We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario ArtsCouncil for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and The Association for the Export of Canadian Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishers Tax Credit program.

      Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credit in subsequent editions.

       J. Kirk Howard, President

      Printed and bound in Canada.

       www.dundurn.com

      A YEAR LESS A DAY

       acknowledgements

      All characters depicted in this novel are fictitious and any resemblance they may have to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. However, I acknowledge that this work was inspired by the habitués of coffee shops around the world, including La Poet, Cannes, France; Perkins Coffee, Nanaimo, Vancouver Island, British Columbia—especially Sunnie and her staff; The Sunflower Café, Ladysmith, British Columbia; and most especially by the wonderful poets, musicians, writers, artists, patrons, and staff of The Corner Coffee House, Newmarket, Ontario, all of whom I have the privilege of calling friends.

      Kathy the carer, John the engineer, Andrea the director, Carol the singer, Mabel the florist, Nancy the birder, Catherine the scrabbler, Mary the banker, Dave the mineralogist, George the superintendent, Kevin the librarian, Gillian the actress, Jesse the bird whisperer, Lynne the therapist, Mikaleena the fashion designer, Debbie the dairymaid, Lisa the herbalist, Innez the plivate eye [sic], Sandra the writer, Mike the builder, Pete the guitarist, Paul the photographer, Malcolm the novelist, Jenna the tot-teacher, Patrick the sailor, Ron the big guy, Paul the gemmologist, Katie the personal trainer, Lillian the sweetest woman in the world, Stanley the sweet and sour shrimp guy, Sharon the nurse, Patti and Donna—the mums, John and Cynthia—the greatest Brits, Diane the channel, Caroline and her caricatures, Ralph the barrista, Bob the musical director, Jim the cigar man, Sylvie-Anne le made-moiselle, Susan the lawyer, Tom the arranger, Rosie the hummingbird, Noreen the nightingale, Bernice the poet, Elaine the PI, Ted the accountant, Anna the hairdresser, Goldfinger Ron, Donna at the library, Roy the reporter, Angela and her fairies, Jim the market guy, Al and Kerry on the web, Rick the drummer, Tamara the bookseller, Jackie at the dead centre, Jeff the artist, Cara and Bene the Moonrakers, Carol the teacher, Kate at the kindergarten, Janice and her teens, Jim at Chapters, John the drycleaner, Peter the meteorologist, Artful Claire, Lara the songstress, Gord the storyteller, Ron the golfer, Mo the squirreller, Thor the constructor, Grant the plumber, Wendy the veterinarian, Elizabeth the jeweller, Diane the councillor, Leo the actor, Chris the Major, Jack the raconteur, Trish the entrepreneur, Tony the realtor, and the entire biker gang.

      The staff: Cynthia, Brooke, Candace, Ann, Jessica, Debbie, Nancy, Lindsay, Jagger, Stephanie, Katherine, Kay, Cathy, Anouk, Chris, Robyn, Vilija, Sandra, Stefany, Mary Lou, Sunny, Christine, Philip, Kathryn, Megan, Anthony, Allison, Kristen and Sara.

      Very special thanks to:

      Michael Rowbottom for his many years of friendship and for his kind permission to quote his poem, “Trouble.”

      My greatest apologies go to all those I have missed and, above all, my greatest thanks goes to Sunshine, without whom none of this would have made any sense.

       This book is dedicated to my younger daughter, Emmeline. A golden heart who brings light and laughter to all who know her.

       chapter one

      Life, love, lies, and lotteries are adventures so perilous that it is surprising anyone would willingly participate in any of them, but when all four coalesce and start ticking down in conjunction, the chance of a simultaneous joyous outcome is hardly worth a wager. Yet, the day Ruth and Jordan Jackson set such an escapade in motion, neither thought it at all risky.

      Life was given to the couple nearly forty years ago by their respective parents with almost no consideration of the consequences, but their love had been more measured, though it had certainly taken friends and family by surprise—especially Ruth’s. They may be of similar age, but that’s where the resemblance ends. Jordan is tall enough to look arresting in uniform, and handsome enough to be a politician or a pilot, whereas Ruth had suffered plainness at birth and has gone downhill ever since.

      “Oh, what a ...” but lovely, beautiful and pretty had stuck in crib-side throats.

      “... nice baby,” was as far as anyone had strayed from reality. “Lovely personality,” friends and family would say as she grew dumpily through puberty, and Ruth’s few friends who had shown up at their wedding had been more curious than congratulatory. However, life was not totally unfair to the dark-haired, plump young woman. Her premature pregnancy had been easily lost in the folds of flesh and the flow of her wedding gown, and Jordan continued loving her even after the stillbirth of their only child a few months later. Jordan’s mother, on the other hand, had never loved her, and was very quick to assert that the loss of the child was clearly ordained by God.

      As the years passed, Ruth’s waistline inched apace; one inch per annum come feast and famine; binge and starve; high this, low that; quirky and quacky diets; blood, sweat, and tears—tears mainly. If only the tears had dissolved fat at the same rate as sweat does, Ruth would have found herself alongside Fergie in the tabloids, but, in the long run, the tears never helped.

      The coffee house is her enemy. Lattés with whipped cream, double-chocolate explosions, and white-chocolate mousse bombs—death by chocolate. “Live by the sword ...” the maxim begins, and Ruth followed the maxim to the letter the day she and Jordan borrowed a fortune from his begrudging mother and opened the coffee house. “I’ll expect interest with no excuses,” Mrs. Jackson senior