Page 57 of Sad Girl Hours
“Here we have the ultimate autumn scavenger hunt. The first person to find every item on their list wins a prize.”
“What’s the prize?” Saffron asks.
“Their pumpkin paid for later on and all of the leftover treats from the trick-or-treaters tonight. I always overestimate how many there’ll be and end up with loads extra.”
“Oh, you’re on,” Saffron says. “I love a good lollipop.”
“Excellent. So, here you go.” I hand Saffron her list. “May the best person win.”
We start roaming around, scanning the ground, the trees, the sky, for any of the items on our lists.
“Aha, a conker!” Saffron finds one, burst open from its green prickly cage, on the ground among the mulchy leaves.
“Ooh, well done. It’s tricky to find them this late. The squirrels have usually ransacked them by now. Speaking of –” I point upwards towards an epicentre of twitching leaves and rustling in the branches above us – “I believe I’ve spotted a friend.”
A flash of grey fur scampering from bouncing branch to bouncing branch confirms my suspicions. “One each,” I say.
“The competition is heating up.” Saffron pockets the conker. “For this one – a leaf pile perfect for jumping in – do we have to come across one by chance, or can we manufacture one?”
“Hmm.” I rub my chin in mock-serious thought. “Given it doesn’t specify and leaf-pile making feels in the spirit of our whole objective, I think either?”
“Right,” Saffron says. “Well, then.” And, with that, she starts kicking up the leaves, drawing them towards a mini pile that was already there.
I don’t need any encouragement to join in. I start grabbing handfuls and chucking them on to the pile.
A couple of minutes later and we’ve managed to form a very respectable mound. “Now,” I say dramatically, “are you ready to jump in this bad boy?”
“I am. Let’s do it together.” She grabs my hand and we get in position to take a running leap.
We run and fly into the air, leaves dispersing everywhere, laughing as we stumble. We begin grabbing handfuls of the leaves and throwing them at each other, autumn’s (crispier) version of a snowball fight. Saffron tries to hide behind a tree but she’s not fast enough to avoid me filling her hood with a fistful of them. I may be small, but I can be speedy when incentivised. And teasing Saffron is definitely a great incentive.
Chapter Twenty-five
Nell
“So, what inspired this hunt?” Saffron asks a little while later as we’re trudging through the leafy carpet, slightly dishevelled now, scanning our surroundings. We’ve found several more items – the perfect oak leaf, a bundle of moss, a pine cone and some fungus that we spotted creeping out of a crack in the trunk of a fallen tree. “Is this another Holloway family tradition?”
“Nah,” I say. “This is one I came up with just for us, in honour of one of my favourite poets.”
“Who?”
“Mary Oliver,” I say. “I’m a cliché of myself but I love her work so much. She writes about nature and about paying attention in ways that almost feel like a religion in themselves. She said once that her instructions for ‘living a life’ were to ‘Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it’. And that’s what I want to do. I want to notice things,” I explain. “And then I want to write about them so that others notice them too. And, I suppose, that’s why I put this on the list. So that you can appreciate all the things that you can only really find in autumn. So you can be astonished too.”
“I love how much you love poetry,” Saffron says, not looking at me. “It’s more than just an interest, or something you’re studying. It’s the whole way you see the world. It’s lovely. And being around you makes it seem more beautiful to everyone else too.”
Horrifically, I feel tears prick at the back of my eyes. “Thank you,” I say, voice soft in surprise. “That’s actually kind of my main goal in life, so it means a lot that you think that.”
“You’re welcome,” she says. “It’s true.” And then she looks up and at me, with a smile that makes me feel the same way I do hearing my favourite poem read aloud.
With no one else around, it’s as though the woods belong to us and us alone. Like the trees are brushing against each other to pass their secrets along, until finally they flow into us. Like the wind is blowing through the leaves to make music for us. Like everything around us has softened into browns and ambers and russets, so it’s less harsh on our eyes. Not that I’m really looking around right now. I’m looking at Saffron and hoping that she really means it when she says things seem more beautiful when she’s around me.
I clear my throat. “Would it ruin the moment awfully if I paused to write a poem?”
“If you were a crusty straight white man who studies philosophy and plays the acoustic guitar, then yes,” Saffron says. “As it’s you, not at all.” She smiles. “Just so long as you show me after.”
“Deal,” I say, sinking down on to the fallen tree with my notebook and beginning to scribble on the next blank page.
In response to Mary Oliver:
