Page 35 of Hope and Happiness in Bluebell Wood
‘Ava wasn’t feeling too well,’ Callum explains. ‘I brought her some water.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that, Ava.’ Jonah looks at me with concern. ‘Are you feeling any better now?’
I glance at Callum. He returns my look with one that suggests it’s totally my decision.
‘Yes, I’m feeling much better, thank you,’ I tell Jonah.
‘Good stuff. Will you be okay to come back soon? Because we really needbothof you when the quiz gets going.’ He looks meaningfully at Callum.
‘What do you say, Ava?’ Callum asks. ‘Shall we go back in now?’
I put my hand in the pocket of my jeans and immediately feel the hard plastic of the Trivial Pursuit piece I’d placed there before I left the cottage tonight.
‘Yes,’ I say, wrapping my hand tightly around it. ‘Yes, let’s give this a try.’
Ten
The next day I awake, and for once I smile.
I did it. I actually did it.
I hadn’t done anything major in a normal person’s life. But to me spending the night in a busy pub among a lot of noisy people was just as much of an achievement as running the London Marathon would be to someone else.
Callum had been great all night. He’d kept checking on me, and asking if I was all right – not in an obvious way, but in a quiet considered way, that most of the time no one else would have even noticed.
He’d insisted that I took a couple of breaks outside – at the halfway point of the quiz when everyone paused to buy more drinks, and at the end just before the scoring had taken place.
I’m sure the others must have wondered what we were doing popping outside together. Maybe they thought we were secret smokers? But to their credit no one said anything when we returned. Callum appeared to be a sort of superhero here in Bluebell Wood; no one wanted to criticise him or question anything he was doing – they simply accepted it. They did tohis face, anyway; I don’t imagine for one second that Jenny won’t already be gossiping about this in her shop this morning!
But I don’t care. I’m proud of myself, and I felt like I’d made a new friend in Callum.
He’d been so kind and calm that any stress I might have felt at being in a crowded room full of people was quickly dissipated every time we stepped outside into the cool night air.
Nothing had been mentioned again about the proposed ‘date’, we’d simply concentrated on keeping me calm and getting me through the quiz – which had been a great success for the team. We hadn’t won, but we’d come joint second, which Callum assured me was a much higher placing than they usually managed, so much was made of the two new team members continuing on in future competitions.
I wake Merlin, who is snoozing at the bottom of my bed, and we head downstairs. I open up the back door and Merlin wanders out to empty his bladder in his favourite places across the garden.
While the kettle is boiling, I look out of the small kitchen window at the bird table. As usual, overnight the birds had demolished any remaining food, so the table and the feeders look bare.I must get a lot of ‘early birds’, I think to myself, smiling at my own joke.
‘I’d better feed you now,’ I say through the window, as I spy one of my blackbird regulars landing on the table. As he pecks around, trying to find something to eat, I’m reminded of Lonan from last night. He hadn’t been so bad in the end. He was a bit full of himself, but he’d been entertaining enough, and luckily for the team his broad and varied knowledge of ancient history had helped us through a number of tricky questions, and had balanced well with my knowledge of twentieth-century events.I’d always enjoyed modern history. Anything from the 1900s onwards was my thing, and I’d been lucky enough to spend a fair amount of time in a few of London’s excellent museums, both when I’d been doing work for them and also in my spare time.
That seemed such a long time ago. How different my life was now – my daily commute involved walking to the bottom of the garden to feed wild birds, instead of travelling by tube across the city to my office.
I load up the various paper cups that I’d found in one of Evelyn’s cupboards, which I now use to ferry bird seed, nuts, worms and all the regular things I left out for my bird friends every morning, then I head from the shed out into the garden.
I fill up the hanging feeders first. I’m about to empty seed on to the flat feeding platform when I spy something shiny tucked away in the corner.
Reaching my hand under the little roof, I fish out what looks like a broken piece of green glass. No, it’s not glass, I realise, as I turn it over in my hand: it’s a piece of ceramic with one shiny green side. Then under some husks of seed I notice there’s a second piece – this time it’s a bluey green colour.
How very strange?
I’m about to turn away with the pieces in my hand, when I notice down on the floor two more shards. These two are both shades of deeper blue and look like they’re from the same pattern.
What on earth?
I pick the third and fourth piece up and examine them in the palm of my hand.
‘Where did you come from?’ I ask, looking around at the trees, as if one of the birds is going to lift its wing and admit to being the culprit. ‘I’m starting quite the odd little collection.’
