Page 80 of Hope and Happiness in Bluebell Wood
‘He sounds a bit like you,’ Robin says in a sleepy voice. ‘He doesn’t like crowds.’
‘Yes, I suppose he is a bit of a loner.’ I hadn’t really thought about it like that. ‘I guess even in the bird world, they all behave differently, just like us humans. Some of them like to be in crowds, and some of them like to be alone.’
‘I don’t think you’re alone like the chaffinch,’ Robin says in a yawny voice that sounds like it’s about to drift off to sleep.
‘Don’t you?’ I ask gently.
‘No, you have lots of friends here in Bluebell Wood. Merlin, me . . . my mum, and the vicar man . . . You have all your birds as friends too, and . . . you know what?’
Robin’s voice has become slow now as well as drowsy.
‘No, what?’ I whisper.
‘I think the birds of Bluebell Wood might just be the best friends of all.’
Twenty-five
I breathe a sigh of relief as I leave the school gates.
My first visit to Bluebell Wood Primary had gone amazingly well. Merlin seemed to really enjoy himself, the children looked like they were loving it, and best of all I’d had fun too.
The Year One children spent the first few minutes getting to know Merlin and asking me questions, then some of them read their reading books out loud to him – which they absolutely loved.
Merlin, like the angel he is, sat and looked attentive for a while when they were first reading, then he got a little sleepy, and I pretended the children were reading him a bedtime story, which went down very well.
The teacher, Mrs Hobby, seemed very pleased with how it had all gone, and promised to report back enthusiastically to Miss Swan.
I decide to walk the long way back to the cottage to give Merlin a well-deserved run off his lead. We take the little footpath that we’d found after our first visit to the school.
That’s weird,I think, as we walk a little way along the path and I notice a couple of empty crisp packets blowing around on the ground.It’s unusual to see any litter in Bluebell Wood.
I pick up the rubbish, and put it in my pocket to dispose of later. But it’s not until we walk on a little further and begin to curve our way back towards the village around the edge of the fields, that I get a stark reminder of all the building work due to commence here.
One of the fields is now full of huge pieces of yellow machinery – fork lifts, diggers and large empty trucks waiting to be filled with the soil that would once have grown the farmer’s crops, but would soon be growing many new houses instead.
There are a few men in hard hats standing around with measuring devices and clipboards, and a few others smoking cigarettes or looking at their phones, presumably waiting for instructions.
One of them, wearing earphones plugged into his mobile, finishes a chocolate bar, then he tosses the empty wrapper carelessly on the ground.
I feel my blood begin to boil as I watch them from the footpath, because only this morning I’d found another chocolate wrapper, but on my bird table this time.
‘Eating chocolate now, are we?’ I’d joked to the birds, as I’d removed a black Mars Bar wrapper from the table. ‘Makes a change from sunflower seeds and peanuts.’
‘All right, darlin’,’ one of the men calls, making me jump from my thoughts. The others look up from their phones to see who he’s talking to.
The sensible part of my brain knows I shouldn’t, but that part’s rational pleading is currently being stomped on by thereckless part of my brain that is angry, and before I know it I’m pacing across the field in a pair of shoes that really aren’t designed for a muddy field, with Merlin in hot pursuit.
As I approach the group of men, I suddenly feel a moment’s trepidation. But it’s too late to back down now, and anyway I realise I’m so annoyed I don’t want to.
‘No, I am not all right, as you so kindly enquired,’ I say as I reach the part of the field where the men are all standing.
‘What’s up, love?’ one of the older men asks, coming over to me. He looks at me with concern, which I hadn’t expected.
‘Thatis what is up,’ I say, pointing to where the fallen sweet wrapper is already blowing across the field in the wind. ‘That and these . . . ’ I pull the crisp packets from my pocket. ‘I found these blowing around up on the footpath, and this morning I found an empty Mars Bar wrapper on my bird table.’
‘What sort of birds are you keeping?’ the man jokes, grinning at me. His smile drops when I don’t appear to share his amusement.
‘It’s litter,’ I tell him. ‘Most of which seems to be coming from this building site, by the look of what I’ve seen so far.’
