by Jules Wake
‘Maybe she doesn’t have many people to talk to during the day.’
‘Maybe.’
‘It can be tough all day on your own.’ There was a thoughtful expression in his eyes as he scanned the path ahead.
‘Any news on the job front?’
‘I may have news for you tomorrow night.’
‘You’ve got a job?’
He smiled enigmatically. ‘Tomorrow.’
‘Tease.’ I pouted.
‘It’ll be worth waiting for; it’s not long now,’ he murmured in an undertone which made my trigger-happy libido jump to attention, releasing excited hormones that skipped through my veins.
‘True,’ my throaty response brought a slow twisted smile to his face.
For a second we stared at each other, the moment laden with intensity, until Ava skipped up between us, her eyes crinkled in concentration. ‘Will there be cake at the café? Sascha’s cake? She has nice cake.’
Ash laughed and caught her hand. ‘Yes, there will be cake.’
‘Are you sure?’ she asked with a frown.
‘A hundred per cent positive. I saw Sascha’s sister delivering cupcakes when I walked over with Bill earlier.’
With a nod of satisfaction, she fell into step beside us and slipped her other hand into mine. ‘Ash, do you think Bill likes cake?’
‘Bill likes anything but cake is not good for him.’
‘But why?’
I grinned at him and listened as he gently explained in great detail how dogs’ digestive systems differed from humans and that they were allergic to chocolate and certain fruit. For someone who was in touch with his grumpy side, he could be very patient with the girls.
The park had a closing-down-for-the-night feel to it as we followed the path to The Friendly Bean; a couple of lads were swishing backwards and forwards on the skateboard ramps, a few dog walkers ambled between the flower beds, but the swings were still in the play area and the benches around the bandstand and rose garden were all empty.
The lights in the café beckoned and when the six of us pushed through the door, I was greeted by several friendly faces and a surprising number of vaguely familiar ones. Charles, Penny, and Janie were there along with Neil Blenkinsop and Karen and Dave, the keen runner from work. There were also quite a few other people that I recognised: a woman who worked in Dr Boulter’s surgery, the young couple that lived next door but one to me, the man who stood at the ticket barrier at the station every day, the milkman, Greg, who jogged between houses as he delivered pint bottles, and a couple of checkout people from the local supermarket. There were also several fellow commuters, the balding man with a propensity for brown suits who usually sat in the same carriage as me on the seven thirty-seven train, a young permanently cheerful woman with the most gorgeous shade of auburn hair whom I often followed across the park, and a couple of others that I sort of knew but had never actually spoken to.
‘Evening,’ said Sascha with a very broad grin. ‘Busy.’
Wide-eyed, I looked at all the people in the coffee bar. There were easily four times as many as I was expecting and it wasn’t even seven o’clock yet.
‘I backed a winner.’ Her tone was triumphant. ‘Good job I got lots of cakes in.’ Dotted around the tables were little cardboard cake stands, each filled with mini cupcakes with swirled buttercream toppings of cream, pink, and pale blue. She’d done a far better job of guesstimating numbers than I had.
By seven o’clock, The Friendly Bean was packed. Ash, Hilda, and I made our way to the front of the room to the area we’d decided would be best from which to address people.
‘I can’t believe there are so many people here,’ I muttered to Hilda.
‘I have to say, I’m quite surprised too,’ said Hilda. ‘Although, in the good old days there was always a strong community spirit in Churchstone. Maybe it was the promise of cake. People love a freebie. And also, Sascha has quite a lot of connections.’ The turnout was great but I was worried that a lot of them were here to find out more about the run rather than wanting to volunteer.
For some reason, both Ash and Hilda had nominated me chief spokesperson. To my relief, this crowd of smiley people, nodding their heads in encouragement, were clearly going to be a lot easier to please than a hostile boardroom, of which I had plenty of experience. Penny gave me a big double-thumbs-up and Janie waved, as did the man next to her, who I assumed was her husband who had done all our artwork for free. I made a mental note to make sure I thanked him.
‘Good evening everyone and thank you for coming.’
Someone lifted a cake in toast. ‘Thanks for having us.’
‘Thank you to Sascha for letting us use the café and also to Matt who designed the posters, to Neil for supporting the idea with the council, and to Hilda,’ I indicated her with my hands, ‘who came up with the idea for a parkrun in Churchstone. And to the Harriers who have all been so supportive.
‘Thanks to a generous donation from someone in the community to get us started, we have the money to set up the parkrun, although we are researching grants and hoping for local sponsorship to pay this back as we do feel it should be a community-funded event.’
A man at the back of the room put up his hand. ‘I run Churchstone Sports on the High Street, I’d be more than happy to sponsor you.’
‘That’s great, thank you.’
‘Me too.’ Another man raised his hand. ‘Picton’s, family solicitor’s on Church Street.’
‘Brilliant.’ I hadn’t been expecting people to offer money tonight; this was an unexpected bonus. ‘Perhaps we can get together at the end of the meeting? For now, one of the things we are in desperate need of is volunteers. There are 678 parkruns in the UK and we hope to make Churchstone number 679. However, to sustain those existing runs there are over 15,000 volunteers.’ I paused and let the number sink in, scanning the faces to vet their reaction. To my relief, half of them didn’t jump to their feet to leave. That was a good start. ‘In order to make the parkrun happen every Saturday, we need at least twenty volunteers every week. Obviously, we would have a rota so we really need a bank of between forty and fifty people who would be willing to be help. So I’m asking for people who might be interested and who might know other people who would be interested. Some of these roles would also allow you to take part in the run but obviously things like marshals would preclude that. I’ve drawn up a list of the sorts of roles there are.’ I indicated the A3 flipchart which Ash had dropped off earlier. ‘We’ve got everything from run director, marshal, timekeeper, token sorter, funnel manager, pre and post-set-up. There is quite a lot involved but it’s only a few hours on a Saturday morning. The aim is to start at nine o’clock so that people have the rest of the day to get on with their weekend. I’m going to hand over to Ash here, who is going to explain what some of those roles are and what they would involve.’
Ash stepped forward and seamlessly took over. I watched as he spoke, his hands punctuating his speech, his occasional steps sure and steady. He exuded charismatic self-confidence and I couldn’t take my eyes off him. Despite being dressed in an everyday navy-blue T-shirt and blue jeans, to me he was mouth-watering. Oh yeah, he was back and sexier than ever.
Concentrate, Claire. I forced myself to listen to his words rather than let myself be distracted by thoughts of what was under that T-shirt and just how well his bum filled those jeans.
It had already been agreed amongst us that for the first few months, Ash, Charles, and I would take it in turns to manage the event and rotate the run-director role as this shouldered quite a lot of responsibility. Although, having spoken to the run director at Tring, we hoped that further down the line other people would move up the ranks of the volunteers to take their turn at running the event. The RD was, we’d learned, a big job as this person was in charge of set-up, briefings, health and safety, making sure the course was safe and obstacle-free and ensuring that if there was an accident or anyone was injured that they could be looked after properly.
The information pack that had come through from the parkrun organisation itself had been impressive.
After Ash finished, I took to the floor again, thanking everyone for coming and inviting people to fill in their contact details if they were interested in helping or running on the sheets of paper on clipboards with which Poppy, Hilda, Janie, and Penny were now circulating. If anyone was specifically interested in a particular role, they could put their name and number next to the role outlined on the A3 Flipchart.
Elaine, my neighbour, was first to the chart with two other women.
‘That was very good, Claire. You’re very good at public speaking. I was impressed. This is Marsha. She used to be Head of Maths at Churchstone Secondary – we haven’t seen each other for a couple of years – and this is Wendy. She was a science technician in the chemistry labs at the school. Retired like me and Marsha.’
‘Hello,’ I said to the other two ladies, slightly overwhelmed by Elaine’s rapid-fire information dump.
‘We’ve decided to volunteer to be your official timekeepers and token sorters,’ announced Wendy. ‘It’ll be something to do on a Saturday morning and the three of us used to have such a laugh at school. We always organised the school quiz together. I can’t believe we’ve lost touch. And here we are tonight, picking up exactly where we left off.’
‘And it doesn’t seem like five years since our joint retirement do,’ added Marsha. ‘Although that ghastly carriage clock gave up the ghost after five months.’
‘I never liked the bloody thing anyway. Who needs to be reminded of how slowly time goes when you’re not at work?’ Elaine chipped in, the quick smile at odds with the melancholy expression in her eyes. ‘Or how many hours it is until wine o’clock.’
‘Lord, yes. This will give us a reason to get out in the fresh air on a Saturday morning.’
‘And for a weekly meet-up. Sascha makes a damn good cup of coffee. We can sit here putting the world to rights and sort out all your tokens.’ Marsha beamed at me. ‘Can’t wait to get cracking. When do you want us?’
The three of them were as garrulous as each other and, I realised with a sharp pang of guilt as I noticed Elaine’s animated face, just as lonely. A touch of shame nudged my conscience at the way I’d avoided the other woman and had taken so little interest in her. I hadn’t taken the time or the trouble to find out that, once upon a time, she’d had a busy, useful job and was of value to the community. Shame on me. From now on, I would definitely make a lot more effort to be more neighbourly. They were so busy chattering away as they signed up with the big fat marker pens I’d supplied, they didn’t notice that I’d been lost in thought for a moment.
‘Thanks a lot, ladies. I’ll be in touch. Do you do WhatsApp?’ I’d already decided that it might be worth setting up a group.
They all nodded and carried on chirruping away amongst themselves like lively canaries. I worked my way through the busy room. Each member of the clipboard team was engaged in earnest conversation. Plenty of people seemed keen to sign up which was extremely gratifying, as was the energetic buzz in the room. Hilda, busy chatting to a group of three older men and two familiar women, caught my eye and called me over.
‘Claire, come and meet Bert, George and Harry. They used to run the bicycle shop. And Georgina and Grace both work for Sainsbury’s part time and are keen to get involved on their days off.’ No sooner had I chatted to all of them than I was called over by Penny to talk to two other men. ‘Claire, this is Edward Comely, Sascha’s dad, and his neighbour, Adam Fullbanks.’ I recognised Adam as the man who’d offered sponsorship from the local sports shop.
‘Very impressive turn out,’ said Edward. ‘And very well organised. I hear you work for Cunningham, Wilding and Taylor. One of their rising stars.’ He glanced over to where Dave from work sat with Karen and another woman I didn’t recognise. Dave acknowledged us with a brief salute.
‘I’m not sure about that,’ I said blushing slightly. Edward tilted his head as if sceptical of my modesty and I felt his narrow-eyed scrutiny.
‘I’m always interested in good people, if you ever want a change.’
I frowned, trying to think what I knew about him. ‘You’re an accountant.’ I remembered Sascha telling me.
He laughed. ‘Well that’s put me in my place. I run Comely and Mitchell. We’ve got a couple of offices in the area but our main operation is in Churchstone.’
‘I’m so sorry. Of course I’ve heard of you.’ They had offices in most of the nearby market towns and had a reputation for being a good, solid, reliable family business.
‘Why don’t you come and have a coffee with me sometime?’ he suggested with a very direct expression. The man was nobody’s fool and I could see where Sascha got her business acumen.
I smiled at him, savvy enough not to say that I had no intention of leaving CWT; it never did to turn down a contact. ‘That would be lovely, thank you.’
I turned to Adam Fullbanks. ‘Thank you for offering to sponsor the event. That’s very generous of you. Have you any particular ideas?’
‘Well, it’s the perfect fit, isn’t it? Obviously, my shop will benefit. We’re the only place for miles that offer advice and expertise on buying trail and running shoes. I was thinking I could offer ten per cent off any purchases in store for anyone who produces a parkrun barcode, same as I offer to the Harriers, and I’d be happy to supply the loud-hailer that you’ll need to buy.’
‘You’ve been to a parkrun before then.’
‘A few around the country. Occasionally I get to the Harrogate one. Unfortunately Saturdays are my busiest days. But if we’re away on holiday I try to get to the nearest one. Last year we did Poole and Edinburgh. But if there’s one on my doorstep, I’d hope to take part a bit more often and I could help with the pre-run set up every now and then – although, with the shop I can’t do much else.’
‘Every little helps, as they say.’
‘I’m no runner,’ declared Edward, ‘but I’d like to help. Sascha is pretty self-sufficient but I could pitch in with the run and then offer her an extra pair of hands. I think she might be a bit busy afterwards if this becomes the designated meeting spot.’
I laughed. ‘I think, given the café’s location and Sascha’s support so far, that’s pretty much a given.’ At that moment, as if she could tell we were talking about her, she raised her head and gave me and her father a quick wave. The free cupcakes had gone down well and I was pleased to see that plenty of people had bought drinks. It was good to see her support being paid back.
Adam and I agreed to talk more and I moved on to find Ava quietly hoovering up the leftover cupcakes, looking a little flushed. ‘You’ll be sick if you eat too many.’
‘I think I ate too many already. My tummy hurts.’ Her lower lip wobbled. I scooped her up onto my hip, hoping that she wouldn’t throw up down my shoulder.
‘Oh, sweetie, that was silly.’
‘But they were yummy.’
‘They were. How many did you have?’ I bit my lip; I really should have kept a closer eye on her.
‘Only two… maybe three.’ When I raised a silent eyebrow, she held up one hand extending all her fingers and amended it to, ‘P’raps five.’
I swallowed down the laugh bubbling in my throat at the honest jump to five and gave her sturdy little body a hug, even though my own stomach recoiled at the thought of that much sugar. Burying my head in her curls, I dropped a kiss on her head, a surge of love making my heart burst. The cupcakes might be small but they had a good wodge of buttercream on the top. No wonder she felt a bit sick.
Hilda materialised at my elbow like my very own Mary Poppins with Poppy at her side. ‘Ava’s not feeling too good,’ I said. ‘She’s got tummy ache. Too much sugar.’
Poppy rolled her eyes and muttered something like, ‘Serves her right.’
I raised a pointed eyebrow. Poppy smiled sweetly. ‘It’s nice here. It reminds me of the place Grandad takes us to for ice cream in the Valley Gardens
.’
‘Don’t talk about ice cream,’ cried Ava. ‘Don’t feel well.’
‘And a late night, I shouldn’t wonder,’ said Hilda with a smile, lifting a hand to Ava’s rosy cheeks. ‘But she’s got good colour. Not grey or green. I think she’ll be all right. Perhaps some fresh air will help. Shall I take her outside for a little while? It’s getting a bit stuffy in here.’
It was unlike Hilda to complain and I realised that her face was a little pale and her eyes not as bright as usual. Because of her sheer energy, I often forgot she was actually quite elderly. ‘It’s probably time we wound things up. Between us, I think we’ve chatted to most people.’
‘Certainly have, and everyone has signed up.’ Her face brightened for a second but I could tell she was very tired. It was definitely time to take her home. I caught Ash’s eye and, like a parent, gave a discreet nod towards Ava, Poppy, and Hilda. Immediately getting the message, he nodded and began to wind up his conversation
‘Amazing turn out.’ Ash came to my side as I glanced around the room, still not quite able to believe the numbers of people who had turned up. For a moment, I felt a little overwhelmed by the outpouring of goodwill and support that everyone had exhibited. It was totally heart-warming.
‘I think we’re really going to make this happen, Hilda.’
‘Well, of course we are. Was it ever in doubt?’
Chapter Twenty-Seven
There was a rustle of feathers as Poppy threw herself onto the bed again, all moody teenager with sprawling, lethargic limbs.
‘So, is Ash your boyfriend?’ she asked, her eyes measured in the reflection in the mirror as I started to apply my make‐up.
‘We’re friends,’ I said, keeping my answer deliberately non‐committal and short. I wasn’t about to elaborate to a ten-year-old.
‘Why’s he taking you out to dinner?’
Phew, that was an easy one. ‘To say thank you. I helped him get a job interview. And we’ve got lots of things to discuss about the parkrun after last night. Didn’t our meeting go well?’