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The vicar looked nervous, Gloria thought. And understandably so. Everyone present in the church had known Noggsie, whereas few of them, including Gloria herself, knew the vicar, who seemed to be an earnest young man, clearly overwhelmed by the many famous faces staring back at him.
A final rustle of his papers, and the vicar began. ‘Peter …’ he said. ‘How strange to call him Peter, when all of us here knew him as Noggsie. He was the beating heart of our community for as long as any of us can remember.’
Primrose Hill royalty had turned out in force to pay their respects, and were now sitting in clusters surrounded by many of their less recognisable neighbours. A tribute to the fact Noggsie always treated everyone exactly the same, celebrity or not. To him, the famous customers were just ordinary people who happened to be doing a bit of shopping on their local high street. And there was nothing celebrities liked more than being treated as ordinary people – at least when they were off-duty and on their home turf. As a result, a surprising number of high-profile diaries had been cleared, with filming schedules rearranged, recording sessions postponed and fashion shoots put on hold. Even Tottenham Hotspur had to manage at training that morning without their most famous striker.
Outside the church, private security, police and paparazzi hung around in their separate tribes. Passers-by stopped to see what was happening and any number of teenage truants – almost exclusively female – tried unsuccessfully to blag their way inside.
Jamie Oliver and James Corden were seated three pews in front of Gloria, suited and booted, heads close together, cook and comedian whispering for all the world like a pair of overgrown schoolboys. Probably, Gloria thought, discussing recipes for Cornish pasties. At the front of the church, Chris Evans and Nick Grimshaw were bookending a pair of elderly women both wearing black hats that wouldn’t have looked out of place at a state funeral.
Gloria felt a ripple of movement behind her and turned in time to see Mary Portas – her recognisable-at-two-hundred-paces auburn bob a little longer than usual – arriving in time to swap ‘Good mornings’ with Harry Styles.
But no sign of rock-god Jake Jay. The man who’d won more Grammys than anyone on the planet was said to be back in rehab, this time at a facility somewhere north of New Mexico, accessible only by helicopter. Maybe Robert Plant would show up instead, and treat everyone to a verse of ‘Stairway to Heaven’.
Double Oscar winner Kelli Shapiro was also conspicuous by her absence. She had sent her regrets – accompanied by an arrangement of peonies the size of Kew Gardens – and the word was that she was in Geneva, waiting for the scars of a neck lift to heal, rather than suffering from the sudden and unfortunate bout of food poisoning that was her official reason for failing to attend.
Gloria was surprised to see Eddie Banks had been prepared to sacrifice the sunshine of Monte Carlo – along with one of his ninety tax-free days in the United Kingdom – to attend Noggsie’s funeral. Bit of a surprise that he dared show his face at all, given the havoc his double-decker, nine-thousand-square-feet basement dig-out was causing along Chalcot Square. Banks and his giant underground extension had been the talk of the Primrose Hill Easter Festival the weekend before. Everyone knew the man was richer than God, but could it possibly be true that he’d instructed the builders to line the walls of his new chill-out zone with solid gold sheeting? Rumour also had it he’d offered his neighbours a week on Richard Branson’s Necker Island by way of an apology for the noise, the dirt, the disruption and the damage caused by his building project, but they weren’t to be bought off so cheaply, and were holding out – politely but with vicious determination – for the title deeds to luxury lodges at a Banks development in the Lake District. Gloria knew that piece of gossip was well-founded. Her parents were among the neighbours.
The Primrose Hill of her childhood had been a different place. Back then it was just another anonymous London backwater, albeit one with a bohemian edge, and the family had moved there only because her father’s fast-track junior banker’s salary wouldn’t stretch to a house in Hampstead.
Just look at it now. Home to so many of the best-known people in Britain. And, increasingly, overseas owners who boasted to their friends about their charming home-from-one-of-their-other-homes in a neighbourhood that had grown stealthily into Britain’s answer to Beverly Hills. Gloria, however, retained her affection for the Primrose Hill she had once known, and especially for Noggsie, whose General Hardware Store had been a local landmark for longer than she could remember.
As the years passed, Noggsie’s business had survived and thrived. Car showrooms, coal merchants, computer shops, curry houses, coffee shops … butchers, bakers, bookshops, betting shops, builders’ merchants … dry cleaners and drapers … fish-and-chip shops, furniture shops, florists … laundromats and lending libraries … glaziers, greengrocers, Apple Stores … Their custodians came and went, but the General Hardware Store was a permanent fixture, a family business that continued undaunted by the changes happening around it, rather like Ian Beale in EastEnders, which was one of Gloria’s many guilty pleasures.
This time last year, Noggsie’s shop was still a much-loved anachronism, its green-tiled façade a shabby yet proud island in the present sea of Michelin-starred restaurants, cupcake shops, art galleries, pampering places, frock shops, interior designers, more cupcake shops (mostly gluten-free; some of them also vegan), wine bars and – briefly – a pop-up shop that specialised in miniature replicas of fairground attractions whose price tags might reasonably have been thought sufficient for the full-size originals.
Noggsie himself had remained in excellent health for eighty-five of his eighty-six years. ‘It’s the work and the customers that keep me going,’ he insisted whenever Gloria or anyone else asked whether it wasn’t time he relaxed and took it easy. ‘Besides, if I weren’t here, who else would sell you a couple of curtain hooks or half a dozen nails?’ In Noggsie’s opinion, blister packs were the work of the devil. No matter what you needed, from a kettle to a casserole dish, from a single tap washer to a wooden toilet seat, the chances were high that Noggsie had it in stock.
He had been a kind man, too. ‘Hear you’re involved in some urban gardening project,’ he’d said to Gloria when she popped in on an errand to collect dishwasher salt for her mother. ‘Take these.’ And Noggsie had produced half-a-dozen planting troughs along with three bags of compost, refusing all offers of payment.
Now Noggsie was gone and the General Hardware Store along with him. It had been shut for several months, ever since the day its proprietor collapsed across the counter with the first in a series of strokes, and was one of several shops in the high street that continued to stand empty. It had come an unwelcome surprise to many of the locals – Gloria included – to discover that even Primrose Hill was not immune from the toxic effects of hard times, greedy freeholders, ridiculous business rates, and the residents’ own growing tendency to go shopping without ever leaving home.
Whoops!
Gloria realised she had been lost in her trip down memory lane and stood up hastily, a second or two later than the rest of the congregation. She fumbled for the order of service and stood in respectful silence as the three members of a boy band whose strategic failure to win Britain’s Got Talent a couple of years earlier had launched them on the path to international stardom (and adjoining mansions in Regent’s Park) began their acapella arrangement of ‘Praise My Soul, the King of Heaven’.
The hymn’s final notes died away and everyone sat down again. All except for Eddie Banks. He inched out of the pew, negotiating around his two grown-up children, Zoe and Barclay, then walked purposefully towards the lectern.
‘Noggsie was my neighbour, my friend, and my inspiration.’ Eddie Banks paused as if he expected to be challenged about what he had just said. ‘He watched me grow up, and I watched him grow old.’ Unexpectedly eloquent for Banks, Gloria thought. He was a man who tended to call a spade a bloody shovel. Or worse. She wondered how many of his PR people had been working on the eulogy.
Everybody present knew the story of Eddie Banks. Local boy made billionaire. Born in a council house along Chalcot Road, and now reminding his captive audience about the car cleaning business he’d started aged nine, equipped only with a bucket-load of ambition, a green sponge and a jumbo bottle of Fairy Liquid, purchased with his Christmas money from Noggsie at the General Hardware Store.
‘Noggsie taught me so many things,’ Eddie Banks continued. ‘But most important of all, he taught me to dream big. When I told him I had no time to clean more cars, he told me to recruit my friends to help out. And that wasn’t just so he could sell more Fairy Liquid.’
A pause for gentle laughter. ‘When I told him my first business was about to go bust and my best bet was to go work for someone else, he told me to get over myself. And fail better the next time round. Then later, once I’d stopped failing,’ a modest shrug, ‘and could afford to buy Noggsie a decent dinner or two, I asked him … “Noggsie,” I said, “you’ve told me I’m capable of conquering the world, and I believe you. But what about you? What is it that you dream of? What is that you want? And how can I help you have it?” You know what he replied? He told me, “I’m blessed to have found a way to earn a living doing something that contributes to others, yet doesn’t rob my soul. I’m lucky enough to have found my calling, which allows me to continue the tradition of helping my community and to know that in my own small way, I’m making a difference.”’
Banks’s excellent eulogy made Gloria think of Nina. She imagined her friend casting a professional eye over the proceedings. What was it Nina had said the day before? About the way funerals were changing, with more people drawing up plans for their own farewell appearance while they were still alive and well. A question of matching the occasion to the person, she had explained.
Gloria made a mental note to tell Nina the Traders Association had organised a wreath in the shape of a giant hammer.
Then she realised she could do so much better.
At the champagne reception that followed Noggsie’s funeral, Gloria cornered Eddie Banks and told him about Nina and her ideas about dragging funerals into the modern era.
Banks immediately offered to do what he could to help, and Gloria had been impressed that someone so successful was prepared to go out of his way to help a woman he’d never even met achieve her dream.
Noggsie would definitely have approved.
And later, listening to the way Nina talked – enthusiastically yet respectfully – about the people she intended to help once she had refurbished Noggsie’s shop, Gloria was convinced Happy Endings would have had his blessing.
7 (#ulink_ce8a1eda-d187-5d38-b9f1-aa13011d85d5)
Here I am in Primrose Hill, one of the most fashionable parts of London, and it ought to be wonderful.
But it’s not.
I’ve spent all morning watching the world stroll past my shop window oblivious to my presence.
All morning, feeling I don’t fit in.
All morning, every morning.
Monday to Friday.
Afternoons, too.
It’s been an entire week and I almost wish I was back in Siberia. When Jason banished me to the back office, at least I had a sense of belonging.
I keep reminding myself it’s like being the new girl at school. Too soon to have made any friends, too shy to approach anyone, but knowing that before too long, someone will be kind.
Maybe Eddie Banks lulled me into a false sense of security. I’ve never actually met him because he’s almost always in Monte Carlo. But I spoke to him on the phone after Gloria’s brilliant idea about me taking over Noggsie’s shop.
The moment their conversation ended, Eddie Banks had apparently marched right up to Noggsie’s son and told him, ‘I’ve got the perfect tenant for your father’s shop. Young entrepreneur by the name of Nina Sherwood. I know you’re back off home to Australia tomorrow, so shall I have my people sort out the lease and the terms on your behalf? Save you the hassle, and get that shop open again.’
The two men shook hands and Eddie Banks’s team proceeded to process the paperwork in record time, which was just as well, because apparently another retailer was showing serious interest in opening a business. I felt especially fortunate that Noggsie’s son had even been talked into letting me have an initial discount on the rent. All I’d had to do was sign the agreement.
It had felt like destiny. But now I’m not so certain. Still, it was foolish of me to imagine customers would fall into my lap. That only happens once a business has proved itself and the recommendations roll in. For now, it’s important to get a proper feel for the neighbourhood. Which makes the people-watching important rather than just a time-filler or an activity to stop myself fretting about the future.
I’ve certainly seen one or two strange sights, including a family of four dressed all in matching tweeds riding along the road on a double tandem the length of a hearse. Then there’s Sybille Newman, my neighbour with the roof issue. Always dressed in orange. She’s just spent five minutes telling off a road sweeper for doing a sloppy job. (I’ve privately taken to calling her Mrs Happy, because she treats me to a scowl every time she marches past the shop, pretending not to look inside.) There’s also a man on rollerblades who seems to be circling our block of shops … I’ve seen him go past at least five times, and here he is again.
In between studying the locals, I try to knuckle down and practise my daily exercises in creative visualisation. I imagine myself busy and productive, doing a good job for satisfied customers, opening bank statements that demonstrate increasing prosperity, then the look on my parents’ faces when I present them with tickets for a luxury weekend in Sardinia to say thank you for their backing.
And the rest of the time? I’m scared I’ve made a dreadful mistake.
Marry in haste and repent at leisure, isn’t that what people say? I begin to think I’ve achieved the retail equivalent, and that I should have looked a lot more carefully before I leapt into self-employment.
My watch tells me it’s still far too early for lunch, although talking of food, word must have got out that Happy Endings has nothing to do with coffee or cupcakes. No-one’s asked me if I’m selling either since Wednesday.
But I’m still being mistaken for a bookshop and every time I explain I’m an undertaker, the outcome is more or less the same. I get an, ‘Oh, what a shame, dear!’ as though I’ve missed out on tickets for Glastonbury or the Latitude Festival. And that’s on a good day. There have been two or three others who, like Mrs Happy, have made no secret of the fact they believe my business has no business being here.
‘How dare you give your shop such a misleading name?’ The woman who berated me for that didn’t hang around long enough to let me explain my conviction that the best funerals are those that honour someone’s life and give a true sense of who that person really was – and are far from morbid or mysterious affairs – which is why I think ‘Happy Endings’ is such a great choice.
Not, of course, that anyone’s showing any signs of choosing me. I still have no idea when I’ll be called to action. I firmly remind myself this is par for the course. In my line of work, there’s mostly no lead time.
Obviously, I feel sorry in advance for the person who’s going to be my first customer, because organising a funeral is a distress purchase. But at least when it happens, I’ll know how to help them and the people they leave behind. It’s what I’m best at.
In the meantime, there’s no point drooping around an empty shop like one of my wilting delphiniums. I’ve got plenty to do. The cremation urns are still down in the basement. I’m incorporating them into my inaugural window display – the empty window has turned out to be a mistake rather than the minimalist statement I had been aiming for – to eliminate any further misunderstandings about the nature of my business.
Edo promised to help me haul everything out front this afternoon, but there’s still no sign of him, so I might as well get on with the admin instead of wallowing in procrastination.
In particular, I need to compose an email to Zoe Banks.
Zoe is not only Eddie Banks’s daughter but also a fellow retailer – her shop is called The Beauty Spot – and she’s the driving force behind the Primrose Hill Traders Association. I really want to get to know my fellow shopkeepers, and I need to get cracking. I activate my computer with a flick of the mouse and begin.
Dear Zoe Banks,
My name is Nina Sherwood and I am the new kid on the block. As you may know, my shop is called Happy Endings, and in many ways, it is thanks to your father that it is here at all. My friend Gloria was present at Noggsie’s funeral, and afterwards, when she was talking to Mr Banks, my name came into the conversation.
There goes that man on the rollerblades again, whizzing past the shop. On the pavement this time. Close enough to flash me a smile. And for me to grin at his T-shirt, which declares, Always be yourself. Unless you can be Batman. I’m probably imagining his smile, but he’s certainly around a lot. Training for some sporting event, perhaps. Anyway, back to my message …
Mr Banks generously used his powers of persuasion to ensure I could get the lease, and without this initial help, my business would never have got beyond the dreaming stage. In case you’re wondering, I previously worked for an established funeral director in Queen’s Park but this is my first solo venture and I am hugely excited about it all.
Gloria says The Beauty Spot is one of Primrose Hill’s most successful shops, so Zoe must have inherited her father’s business acumen along with an appetite for hard work and the ability to be both popular and profitable. I hope that as we get to know one another, she might teach me some of the secrets of maximising income without ripping anyone off.
I hope you will wish me well and I look forward to meeting you in the near future. I am also very keen to participate in the activities of the Primrose Hill Traders Association. Could you please advise me of the procedure for joining? Is there a meeting coming up some time soon that I could attend? Finally, I am sure you are very busy, but if you fancy a break, then I would love to have a chat with you. Shall we meet in the wine bar? Drinks on me!
Best wishes,
Nina Sherwood, Happy Endings
I send the email and try to convince myself I’m having a good day at work. Now for those cremation urns …
8 (#ulink_8e71ee0b-7044-58b5-b040-602b4d6d36db)
The next morning, I wake to discover two significant additions to our household.
First off, I hear footsteps crashing up and down a flight of stairs so I get out of bed, shrug into my dressing gown, nudge my bedroom door and realise Edo is here. On his way to the little room at the top of the house. He’s juggling an assortment of bin bags and holdalls plus a red and white ‘NO ENTRY’ sign that is still attached to the mid-section of a lamp-post.
By the time I am decently dressed he’s on another trek, this time laden with a bunch of canvases. I observe that Edo’s favourite colour is purple. And that he has at some stage persuaded at least four different women to pose for him while naked. One of them – a curvy redhead with spectacular breasts – has her cellulite-free thighs teasingly splayed around the ‘NO ENTRY’ sign.
‘Morning,’ I say. ‘Are you storing your stuff in the attic?’
Edo looks puzzled. ‘Didn’t Gloria tell you I was moving in? That’s why I didn’t get to the shop in time to help you yesterday. Sorry about that.’
Um, no. Gloria’s said nothing. ‘Want some coffee?’
‘Awesome!’
I get my head around Edo’s news as I make my way to the kitchen. He did say the place he found after he moved out of Happy Endings was a bit too dirty and a touch too noisy for his liking. Typical Gloria to say he could stay – she’s both generous and impulsive, and it’s her house, of course – but I’m surprised she didn’t at least discuss it with me first.
An even bigger surprise awaits me in the kitchen.
A dog.
Eating breakfast.
Actually, he appears to be on his third breakfast.
The creature is almost the size of a Shetland pony. It looks as if it’s been dreamed up by Disney, but is acting out a script from Tarantino – working title The Andrex Puppy on Drugs.
The pristine kitchen I remember from last night is a wreck. Two chairs have been overturned. The floor is covered in a collage of broken breakfast bowls, with several million breadcrumbs and a gooey patch of what looks like blood but is hopefully nothing more sinister than strawberry jam added for texture. A steady trickle of milk is dripping onto the floor from an overturned carton on the table. And, unless I’m very much mistaken, the roll of paper towel we keep on the kitchen table in lieu of napkins has three Shetland-pony-sized chunks bitten out of it.
The dog gives me a cursory glance then shamelessly returns to the plate of ham, cheese and salami that’s occupying his attention. In fairness, his table manners seem to be improving with every chomp. He’s figured out he’s the perfect height so that his head – and jaws – can get to the food without the need even to flex his paws, let alone knock food to the floor. Perhaps he’s cleverer than he looks.
A split second later, just as the dog’s inhaling the final scrap of meat, Edo arrives in the kitchen. ‘Oh no,’ he says. ‘Maybe this was a mistake.’
I give him a look.
‘There was this bloke in the pub last night.’ Edo has got himself a part-time job pulling pints. ‘Said he and his partner had come to the conclusion their place was too small for Chopper. That’s his name, Chopper. They took him to Battersea, but the people there admitted that if they couldn’t rehome him, he’d be put down. The guy was literally sobbing into his beer, so I called Gloria and she said it would be okay. Then today, I wanted to get off to a good start and be a good housemate, so I put breakfast together before I moved my stuff in. Which turned out to be a mistake. Do you know anything about dogs?’
‘Only that they appear to enjoy granola and salami. But I guess I’ll learn.’ The truth is, I’ve always wanted a dog.
‘He’ll be my responsibility. I promise this will never happen again. I’ll clear up all the mess. And he’ll sleep in my room. I’m going to make him a bed out of wooden crates. And then I thought I might paint him.’
‘Purple?’ I enquire.
Edo’s enthusiasm is somehow infectious. Even though Chopper has wrecked our kitchen, he is trying earnestly to make amends by hoovering the floor with his tongue, which is the size of a rump steak.
‘How old is he, anyway?’
‘The guy said he’s a year old. And fully grown.’ Even as he says it, Edo sounds doubtful. He looks at me, then back to the dog. ‘I’m really grateful to you and Gloria for agreeing I can move in, you know. I’ve promised to help out around the house, with odd jobs and that. And I’m going to be paying rent, of course.’
Immediately, I feel guilty. Gloria insisted I should only pay half-rent until Happy Endings is on its feet – an offer I gratefully accepted. She’s probably delighted Edo needs a place to live, and can help make up the shortfall.
‘I’ll clean up the mess,’ I offer. ‘Then maybe, once we’ve had breakfast, we can take Chopper out for a walk.’
After breakfast, during which I observe Gloria sneaking morsels of still-warm croissant under the table to our new dog, the four of us – Edo, Gloria, Chopper and I – head for Highgate Ponds.
It’s beautiful late spring weather, and Gloria is excited to see the lilacs in full bloom. Edo keeps Chopper on a stout leash, offering him no further opportunities for misbehaviour.
‘So what sort of dog is he?’ Gloria asks. She’s spent the past ten minutes complaining she’s fed up with having her social life dictated by the schedule of Thrice-Wed Fred’s wife, whose latest crime is to surprise her cheating husband with a weekend jaunt to Berlin.
‘Half-Bernese half-poodle,’ Edo says.
I can see the poodle in Chopper. Woolly coat in shades of black, brown and white, with a head of hair that reminds me of those long wigs worn by the old codgers who populate the House of Lords. But Bernese? Isn’t that a type of sauce?
‘So that makes him a Bernedoodle!’ Gloria is amused by the thought.
