Grabbing her bag, she got to her feet ready to leave just as a woman flew through the pub entrance, looking hurriedly around before rushing towards her. ‘S-s-s …’ she started, and then stopped, her cheeks flushing furiously as she glanced at the ceiling. ‘I’m sorry I’m late,’ she said, clearly flustered as she looked back at Sarah. ‘There was a crisis at work. A p-p-patient …’
She had a stammer. Sarah was surprised. Steve hadn’t mentioned it, though she supposed there was no reason why he should have done. Her gaze travelled over the other woman. Small and delicate-featured, she seemed fragile, a vulnerable quality about her that would make you instinctively want to protect her. Yet there was a determination beyond the nervousness she could see in her eyes; feline eyes, she thought, almond-shaped and the true striking green of a cat. With her rich auburn hair tied messily on top of her head, she was open-faced and undeniably pretty, in an imperfect way. Sarah didn’t know her, but she could see why Steve had been so easily attracted to her.
‘It’s okay,’ she said charitably. ‘I was beginning to wonder whether you were coming, but I haven’t got to rush off anywhere.’ Joe had offered to look after Ollie. She still hadn’t told Steve that they were sort of together. It was early days yet. She wasn’t sure what the future might hold for them, but still she was aware that she might possibly have been practising double standards, wanting to know all there was to know about Laura whilst neglecting to mention that Joe had become part of Ollie’s life. She knew Joe, but Steve didn’t, after all.
‘S-s-sorry,’ Laura said again.
Noting the two bright spots on her cheeks turning crimson, Sarah couldn’t help feeling sympathetic. She was clearly terribly self-conscious. ‘It’s fine,’ she assured her again. ‘Shall I get us a drink while you catch your breath?’ They probably looked a bit obvious standing in the middle of the pub. The two guys at the bar were now openly eyeing them both, one of them clearly liking what he saw as he looked Laura up and down. Evidently he was into nurses’ uniforms, which was what Laura appeared to be wearing.
‘Thanks.’ Laura began to ferret in her bag – for her purse, presumably.
‘I’ll get them,’ Sarah offered. ‘Why don’t you grab a seat before someone else takes the table?’ She indicated the one she’d just vacated. ‘What do you fancy?’
‘White wine, please.’ Laura squeezed her eyes closed as she said it, making it obvious she was concentrating hard to get the words out.
Minutes later, Sarah returned with white wines for them both, having given the guys who’d started talking to her at the bar short shrift on Laura’s behalf. The woman looked as if she might die of embarrassment should one of them approach her. ‘Here you go. I got us large ones. I thought you could use it,’ she said, placing the drinks on the table and slipping around it to slide in next to Laura on the bench seat, rather than sitting opposite her, which she thought might seem confrontational.
Laura smiled gratefully. ‘I could,’ she assured her with a weary roll of her eyes, and took a sip.
Sarah did likewise. ‘I noticed your uniform. What is it you do?’ she asked. It didn’t appear to be a regular NHS uniform, the sort Sarah’s mother wore.
‘I, um … I’m a p-p-palliative nurse at a hospice,’ Laura provided haltingly.
The hospice where Steve’s father had died, Sarah gleaned, thinking that trying to improve the quality of life for people with serious illnesses was a commendable thing to do. She couldn’t help admiring her for it. She assumed that that was where Steve had met her. Had he become involved with her then, she wondered, while he was visiting his father? He’d stayed at the hospice for endless long hours on his own as his father had deteriorated. He’d been devastated the night he’d slipped quietly away. He would have needed a shoulder. Had Laura been the one to offer it, while Sarah had been at home with their child? The pang of jealousy she felt at that realisation surprised her, along with hurt that Steve might have been seeing someone else before they’d made the decision to part, though that would have happened sooner or later, she supposed. Their relationship had already been floundering.
‘Have you worked there long?’ she asked.
‘Nnn …’ Laura started, and stopped, clearly embarrassed. ‘Just over a year,’ she said with a weak smile.
‘You have a stammer,’ Sarah said carefully, aware of how she must be feeling.
Laura’s gaze shot to hers. Her eyes were so large she looked like a frightened kitten.
‘It’s nothing to be ashamed of.’ Sarah smiled kindly. ‘I had a friend at school who stuttered. She got stuck on certain letters. Her lips touched, she said, and she couldn’t get the words out. She tried to use alternative ways to start a sentence, but she used to get really frustrated. She hated it when people wouldn’t give her time to speak, or finished her sentences for her. I think what really hurt, though, was when people avoided talking to her out of embarrassment or ignorance or whatever.’
Laura blinked uncertainly, as if she wasn’t quite sure what the catch was. Sarah supposed she was bound to be wary. There was probably nothing more daunting for a woman than meeting her boyfriend’s ex-partner. She’d have come prepared for bitchiness and bitter accusations. Sarah did feel bitter to a degree, suspecting what she now did about how they’d met. She didn’t feel any malevolence towards Laura, though. There didn’t seem much point.
‘I told her that friends like that weren’t worth having anyway,’ she added, hoping to relax her a little.
Laura glanced down again. Her eyes were glassy with tears when she looked back up, and Sarah felt for her. ‘Thanks.’ She smiled, more readily. ‘It is embarrassing,’ she admitted, pausing for thought. ‘The mental gymnastics I have to do to come up with synonyms is so draining sometimes I give up before I’ve started.’
‘Well, that came out okay,’ Sarah assured her, with a surprised smile back.
‘Because I was taking it slowly,’ Laura pointed out. ‘You were right about people getting impatient. You can see their eyes glazing over sometimes, or else they get irritated, and you sense they’re itching to check their watches.’
Sarah nodded, thinking of her school friend, who’d said she wanted to give people a fat lip sometimes so they could see what it felt like to struggle to speak. ‘Have you always stammered?’ she asked gently.
Taking a sip of her wine, Laura thought about it. ‘A bit. It really kicked in when I was in my teens, though. I didn’t dare open my mouth for a while,’ she said, a small furrow forming in her brow.
‘Did you not get some support?’ Sarah asked, aware that there were various therapies and support groups available.
‘Eventually.’ Laura looked pensive as she placed her glass back on the table. ‘Not at first, though. I think my mother thought I would just grow out of it. We don’t get on that well, I’m afraid.’
‘That’s a shame.’ Sarah really did feel for her now. She would have needed all the help she could get at such a sensitive age. ‘What about your father? Do you get on with him okay?’ she probed, hoping she wasn’t venturing too far onto sensitive ground.