Page 95 of Second Verse

Dotted around the edge of the fayre were a variety of stalls, and families moved from stall to stall, trying their luck at the tombola, eating hot dogs, and browsing through the handmade crafts for sale.

‘Susan’s outdone herself,’ said Poppy to herself, looking around. ‘I’ll give her that.’

‘What does “outdone herself” mean?’ Luna asked, eating popcorn by the fistful.

‘It means she’s made this fair great,’ Poppy told her.

‘Who did?’ Luna asked.

‘Susan. She runs the PTA.’

‘What’s the PTA?’ Luna asked.

‘The Parent-Teacher Association. They make sure there’s money for cool things like trips and fairs. And Komodo dragons, apparently.’

‘What’s a Komodo—’

‘Hey, you wanna go on the bouncy castle?’ Poppy asked, gesturing at the big pink palace.

‘YES!’ Luna screamed, already slipping her shoes off.

The morose grey-haired woman running the bouncy castle took money from Poppy as Luna jumped around with a lot of other kids. Roughly twenty, by Poppy’s count.

‘Is that within the legal limit?’ Poppy asked the woman.

‘Yeah, sure,’ the woman said.

Poppy googled it. Google seemed to think the limit on a bouncy castle was actually five. A collision was inevitable.

Poppy prepared herself to withdraw a crying Luna at any moment. She was so focused on a potential head injury that she didn’t even realise that Freddie was on there too until he screamed, ‘Hi, Luna’s mum!’

Poppy waved and turned to look for Norah, frightened. They hadn’t seen each other for weeks. Which was a hard thing to finagle, given the bi-daily drop-off. But Poppy fixed that by being five minutes early to drop off and five minutes late to collection every day, which had a pretty shitty knock-on effect on the rest of her life. But she had to do it. She couldn’t be around Norah. It hurt too much.

But where Freddie was, Norah was. Poppy did a full revolution to scan the crowd of parents, watching the kids leaping about, searching for her.

Instead of Norah, she found Max. ‘Hi,’ he said, giving her a chipper little wave.

‘Hello,’ she said coolly.

What the hell was he doing here? He never came to school stuff. And why did he look so pleased with himself?

A moment later, Norah appeared at his side with her mother, and Poppy felt the answers to that question had been revealed.

‘Here’s your beer,’ she said, handing him a can.

‘Cheers, babe,’ he said, taking it with a smile.

Mrs Cauldwell watched the interaction, looking pleased with herself. So Grandma’s prediction had come to pass. Norah was back with Max. Poppy’s heart felt like a balloon in a threshing machine.

Norah turned and saw her. Poppy turned away quickly, fixing her eyes back on the castle. It was the hardest thing in the world, but she was not letting herself get in the way. She didn’t think it was a good idea for Norah to get back with Max; he wasn’t even close to good enough for her. But Norah needed to be able to make that call without Poppy getting in the way. It was her family and her choice.

Not that she’d held out any real hope for anything to happen between them. She knew it was silly. A fantasy of what might have been.

Well, love wasn’t for her. She had to accept it. She had Luna, and that would be enough. She’d be OK. She would let this go.

She would do her best to be, if not happy for Norah, then at the very least, cool with this. Poppy was glad she’d made the choice she’d made. It was the right call.

She. Would. Let. This.Go.

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