Free 31 Dream Street by Lisa Jewell

yes. My mum had one of those housebound cats. Bloody nuisance. But at least you know you’re not going to get the dead rats on your pillow and the dismembered birds on the carpet.’
    Melinda turned to face him, one knee tucked up under her. Her hair was the wrong shade of blonde for her colouring, slightly yellow, as if it had been left out in the sun for too long. Her nose was small and hooked, and her lips were a strange shape, too thick in places and too thin in others. She didn’t have any wrinkles at all until she smiled, and then she got a set of very dramatic crow’s feet which exploded from the corners of her eyes like fireworks. But she had beautiful eyes, a clear Caribbean turquoise, fringed with heavy black lashes. ‘I know this sounds dreadful,’ she leaned towards him, conspiratorially, ‘and don’t take this the wrong way, but I much prefer it here now that Gus’s gone.’
    Toby glanced at her in horror.
    ‘Not that I didn’t like him. Don’t get me wrong. But it was just a bit weird, wasn’t it, having him around? Didn’t quite fit the image of the house. But now he’sgone it just feels perfect here. You know something, Toby, I love this house, I really do. Can’t imagine living anywhere else now.’ She glanced up towards the towering ceilings. ‘I couldn’t move back into some pokey little purpose-built with paper walls now. I’m ruined .’ She laughed.
    Toby gulped. ‘So you’re happy, are you, sharing a room with Con?’
    ‘Oh, it’s lovely. You know, I was thinking I might ask you about Gus’s room, now that he’s gone. Thinking I might ask if I could move in there. But then I thought, do I really want to share a room with that horrible cat? And then I thought, do I really want to move out of Con’s room? And I don’t. Really don’t. I love sharing with him. He’s such a great boy. And after being apart from him for so many years. I missed out on a lot. But now… we’re so close,’ she gushed. ‘It’s like we’re best mates, you know, we’re equals. It’s lovely now. Everything’s lovely.’ She smiled and caressed her mug. ‘What about you, Toby? You’ve been single for a while. Anyone special in your life?’
    ‘Er, no,’ he began, subconsciously filing away Melinda’s suspect conversational leap from her relationship with her son to Toby’s love life. ‘Not at the moment.’
    ‘Ah,’ she cooed sympathetically, squeezing his leg gently, ‘that’s a shame. How old are you now?’
    ‘Thirty-nine,’ he said, ‘next week.’
    ‘Yes. It’s a funny age that. I remember my late thirties. You start panicking, thinking you’re running out of time. Irony of it is that it takes you bloody ages to getold after that. I thought I’d be an old relic by the time I hit forty-five, but I didn’t get a wrinkle until I was forty-one. And my boobs are still pretty OK.’ She put down her mug and gazed thoughtfully into the distance. ‘You know, every birthday I look in the mirror and think, not yet, Mel, you’re still there, still looking good. Have to work at it mind, but it’s so worth it. Especially in my line of work, looking good is so important.’
    ‘You mean, being an air hostess?’
    ‘Well, no, not an air hostess exactly. Ground staff now. Keeps me closer to home, closer to Con. But image is still mega-important. You’re the first contact the customer has with the airline. And if you look crap, well, that’s not going to make the customer feel very confident about their flight, is it?’
    Toby nodded sagely, thinking that he would be more likely to base his confidence in an upcoming flight on the condition of the aircraft than on the eyeshadow on the check-in girls.
    ‘Well,’ she got to her feet, ‘you’re a lovely fella. I’m sure someone’ll come along when you’re least expecting it. And you’ve got tons going for you.’
    ‘I have?’
    ‘Yes, you’re lovely and tall. Girls like tall men. You’ve got this amazing house. And you’re