When Honey is nice to me, it makes it a whole lot harder to justify the fact that I am falling for her boyfriend.
The day of the Chocolate Festival dawns sunny and dry. I run up to the house in my pyjamas, wash quickly, eat toast, then go up to Skye and Summer’s room to dress.
‘It’s years since I’ve dressed up in fairy wings,’ Skye says, twirling round in her chocolate fairy tutu. ‘I could get used to this!’
She has added a bundle of cream and brown net and a cascade of chocolate-coloured ribbons to her upswept, tawny hair, woven in braids and threaded through with beads and bells and bits of ancient lace. Skye spends her whole life playing dress-up, channelling her own unique raggedy-fairy look.
Summer has a different look, her hair pinned up in a perfect ballerina bun, her shoulders shimmering with body glitter. She wears the velvet and net like a ballet costume, slides her feet into the soft, brown ballet slippers and ties the ribbons neatly, criss-cross fashion.
Coco bursts in, a small whirlwind, waving her wand about dangerously and pretending to change her sisters into frogs.
‘Is Honey dressing up?’ I dare to ask.
‘I think so,’ Skye says. ‘She said she would …’
The door opens and Honey walks in, looking like she has just done a photo shoot for teen Vogue with her waist-length hair and her kohl-rimmed eyes and her lazy, effortless confidence. She somehow makes the home-made fairy costume look like it just came off the catwalk.
And then there’s me.
I have no memories of dress-up days with pink fairy wings and fluffy feather boas – my dad never thought of stuff like that, and I didn’t go to other kids’ houses often enough to come across the whole fairy fantasy. In spite of the stories I told Summer and Skye, I have no experience of ballet classes or end-of-term dance productions, either. In the Christmas plays at primary school, I was always a sheep or a donkey, or once, memorably, a shepherd with a striped tea towel on my head and Dad’s fleecy dressing gown.
I was the classic misfit kid, always on the outside looking in.
I wish I could admit all that, but it seems kind of difficult after the little white lies I have told. I look at Skye and Summer and Coco, laughing, talking, adjusting net skirts and twirling in front of the mirror. I could tell them the truth, couldn’t I? Admit that I never did ballet, didn’t have tons of friends, lived in a tenement flat and not a swish apartment. They wouldn’t mind, I know that now. They might even understand why I lied.
Then I see Honey, her head tilted to one side, her long hair swishing, and I know that she would never understand, not in a million years.
I push away any ideas of confession and pick up the fairy costume with a sigh.
I am not really a tutu kind of a girl, but when I slip into the dress I can feel the tug of childhood magic just the same. The velvet is soft against my skin, the layers of net light and airy. The borrowed wings tickle my shoulders, and a cloud of silver glitter drifts to the floor as I move.
‘I sprinkled the dresses with fairy dust,’ Coco explains. ‘So they’ll be magic!’
I am not a great believer in fairy dust, but I can’t help smiling at my reflection in the dressing-table mirror. Skye brushes my blue-black hair up into high bunches, adorning them with satin ribbon bows, Summer helps me to tie the ballet slippers and even Honey rolls her eyes despairingly and leans in to brush silver glitter along my cheekbones.
The girls check their reflections, adjust their wings and run out on to the landing, laughing, waving their sparkly wands around, while I take one last look in the mirror.
I look like I belong … and I almost feel that way too.
I can’t stop smiling.
‘You look OK,’ Honey says. ‘Really.’
It’s probably the best compliment anyone ever gave me.
I run out of the bedroom, wings bobbing behind me, leaving a glittery trail.
25
The sound system is belting out ‘Sugar Sugar’, an ancient sixties number Mrs Mackie used to play back in Glasgow, as Honey and I walk down across the grass. Shay comes towards us, grinning.
‘Hey,’ Honey says. ‘I thought you were working?’
‘I decided to duck out of it,’ he confesses shiftily. ‘They’ll have to do without me for once. Dad will go mad when he susses I’ve gone, but hopefully he will be too busy to do much about it. I haven’t told Paddy … he just thinks Dad changed his mind at the last minute …’
‘Skating on thin ice,’ Honey says. ‘I like your style.’
‘Hope your dad doesn’t go too crazy,’ I say.
Honey narrows her eyes. ‘Why should you worry?’ she huffs. ‘You don’t even know Shay’s dad.’
I try not to look guilty. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Sorry.’
‘It’s OK,’ Shay shrugs. ‘Don’t stress. I’ll deal with that when it happens … if it happens.’
He cracks a cheeky grin. ‘By the way … did you know you have fairies at the bottom of your garden? I mean, seriously?’
‘Watch it,’ Honey teases. ‘That information is Top Secret. Tell anyone and I might have to put a spell on you …’
‘I think you already have,’ Shay says, but his eyes snag on to mine, not Honey’s. She catches the look and a shadow passes over her eyes, replaced just as quickly by cold indifference.
Panic flutters inside me like a bird’s wing beating on glass. The fragile truce Honey and I have built over the last couple of days comes tumbling down, and suddenly I know why Honey and I can never be friends. There is nothing going on between me and Shay Fletcher, nothing but hopes and dreams that will never be anything more. There is definitely nothing anyone could ever see.
Honey sees it, though. I think maybe she has seen it all along.
She snakes an arm round Shay’s waist, staking claim, and drags him away from me, laughing, leaning up to whisper in his ear. I turn away, pink-cheeked.
I find Skye and help her to transform the steps of the gypsy caravan into an oasis of mystical, fortune-telling magic. The chocolate fountain is glugging away gently on a stall nearby. In the kitchen, Charlotte has cleared away all traces of breakfast activity and set out trays, plates, teapots, cutlery, cups, saucers, milkshake and sundae glasses. The counter is crowded with half-a-dozen varieties of chocolate-cake heaven.
At half ten, we take the chocolates from the workshop fridge and carry them down to the stall, arranging them on pretty china plates in towering pyramids. Shay adjusts the music system and Skye and Summer and Coco’s friends begin to arrive, ready to help.
Dad puts on a trilby hat he has adapted with cocoa beans dangling on threads from the brim, and ties on a big white apron. I’m just coming out of the kitchen with one last tray of truffles when a blue jeep skids to a halt on the gravel.
A middle-aged man in cut-off shorts and a T-shirt that says Kitnor Sailing Centre jumps out, his face like thunder.
‘Where is he?’ the man growls. ‘I know he’s here. Let’s face it, he’s always here … or was. Not any more. That boy has blown it big time …’
He looks at me, curls his lip at the sight of my tutu skirt and lopsided wings, and scans around for someone less ridiculous to talk to. Dad appears in the doorway behind me, his arms full of chocolate crates.
‘Are you looking for Shay?’ he asks politely. ‘He’s been pure brilliant already, today, helping me to get the sound system running. We’re really very grateful you can spare him. He’s a great lad!’
Shay’s dad turns an ominous shade of purple.
‘Are you having a laugh?’ he asks. ‘He’s supposed to be working with me! He had a canoe group booked for ten o’clock. The busiest day of the season so far, and where is he? Up here, with you weirdos, playing that stupid guitar at a bloomin’ festival …’
Dad blinks. ‘Oh, it’s not that kind of festival,’ he says. ‘It’s part of the Food Trail, launching our new chocolate busin
ess …’
‘While my business goes down the pan,’ Shay’s dad says grimly. ‘D’you think I care about your poxy little festival? Not exactly mobbed, are you? No … but you still need my son to run around doing your errands!’
‘He offered!’ Dad splutters. ‘And we will be busy, I hope … we haven’t even opened yet!’
‘Whatever,’ Mr Fletcher growls. ‘Let’s get this straight, Mr … well, you’re not Mr Tanberry, are you? Whoever you are. I don’t like my son hanging out up here till all hours. Two in the morning he got home, the other night, and that wasn’t the first time. Where is he, anyhow? Lazy, lying, useless little layabout …’
Shay steps out of the trees. His face is closed and his shoulders slump, and I know right away that he has heard every word.
‘Get in the jeep,’ his dad says, and Shay gets in, cheeks burning.
‘Just hang on a minute, there,’ Dad is saying. ‘Mr Fletcher, is it? I think there must be some misunderstanding. Shay obviously thought … well, I don’t know what he thought, but he was only trying to help us! You can’t just come up here, yelling and shouting …’
‘Watch me,’ Shay’s dad snarls, and he guns the engine and drives away in a spray of gravel.
‘Poor Shay,’ Dad says.
Poor Shay indeed.
Ten minutes later, Shay texts Honey to say he has been grounded for a fortnight. ‘He’s not allowed to see me!’ she declares, outraged. ‘His dad expects him to work every day and sit around at home every night. It’s practically inhuman! The man’s a monster!’
‘He’ll probably calm down,’ Charlotte says. ‘A fortnight might seem like forever, when you’re fourteen, but it will pass. It’ll be OK.’
‘It had better be,’ Honey growls.
There’s no time to worry too much about Shay or Honey, though, because the first real visitors begin to arrive. I take my place behind the counter with Dad, while Honey and Summer get their notebooks ready to scribble down orders for the outdoor chocolate cafe.
It’s the last time I get a chance to draw breath for five whole hours. More and more cars arrive, and streams of tourists begin to wander down across the lawn, and I am seriously glad that Coco sprinkled fairy dust over the brown tutu dresses, because the chocolate fairies need all the help they can get.
I take up my tongs and start picking out truffles, selecting the flavours each customer points to. I get used to folding down the tissue paper, sealing boxes, tying ribbon bows, and I take the money and use the calculator to add everything up, counting the change out slowly. Soon there’s a queue, and then a whole crowd, and people aren’t just buying one box but two or three.
‘These look amazing,’ one woman says. ‘The boxes are so unusual!’
‘They taste even better than they look …’
‘So pretty,’ another adds. ‘They’ll make the most amazing presents … can you do really big boxes too?’
‘No problem,’ I say. ‘We can do chocolates for any occasion …’
Skye must have a steady stream of punters for her chocolate fortune-telling, because most of them come down to buy a box of whichever variety she has predicted they will love.
As for the refreshments, Honey and Summer are run off their feet. The four trestle tables reserved for refreshments are full, and people overflow on to the patio too, balancing their plates and teacups on knees as they flick through brochures and admire the fish pond. When people begin to gather in clumps, waiting for a space, Honey grabs an armful of picnic blankets and spreads them on the grass, and keeps on serving.
You can’t even get near the chocolate fountain, and a friend of Charlotte’s has to be dispatched down to the village for emergency supplies of fresh fruit and marshmallows.
In the afternoon, Honey appears with a clutch of journalists in tow, and we get a five-minute break while they quiz Dad and Charlotte about the business and take pictures of the chocolate fairies posing with little boxes of chocolates. One is from the local newspaper, but the other works for one of the big national women’s mags and is certain she can run a big story about Dad and Charlotte and their chocolate-fairy daughters.
Even Fred gets in the pictures, looking like a small grey-and-white haystack and wearing Coco’s fairy wings.
‘We’re going to be famous!’ Skye and Summer whisper together.
‘Do you think?’ Coco asks.
‘I think,’ Honey says. ‘How cool is that?’
She grins at her sisters, radiant, but her eyes slide past me as if I am invisible.
26
A part of me wants the buzz of the festival to go on forever, even when my feet begin to ache and my shoulders sting with sunburn and my wings hang sadly askew, but by five o’clock the last of the crowds thin and dwindle. We start to clear things away, picking up litter and gathering plates and dishes to bring up to the house.
All anyone really wants to do is flop down in a heap and recover, but Charlotte pushes us on.
‘Come on,’ she says. ‘If we get everything cleared now we won’t have to do it tomorrow … and then we can really relax. OK?’
‘You are a hard woman, Charlotte Tanberry,’ Dad sighs. ‘I don’t think I can even stay standing much longer. I’m just about ready to keel over …’
Charlotte raises an eyebrow.
‘Too tired?’ she asks. ‘That’s a pity. I have a home-made lasagne ready to pop in the oven, and strawberry pavlova, and the wine is chilling. The girls are going down to the beach for a swim and a picnic, and I was thinking we’d have a quiet night in, a romantic dinner for two. A reward for all the hard work of these last few weeks. But of course, if you’re too tired …’
Dad holds up his hands, grinning. ‘Tired?’ he says. ‘Me? No, not a chance … I’m raring to go!’
Charlotte laughs. ‘Thought so … funny, that! Well, girls, let’s get moving, get this place cleaned up!’
An hour or so later, the worst of the chaos is sorted. The trestle tables and folding chairs have been stacked in the workshop, the empty boxes and crates have been cleared away and the washing machine is whirling through a final spin cycle.
Inside, the kitchen table is spread with a fancy white cloth, the CD player is churning out sad Irish fiddle music and Charlotte is lighting candles and setting out two shiny wine glasses. Dad appears in the doorway wearing a clean T-shirt and jeans, his hair still damp from the shower.
‘Slush-y,’ Honey says, pulling a face.
‘We’re allowed to be slushy,’ Charlotte grins. ‘We’re engaged, remember? Besides, I think we’ve earned a night off after all that hard work! And we’ll have to be up at half six tomorrow, remember, to start the guest breakfasts …’
‘Whatever,’ Honey says. ‘I just wanted to remind you that I’m going up to Dad’s tomorrow. You have to drop me at the bus station in Minehead – my coach is at five to nine.’
‘Oh, goodness …’ Charlotte says. ‘London, of course. I was forgetting, with all the chaos today. Are you all packed? I know it’s only for a couple of nights, but don’t leave it to the last minute …’
Honey raises an eyebrow. ‘Don’t stress, Mum,’ she says. ‘I’ve been packed for days. I’m the organized one, remember?’
‘Too right you are,’ Paddy grins. ‘You were brilliant, today. I can manage the breakfasts, Charlotte, if that will help …’
‘OK,’ Charlotte says. ‘Be ready for eight then, Honey. Now … off you go, all of you … catch the last of that sunshine and enjoy it! I’ve packed you up a couple of picnic baskets …’
Skye, Summer and Coco come clattering into the kitchen, laden down with towels and swimsuits. They scoop up the picnic baskets, grab crockery and cutlery and tin mugs from the dresser.
‘Come on!’ Coco nags. ‘Let’s get down there! Can we take the Irn-Bru?’
‘Disgusting stuff,’ Honey scoffs. ‘Take the lemonade, instead.’
‘
Take both,’ Charlotte says. ‘Cherry, can you carry the blankets? And, Honey … the picnic cushions are just over there …’
The five of us trail down across the lawn, Fred running on ahead, his tail waving madly, and we slip out of the little gate and climb carefully down the path cut into the cliff edge.
We throw down the blankets and cushions, spreading them out across the warm sand. Then Honey’s mobile rings, and her voice lights up with excitement.
I can’t help biting my lip, a shadow of jealousy darkening my mood. Shay?
‘Oh … so good to hear from you!’ Honey says into her phone. ‘Sure … sure, Dad … I can’t wait to see you … I’m soooo excited about tomorrow!’
I breathe again. There’s no reason why Shay shouldn’t call Honey, of course, but I can’t help being glad it’s just her dad, probably making last-minute plans for her trip to London tomorrow.
She wanders away to talk.
It’s only when Skye, Summer and Coco start wriggling into their swimsuits that I realize I have forgotten mine.
‘Fetch it,’ Skye tells me. ‘No skiving off! Hurry up!’
They run down to the water’s edge, yelling and laughing, and I climb back up the cliff path, run across to the caravan and grab up my swimsuit and towel. Picking my way back down the steps again, I can see Honey sitting on a rock in the sunshine, almost hidden beneath the cliff, her golden hair fluttering around tanned shoulders. In spite of everything, there is something slightly lost, alone, about her, as if she is on the edge of things.
The way I used to be.
As I step on to the sand, I look more closely and see that her shoulders are shaking slightly as if she is crying, and my heart stills. It looks like Greg Tanberry has let his daughter down again.
I look over to see if Skye, Summer or Coco have noticed, but they are far away, out in the waves, swimming, splashing, giggling, floating on the silver-tipped tide.
Chocolate Box Girls Page 13