Brick by Brick

Part One

Chapter One

A year later

Sammy adjusted the sling that hugged Eleanor close to her. She preferred to carry her daughter close to her when she was negotiating the busy streets of London; it was no place for something cumbersome with wheels. That didn't mean it was easy, babies weren't light, her daughter was no exception, four month old Ellie, for short, was asleep, but then she was an angelic baby, thankfully. Looking down at her cherubic face, eyes closed, long lashes fanning her cheeks, cupid bow lips slightly parted, Sammy knew that she could and would fall more in love with her daughter more and more every single day. She had laughed that morning, the first full on recognisable belly laugh that she'd noticed. Every achievement, every tiny milestone was a stark reminder that he wasn't there, that Marcus was missing it all, and there was no one there to share those moments with, and even worse, she'd never told him that there was going to be a baby, he'd died not knowing that.

She gasped, the pain was still almost as real as the day the police woman knocked her door and told her that he was gone. She hated that she would break down at totally random places at any time, Martini her best mate Corinne called her. Admittedly Corinne was the only person who could compare her still unremitting grief with an alcohol advertising campaign slogan of anytime, anyplace anywhere, but then no one else was there for her, no one else knew how to deal with her. She wished that her gran was still there, she'd help. Monica was as useless as ever, and Marcus' family were still knee deep in their own sadness.

The lift dinged as it reached the fifteenth floor and she had to shake herself. She was here to sort things out, to fight for what was hers...she shook her head, her hands wrapping around the baby attached to her, it wasn't for herself, she needed nothing, but Ellie, she deserved more.

Joel's office sat at the end of the corridor, next door to the one that Marcus had used. She had visited the building a million times when she had been dating Marcus, coming straight from the station after her usual arduous trip into the City most weekends. He was usually too busy to make it out to Cornwall, but then she loved coming to London. Joel was both his best friend and his business partner, and they had adjacent offices as well as sharing a home in the early days. So, needless to say, they spent a lot of time together. Every story Marcus regaled had involved the other man, but long before they married Joel had become distant. He never visited them once Marcus took on his own place, a place for them both, and she heard many a late night argument on the telephone with Marcus begging him to be the friend he always had been. She couldn't help but blame herself, Joel obviously didn't like her.

Despite that he was best man at their wedding, though there was an awkwardness to the whole thing, then within a few months Marcus had died. And Joel hadn't come to see her since, not once.

She hated that, but not as much as she hated the realisation that he was about to take the roof from over their heads. Who did that? What sort of man?

At his door she took a deep breath, it had taken a letter from the property management company and a visit from Daniel, Marcus' brother to spur her out of her sadness and make the trip to this man's office.

They say that in times of crisis you find out who your friends are. That was never more true for Sammy. The moment that the words had been issued by the policewoman that day almost a year ago she'd watched people fall away from her. Her mother, Monica...that was no surprise, she was a mother in biological terms only and she expected nothing more. But other than Corinne, no one from her life back in Cornwall kept in touch, and she hadn't made any true friends of her own in London, and she didn't really know any of his friends that well. They had little in common other than him, being from completely different social circles. It was inevitable that they would drift away.