Between Friends

by Hudson, Melanie

  My mother, the old cowbag, still hasn’t been in touch. I haven’t contacted her this week and I won’t again. No doubt I’ll see her when I get home (not that I’m sure I want Midhope to be my home any more). I have a few decisions to make, but not right now. Now is the time for providing a little TLC to the café pilgrims – and I bloody love it!

  Life here continues with its renewed twists and turns. I decided to let Isabella settle in a bit before dropping the Nathan Browne bombshell on her, which is an appropriate word to use as she did look fairly shell-shocked after I broke the news. She blushed bright red and had to grab onto the counter to steady herself. AND, for the first time in her life, not only did Isabella Gambini proceed to overly beat her meringue, she forgot to add eggs to her cake mix, too … hmm, something’s fishy here, me thinks. Do you think they had an affair? Oh – wait! Even better! Could Nathan be the real father of her first child? So exciting. I’ll wheedle it out of her soon, and if not, I’ll just get Anya to slip something ‘special’ into her gin and then we’ll discover the truth!

  Love, Aggie

  P.S. Are you sure Gethyn’s in a relationship?

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Oliver

  To: Polly

  Date: 7 April

  Dear, Polly

  I’m glad you have a friend. School was ok today because we did maths but tomorrow is The Huge Write and I don’t like holding a pen too long and even if my work goes on the wall, I don’t have anyone who would want to come and see it and because I write slowly, I sometimes have to miss playtime to finish my writing. I love writing letters to you because I say what I want to say and Miss types. Here are my answers to your questions:

  I don’t have a best friend because I’ve moved from school to school too much. The other kids in school are ok but they made their best friends by Year Three so I don’t have one as I didn’t go to school much then and even if I had gone to school and got a friend I would have moved away from him by now so it would be a waste of time. I didn’t cry when the school burnt down. I don’t know if I feel lonely but it might be nice to have a friend. My last foster mum said there’s no point wishing for what you can’t have - she was talking about a dog because I wanted a dog. I like fishing. I don’t mind the bus now but I will mind it in the summer because I’ll have less time for fishing in the evenings. I like all sweets. Didn’t you want your best friend in Iraq to be a girl?

  Oliver

  Bluey

  From: Gethyn

  To: Aggie

  Date: 7 April

  Hi, Aggie

  Don’t force the writing, forget about it. You’ll know when the time is right to start again. I’m glad you’re enjoying life at the café. It sounds wonderful. I’d love to be there right now and can imagine myself drinking tea from a giant mug (do you have giant mugs? I hope so), eating one of your cakes and staring out of the window at the changing landscape of the sea while blithering on to you about everything and nothing. I don’t know how much Polly has told you about my life (probably nothing, why would she?) but over the past couple of weeks - for once - I’ve found myself talking over a few bits and bobs, and this has helped. I think we both used the war as an excuse to get away, which is beyond ridiculous.

  But back to Appledart. I’m trying to imagine what your friends look like. I imagine Anya is someone in her sixties who wears hippy clothing and has long white hair – is that correct? And how old is Ishmael, you didn’t say? Do you spend much time with him? What colour are the horses? Are there any seals? Have you had much snow? So many questions, but I have to say, Agatha, for an author you haven’t imparted much information. Please remember, I’m living in a black and white world at the moment and it’s your job to paint me the colours of home.

  G

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Aggie

  To: Gethyn

  Date: 11 April

  Hello, you.

  Don’t you think it’s odd that we’ve become friends (I hope you do regard me as a friend now?). I don’t suppose either of us would have believed we would have become such confidantes so quickly. We must be kindred spirits.

  In answer to your questions regarding my neighbours, here is a little detail: Anya is beautiful, both in spirit and in looks. She has very short spiky hair dyed bright red (it was purple when I arrived and will be a different colour altogether next month). She’s in her sixties – I think. She never discusses any men in her life, but she gives off an aura of a woman who has known great passion. She moves like a cat. She is centred, calm and at one with her soul. She has never suggested any kind of need to have a relationship and I get the impression that she’s so utterly at peace with herself she doesn’t go out of her way looking for one.

  And Ishmael? Well, he’s striking-looking. He’s quirky, too; abstract, kind, a little bit on the spectrum, perhaps? I haven’t asked his age but I would guess forty. It’s difficult to say because Appledart seems to give its inhabitants a timelessness about their looks. It’s as if everyone who lives here becomes fixed – tree-like - remaining constant with time. Wrinkles exist within their landscape – steady and sure and content. I do sometimes wonder if Ishmael and Anya have something going on (he tiptoes to her house late at night). How wonderful if that were true – an older woman with a younger man? What a refreshing change and what an absolute goddess!

  The family-of-noise are blonde, white-teethed, annoyingly healthy, completely self-contained and, although they’re annoying, they’re actually growing on me. Then there’s the Aussie, Shaun, who runs the pub (five miles away). He’s never lost for company as he has a constant stream of guests arriving to stay at the hotel thanks to Hector’s boat. The only people who enter into his life are transient – and he’s happy that way. He’s burly and hasn’t got a clue about small talk, but he is practical, which is a great asset for the rest of us. The three of us - Ishmael, Anya and me - spend one evening a week at the pub, usually on the night the fiddler comes across from Mallaig (I know … aren’t we the twee ones?).

  As for Appledart, it’s a mountainous peninsula only accessible by boat or on foot. The hills that rise directly from the water’s edge are steep and marvellously atmospheric. A couple of handfuls of cottages are divided between the only two hamlets - Aisig and Morir. Both have pretty little harbours. Morir faces out into a sheltered inlet of water and has a calm quality, but Aisig (where I live) is much more open to the elements. Looking up from my laptop and out of the front window, I can see the Isle of Skye, and the Cullin Mountains beyond, which are snow-capped and will remain so until late spring. Because of the Gulf Stream we don’t get too much snow, but it’s very cold. We endure quite a lot of rain, which turns to ice on the track, which is why Jekyll and Hyde are invaluable.

  The best days are the days of clear blue skies when the air is so crisp it could be cut with a knife. But whatever the weather, as soon as I step outside my front door I feel soaked through in the freshness of it all. My cheeks have never been so ruddy and I have never slept so well. I have a wood-burning stove at home in Yorkshire, but it only serves as a luxurious appendage to the central heating system. In Aisig, my wood-burner is my only source of heat and it is the heart of the house. However, like a child, the stove requires constant attention, but I love it despite its neediness. We burn peat and the smell is delicious. My bedroom is always freezing cold, but I stoke up the wood-burner at night and when I dash downstairs in my pyjamas and slippers in the morning, the embers are still glowing and I’m toasty and warm in seconds. The cottage is an eclectic mix of bargain-hunt treasures, herbs, spices, old magazines, dust, Afghan rugs and house plants. I love it. It smells of earthiness and incense.

  Before I came to Appledart I was lonely, but now I’m here, I’m happy. My only fear is that the portal to Brigadoon will close soon, and I’ll have to slip out of my pretend reality and return to my real one.

  Stay safe, my lovely new friend.

  Aggie

  ‘E’ Bluey

  Fr
om: Mr & Mrs Day

  To: Polly

  Date: 8th April

  Dear Babe

  Are you still safe in Kuwait? I see scuds have been hitting the city. Wouldn’t you be safer in the desert? Mammy wants to know if you’re getting enough sleep? We’re watching the news as much as we can. Terrible business. I’ll kill Tony bloody Blair if I ever get my hands on him. Simon phoned last night to see if we’d heard from you. Mammy was so pleased he phoned, she even agreed to take a little run out to the garden centre afterwards. Don’t think badly of him if he hasn’t written. He’s just so busy. But, credit to him; I haven’t seen Mammy smile much since you went away and his phone call made her chuckle (he can wind her round his little finger, that one).

  For God’s sake, KYHD.

  Love you.

  MumnDad xx

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Aggie

  Date: 9 April

  Dear, Aggie

  I think Gethyn is still in a relationship, but I’m not sure how solid it is (you know what men are like, they never get down to the proper detail).

  I had such a shitty day today. At the evening briefing when the Chief of Staff asked the Brigades (via the communications link) if they had any points, some bloody colonel piped up and asked why the sand storm we had experienced that morning hadn’t been forecast. He said, ‘If the met girl isn’t up to the job, get someone else in’. He then went on to say that the wind direction I had given at the beginning of my brief was different to the one given by the NBC (nuclear, biological and chemical) guy and this was unacceptable. I wasn’t given the opportunity to explain which left me standing in the brief like a humiliated, inept, naughty school girl. The Chief of Staff said he would ‘speak to me in private’ which I suppose was the professional thing to do, but that brief goes out to the whole of the fucking army, and I would have loved to fight back and say …

  … ‘Fuck you, you numb-nut, arse-wiping cock-face, twat. I get the met forecast from the Yanks, so have a dig at them! AND, by the way, if there is a sandstorm and a chemical attack at the same time, the wind direction will be so variable it won’t matter – you’ll be completely fucked. And another thing, if there’s a chemical attack, put your fucking respirator on rather than try to remember the wind direction which probably will have changed since the morning briefing!’ Can you imagine the look on everyone’s faces if I had said all that and just let rip!

  Also, why did he assume the NBC officer (a MAN) was right and I (a WOMAN) was wrong? Whatever the answer, he’s fucked over my reputation good and proper. Gethyn said I should put it in context and see that the man was clearly operating under extreme pressure, was stressed out, desperate to look after his troops and may be under the effect of NAPs tablets, and that I shouldn’t take it personally (Gethyn knows I’m pre-menstrual). Luckily, Gethyn had a compass on him, so now, before each brief, to get an accurate wind direction, I step out into the desert and look for an oil refinery, follow the fumes and get the wind direction from that – clearly, if that arse-wiping colonel had any sense, he would do exactly the same thing! Why oh why didn’t the army bring a fucking met unit with them, or at least give me some basic kit – like a fucking hand-held anemometer?

  Please save all my letters. When I’m back at the Met Office I must remember to read them all to remind me that nothing that happens at work can ever be as frustrating as this. Rant over.

  Love, Pol

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Aggie

  Date: 10 April

  Dear, Aggie

  Sorry about yesterday’s letter. What a moaning, whinging baby I was. Truth is, I cocked up and I just couldn’t bear it.

  I phoned home today for the first time since I got here. They’ve introduced a welfare package to provide us with a couple of minutes of satellite phone calls per week. Poor Dad. I thought he was going to have a heart attack when he heard my voice. He just started screaming, ‘Marge, Marge, it’s our Polly, quick!’ And I was trying to tell him there was no time to get Mum and not to waste the call, and so I spent the first minute speaking to no one - typical. Mum’s voice was shaking a bit but she was calm, then Dad grabbed the phone and said, ‘I’ve had a terrible nightmare! Under no circumstances are you to get on a helicopter – promise me, Polly!’ What a ridiculous thing to say. And the worse thing is, I AM getting on a helicopter, about an hour from now, so I feel vulnerable today, which is not how I’ve been feeling at all lately.

  I want to put my hands up and say, ‘This is madness. I want to go home immediately.’ But there’s no getting off this bloody fairground ride once you’re on it and to be perfectly honest, even if someone pitched up in the next ten minutes and said, ‘OK love, there’s been a huge mistake, you shouldn’t be here, I’m taking you home,’ I still wouldn’t go because how can you leave your mates once it’s started? How can you not stay as part of the team until the bitter end? Gethyn and I were sarcastic, opinionated onlookers before the war started. But now we get it.

  I’m glad you love Appledart. It will always hold a special but bittersweet place in my heart. Reading your letters is like hearing your voice again, and you’ll never know (except for the fact that I’m telling you now) what a comfort you have been. So many memories have come flooding back, memories of the little things, like sitting at my house watching films, usually with me laying on the settee and you sprawled across Mum’s sheepskin rug (do you still sit on the floor rather than a chair?). Do you remember that year we set up the Midhope Division of Charlie’s Angels? Your mum gave you a spy set for Christmas and you persuaded me to hide behind the bins in Janey Peters’ back yard to see if she was having a fling with that bloke your mum was knocking about with – can you actually believe she really was? Your poor mum was heartbroken.

  With much love, Polly

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Josh

  Date: 11 April

  Hi, Josh

  Thanks for the apology, but you were probably right.

  Can you do me a favour, please? Could you possibly sort out all of Dad’s tools we’ve borrowed over the years? He’s getting himself into a pickle because he can’t find a few bits and bobs and is worried Alzheimers is settling in. If anything is broken just replace it. I think we have the sander, the matik (from when you dug out the drains for the new septic tank) a trestle table (from the wall papering fiasco) and a battery-powered drill (from when you built my raised beds).

  I’d forgotten how much work you did. I’m not sure what I was doing while you were doing all these jobs? If I never said thank you for all the hard work you put into the cottage, I’ll say it now. You created a beautiful home for us and, for what it’s worth, I loved it. Polly x

  Bluey

  From: Gethyn

  To: Aggie

  Date: 11 April

  Hi, Aggie

  I’m in love with Appledart and want to fly there immediately. But there is one thing I don’t understand. In your letter you said you all travel to the pub on horseback, but you have two horses to share between three people, and one of the horses is a pony – do you and Anya share?

  Speaking of Anya, a few nights ago Polly and I were laying in our bunks in the dark in the tent, hoping the scud alarm wouldn’t go off, and Polly told me she had been to Appledart (you probably already know this). But what you may not know is that Anya read Polly’s cards for her (if that is the correct terminology). In fact, Anya’s presence at Appledart is the reason Polly chose to go there. Polly wanted to ask Anya if she would ever have a child. Anya didn’t answer Polly directly, instead she told her that her future would not turn out as she might expect at that moment and that she had some challenging times ahead. Anya said Polly would travel to a hot country – to a desert - and her life would turn in an entirely different direction, but that in the desert she would finally find peace from an issue that had been troubling her.

  I’ve often wondered if people actually find a way to act
out the prophesies they are given. Take Polly, for example. Would she have accepted the offer to work with the army if Anya hadn’t predicted she would go to the desert and find peace? Maybe Polly’s future changed the very moment she stepped through Anya’s front door.

  My personal journey into the desert was less intense, but has a similar theme. I’ve journeyed from regular moments of melancholy before the war started, to the depths of despair when it began. But now I feel a greater force is pulling at me – pulling me out of myself. When I leave here I want to be a reborn version of a man others once new – a phoenix out of the ashes. I’m babbling. Write soon.

  G

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Oliver

  Date: 11 April

  Dear, Oliver.

  How was The Huge Write – did you hate it? Why don’t you ask your teacher if you can do some of your class work on a computer? You write my letters on a laptop, so why can’t other long pieces of writing also be written on one? Can’t you ask for a scribe? You said in your letter you like maths – me too. My dad always told me to, ‘play to my strengths’. If your strengths are maths and fishing then maybe focus on them. Maybe one day you will to live near the sea and be a commercial fisherman? Or you could be a maths teacher? In answer to your questions: