A Perfect Paris Christmas - Mandy Baggot Page 0,106

see inside Ferne’s space.

The door swung back and revealed the kind of sized room most people would kill for their central living space, let alone a bedroom. It was so vast it could easily have been sectioned off into a sleeping area, a sitting area with even room for a full bathroom if required. It was like a whole apartment, something Keeley envisaged sharing with Rach when they began their accommodation search. Keeley hesitated on the threshold for a moment, until Silvie urged her forward. ‘Please, go inside.’

Keeley stepped inside the cavernous area, eyes roving, picking out this and that and trying to capture everything there was to learn about her donor. This bedroom seemed pristine, like maybe time had stopped. For some reason she could envisage drawers being open, clothes with sleeves draping down from the units, open make-up pallets with stray brushes, music in the air…

‘It’s beautiful,’ Keeley breathed. Maybe it wasn’t to her own taste, but it was divine in design. With its flocked wallpaper – a pink and silver embellishment that seemed to speak of the liking for both finery and girlie – the bed a king-size with a mattress so thick you might need a step to launch yourself onto it and cushions – silk, fur, feather, sequins – it was, without a doubt, a perfect boudoir.

‘Ferne was a little spoiled,’ Silvie admitted. ‘She was my only daughter. And she was really… how do you say in English? A daddy’s girl.’

Keeley smiled. ‘My mum would say the same about me.’

‘Would she be right?’ Silvie asked.

‘No,’ Keeley admitted freely. ‘But my mum has always been the one to hand out the tough love. While my dad is the one Bea and I could sweet talk into anything.’

Silvie smiled then as they edged further into the room. ‘Pierre was always sweet-talked by Ferne. If it had been up to him, our house would have been filled with dogs and candy floss, with members of Ferne’s latest boy band obsessions coming on weekends.’ She sighed. ‘He was always a little harder with Louis.’

Keeley stepped on into the room, her feet sinking into the soft pile of the carpet. This was the suite of a princess. At first glance it could be the sleeping palace of a child, but there were touches of Ferne the young woman too. A pin-board of photographs on one wall, a map of the world with pins in it – destinations she had been or ones she would now never get to? – a computer station with an Apple Mac lying dormant, a coffee mug full of pens, unopened letters, a cactus plant…

‘When Pierre died I went through everything and only kept what we really needed to save. But with Ferne, somehow, I… could not bear to let anything go,’ Silvie admitted, her voice tight. ‘She had her own apartment but she almost always stayed at home.’

‘I understand,’ Keeley breathed. ‘Bea’s room at home… well, before… we lost her… she was always talking about changing her décor. She wanted me to help her and we had looked at hundreds of magazines and style brochures I’d ordered and she never could make up her mind on furnishings. Bea liked to be surrounded by practical and calm. The only thing she had settled on was knowing she wanted it painted a light, soft shade of aqua.’ Keeley shook her head. ‘I remember my dad arriving at the door of her room in the summer, a huge tin of aqua paint in his hand, telling my mum he was going to paint it the colour Bea had always wanted it.’ Tears were gathering in her eyes now. ‘My mum went mad. It was change. It might have been what Bea had talked about and planned out, but it wasn’t the same now she wasn’t around. My dad thought it would help us move on, remember Bea by turning her room into how she wanted it but… my mum… and I… wanted to hold on to everything of Bea that was left. Just the way she left it. Her finger marks on the door frame, the sheen of hairspray across the mirror, the last pillowcase she lay her head on that my mum presses her nose against even now.’

A tear began to slide down Keeley’s face, and she looked to Silvie, finding the woman was getting emotional also.

‘I can relate to those feelings.’ Silvie sniffed. ‘That is why I keep the room exactly how it is. The maid