, and that you’ve been more like family to me than my own ever were. And that I need you to be there for Martha, if the worst comes to the worst. If I die in a car crash or fall out of a rollercoaster, or whatever. I know the thought will terrify you, and yes, I know that you even managed to kill that allegedly unkillable cactus we bought on holiday in Ibiza that time. I know you can’t cook, and drive like a nutter, and wear odd socks, and lose your keys three times a day, and go so long between brushing your hair that you get dreadlocks.
I know all this, but I also know that where it counts, you have everything it takes to care for a child – because you’ll love her as much as I could. You won’t try and make her something she’s not, or force her into a shape she doesn’t fit, and you’ll love her no matter how messy her room is. That’s far more important than matching socks, honestly – so believe me when I say I know you can do this.
Anyway, I’m pretty knackered now, so I’m going to take some Night Nurse, pretending it’s absinthe, and go back to bed and hope for the best. It’s Martha’s class assembly tomorrow, and she’s playing a Ninja Fish. Don’t ask. I need to be bright eyed and bushy tailed and pretend that I enjoyed all the other kids’ performances as much as hers (which is a lie all parents have to tell – in reality you’re just waiting for your own magical superstar to appear).
Now, I know this is random, but a few things to mention. Her favourite food is fish finger sandwiches, squashed onto soft white bread and butter. You have to really squish the bread together, so hard you leave thumb prints.
Her favourite TV show is still Spongebob, but she secretly also loves In The Night Garden, even though she thinks it’s a bit babyish. She likes dressing up as Stephanie out of Lazy Town, and will try and wear the pink wig to bed if you let her. Don’t – it leaves her real hair in terrible tangles, and then you have to use the No More Tears, which in my experience isn’t that accurate a name.
If she can’t sleep, she likes to listen to a CD of those stories about talking hamsters while she drifts off. Her favourite outfit is currently her Shaun the Sheep pyjamas, which she even likes wearing in the day. I don’t have a problem with that and I know you won’t.
If she’s upset about anything at all, try singing the theme tune to Postman Pat out loud. You have to do it with gusto, or she’s not convinced. If you do that, even when she’s angry she can’t help joining in at some point, and before you know it she’ll be more interested in words that rhyme with ‘black and white cat’ than whatever’s bothering her. Even though she doesn’t watch the programme any more, it’s like there’s a folk memory in her brain that makes it soothing, no matter what else is going on.
And on that helpful note, I shall bid you farewell. Yeah, I know, I’m being nuts – but then again I always was, wasn’t I? Poor Princess Di.
Don’t forget – Postman Pat theme tune. Out loud, and with gusto. It cures all ills.
Love you loads,
Kate xxx
I read the letter through for what feels like the millionth time, and fold it back up into familiar squares. It’s starting to tatter and fray, and I really need to do something about that. Like get it laminated maybe; anything to preserve the precious words, the precious hand-writing, the precious connection between me and my now-dead friend.
The main connection between us is just as precious. Well, more so, obviously, as she’s a human being and not a piece of paper – but she’s nowhere near as easy to protect. I glance at Martha, who is lying in a heap on the living room floor, covered in vomit, and wonder if I can possibly get her laminated as well. It would definitely cut down on the amount of washing I have to do.
That letter was written years ago. What feels like millennia ago, now. Back in the days when Martha was a happy-go-lucky, ultra-lovable little girl. She used to dress up in her Stephanie wig and I used to pretend to be Sportacus, and we’d eat satsumas together and lick the juice from our fingers like we were sampling the nectar of the gods.
Now, Martha is 16, and I could marinate her in a whole bathtub of No More Tears and it wouldn’t help. In fact, she’d probably just drink it, in an attempt to find a new high. Martha lives in a whole different type of Crazy Town now.
