Summer Strawberries at Swallowtail Bay

by Katie Ginger

  It didn’t feel right just shoving her into a taxi. God knew what the taxi ride would do to her and what if she was sick again? Would they even take Jaz if they knew she was vomiting like The Exorcist?

  ‘I don’t feel well.’ She rubbed her eyes like a tired child.

  ‘It’s all right, Jaz,’ he reassured her. Looking back at the house, he knew it was his only option for her to retain some dignity. Helping her to stand up straight, he hooked her arm around his shoulder and slowly but surely got her back to the house, this time thanking his lucky stars for the many spare rooms in the enormous, crumbling money-pit.

  Chapter 26

  John sat in the study with the door open so he could see the stairs and Jaz, whenever she managed to descend. He hadn’t slept much last night and had snuck out at dawn to cover up her vomit, removing all trace of embarrassment, then coming back to the safety of the study as the sky grew blue.

  It had been a beautiful shade of pink as he’d walked the fields and the world around him had been quiet and still with a strong cold breeze. He’d wondered – hoped even – that he might run into Hetty, but of course he hadn’t. There was no reason for her to be there that early. Seeing her with Ben should have changed how he felt about her, but his heart and head still longed for her. Tentatively, he sipped his coffee and kept watch on the stairs.

  He’d stealthily managed to get Jaz back to the house unseen and plonked her into one of the spare beds, fully clothed. The room was a little dusty, as was the bed spread when he yanked it back with one hand. Not exactly The Ritz, but it was better than nothing. Jaz had fallen asleep within seconds, but he’d still left a glass of water on her bedside along with two painkillers. She would definitely need those this morning.

  Already John’s neck was prickling with shame and embarrassment. Suddenly worried she might quit, John knew he had to stay calm and pretend like nothing had happened or have a quick chat that it was flattering but never to be, and then move on to work. But he worried things had irrevocably changed between them. Hot and flustered, he put his unused pen down and began opening a letter left on his desk by Jaz yesterday. Just when he thought life couldn’t get any worse, he scanned the page: the bailiffs were coming. Angrily, John scrunched up the letter and threw it across the room.

  Footsteps sounded in the hall, but they were loud and heavy. Not Jaz’s. John calmed a little until Felix crashed into the room and shut the door behind him, taking a seat without even being asked. John looked up from his work. ‘Felix, I need the door open.’ He noticed his brother was looking more and more like their mother every day, his face ashen and drawn. John leaned his elbows on his desk and rubbed his hands over his face. He hadn’t ever seen his brother anything other than bossy and in control. There was something defeated about him and dread shadowed John’s mind, building heavy in his stomach. ‘Felix?’

  ‘I need to talk to you.’ His voice had lost its authoritarian edge and carried a weakness that John didn’t recognise in the man before him. With a sinking feeling he knew it was a weakness born of regret.

  ‘Okay.’ John nodded and tried to say it in a way that showed support for whatever it was. He stopped and pulled back from his work. ‘What about?’

  Felix rubbed his face again, his fingertips resting in the hollows of his cheeks. ‘The investment’s tanking.’

  John’s throat closed over in a rush of panic, but he tried to control it. ‘What do you mean “tanking” exactly?’

  ‘I mean …’ He stretched the word patronisingly and John took a deep controlled breath. ‘It’s not going up, it’s going down.’

  ‘But that’s normal, isn’t it? They don’t all shoot up straight away. It’ll come back up won’t it?’

  ‘It’d have to come up a long way to get back anywhere near as much as we put in.’

  John felt a prickling around his eyes as they sharpened on his brother and his pulse raced. ‘But we’ll get some back, won’t we? Eventually?’

  Felix slowly shook his dipped head, keeping his eyes away. ‘I just don’t know. We were supposed to see almost immediate returns. It was just about timing the market and selling up when the shares shot up, but that hasn’t happened yet, and they’ve sunk so low I don’t even know if they’ll get going at all.’

  Anger rushed through John’s body and he felt the muscles of his legs contract. His chair shot back against the wall and he stood, resting his hands on the dark wood of his desk, feeling it cool beneath his knuckles. ‘I knew this would happen. I told you not to do it, Felix, but you just had to, didn’t you? You just had to ignore me as the stupid little brother you think I am.’

  ‘At least I was trying to do something, John.’ His eyes sharpened, losing their tiredness. ‘Which is more than I can say for you. All you do is sit here in your little office with spreadsheets and bits of paper.’ John balled his fists and turned, focusing out of the window on the winding arms of the wisteria. ‘Don’t turn your back on me,’ Felix spat, standing too.

  ‘Why shouldn’t I turn my back? You did this without my agreement, and now it’s all gone wrong – as I feared it would – you come barging in here, asking for help.’

  ‘I haven’t asked for help,’ Felix replied. John turned to face his brother and Felix lifted his weak chin a little more.

  ‘Then what are you doing here? And you may joke about my spreadsheets and bits of paper, but at least I work through all my ideas seeing what’s actually viable and what’s not. What could make a real difference to this family and what’s a pipe dream. I don’t get Mother’s hopes up with fantastical solutions that don’t happen. All the hours I’ve spent, Felix, ignoring my own business, working my arse off and now you want me to help solve your problem—’

  ‘It’s your problem too.’

  ‘—and dig us out of the mess you got us into.’

  Felix slid back down into his chair, defeated.

  ‘And I’m well aware it’s my problem too.’ John leaned his back on to the windowsill, tapping his fingers. His stomach was swirling with anger and fear making him feel slightly sick. ‘Are you even sorry, Felix?’ It wouldn’t change anything, but he had to know. It would help a little. Help him forgive and swallow down this terrifying ball of rage filling his stomach. But his brother, ever pig-headed and defiant, simply snorted.

  ‘Sorry for what? For trying to help my family? No. I’m not sorry for that.’ Felix crossed his arms over his chest looking every inch the bossy older brother.

  ‘You took a huge risk without the agreement of your family and you’re not even sorry now it’s failed and you’ve ruined us forever?’ John met his gaze but still no apology came. Of course his brother wouldn’t apologise for not listening to his concerns. ‘Why did you have to take it all, Felix? Why couldn’t you just use some of it? Why is it always all or nothing with you?’

  Felix pounced defensively. ‘What would have been the point in that? You play it so safe, John. It blinds you to opportunity.’

  ‘And this turned into a great opportunity, didn’t it, Felix? Do you think the bank will approve the loan now? How are we going to even start trying to do something new?’ They couldn’t even make a token payment to keep the bailiffs away. The consequences of Felix’s actions were truly dire and a fierce sense of betrayal consumed him. ‘You’ve completely ruined us.’

  John needed him to leave before he said something he regretted. He had to get to work as soon as possible trying to fix this mess – a mess he didn’t believe he could fix. He’d have to prepare his parents for the very real possibility that their only option now was selling the house. Would all their stuff fit into a two-bed bungalow? he wondered. Probably not. ‘Just go home, Felix.’

  But Felix didn’t move. ‘You’re so bloody pious, John. You always have been. Always playing it safe – overthinking. Maybe that’s why no women ever stick around.’ Despite its sting, John let the parting shot slide and Felix pushed himself out of his chair, stomping to the study door and pulling it open.

 
Jaz was just stepping across the hall. ‘Morning, Felix.’ Her voice sounded delicate from the hangover she undoubtedly had. Felix didn’t answer, and as she reached the study door, he ran his eyes over her, examining her rumpled clothes. John readied himself to defend Jaz if his brother dared to say anything, but he walked off into the depths of the house.

  Edging into the room, Jaz looked like she might start being sick again at any minute. John fiddled with some papers on his desk, trying to calm down, wishing he’d kept some painkillers for himself. His brain was going to burst out of his head and the tension in his shoulders was killing his back.

  Jaz watched on, then quietly slipped into the chair opposite, rubbing her bare arms.

  ‘John, if you want me to resign, I will.’ Her eyes were doe-like and misty with tears. She looked like a Disney character and John couldn’t help the feeling that overtook him. He wanted to laugh at the absurdity of his day so far. How could it be only half past ten? He pressed the laugh down, but it still escaped.

  Seeing Jaz’s mortified expression as he let out a breath, he quickly said, ‘No, Jaz, I don’t want you to resign. You got drunk and made a mistake, that’s all. If I told you all the times I’d done that, we’d be here all day. Besides, it’s my fault.’

  She dropped her eyes, toying with the hem of her top. ‘It’s not.’

  ‘It is. You’re a great assistant. The best I could ever have hoped for. I don’t tell you enough how much I appreciate you and what you do, so when I finally did you misread the signs. I should tell you every day how good you are at your job.’

  ‘John—’

  ‘You’re like a little sister to me, Jaz.’ He needed her to know exactly how he felt about her to extinguish as kindly as possible any more ideas. ‘I want to help you achieve the dreams we talked about last night, but because I care about you as a brother. Okay? Nothing more. But this mess – this mess is on me.’

  ‘John, I—’ She was either going to protest, drawing out this already difficult conversation, or tell him how much he meant to her, and rather than make a bad situation worse, he cut her off.

  ‘No more about it now. We’ve got work to do.’

  ‘Okay.’ She nodded, but traces of embarrassment were still colouring her cheeks. ‘What did Felix want? He seemed a bit stressed out.’

  As his anger at Felix flared and the enormity of the situation sunk in, John collapsed into his chair. He rested his head in his hands and began to work through possible outcomes and solutions. The headache that had started pounding after Felix’s news spiked and pain shot through his temples. ‘You won’t believe me when I tell you. And get ready to barricade the front door.’

  Chapter 27

  Hetty eyed the gathering clouds with concern. Her weather app had lied – out-and-out lied – telling great big giant fibs. This morning when she’d looked at the screen there’d been a big yellow sun, and it clearly said there was only a five per cent chance of rain, but the bulky dark grey clouds that were completely covering the sky said otherwise. She’d worn jeans with a short-sleeved T-shirt and the hairs on her arms were rising with the chill wind because that’s what it was now – wind. Not a breeze – a wind. And a gusty one at that.

  ‘What do we do if it rains?’ asked Macie who’d left her hair down today – it was now whipping across her face. She tied it back with the spare hair band she always had wrapped around her wrist.

  Hetty took a deep breath and examined the sky once more. Though it was blustery, the wind wasn’t blowing the clouds away, they were still mounting, blowing them into a huge patch of grey right over her festival. ‘We chuck on our pac-a-macs and try to stop people leaving. At least it’s not movie night. That went even better than I hoped.’ She thought about John and his speech. She admired his courage, his strength of character and those eyes that made her breath seize. Over these few days more than any of the others, she felt she’d seen his true self; the sense of humour beneath the hard exterior he presented to the world. But then she’d seen him kissing Jaz and the shock had been like a smack in the face. She’d long suspected that Jaz had feelings for John but hadn’t thought he shared them. How wrong could she have been? The way he’d looked at her, the way he’d been holding her underneath a beautiful, romantic starlit sky. It had caused a pain unlike any other.

  And Ben had proposed. The man she’d loved for ten years but whose lack of commitment had ruined them. Had he really missed her so much that he now realised they had a future together? Or did he feel forced into proposing just to get her back? Was it what he really wanted? She’d told him she’d think about it after the festival. She needed time to get her thoughts in order and she couldn’t do that right now, especially not with her mum and dad’s impending divorce.

  As facile as it sounded, Hetty was sure that going from getting under each other’s feet, to ignoring each other completely was what had sown the seed of doubt in her mum’s mind. That was why she couldn’t produce any evidence that Dad had been doing something he shouldn’t. But how could she get them to see the person they fell in love with in the first place, rather than the grumpy one they’d been living with for the last year?

  Macie, still gazing at the sky, said, ‘I reckon if it’s just a few showers, we’ll be fine.’ Hetty agreed, bringing her mind back to the present just as a small, furious-looking woman stomped towards them dragging a little boy by the hand.

  ‘Are you the organiser?’ she shouted, even though they weren’t very far apart. ‘That steward’ – she pointed to one of the volunteers who gave Hetty an apologetic look – ‘told me you were the organiser.’

  It didn’t take a genius to know a complaint was coming. ‘Yes, I am. I’m Hetty. How can I help?’ Though the woman was tiny she looked like she could handle herself in a fight. Hetty glanced down at the little boy but he wasn’t paying attention, though his cheeks and nose were a little pink and he seemed a bit upset.

  ‘We’ve just come from the funfair. My little boy tried ten times to win at the coconut shy but didn’t win anything.’

  Hetty had dealt with things like this before at kids’ birthday parties. When someone thought they should have won just because they’d put a lot of money into a game, but unfortunately things weren’t like that. ‘I’m afraid that is the chance you take with games like that—’

  ‘But even my husband tried and he hit one square on but it didn’t fall over. It didn’t even wobble. And he’s six foot three and built like a brick shithouse.’ Hetty’s mind took a moment to catch up with what the woman was saying. Not only was it odd to think of this tiny firecracker with a tall, broad man like she’d described, but if he had hit one of the shies it should definitely have fallen over or at the very least, wobbled. Looking at the woman in front of her, Hetty knew she wasn’t exaggerating and that she had a fair point. Tiny pinpricks of concern ran over her skin. Since the hook-a-duck thing yesterday, she’d had a suspicion that Mr Wade wasn’t as trustworthy as he first appeared.

  ‘Well, that sounds like something I need to look into.’ The woman stared in an I-told-you-so manner. ‘I think I’d better go and have a look and just make sure everything’s okay. If something is amiss then I sincerely apologise, and I’ll get it rectified.’

  The woman was a tiny bit mollified but still said, ‘Well, I’m coming with you because I want my money back.’

  Hetty headed to the funfair trying to make conversation, asking questions about the food and if they’d enjoyed the rest of the festival. The woman softened a little as she chatted but was clearly in too bad a mood to give any praise. Hetty couldn’t blame her.

  Once there, they were immediately hit by the sweet sickly smell of candyfloss. If it had been Mr Horrocks’ carnival, Hetty couldn’t imagine having to deal with anything like this, the old man had seemed so professional and trustworthy. She hoped that there’d be a next year they could book him for. She was sure nothing dodgy would go on with his games. Mr Wade clearly didn’t run as tight a ship. She spied him looking over,
pretending he wasn’t watching.

  Hetty approached the coconut shy with her head held high, assuming her authority. ‘Excuse me, what’s your name please?’

  ‘Ya what?’

  ‘What’s your name please? I’m Hetty, the event organiser, and you are?’

  ‘Robbie.’

  ‘Robbie. Hello. I’d like you to remove your coconuts for me please.’ Not a sentence she’d anticipated saying when she woke up this morning, but still. It was one of the reasons she loved her job.

  ‘Hey?’ Robbie was middle-aged with a receding hairline and portly tummy and was not happy about Hetty being there. The wind, Hetty noticed, was strong enough to blow the bunting about, and yet, not a single coconut was wobbling.

  Keeping her voice pleasant but authoritative, she said, ‘Like I said, I’m the event organiser and I’d like you to remove your coconuts please.’

  ‘Why should I?’

  The fact that he became immediately defensive put Hetty on her guard. If he had nothing to hide, he would have laughed it off and done it without question. Those who had been about to play held tightly to their balls and behind them, a crowd started to build.

  ‘Because, Robbie, I want to check you haven’t glued them down. This young man and his father tried for a long time to win but not a single one budged. And given your reluctance to do what I’ve asked, I’m inclined to believe that something isn’t quite right.’

  The little woman nodded, and Mr Wade came over to join the group. ‘Everything all right, Robbie?’

  ‘Nah, it’s not, guv.’ He pointed at Hetty. ‘This woman’s accusing me of cheating.’

  ‘Is that right, Miss Colman?’ Mr Wade asked turning to her. He was speaking like a headmaster, but his body language was that of bluster rather than authority. ‘I’m very disappointed to hear that. Relationships like ours should be based on trust.’

  Hetty studied his tanned face. She didn’t like it – the situation or his face. She’d thought he was decent at first, but he was definitely looking a bit shifty now and that speech was flannel if ever she heard it. ‘If that’s how you feel, Mr Wade, then remove the coconuts and I’ll happily apologise.’