A Home for Shimmer

by Cathy Hopkins

  ‘They must feel cooped up in there,’ I said, remembering how Ginger acted when he was kept inside. He was one miserable cat.

  Mazhar nodded. ‘We have an area where we can let them out one at a time so they get some exercise at least and we also play classical music to help keep them calm, and sometimes give them catnip which is a herb they seem to like. We even have someone who comes in and does massage sometimes – on the dogs too, they love it.’

  Caitlin ran to catch us up. ‘Don’t you find it heartbreaking working here?’ she asked.

  Mazhar smiled. ‘Of course I do, especially when I see the cases of abuse or an animal that has been neglected, but at least I am doing what I can – and all of these little guys are such fun to hang out with. Animals are so trusting, dogs will love a person unconditionally if they are treated well – and even sometimes if they aren’t. I just try to do what I can to keep them safe and find them homes, so it’s a very rewarding job, really.’

  By the time we’d finished, I felt sad. So many animals in need of homes and someone to love them. ‘I’m glad there are places like this,’ I said to Mazhar when it was time to say goodbye.

  ‘Me too,’ he said. ‘And we need more centres. It’s hard work but worth it.’

  ‘Can we stay in touch in case we have any more questions?’ asked Dad.

  ‘Of course you can. Best of luck with your venture,’ he said.

  We need more than luck, I thought as we walked back to the car. We need a miracle – one that involves us finding a bounty of gold at the bottom of the pond.

  Everyone, even Caitlin, was quiet as we drove away. I cuddled Shimmer extra close and buried my nose in her soft fur. ‘You’re my girl,’ I said, ‘and I’m going to make sure nothing bad ever happens to you.’ She replied in her usual fashion – by giving me a big wet lick.

  Chapter Nine

  Chateau D’Espair

  Dear Diary,

  Silverbrook Farm rescue centre/farm shop/café project update one week after the visit: NOT HAPPENING.

  Family mood: It is Chateau D’Espair here. Everyone is mucho glum and silent. Even Josh, who’s usually Mr Bright and Annoyingly Perky.

  Silverbrook animals: oblivious to the atmosphere. Ginger likes to go exploring now that it’s April and the winter is over. Sometimes we don’t see him for hours because he is out surveying his new territory and no doubt telling any creature he meets that he is king of the land. Shimmer still eats too fast and gets hiccups – she loves food and eats anything she sees, even bread. One day she got the runs and Dad had to take a look at her and put a thermometer up her bum to check her temperature. Boy, did she let out a yelp! It didn’t stop her eating everything in her sight afterwards though. Her favourite food is ice cream. Vanilla. She can’t get enough of it. She eats it in one go. No licking and savouring it for her. Gomph. And it’s gone. Other favourites are sausages, sausage rolls and crisps – any flavour.

  School: is fine. Seems a long time ago since I stood outside feeling nervous. It’s cool for a school but nice to be on holiday from it over Easter.

  Me: Since our visit to the rescue centre, I feel like I am made from wet sand – and not even getting Easter eggs cheered me up. Shimmer seems to have picked up on this and as soon as I sit down, she comes and sits next to me and puts her head on my knees. But that might be because she wants to eat the Easter eggs. She is one greedy dawg. Now the weather is getting better, I take her down to the beach, which she loves because she can dig the sand there and she adores playing in the waves. So far, Mum and Dad haven’t found her another home, though I don’t think they’ve been trying too hard. I don’t ask about it because I don’t want to remind them of their plan to find her somewhere else.

  Late afternoon, I emailed Natalia.

  From: Chumbuttie@hotmail.com

  To: DiamondDiva@gmail.com

  Visit to rescue centre has shown us that we were aiming way beyond our level. Project abandoned. Boo hoo. We are the house of Les Miserables here.

  Love

  Amyserable

  From: DiamondDiva@gmail.com:

  To: Chumbuttie@hotmail.com

  Dear Darlink Chumbuttie

  No way. Get up. Get over it. One should always aim high. Remember that quote: if a man aims for the top of a tree, he will get to the lower branches, if a man aims for the stars, he will reach the top of the tree.

  Huh? I thought.

  A second later, another email pinged in.

  From: DiamondDiva@gmail.com

  To: Chumbuttie@hotmail.com

  Dear Dozo

  It means always aim beyond your means.

  N XXX

  It was as if Natalia was reading my mind. I had forgotten how spookily psychic she could be, as well as infuriatingly positive. She was always coming out with quotes she found in her ‘think big, change the world, change yourself, conquer the universe’ books. She didn’t understand. She hadn’t heard what Mazhar had told us. We had the facts and Silverbrook Farm animal rescue centre was a non-starter. Mum and Dad had no savings. Dad had little work. The situation was hopeless.

  To: DiamondDiva@gmail.com

  From: Chumbuttie@hotmail.com

  Dear Nat. You are Very Annoying. Love Amy.

  From: DiamondDiva@gmail.com

  To: Chumbuttie@hotmail.com

  Herumph. So are you Annoying, you poo bucket. Don’t give up. Miracles happen but first you have to work hard. Make plans. There will be a way. Love Natalia

  Another of her quotes, I thought. Although highly irritating, I didn’t want Natalia to think I was a loser, so I decided to Google some quotes of my own and send them back to her. I will out positive you. Haha, oh yes, let’s see who can have winning attitude.

  I Googled ‘quotes for success in business’. Pages and pages of sites came up. I clicked on the first one and began to read.

  1. Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway. ~ John Wayne

  Hmm. OK, if you’re a cowboy I guess, I thought.

  2. If you don’t make things happen then things will happen to you. ~ Robert Collier

  Yeah, like mass family depression. It’s like the Temple of Doom round here lately.

  3. A business has to be involving, it has to be fun, and it has to exercise your creative instincts ~ Richard Branson

  Missed a point there, Richard my man, I thought. It also has to have lots of dosh rolling in. Doesn’t he know anything?

  4. Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve. Thoughts are things. And powerful things at that, when mixed with definiteness of purpose, and burning desire, can be translated into riches ~ Napoleon Hill

  Yeah. Go Napoleon. Now you’re talking.

  5. Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Try telling that to my parents, Mr and Mrs Grumpbucket.

  As if to show what real enthusiasm was, Shimmer started to chase her tail and started whizzing round in a circle. It was so funny to watch her going faster and faster trying to catch it.

  6. It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not stop ~ Confucius

  Unless you are Shimmer chasing her tail, in which case, it is a good idea to stop when you get dizzy, I thought as Shimmer collapsed on the floor, her head spinning. She looked up at me, tongue out, tail wagging. She is one happy daft dog. I do love her.

  7. Life isn’t worth living unless you’re willing to take some big chances and go for broke ~ Eliot Wiggington

  Ah, now that’s one to show the family, I decided.

  8. People become really quite remarkable when they start thinking that they can do things. When they believe in themselves, they have the first secret of success ~ Norman Vincent Peale

  9. Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do ~ Mark Twain

  10. The important thing is not being afraid to take a chance. Remember, the greatest failure is to not try. Once you find something y
ou love to do, be the best at doing it ~ Debbi Fields

  By the time I’d finished reading the quotes, I felt the stirring of excitement. Natalia had been right. We’d given up too soon and had to change our attitude. I copied and pasted the quotes and sent them off to Natalia. Stick those in your positive pipe and smoke them, I thought as the email disappeared from my outbox. I read the quotes again.

  ‘We accepted defeat,’ I said to Shimmer, who wagged her tail in response. ‘We’ve been thinking like losers. There must be a way forward. Other people have made things work.’

  I highlighted the ten quotes I liked the most, printed them out, then went out into the hall and called, ‘Family conference.’ Then I did a trumpet blowing sound. ‘Doo do do do dah.’

  I went downstairs. No one came. I found Mum in the kitchen. ‘Didn’t you hear? I called family conference.’

  Mum shrugged. ‘If it’s about the project, I don’t want to hear,’ she said as Dad came through the door.

  ‘Hear what?’ he asked.

  ‘I called a family conference,’ I said. ‘I’ve been thinking, we gave up too soon. Read these.’ I handed Dad the sheet of paper. ‘Think about it. Yes, we can’t achieve anything like the centre we went to see, but we could create something here. Mazhar told us that they cover over six hundred square miles. We don’t have to cover an area that big. We take it step by step. Start small with what we can manage. Please let’s not give up yet.’

  Dad looked over at Mum. Her expression gave nothing away. ‘I had actually been thinking something similar,’ he said.

  ‘Me too,’ said Josh from the doorway. ‘Let’s not give up. We could put out feelers, advertise our plan and see if we can get any backers. If we can get the community behind us, word gets out. As Mazhar said, we’re a nation of animal lovers, we might get some donations.’

  ‘And pigs might fly,’ said Mum, Queen Grumpbucket of the Day.

  ‘That would make a great headline,’ I said. ‘Especially if we could find some flying pigs.’ I flapped my arms like wings. ‘Oink, oink.’

  Dad and Josh cracked up and even Mum had to smile. ‘I suppose everyone has been a bit miserable since we gave up,’ she said.

  ‘Understatement,’ I said. ‘We’ve been tragic. Les Miserables. Famille Westall de Glumpole.’

  ‘But the real tragedy would be animals that need homes and help,’ said Dad.

  ‘Exactly,’ I agreed. ‘We don’t try to do it on the scale of the rescue centre we saw, we do it Westall size, what we can manage here at Silverbrook Farm. And the ideas of the shop and café are still good ones.’ I looked at Mum. I knew that was the part of the project that appealed to her most. ‘We could make it so fab. We have the location. People will want to come here if we get it right.’

  ‘The press,’ said Mum. ‘That’s where we should start. We could feature a few stories about the kind of animals who are brought to rescue centres, appeal to people’s hearts, individual stories about individual cases – the sadder the better – and then we could outline our plans. We can’t be the only family in the county that are soft when it comes to animals.’

  Dad gave her a surprised look. ‘Wow. You’ve changed your tune.’

  ‘Amy’s not the only one who watched TV programmes about how to be a success in business,’ she said. ‘Us Westalls are winners. And really, what choice do we have? There’s still not a lot of work for you, Richie. I haven’t got a job. I’m tired of feeling grumpy. I want to move on and be positive. I love the idea of running our own business and I reckon I could create a great shop and café.’

  I went and gave her a hug. ‘Now you’re talking.’

  Mum made sandwiches, a pot of tea and we spent the rest of the evening brainstorming ideas. Some were mad, some were sensible, but as the evening went on, a list was emerging of things that we could do:

  1. Contact bank manager Dad

  2. Contact local newspapers and invite them to come up and look at Silverbrook Farm Mum

  3. Find appealing animal stories on line to give examples Me and Josh

  4. Make a leaflet for distribution door to door Josh

  5. Arrange meeting in village hall to tell everyone the idea but also the problems. Invite newspapers and bank manager Mum

  ‘A step at a time,’ said Dad.

  ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day,’ said Mum.

  ‘And nor will Silverbrook be,’ I said, ‘but we will get there.’

  ‘No one could say we didn’t try after this,’ said Mum as she looked at her watch. ‘Heavens, Amy, it’s eleven o’clock. Bed.’

  I went up to my room feeling a million times better than I had earlier. Project Silverbrook was back on!

  Chapter Ten

  Cluck Cluck

  ‘What time is le kick-off?’ asked Caitlin.

  I laughed. ‘It’s not a football match, Caitlin,’ I said. ‘We open the doors in five minutes, but shut the doors when people are in so Shimmer doesn’t get out.’

  Caitlin punched the air then did a spin. ‘Yay. Get ready to rock.’

  We were at the village hall on the first Saturday evening in May for a meeting with the locals. Josh, Caitlin, Shimmer and I had been there since six-thirty and Caitlin and I had set out chairs for a hundred people while Shimmer ran around sniffing in all the new scents.

  The plan was to let everyone in the village know about our centre and hopefully get some of them on the bandwagon. The Westall family had gone into positive mode in the last couple of weeks and Dad had submitted his business plan to the bank. He had worked out costings with his accountant and Mum had designed plans for the café and shop with an architect. Josh had been busy with designs for the logo. All we needed now was the financing and a team of volunteers to get things started. I. Was. So. Excited.

  The hall was a bit shabby. It had threadbare red velvet curtains, one of which was hanging off the pole at the windows. There was an old piano in the corner near the stage and the whole place felt cold. I wished we’d had more time to make it look cosier and get rid of the musty smell of onion soup that lingered from the pensioners’ lunch earlier in the day.

  We’d decided that Mum would be our spokesperson because she looked professional and wasn’t shy of public speaking like Dad. He and Mum had arrived soon after us with papers, posters and leaflets for people to take away. Josh had come up with a gorgeous-looking logo for Silverbrook products, which he’d used as a header on all the leaflets. It was an ink sketch of the front of the farmhouse with roses growing over the trellis. It looked perfect. Rural but classy.

  Mum had put a suit and her heels on for the occasion and looked every inch the modern businesswoman. Dad got busy setting up a table at the back of the hall showing plans for the layout of the shop, centre and café.

  At half past seven, Dad gave me the thumbs up and Caitlin and I opened the door to find Mrs Watson outside.

  I looked up and down the road.

  No sign of anyone else.

  ‘Where is everybody?’ I asked as she came in. Mrs Watson shrugged. ‘There’s a big football match on tonight. Everyone will be in watching that. Me, I don’t go for all that kicking a ball about. I like the soaps.’

  ‘It can’t be that,’ said Mum after Mrs Watson had gone in. ‘Surely not?’

  Ten minutes later, Mr and Mrs O’Neill arrived with Zack and Joe. Zack gave me the thumbs up and winked. Caitlin had told me he had a crush on me. As if. I stuck my tongue out at him. It didn’t seem to put him off because he grinned back at me.

  A trickle more people arrived but, at eight o’clock, there were only seven people in the chairs.

  ‘Should I start or not?’ Mum asked.

  ‘Give it a bit longer,’ Dad said.

  ‘Maybe Caitlin could get up and show us her acting skills,’ I suggested. I was joking, but Caitlin agreed straight away.

  ‘I could sing if you like,’ she said.

  ‘What? Old MacDonald’s Farm?’ I asked.

  ‘I could do that one if you like,
’ said Caitlin. ‘Only I could change the words to Old MacWestall’s Farm. We could get people to join in.’ She began to sing. ‘With a woof woof here, a meow meow there . . .’

  Josh rolled his eyes. ‘Look, why don’t we do something useful? Go and talk to the people that are here so that they don’t get bored. Go and explain what our plans are.’

  Caitlin pouted. ‘You don’t think I could do it, do you, Josh?’

  Josh went slightly red. ‘Caitlin, I think you could do anything you set your mind to.’

  Caitlin gave him a direct and meaningful look. Haha. He turned even redder.

  By nine o’clock, only a couple more people had turned up. Mum and Dad went round and talked to everyone individually and gave them tea and biscuits, then they went off into the night.

  ‘That didn’t go too well, did it?’ said Dad after the last one had gone.

  ‘Happening event of the year – not,’ I said.

  ‘So what’s the feedback of the people who came?’ asked Mum.

  Dad sighed. ‘Those that came were encouraging, glad we’re doing it etc., etc. But no one offered to help,’ he said.

  Mum look disappointed. ‘So we’re back to square one,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘We keep on trying.’

  ‘OK,’ said Mum, ‘but what?’

  I hadn’t got any ideas. Neither did Josh, Caitlin or Dad. ‘I’ll ask my guru,’ I said.

  ‘Guru?’ asked Caitlin. ‘Like an Indian man?’

  ‘No, my business guru. My friend Natalia in Bristol. She’s a fellow Silverbrook Girl – just like you.’

  When I got home, I Skyped Natalia. It was lovely as always to see her smiling face on my screen. She’d had her dark curly hair braided into corn plaits since we last Skyped; it made her look cooler than ever. I used to feel so uninteresting next to her sometimes, her with her coffee-coloured glowing skin and wild hair, me with my pale face and straight, brown hair. She listened as I told her about the evening.