by Jenny Colgan
The book was utterly beautiful.
‘Um, Nina,’ said Zoe, not wanting to get above herself. ‘I mean, just so I’m sure about how you organise things and so on . . . I just don’t quite get it . . . sorry, why don’t you want this?’
Nina looked up, ready to explain a few things to Zoe about the book business.
Nina was not a vain person in any way shape or form, but the one thing she did know, the one thing she was sure about, was books. Books she loved. Books that changed her. Books that may not be the best written, but stayed with her. Books that would leave people cold with fear, or stir the blood, or make sad people laugh and forget their troubles just for a little while. She knew books. So she was going to have to explain to Zoe that it was something deep in the bone; a feeling, a sense you had for what books would come into your life one day and be your friend for ever.
‘Well,’ she began. ‘The thing you have to understand is . . .’
Then she saw what Zoe was holding.
‘Oh,’ she said. And she took it with reverence. ‘Oh, look at this.’
She unfolded the first page and gasped.
‘Oh my goodness,’ she said. ‘I must have baby brain. I must . . .’
She was furious with herself.
‘I think . . . You know Noel Streatfeild’s real name was Mary?’ she said. She googled quickly and sure enough, the handwriting was the same.
‘Signed by the author!’ she said, whistling through her teeth. She looked up at Zoe, feeling embarrassed.
‘Good catch,’ she said.
‘I loved it so much,’ said Zoe.
‘Me too,’ said Nina, wishing she could take it with her, head back to bed, sleep even more and start the day over again.
Chapter Thirteen
They pulled up into the centre of Kirrinfief, seeing as that was where they were expected most Wednesday mornings and it would be a chance for Zoe to meet the customers and maybe pop into the nursery. Zoe went round with the duster – she’d vacuumed the van back at the farm, and Nina was already aware of how helpful this was going to be, especially as Zoe stretched up to get to the top shelves that Nina had been finding more and more difficult. It felt like every time she remembered where her centre of gravity was, she lost it again.
Zoe suddenly felt terribly nervous. Despite the fact that she’d had a baby a few years ago now she hadn’t exactly gone back to her old wardrobe. The odd thing was, she weighed the same. It just seemed to be distributed in totally different places. And it was tricky, not working as well as not having any money. She’d gone to Primark and bought a plain black top and black trousers and was trying to accessorise with a floaty scarf of her mother’s, but was definitely thinking she was not a floaty scarf type of person, and if you’re not a floaty scarf type of a person, all a floaty scarf does is annoy you and get in your way, sometimes even getting in your mouth or sticking to your lip gloss, so eventually she took it off and Hari snaffled it to use as a captain’s scarf on his boat.
‘Oh look,’ said Zoe. ‘He’s pretending to have his own pet snake. He’s obsessed with them.’
Nina smiled politely.
‘Do I look all right?’ said Zoe. Nina glanced up. She’d had to change her wardrobe considerably after moving to Scotland, and everything generally now consisted of several thin layers piled up and then occasionally dragged off in a tearing hurry when the sun came out, topped off with a bright yellow mackintosh she adored and Lennox thought was hilarious. Although he liked it as, even when he was up striding on the hills, he could spot her from miles off. Now it was the stretchiest T-shirts she could find, all of which were incredibly stretched. The mac still just about fitted though.
She glanced up.
‘Yes, you look fine,’ she said, barely looking up. Then, spotting Zoe’s face, said, ‘You’ll be fine. Honestly, everyone’s really nice.’
Zoe smiled bravely.
‘Good!’ she said, and Nina opened the back door of the van.
* * *
Outside, the clouds were scudding across the sky, and Zoe briefly paused just to watch them. In London, she never noticed the sky. It was full of cranes, of towers that appeared out of nowhere, great big empty glass boxes in the sky, waiting for goodness knows who to live there.
Here it looked as if the sky was perpetually washing itself clean; as if completely changing itself was as easy as shaking an Etch A Sketch. Every time she looked up, it seemed completely different. She felt her fingertips tingle. She glanced back. Hari was fine in the cab, looking at the book that was almost certainly going to come out of her first wage packet. Well. Here she went. She took a deep breath as Nina put the blocks on the wheels, pushed open the door and changed the closed sign to open. She shot Nina a look, hoping to get an encouraging smile, but Nina was already looking down the road.
The first customer advanced slowly, at a steady pace. She was an older woman, with tiny bifocals attached to her by a long chain around her neck, and she wore a slightly disapproving look on her face.
‘Um, hello,’ said Zoe as she mounted the steps. The woman looked at her, then looked at Nina.
‘Who’s this?’ she announced loudly.
Nina sighed. Of course the first customer would be the trickiest. Of course it would. Mrs Wren, feared matriarch of Wren Dairies, who ran it with a rod of iron and gave fairly short shrift to supermarkets, milk drinkers, lactose intolerant people, local shops, juice drinkers and in fact pretty much everyone in the world who wasn’t a cow. She pretended to only like books about cows but in fact could easily be directed to the most raucous bodice-rippers Nina had at any time and Nina kept a stock of these in for just this reason, even though, had anyone else looked inside them, they’d quickly have realised they’d actually have been better off under the counter.
‘Hello, Mrs Wren,’ said Nina. ‘This is Zoe. She’s going to be helping me out while I have the baby.’
Mrs Wren snorted loudly.
‘Cows just pop ’em out,’ she said. ‘Pop ’em out and get on with things.’
Seeing as the two things cows had to get on with was eating grass and giving milk, and the things Nina had to get on with numbered in the several hundreds, Nina didn’t answer this, but smiled nicely.
‘Ah well, you know,’ she said non-commitally.
‘Hi,’ said Zoe. ‘Nice to meet you. Do you know what you’re looking for?’
A frosty silence descended. Zoe blinked. She wasn’t quite sure what had gone wrong.
‘Do you have,’ said Mrs Wren finally, ‘any new books in? About cows.’
Zoe looked at Nina. She hadn’t seen any on the shelves. Inspiration struck her, and she took down a book called We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves.
‘You might enjoy this,’ she said. She had, very much. ‘It’s not about cows though. It’s about a monkey. About a girl who has a monkey for a sister.’
Mrs Weir looked at her fixedly.
‘A girl. With a monkey. For a sister,’ she said eventually, as if Zoe had recommended a ‘How To’ book about killing puppies.
‘It’s very funny,’ mumbled Zoe. ‘And sad. And it’s just . . . it’s very good.’
Mrs Weir turned to Nina.
‘A girl with a monkey for a sister.’
Nina raised her arms. ‘Or!’ she said, and stretched to an out-of-the-way spot on the very bottom shelf, puffing slightly as she removed a black-coloured book illustrated with an extremely buxom, rather shocked-looking young woman with cascading hair wearing a corset and an enormous pink skirt, being eyed cruelly by a man in period soldier costume. ‘I have . . . The Billionaire Earl’s Impossible Passion.’
Zoe screwed up her face.
‘Has it got cows in it?’ asked Mrs Weir fussily, getting out her wallet.
‘He’s a billionaire,’ said Nina. ‘He’s got everything.’
* * *
‘Are they all like that?’ said Zoe after she’d gone.
‘Nooo,’ said Nina rather too quickly, as she’d j
ust spotted Colonel Gregor marching up the street. A spry and well put together figure, he also liked to buy expensive tomes of military history – ideal for Nina; hardbacks were good sales for her – then come along and explain why everything was wrong, sometimes with the help of moving about the stationery she kept on her desk. It was worth it to keep him as a very good customer but Nina wasn’t quite sure how to explain this to Zoe.
Instead, she stood watching as the colonel replayed the Peninsular War with her paperclips standing in for the Bourbon soldiers while Zoe hovered awkwardly, which made Nina feel awkward too, until the Crombie twins, Bethan and Ethan, came in and immediately started causing havoc, particularly when they found a small boy in the back of the van.
‘CAN WE KEEP HIM?’ shouted Ethan when Hari declined to answer their original question.
‘I don’t think they sell boys,’ said the weary but sweet Kirsty Crombie, who taught at the local school. ‘Hello! Are you new? Is he yours?’
Zoe grinned. ‘Yes, he is.’
‘Ooh lovely, always nice to see a new face. Hello, little man. What’s your name?’
Hari blinked appreciatively.
‘He’s a late speaker,’ said Zoe quickly, as usual.
‘Oh right . . . Will he go to school here?’
‘I don’t know . . . It’s all a bit new.’
‘Okay! Where are you staying?’
‘Up at The Beeches.’
A deathly silence descended.
Kirsty looked at Nina, who pretended to be very busy looking for Kirsty’s usual, which tended towards manuals about how to get out of teaching, life after teaching and who needs teaching anyway. If you asked Kirsty if she liked being a teacher, she would say she absolutely loved it, apart from the kids, the admin, the marking, the other teachers, the government, the hours and the money.
‘Um . . . whose idea was that?’
Zoe glanced at Hari, but he didn’t seem too upset being inspected in his box.
‘Oh, Nina set me up there.’
‘Did she?’ said Kirsty, as Nina went bright puce. ‘And how are you finding it?’
‘Well, I’ve just arrived . . .’
‘Kirsty’s the headteacher,’ said Nina, trying to deflect attention.
‘Oh!’ said Zoe. ‘Why aren’t they at school? When can they go back?’
Kirsty sighed.
‘They’re excluded. Until half-term, I’m afraid. The daughter got in . . . well. Of course I can’t really discuss it.’
‘MARY URQUART BIT AND KICKED STEPHANIE GILLIES!’ shouted Bethan from the back of the shop. ‘SHE HAD TO GET STITCHES!’
‘AND SHACKLETON TOO!’
‘SHE is SO mean,’ said Bethan, looking like a tiny old lady passing gossip over the garden fence. She shook her head sadly. ‘Mean, mean, mean.’
‘It’s . . . everybody realises it isn’t easy for the Urquart kids,’ said Kirsty. ‘But I’ve sent plenty of work home. Um. Good luck.’
‘Thank you,’ said Zoe awkwardly as Kirsty bought Topsy and Tim Go to Hospital.
‘Stephanie Gillies had to go to the hospital,’ observed Bethan loudly. ‘For all the stitches.’
They were still discussing it as they headed down the street.
Zoe turned to Nina.
‘You knew about this?’
‘I genuinely didn’t,’ said Nina. ‘I’m sorry . . . I knew they were troublesome but . . .’
‘Hari is only four,’ said Zoe. ‘What if she bites him?’
Nina cringed.
‘It’s a big house,’ she said. ‘Maybe keep them apart?’
‘Oh good,’ said Zoe. ‘Perhaps I can lock him up in one wing.’
Chapter Fourteen
There was a distinct froideur in the van after that, and Zoe was quite happy to escape to go examine the nursery, her mind working furiously. Lots of kids bit, she told herself. Perhaps not nine-year-olds but . . . She thought of the look of terrible disdain on Mary’s face for a moment. Well. At least Hari never liked being out of her sight, that was one thing. And perhaps the nursery would be amazing . . .
She followed Nina’s directions. It is hard to get lost in Kirrinfief. There is the central cobbled square, with Wullie’s pub and the war memorial and the irregularly frequented bus stop and a little park with wildflower beds (the council ordered it to try and save some bees. Every year a child gets stung and there is a bit of a kerfuffle about bee management, but so far the bees are winning out, and the wildflowers do look very pretty).
Four streets go off the square – two up, two down. Downwards leads south towards the loch, and much of the housing – mostly single-storey grey cottages connected to each other in the old style, even if their thatched roofs are long gone, and many have dormers – go up in zig-zags, higher and higher up the side of the hill, so that nearly everyone has a view over the loch and down into the ever-changing valley with the long shining railway line. It also means everyone has a bit of a clamber to get home from the shops, but that can’t be helped and is probably doing you good.
The nursery, however, is downhill, just next to the school. It was a small low building originally built as a community centre that now spends most of the day as the centre of a small typhoon, and is used in the evenings for a variety of purposes, including puppy training classes. Not a few mums and dads arrive late for pick-up and wonder why they can’t use some of the puppy training rules on their own offspring.
The centre is run by a woman called Tara, who was a type Zoe knew very well from childminding herself: commanding of voice, elaborate in her condescension to very small children and almost completely ineffectual at all times. She was wearing a purple pinafore and a bright pink scarf with dangly silver bits tied round her hair.
Sure enough, inside the nursery was havoc; a blur of tiny people charging up and down.
‘YOU’RE ENGLISH!’ boomed Tara. ‘WELCOME! I sound English, but my heart and passion are here, in the bonny Highlands of my homeland.’
She did, Zoe thought, sound very much like she came from Surrey.
‘Now, here, we like our children to have freedom to express themselves.’
Out of the corner of her eye, Zoe saw a boy of about three – but very large and sturdy – expressing himself by hitting another child repeatedly on the head with a toy car.
Tara gave Zoe a pitying look and knelt down to the child’s level.
‘Now, Rory,’ she said in what she plainly felt was a very charming voice. ‘Are you feeling bad today? Is that why you’re using the car in a non-kind way?’
Rory simply growled in response and snatched back the car.
‘Would you like to just hand me over the car and let me keep it for now?’
Rory would not like to do that. Meanwhile, the child who had been whacked was still crying quietly and being completely ignored as Tara wheedled with his tormentor. Zoe closed her eyes and contemplated whether or not a village the size of Kirrinfief was likely to support another nursery.
She concluded: not.
Hari was clinging onto her hand in a way she knew meant ‘get me out of here at once’.
‘Well, I shall let you have the car just the once, my darling,’ said Tara to a still mutinous-looking Rory. ‘As long as you promise to be nice with it!’
Rory promised no such thing as Tara swept on.
‘We do painting over here,’ she said, coming to a corner that was utterly covered in paint splashes. A harassed-looking younger woman looked up, shadows under her eyes.
‘Ah, Tara, have you got a minute . . . ?’
‘Just showing round a new parent!’ trilled Tara. ‘Showing them our wonderful community spirit! And happy environment!’
There was definitely an echo of a warning tone underpinning Tara’s words, and the woman went back to trying to separate some girls who were splattering each other’s hair with poster paint.
Zoe would have run out of there in a minute; in a second.
But then she glanced out of the huge window at t
he back of the building. It overlooked the garden.
There was something they called a garden in the nursery in London, but space was at such a premium, it was really a tiny terrace with a few tricycles and a strip of grass that occasionally yielded one snowball if it snowed, which it never did. Sometimes they would bundle the children up in rows of triple buggies and take them across the road to the neglected little corner park, constantly terrified in case any of them got hit by a car or stolen, all of them in tiny hi-vis jackets. And that had been an expensive, exclusive nursery.
Here, there was a vast lawn leading to a high stone wall at the end. Even though the day wasn’t particularly warm, a clutch of small children was charging around, being nominally supervised by a young woman staring at her phone. They were jumping, laughing and throwing themselves in and out of a huge sandpit with complete and utter freedom. Two little girls were sitting, trying to make daisy chains. One boy was halfway up a low tree, swinging upside down on his little legs, laughing uproariously.
Zoe froze, staring at it, then looked back at Hari, who was hiding behind her knees in absolute terror.
It felt awful; almost cruel. But he needed this. He needed it.
* * *
Tara led Zoe into a large, well-proportioned office at the end of the hall and shut the door.
‘This is where I come for a little peace and quiet!’ she tittered. ‘Not that I don’t love the little things. Each and every one of them. Now. Do you have your council papers?’
Suddenly she was all business. Zoe had emailed her in advance, cutting and pasting the information from the outpatient letters about Hari’s diagnosis.
‘You have to fill this in so the government can reimburse us. We’re so excited he’s disabled! Does he have a SEN?’
‘No,’ said Zoe. ‘But he has elective mutism.’
Tara donned a pair of bright red spectacles and tilted her head to one side.
‘You know,’ she said. ‘We don’t call it that any more.’
‘I realise that,’ said Zoe stonily. ‘But he’s not selectively mute. He never speaks at all.’
‘Well, we’ll have to write selective mutism on the form.’