Page 29 of Fool Me Twice
Zig grinned hastily.“I’m right here.Body and soul.Hey, any idea where I could get a book of local folktales?Library was fresh out of ’em.”
“Yeah?Which one did you go to?”He ground some pepper into the pan, which smelled wicked, like an Italian restaurant.
Zig’s stomach rumbled.“Uh, there’s more than one?The one near that big church.Calls itself a hub.”
“Oh, yeah, see, you’ll want the Library of Avalon for folktales and all that.It’s on the high street, up by Market Place?Back of the Glastonbury Experience.I mean, I ain’t been in there much, but I heard it’s where you go for all that mythical stuff.”Si slid the contents of the pan onto two plates, and handed one to Zig.
They took them out to the living room and ate sitting companionably on the sofa.
“I saw that Glastonbury Experience place, but I thought it’d be some tourist thing.I’ll have to check it out.”Zig expected Si to ask why on earth he wanted books of folktales, but Si seemed to accept that was a normal thing to be interested in.It was nice.He ate another mouthful of pasta.“Fuck me, this is good.Family recipe?”
Si shrugged, a little pink.“I found it online.Mum’s more into your traditional English stuff.So where else did you get to today?”he asked quickly, like he was keen to change the subject.
Zig didn’t like to think why that might be.“She does do a mean bacon and eggs, your mum,” he said lightly.“I went up the tor.Flippin’ freezing up there.People were saying there’s gonna be, like, celebrations for the solstice—you fancy going up for that?”
“Yeah, we could do that.”Si’s eyebrows shot up, but his cheeks were pinker than ever under the beard.“Would you believe it, I’ve never been?Always thought I oughtta but never got off me arse to do it.”
Zig laughed.“Well, I lived in London all my life, but I ain’t never been to Buckingham Palace.Or the Tower, or half the museums.You don’t, do you, when it’s local?So, you’re okay with getting up there for dawn?”
“This time of year?No problem.You want me up there for 3 a.m.in the summer, mind, we might have some issues.”
They ate contentedly for a minute or two.Zig felt bold enough to address the elephant in the room.“How was lunch with your mates?”
Si shoved a forkful of pasta into his mouth in the most obvious delaying tactic in the history of the universe.
So, he’d told Adam that Zig was here.And it hadn’t gone down well.“Adam all right?”
Si swallowed.“Yeah, he’s great.Sorry.He’s got this new bloke, Corin.One of they computer wizards.”
Good, that’ll keep him happy and stop him worrying about me.“You say that like it’s some arcane magic.I know you know how computers work.”
“Yeah, but you ask him what he’s been doing at work and it’s like he’s talking another language.Or worse, it’s the same language, but all the words mean something different.But he’s a good bloke.Got a brain condition.Prospo...prospag...Face blindness, that’s what it is.Can’t recognise people.”Si cocked his head.“Be all right with you, mind.See, the way he explains it, he can see features, but he can’t put them all together?But he’d know you, with that hair, and them eyes.”
“At least they’re good for something, then.”Zig’s tone was bitter, his dad’s voice scathing in his head.
“I like your eyes.”Si busied himself getting a precise combination of pasta, sauce, and veg on his fork.
“Yeah, right.Cos one blue and one brown looks so great.It’s like wearing odd shoes.Never gonna see that catching on.”
Si glanced up.“So, they’re different.So what?Be a boring world if we were all the same.And it suits you.Being one of a kind.”Then he turned his attention back to his food.
Zig’s chest was oddly tight.Like someone was squeezing his heart out to dry.
Maybe he’d better start looking for a room somewhere else sooner rather than later.
That night,Zig was drifting off to sleep on the sofa when his phone vibrated.A flash of alarm jolted through him, and he quickly quelled it.Daft.There was no way Dad—or Trent—could know his number.
Course, Ani had his number...No.She wouldn’t hand it out to anyone.
Fuck it.Zig grabbed his phone and thumbed it on, finding a text from an unknown number:This is Kai.You at your mates place?
Chest easing, Zig smiled and texted back, Yep.Not sick of me yet.You somewhere warm?
Im okay.Night :)
Still smiling, Zig saved the contact.Then he switched off his phone and rolled over.
The next day, Zig headed down to the Avalon library.It was easy to find, now that he knew what he was looking for.The entrance was in a small courtyard off the high street, the tiny space adorned with flowerbeds and trees—bare now but promising colour and shade in summer.The building itself was of unknown age, at least to Zig: a hodgepodge of different bricks and stone that might have been patched together over centuries.
