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    â€˜Well, there have been a fair few of those, believe me,’ May said, remembering her old life and the endless hours daydreaming and fantasising about one day being published. Fantasies that, of course, also included marrying Jake and being able to indulge in vast quantities of chocolate cake without putting on a single pound.
    â€˜Take the table next to the window,’ Alice suggested. ‘Sit in the chair next to the wall. It’s lucky. A lot of very fantastic things have happened to people sitting in that chair. It’s had more than its share of marriage proposals, let me tell you.’
    â€˜Really?’ May asked, wide-eyed, her heart quickening as she thought of Ben. They’d never talked about that, though she thought about it, hoped for it often enough. She was nervous about the subject that might follow it though: children. When her mother died May developed a fear of becoming a mother herself. She worried that she wouldn’t be enough, that she wouldn’t know what to do and how to do it right and, since she wouldn’t be able to go to her own incredible mother for help, she might scar them for life. And that she couldn’t quite bear.
    â€˜Yep.’ Alice handed her a cappuccino. ‘And now the chair can have its first ever book deal. How cool.’
    â€˜Oh, well, I don’t know about that,’ May mumbled, desperately trying not to get her hopes up too much in case they were soon to come crashing down in disappointment. ‘I hope, I wish, but… we’ll see.’

    After May settled herself into the lucky chair, trying to swallow some cake and silence her rumbling belly, the next seventeen and a half minutes were the longest of her life. She tapped her finger on the table, crumbled the cake into a pile of crumbs and gazed out of the window, trying to distract herself from her nerves.
    At ten past twelve exactly a short, slim woman, with shiny blonde hair in a pixie cut that highlighted her big green eyes, stepped into the café. Before she reached the counter she stopped and glanced around the room. Then, spotting May at the window, smiled and turned to walk to her.
    â€˜You, I see from the photo on your book jacket, must be May.’ She reached out her hand. ‘I’m Olivia Greene, but call me Lily.’
    May stood, trying not to tremble, and she shook Lily’s hand and smiled.
    â€˜It’s lovely to meet you, Lily.’ May forced herself to stop grinning, lest the publisher think she was a crazy person, and gently let go of her hand, though she wanted to hold on tight and kiss it.

    Half an hour later they were sitting together, drinking coffee and chatting, while sunlight shone through the window, bathing them both in a warm glow.
    â€˜Lily was my mother’s name,’ May said, because she didn’t know what else to say and because she’d been thinking about it since yesterday.
    â€˜I remember reading that in your book,’ Lily said, smiling, ‘but didn’t know if it was true or not. I wondered how much of it was autobiographical.’
    â€˜Almost all of it,’ May admitted. ‘I suppose perhaps I don’t have much of an imagination.’
    â€˜Oh, I doubt that,’ Lily said, ‘and anyway, it takes courage to write like that, to expose your heart for everyone else to see.’
    â€˜Well, to be honest,’ May said, ‘I never really imagined very many people ever would. When I sold my hundredth book I was so surprised I –’
    â€˜You know,’ Lily interrupted, laughing, ‘if you want to make it over here, you might want to acquire a bit of shameless self-confidence. We don’t really do self-deprecating modesty and all that. After all, how can you expect other people to believe in you, if you don’t even believe in yourself ?’
    â€˜Yes, I see, of course.’ May nodded, rather worried she might have just put Lily off entirely. ‘I