Highland Fling

by Emma Baird

  “Gaby!” Dexter emerges from his chalet, the smart business suit back in place and shoes on his feet. “Take me to Lochalshie. I must see the place.”

  He insists I drive, claiming the narrow roads and death-wish of the local drivers and motorcyclists terrify him and that he’ll get a taxi back afterwards. In the car, he continues to run ideas by me. In one, Caitlin roars up the village in a Blissful Beauty branded speed boat and in another, she makes over all the winning competitors in the games, women and men. The 21st century skin care and make-up company, Dexter tells me solemnly, is open to all and you ignore the trans community and its desire to spend money on make-up at your peril. I nod along, excited and nervous about what I’ve done. Still, when I ask how many people he thinks the launch will attract, the reply should mollify any objections the committee might raise. Caitlin goes everywhere with an entourage of thirty-odd. The list of essential journalists and influencers totals more than seventy, the hangers-on who come along to any event where PR agencies seek bulk numbers to make a launch look more important add up to one hundred, and Caitlin’s loyal fans who will travel anywhere to see her number one hundred. Factor in another three or four hundred people in the surrounding area who won’t be able to resist such glamour and we’re looking at an extra seven hundred or so people. More, even. Blimey. The village will need to do some serious preparation.

  As we get nearer to Lochalshie, the nerves kick in. I’m eager for Dexter to see the place at its best, and I squirm in my seat willing the sun to break out from the cloud cover and scatter glitter dust on the surface of the loch and the houses that surround it. I have to force myself to concentrate on the road as I keep sending beseeching glances upwards, begging it to come out. We pass the village sign, and the miracle I wanted happens—the sun shows its face. Dexter stares out of the window, abandoning the series of email messages he’s been battering out on his phone. This isn’t the usual pale sun I’m used to by now in this part of the world. It’s a proper golden globe, and only one or two fluffy white clouds mark the skies. The water sparkles and gleams in the sunlight and the mismatched paint on the houses along the front adds to the colour. Even the top of the hills and mountains that surround the loch are visible. I park in the village square and offer to give Dexter a tour of the place, show him where the games take place so he can visualise his marquee. He gets out of the car and I hear a curse as appalling as the language he used earlier. I dash around to his side and see he’s just stepped into a pile of horse manure. Oops. Lochalshie being a small place, normal practice is for Laney Haggerty of the nearby riding school to take one of her ponies for a trot up and down the high street on a Monday morning.

  “Sorry about that,” I yelp, and hurry him to the side of the road and the grass. “Wipe it back and forth a few times. It’ll be fine!”

  Equilibrium recovered, we set off toward Jack’s house. It’s right in front of the field they use for the games every year. I’ve never looked at it that closely before, but as we draw nearer, I realise it’s smaller than I remembered. How will another marquee fit in here along with the beer tent and the essential fiercely contested home bakes sale marquee? Dexter marches up and down it a few times, stopping from time to time to put his hands over his eyes, stare into the distance and wipe his feet on the grass vigorously.

  “Is it okay?” I ask. “Do you think you’ll be able to do it here?”

  His eyes shine when he turns to me. “Oh yes! The whole point will be exclusivity. And we’ll put pop-up stalls all over the place, along with a mobile beauty van. That hotel back there—do you think they could host a reception?”

  “Yes,” I say, answering on their behalf. Let’s hope the owner has the sense to charge the company five times his usual rate.

  “Take me to the place,” he says, and we set off back in the direction we came. Just as Jack’s house comes into view, the minibus pulls up, and he gets out. The bus is empty, and I expect he’s about to head off and pick up the latest group from either Edinburgh or Glasgow airport. The front door opens, and he jumps down, cat-like on his feet.

  “Hello Gaby,” he says, the eyes doing one of those up and down confrontational things with Dexter.

  Ooh.

  “This is Dexter. Dexter, Jack. He runs minibus tours of Scotland for visitors. Dexter’s the marketing manager for one of the clients I work for.”

  A half-hearted handshake follows. It crosses my mind that if these two resemble Jamie Fraser and Jack Randall in the Outlander series, it is only fitting that any meeting lacks enthusiasm. I think about commenting on it, then decide if Jack already hates those comparisons, he won’t welcome this one.

  “Dexter’s here to scope the place for—ouch!”

  Ah yes. The stamp on my foot there was no doubt a reminder that these plans are in the early stages.

  All of a sudden, Jack grabs Dexter by the lapels of his expensive suit jacket so that the two of them are eyeball to eyeball.

  “Did you hurt Gaby?” he growls, and the unworthy part of me cheers. Yes! I shouldn’t react this way, but it’s thrilling when two men appear to fight over you.

  Dexter plants his hands on Jack’s and throws them off, brushing off his lapels as thoroughly as possible. I jump in with a “no, no I’m fine” before this turns nasty. Plus, I can’t have Dexter rejecting Lochalshie as his venue of choice for the launch of Blissful Beauty in the UK, if he only remembers it as the place where he was beaten up. “We’re going to the Lochside Welcome, Jack!” I say, my voice too bright. “To see if they’ll take a booking. Would you like to come?”

  “No.” He closes his eyes for a second or so. “Sorry about that. I’m a bit sensitive to men assaulting women. Something that happened a few years ago.”

  My mind boggles, trying to fill in all the blanks. As explanations go, it’s typical male—lacking detail. Nosey and crass as I often am, I know now is not the time to ask all the questions those two statements stirred up. And it was big of him to admit what he did in front of Dexter and me. Dexter reaches out a hand. “Hey, man. No harm done. As Gaby says, I’m looking to do something here in the summer. Something big. You do tours, right?”

  Jack nods warily.

  “Great!” Dexter gives him a back slap I suspect takes their newfound friendship too far down the familiarity pathway. “I’ll be in touch! Hey, has anyone ever told you that you look like that guy,” he turns to me snapping his fingers. “You know, Gaby. I bet you watch it. The one who plays... I can’t remember his name.”

  As one, Jack and I exchange an eye meet. I snap my fingers. “You’re so right, Dexter! He’s the spit of Jon Snow in Game of Thrones, isn’t he?”

  I watch Dexter’s face wrinkle in confusion before deciding I must be right. “Jon Snow! Kit Harington! Totally. Love that show. Season seven was epic.”

  As we wander off, Lochside Welcome bound, I sense a man smiling as he watches us leave, and when I lift a hand behind my back to give him a thumbs-up, I know he does it back.

  CHAPTER 15

  “So, he jumped in on this Dexter guy when he stamped on your foot?”

  Two days later and I’m at Jack’s house working, ahem, and Katya wants me to go over again what happened when Jack met Dexter. We’ve mulled over the explanation between us, Katya muttering darkly that domestic abuse is no laughing matter. I agree and try to hold back from jumping in with a ‘what-a-hero-for-sticking-up-for-women’ comment. I’m reminded once more that I am supposed to be on the Convince Jack Kirsty is His Ideal Woman mission.

  When I tell this to Katya, she bursts out laughing. “Seriously? You fell for that?”

  She stops laughing, however, when I tell her about Donnie, the picture man who offered thousands of pounds for that picture of Kirsty that Jack turned down.

  “Mmm,” she says, and I’m disappointed when she comes up with nothing else, such as a plausible reason he keeps the picture because it matches his decor. “They deserve each other, stampy foot incident aside. Mean and moody meets whatever sh
e is. I mean, last week she—”

  She coughs. “Never mind,” and I puzzle at it. What did Kirsty do last week and what does my friend know about it? Still, if she has a weird secret to keep, so do I—something I haven’t told my friend.

  Dexter and I walked to the Lochside Welcome after leaving Jack, where Ashley the manager was all too keen to discuss possible could-not-be-named celebrity appearance that might take place on August 15. He listed off all the spirits they stocked, eager to prove their cocktail range could compete with any London venue. If a sophisticated crowd needed champagne, he had vintage, loads of the stuff. The bottles ended up ancient by default and no-one ever drank it in Lochalshie. The Wi-Fi reception in the Lochside Welcome was perfect too, thanks to a wee cash handout no questions asked with the mast folks, so the folks who needed to update their Instagram accounts etc., needn’t worry.

  “Sorry about that, Gaby,” he said as I stared at him. I’m in the property right next to the Lochside Welcome, and they get perfect signal/Wi-Fi connection, whereas Kirsty’s house is a blackout zone. Dexter nodded along to everything, throwing in the usual ‘awesome’s’ amazing’s’ and ‘fantastic’s’ before insisting on a guided tour of the whole place. He took lots of photos and issued a steady stream of commands I realised sounded so familiar because I was so used to them. The public bar area was ‘beyond beautiful atmospheric’. If, a teeny-tiny suggestion here, Ashley cleared out all the old furniture and ordered in new stuff in colours that matched Blissful Beauty branding. The bar with its modern gin and vodka optics were so authentic they made Dexter want to stand in front of it for hours and stare at its brilliance, but Ashley might want to consider spirits and whiskies that used a particular colour palette, so it matched Blissful Beauty, and replace the lot?

  By the end, Ashley wore the same glazed expression I recognised from my first meeting with Dexter. I whispered, “remember the money” in his ear, and when Dexter asked how much he needed to put down as a deposit at the end, Ashley glanced at me, swallowed hard and said, “You get the hotel exclusively for the day and night. £25,000 upfront. Another £50,000 the day before the event takes place and £25,000 afterwards. Not including the two glasses of champagne per guest and the handmade pizzas.”

  “Okay,” Dexter said, and Ashley’s panicked look told me he regretted not asking for more. Still, if he added twenty-five percent to all his bar charges, he’d soon make it up. Even with that mark-up, it was still half the price of what Londoners were used to paying.

  Dexter then insisted on buying us both lunch. His request for a vegan pizza didn’t faze Ashley, who presented him with one ten minutes later. He’d decorated the cheese-free dish with a sprig of rocket, olives and artichoke hearts, and served the accompanying chips with a home-made tomato ketchup instead of garlic dip. He was about to tuck in when I remembered what it said on the menu—Chips cooked the proper way in beef dripping! “Sorry,” I said, whisking the bowl away from him. “You can’t eat them because Ashley fries them in animal fat.” Hashtag sorrynotsorry. The Lochside Welcome’s chips were something else, though Dexter might not appreciate the spectacle of me cramming handfuls in my mouth the way Jack had. But his eyes as he watched me dip them into the garlic mayo had a mesmerised quality to them. His gaze focussed on my throat too, keeping track of every chip as it moved from plate to fingers to my stomach.

  Meal finished and further orders issued to Ashley about all the things he needed to do to make his ‘super-cute hotel’ even cuter, I offered to drive Dexter back to Ardlui crossing my fingers behind my back he’d say no. He shook his head. “No, I can get a taxi. I’ve got a business account with Uber.” I hadn’t reckoned he’d find one nearby, but his app showed there were two cars in the vicinity. Ten minutes later, we heard the driver sound his horn outside.

  “Gaby, this has been incredible. The launch will have people talking about it for months, it’s so out there. Thanks for the idea.”

  I nodded, and hoped Melissa would be so pleased with me, she’d award me a bonus or a hefty pay rise. A Volvo estate pulled up beside the hotel, and the driver wound his window down.

  “Are you ready to go, pal? If I can get you back to Ardlui by two, I can nab all the jobs in the east before Joe Alexander gets anywhere near the area.”

  To my astonishment, Dexter threw his arms around me. “I’m gonna be kinda busy the next few months, but I’d love to take you out properly and feed you more fries when this is all over. What do you say?”

  He couldn’t see my face as it was muffled up against his armpit; a bonus as my expression was aghast rather than flattered. The next bit took me by surprise too, as he let me go and swooped in before I could stop him, planting a kiss on my lips.

  “Ciao, baby!” And with that, he was in the back of the car, giving me a cheery wave as it headed south-east towards Ardlui.

  Stunned, I turned away, planning to head back along the road to Jack’s house where I planned to carry on with my dual jobs of designing Blissful Beauty’s website and bringing the Lochalshie village one up to scratch.

  “Gaby, Gaby!”

  Argh and double argh. Across the street, her face the perfect picture of curiosity mingled with delight was Mhari, dressed in her pharmacy uniform. She must have been on her lunch hour, and it was my bad luck that the end of it had coincided with Dexter and I leaving the hotel. Yet another thing for her to be the first to tell the WhatsApp group about.

  “Who’s he, Gaby? That your new boyfriend then? An American! D’ye suppose he’ll move up here too?”

  “A man I work for. No and no. It’s just natural Yankee friendliness. Hugging and kissing people they barely know is standard, and they could teach us closed-off Brits a thing or two,” I said.

  “Aye, aye?” Mhari asked, her eyes widening and mouth rounding into an ‘o’. “Looked awfy friendly to me.”

  The too-familiar ping sound of WhatsApp messages going back and forth sounded, no doubt three hundred villagers contributing their opinions to the latest developments in my life. Jack’s mini-bus passed us, Mhari raising a hand to wave at him and then staring after it, her face creased up in a frown.

  “Well, that wasnae friendly. Didnae even wave back. What d’ye think’s the matter with him?”

  I turned to watch the bus make its way out of the village. “Got out of bed the wrong side. Again.”

  I headed to Jolene and Stewart’s cottage on the street behind the main road to share the good news about the Blissful Beauty launch. Her eyes rounded in wonder. “That’s sweet as!” she exclaimed. “For real, Gaby? Caitlin too? Oh boy oh boy oh boy. The committee will hit the roof with excitement. Mind you, I’ll need to tell them who Caitlin is. None of them will have heard of her.”

  I’m not one to stereotype the older generation and what they do or do not know, but it is eons since the rest of the committee bar Jack waved goodbye to their 21st birthday. And most of them favour the tartan/tweed/wellie approach to dressing. Make-up doesn’t darken their doors either.

  “Are you sure?” I asked. “I think Blissful Beauty will take the whole place over. The Highland Games won’t get half as much attention.”

  “Who cares? Most of the committee find it an effort to organise the thing every year. If some other company wants to come in and take over, so much the better. We’d better tell everyone in the village to get their homes on Airbnb as soon as, seeing as there’ll be heaps of people needing an overnight stay.”

  She fiddled with her phone, thumbs moving over the screen at double fast rate. If that was the Lochalshie WhatsApp group told, she might as well have put a gigantic ad on the front page of Google, Facebook and Amazon, ‘Caitlin to visit remote Scottish village August 15’. Dexter told me Caitlin’s agent would confirm nothing, but orchestrated leaks were all part of a successful launch campaign and if word of her whereabouts came from the village itself, even better.

  I say goodbye to Katya now, reflecting how right she was about Jack’s mean and moodiness, and wonder afresh why I k
ept quiet about the Dexter Incident. As I open one of the web pages I’m working on for Blissful Beauty, I imagine how a ‘date’ with its marketing manager might go. Personal Dexter would be too like work Dexter— how could he not be? I’d turn up for our ‘date’—and I know it would be in some hipster venue so achingly cool it was bound to make me feel inadequate—dressed in my best gear courtesy of the Dating Guru’s recommendations for first date outfits. He’d take one look at me, tell me I looked beyond awesome amazing, and then suggest next time a different pair of shoes might work. And what about jeans that were black not blue, and so on and so forth until he’d recommended a complete outfit change.

  My wretched mind then fiddles around with the scenario. Instead of Dexter waiting for me in a hipster bar, Jack picks me up in his mini-bus, drives us to a tiny hotel miles away, lifts me in his arms and carries me across the threshold, not bothering to check us in and whisking me upstairs where he...

  Oof. Not only cliched, Gaby, Katya barks at my overactive imagination. But you’ve made the bloke superhuman too. In your world, are there many men who can carry someone for so long? I squawk back at her that the first photo we’d ever seen of him was one where he’d just won the caber toss competition, which made him a contender for such feats. And although I am still to find out what that tossing a caber is, it must equal strength, right? In defiance, my mind returns to the fantasy adding a log fire in the hotel’s bedroom and a sheepskin rug where we are just about to discover if it is as soft and fluffy as it looks when the man himself walks in, stony-faced once more.

  Expression hastily changed from dreamy to work face, I call out, “Jack! Don’t usually see you at this time of the day?”

  True, the mini-bus tour days means he returns at 9pm most nights, and I’d assumed when I’d seen him earlier he’d been on his way to Glasgow or Edinburgh to pick up another bus-load of tourists.

  “Emergency,” he says, scrolling through his phone. “My tour guide’s sick, so I’ve got no-one to do the commentary to tomorrow’s tour.”