Free The Lemon Grove by Helen Walsh Page B

inconvenienced than annoyed. Can she be bothered going back to the village car park? It wasn’t just finding the coins for twenty minutes’ parking, it was the whole rigmarole involved in turning the car back round. She might as well just carry on towards Valldemossa and use the mini-market instead. She pictures Greg’s face as he unpacks the bags and finds prepacked croissants rather than the oven-fresh bread and pastries he’s been coveting. She strikes a deal with him in her head: she’ll grab a coffee in the bar across the road while she waits for the shop to open; but if the parking wardensarrive on their mopeds, she’s off. Greg will have to make do with a microwaved breakfast.

    The café’s terrace, perched above the main road, is still grubby from a busy Saturday night: plastic chairs blown over, tables sticky with spilled drinks, the terrace strewn with cigarette butts, and the smell of stale fried garlic wafting out from the dark cavern of a bar. Jenn takes a seat as far away from the door as possible, but close enough to the steps to make a hasty getaway should the traffic warden arrive.
    The crone who serves her is laughably surly; viewing the early morning trade more as a nuisance than a fillip. There’s no ‘ Buenas dias ’ or ‘ Hola, señora ’, just a curt ‘ Si? ’ But the experience is mitigated by the orange juice she’s served, so fresh and thick it feels as though it’s been pumped straight from the citrus grove behind. The coffee is also good; potent enough to zap away the dregs of her hangover – full of bite, but by no means bitter. Why can she never get coffee like this in England? Even the pioneering little independents in West Didsbury don’t come close to this. She sits back, sips slowly at the orange juice, luxuriating in the tang of each slurp. Such simple pleasures, she muses – so profound in their impact. Thesun pokes through the cloud cover and Jenn tilts her face towards it. She stretches her arms out, elbows down, and holds her fingers in a loose yoga pose. She imagines a different life, of mornings that begin with a swim in the sea, a coffee and freshly squeezed orange juice on the terrace instead of traffic jams and juice from a carton. It’s a nice fantasy while it lasts; the sun ducks back behind the clouds. Footsteps below, the irregular slap of flip-flops. Jenn is surprised to see the hippy girl – the diver-chick from the market – emerging from the olive grove. She is wearing a paint-stained man’s vest, cinched at the waist with a belt made from rope, but, even in rags, there’s no disguising her beauty; the barely discernible bobbing of her breasts – no bra – and the tautness of her arms. Is this who they rowed about last night? Jenn tries not to think about it, and instead focuses on the crone who is leaning over the balustrade to gawp at her as she passes below the terrace. The crone mutters to no one in particular and shakes her head – whether in admiration or approbation, Jenn can’t be sure.
    Sensing she’s being watched, the girl looks up, makes the briefest eye contact with Jenn, and smiles smugly. She drives extra swagger into her walk, her young bum flipping beneath the flimsy fabric of the vest. Jenn watches her go. She drains the last dregs of orange juice and as she sets down the glass, she appraises her ownbreasts. She has a deep cleavage; too big, she feels, but, nevertheless, her breasts are still firm and shapely for her age. Even the younger care workers are forever complimenting her on her figure – her tits; tits spared the ravages of suckling babies. The older girls never fail to get that one in, whenever the young ones are complimenting her:
    ‘Course, you haven’t had kids, have you?’
    If only they knew how that killed her.

    Across the road, a van pulls up behind her car. A slender man in chef’s fatigues hops out and slides two huge trays from the back of the van, still hot, she judges, from his ginger grip, insulated