The Woolly Hat Knitting Club

by Poppy Dolan

  There’s a surge towards the fruit baskets and I hear a worrying crack of wicker.

  ‘Plenty to go around, ladies!’ Maggie uses her ‘please be sensible’ voice on the whipped-up crowd, the one she used on us when we had silly putty in the summer of ’96. But this bunch of knitters have seen male flesh and they are feeling wild. Money and yarns pass back and forth like a ping-pong match and after a few minutes, Patti clambers into the back room with me. ‘Isn’t it great? We’re going to have to replenish!’ She dashes out again, a big plastic bag of skeins under each delicate arm. I can’t deny the sight of readies getting tucked into an already-jammed cash box is brilliant, but at the same time that fleshy display is not what I’d call great. Not at all. And it’s definitely not what I’d call on-message either.

  After 20 minutes the fever burns out and the crowd disperses, finally giving up hope that JP will remove another layer of clothing to reveal maybe just crocheted nipple tassels. The guys finally get to tuck into the panini I brought back, although they’re now cold and unpleasantly congealing.

  ‘Doeshn’t matter, shish,’ JP says with his mouth full, as Patti holds up his sandwich for him to take another bite, ‘I’m shtarvin’!’

  ‘Yes, all that stripping is bound to take it out of you.’ I have my arms crossed and my foot is tapping out an uneven rhythm. I know it’s all the classic signs of anger and irritation – I know that all too well from my training on reading body language in others – but I can’t help it.

  JP awkwardly swallows a big mouthful. ‘What?’

  ‘Have you got time for a quick chat?’

  ‘Nope, me and Ben have to get over to the main stage in fifteen minutes. What’s on your mind?’ He lowers his eyebrows.

  ‘Ah.’ Ben looks from me to JP and from JP back to me again. He’s had the same training. He can read from JP’s facial cues and body language that JP is readying himself to meet my anger with some of his own. ‘Why don’t we… get me a drink of water, wet my whistle before my big stage debut?’ He points his thumb off the stall and far away. Patti seems to clock his meaning and heads towards the cafe. But Mags is slower to catch on.

  ‘But what about—?’ Patti takes Mags gently but firmly by the sleeve and pulls her away.

  ‘Come on then,’ JP says when we’re alone. ‘What’s got your FiloFax in a flap?’

  I try to pick my words carefully. ‘That whole stunt… thing. Where did that come from? I only ask because it kind of took me by surprise.’

  JP’s eyes skim over the exhibit centre, taking in the throng of fellow crafters. It might be nearly half past three, but they are still going strong: shopping, chatting, comparing projects in progress at the little break-out areas.

  ‘Yes, that was the plan – catch everyone off guard, with the last thing they’d think of. Make a splash.’

  ‘But me? Why did it have to catch me off guard? I wasn’t ready for that, JP. I could have… helped.’

  ‘You would have told me not to do it, you mean.’

  ‘No!’ I fiddle with my cuticles. ‘Not exactly. I might have said refine it a little. It was a bit,’ I pause and drop my voice slightly, ‘bold.’

  ‘Exactly! It was bold and attention grabbing and everyone will be tweeting it and spreading the message about the knitathon.’

  I fold my arms across my chest again. ‘But what message, JP? That you wear skin-tight vests? That you strip in public? Because I think that’s what’s going to stick in their minds, not the image of cute little baby hats. And where did you even get a vest like that?’ I’ve slightly lost my cool now. My business skill of controlling my language to lead people down the conversational paths I need them to go has deserted me and instead I’m in a maze of frustration and annoyance, getting properly lost.

  JP rolls his eyes. ‘OK, so it was a last-minute thing, while you were walking around. I was a bit stressed about how I was going to make the announcement live up to the hype – my vlog had about 200 views and I’d had hundreds of retweets. So I was chatting with Ben and Patti and we thought – go big or go home, right? So… it was her vest and some Sharpies.’

  ‘Yes. Well.’ I bite the inside of my cheek. ‘It was big, all right. Full Monty big.’

  JP lets out an exasperated sigh. ‘Come off it, sis! I got my message out, I started people talking. I did that. You don’t control everything round her.’

  ‘Oi!’

  ‘I’m not…’ He stops for a minute, breathes and nods before carrying on in a slower voice. ‘I’m not saying I’m not grateful for everything you’ve done for me and everything you are doing for me now. But you’ve done quite a lot of… steering recently. I know you want us to talk to these QVC guys.’

  ‘MCJ.’

  ‘Yeah, them. And maybe that will be good in the long term but I don’t want to forget who I am in all of this. OK, so maybe the reveal was extreme, a bit odd. But that’s me sometimes. And that’s what makes me stand apart from everyone else. I’m doing it my way. And you’ve got to let me.’

  I hold up my hands. ‘But I’m refining your brand identity, I’m looking for partner—’

  ‘You’re looking at your brand identity right here. And it is what it is. I’m my shop and my shop is me. It might not make me as rich as that guy who owns Amazon – what’s his name, Jeff Beavers?’

  ‘Bezos.’

  ‘Him. But that’s not my deal. Just… you’re amazing, but I’m not a project, OK? I’m not here to be managed. We’re in this together. Partners?’

  I look at my brother. Not the tallest. Not the brightest. Not the cleanest, sometimes. But the best brother. Perhaps I have projected too much of my unused energy on him. Rule number one: listen to the client’s needs. But I was too busy singing my own theme tune to listen on this one.

  I clear my throat. ‘Partners. And I get it, I’ll take it down a gear. But you know your nips were visible in that vest, right? And Mum might see that. And send it to all her mates.’

  JP visibly blanches at the thought. ‘OK, so next time you get wardrobe clearance. But that’s it.’

  ‘I’d say shake on it, but how about a hug instead?’ I squeeze him round the middle.

  ‘That’s better,’ he grumbles into my ponytail.

  I step back and appraise him once again. The dark blue shirt is back on, which I realize must be one of Ben’s. ‘You stand by the whole performance, yeah? You’re happy with delivering your message that way? Sure?’

  He nods quickly. ‘Yes. I said. Why?’

  ‘Because there are 300 people sitting in front of the main stage, who maybe didn’t catch it first time round!’

  Chapter 15

  An overturned wicker basket has never felt so inviting or luxurious. With my back against the wall and my feet up on the desk, I am done. My feet are sore, my legs ache, my throat is raspy from saying for the 100th time, ‘Check out the vlog! Yes, it’s two for £5! No, he’s my brother but yes, he is single!’ The cold beer in my hand is the most amazing life-giving liquid anyone has ever drunk, ever. You will have to prise it from my dead, blue fingers if you want a sip. CraftCon has defeated me.

  From the numb silence woven around our party I’d say the sentiment is shared by us all. Patti has her head on Mags’s shoulder, JP is sitting in our only real chair (broken-bone privileges), Ben has just got back from the last run to the van with Stan and is now slumped against the wall to my right. Stan didn’t come back with him, saying he needed to check the engine oil, but I wouldn’t blame him if he’s having a quick siesta in the back before the two hours’ drive home.

  It’s been a knackering day, but a great day. Ben was a bit of a legend on that main stage. Whether he really was as clueless as he made out, the fool to JP’s straight man, or whether he was playing up for audience engagement, it worked. When JP touched on sock knitting and double-pointed needles, Ben asked, ‘But how do you know which end is the right end?’ And the whole room hooted. They talked through the basic skills needed to complete a baby hat, with Ben as the
newbie guinea pig – if it’s not me, I’m over the moon. Hopefully, all those ladies in the audience going gooey over not one but two cute knitting guys will join the movement and send us their hats. At this rate we’re going to have seriously good numbers to pass on to the health visitors to go well beyond our neck of the woods, and maybe – just maybe – cover the whole South-East, like JP vowed. I’m also chuffed to bits at how much stock we’ve sold today – it’s pretty much all gone.

  The tannoy bing-bongs over our heads. ‘It is seven p.m. CraftCon is now closed. Exhibitors, please vacate the hall within 20 minutes.’

  ‘Time to head home, chaps.’ Maggie slowly stands up, gently moving Patti into an upright position. ‘What a day! My first CraftCon. I will come again.’ She smiles the same twinkly smile I have known nearly all my life – and then it hits me: I was planning to throw her together with Stan more today but I didn’t get round to it! I had my walkabout, then the stall went bonkers for JP’s striptease, then we went over to the main stage and then we finished selling our socks off and it just slipped my mind. Stan took up residence in an armchair in one of the break-out areas for most of the day, a paperback thriller in his hands. It would have been so easy to send Mags over to him with an invented errand: Had he seen the scissors? Would he like to share a HobNob? But I totally forgot. What a wasted opportunity. As soon as I have enough energy in my fingers again to use my phone, that’s also going on my task list: get Mags’s love life rebooted.

  We all stumble on weary feet and trundle off to the car park. The knackered silence follows us into our seats, out of the multistorey and onto the motorway.

  I must have nodded off soon after because the next thing I know, we’re lurching to a stop and I’m aware that I’ve left a small patch of drool on Ben’s shoulder.

  ‘Sorry,’ I mumble, my cheeks flaring red.

  ‘Not to wo—’

  ‘Oh, shit balls!’

  ‘Huh?’ I hear Mags wake with a snort in the passenger seat.

  ‘Bloody tyre’s gone! And I used my spare just the other week… Oh, flaming arses!’

  Everyone is now awake and blinking miserably at the realization that we aren’t home. Far from it.

  Usually I’d leap into action in a situation like this: think of practical solutions, a positive spin on the whole thing to stop it spiralling into an argument, and get things sorted. But I’m so tired. So very tired. And JP’s words about me taking too much of a lead recently are still stinging in the back of my mind.

  ‘Right.’ Ben’s face is lit from beneath by the glow of his phone screen. ‘Luckily we’re already on an A road. And it looks like there’s a pub just ten minutes from here. Delilah, why don’t you, JP, Mags and Patti go and line us up some drinks while Stan and I wait for the AA? And some dry-roasted peanuts too for me.’ He’s smiling but I can see from the lines under his eyes that he’s also too exhausted to really be that chipper. ‘We’ll join you in a bit.’

  * * *

  The walk to the pub felt more like a trek to the summit of Everest. We trudged along a scrubby path that ran along the main road, waving our phones around for light and drooling over the idea of a crisp G & T or a full-bodied Guinness or even just a sodding lime and soda as long as it was wet, cold and in our mouths pretty damn soon. Ben might not get so much as a sniff of a peanut as I planned to hoover them all up, without exception.

  When we do make it to the King and Crown by nine p.m. I could ugly-cry with relief. ‘Please, please tell me you haven’t stopped doing food?’

  The barman looks along the row of our pale, dusty faces. ‘Sorry, kitchen’s closed. But only just. Let me see what I can do.’

  And he comes back with the Holy Grail. A huge mixing bowl filled to the brim with chips. They aren’t the warmest or the freshest and maybe they’ve been reheated more than is ideal but they are salty and fatty and they are ours. We snuffle and shove and gobble them down, Patti and I taking turns to ram a handful into JP’s mouth. What Stan and Ben don’t know can’t hurt them.

  When the last little deep-fried scrap is hoicked out by Patti on one neat finger, we raise our glasses over the small pub table and let out a sort of grunt of a ‘cheers’, before sinking our drinks. By the time Stan and Ben reach us it’s half ten and we’ve sunk a fair few other drinks too, out of exhaustion, out of boredom and to numb the worry that at this rate we might be sleeping on the ripped leather banquettes at the back of the pub.

  ‘Here they are! The returning heroes!’ Mags’s cheeks are bright pink and her hair is unravelling from its loopy bun. The look is a little too ‘bag lady’ for my plans for her romantic life, but that’s for me to sort another day. When the dartboard isn’t spinning on the wall. Oops.

  Ben and Stan both collapse heavily onto little stools.

  ‘I’ll get you drinks,’ JP lisps a little.

  Patti prods him on the thigh. ‘Nope. No thumbs, ’member?’ She laughs a big, messy, honking laugh that you can’t imagine would come from such an elfin creature and then that sets the rest of us off.

  ‘I’ll go,’ Ben mutters and I have just about enough sense left in my gin-soaked head to realize he could probably do with a hand, with all he’s been through.

  ‘Sucks.’ I lean against the bar as he orders, half to seem nonchalant and half for actual bodily support. ‘Long wait for you guys.’

  ‘Yes.’ Ben very carefully studies his pint being pulled, as if he’s going to lamp the barman for even spilling one drop of precious beer. When it’s handed over he takes three consecutive gulps with his eyes closed, shakes his head a little and opens his eyes, to find me staring at him. God, I am pissed though.

  ‘I’ve never seen you fully drunk, Blackthorn.’ He lowers one eyebrow at me. ‘It’s fun.’

  ‘I am not drunk!’ Even to my own woozy ears, it doesn’t sound convincing. The half-stumble backwards doesn’t help. Ben grabs my forearm just in time. I feel the grip of his fingers on my arm like he’s connected to a car battery.

  ‘Thank God I ordered two drinks, so I can at least try and catch up before last orders. What’s everyone else having?’

  * * *

  Ben carries a crowded tray of drinks, crisps and nuts back to the table, where the group has fallen into mini huddles: Patti is expansively describing the art museum in Bilbao to JP, flinging her arms far and wide to get across the scale of the place, while JP just moonily gazes at her sweet but angular face. Stan is soberly talking to Mags about the responsibilities of his job and she’s nodding fervently – I suppose in lots of ways it’s similar to how she looks after Extra Granny most of the time. But I must remember to steer her away from job talk with Stan in the future. It can’t be that fun for him, or her. Disabled parking and medication schedules aren’t the best candlelit dinner chat.

  So that leaves Ben and me with a pint and a double G & T, and each other.

  ‘I can’t face a twiddly little stool, Blackthorn – come and sit at a booth thing with me.’

  So I walk after him, trying to keep to a roughly straight line.

  ‘Looks like your brother is in heaven.’ Ben tilts his head in their direction.

  ‘Ahh, yeah. Bless him.’

  ‘It’s been… interesting, seeing you guys together. Seeing more about you. Who you are, outside of work.’

  ‘You too!’ I sip my drink. ‘Actually, I realized the other day – I don’t know anything about you. Apart from the fact that you are not posh.’ I wave my hands decisively. ‘And you got my client list. And that’s it. Tell me…’ My eyes look round the room, struggling to bring things into focus here and there, but settling on the jukebox. ‘What’s your favourite song?’

  ‘“Tiny Dancer”,’ Ben replies without missing a beat.

  ‘Whoa, you had that one ready to go. So, why? Why Elton – or Dwight Yorke, as he was christened.’

  Ben presses his lips together, as if he’s about to laugh or something. ‘Great knowledge. That famous musician-slash-centre-forward. Um, it reminds me of being a
kid. Used to sing along to it in the car with Mum, when we’d go and see my grandparents in Cornwall. For a while we had just this one cassette, so we played it over and over and yelled it out as loud as we could. “Tiny Dancer” is great for yelling. How about you, what’s your favourite song?’

  I am really stumped, and I don’t think it’s just the alcohol destroying my memory cells. I get out my phone to check iTunes, see if my recently played list will nudge me. But there’s only one Clean Bandit song on there that I downloaded in the gym because it spurred me on during Spin class. I’m not sure it counts as a favourite on those grounds. God, when was the last time I just listened to some music?

  Maybe the conscious silence between us catches the others’ attention, or maybe they’re just being plain nosey.

  ‘I know what Dee used to love to listen to,’ Mags chimes in from across the room.

  ‘Oh! Aha! Ha ha ha ha!’ JP’s eyes are lit up with a sudden memory and he laughs so hard he nearly falls off his stool.

  ‘What?’ Ben asks, his smile widening into a full-blown grin.

  ‘No idea what they’re on about.’ I wave my hand in front of my face but a memory is stirring. A memory of loose plaid shirts and baggy red trousers. Of two cheeky faces…

  ‘She was still in primary school, just 7 or 8, I think. And they put on a talent show and she and her little friend Amber—’

  ‘Noooo!’ The shriek that blasts out of my mouth is louder and shriller than I even knew I could make.

  ‘Yesssss!’ JP is laughing so hard that he can hardly breathe. ‘The… backwards… baseball caps!’

  Mags continues regardless, the red wine marks on her lips visible as she talks. ‘She played that song over and over in her room to get it right. Drove her parents bonkers. Even brought it on a Walkman to my house! What were they called? Those ones who do that jungle TV show and the talent one. Peter and Declan?’

  Patti put her hand in the air, like it’s a capitals-of-the-world quiz. ‘Ant and Dec! Oh, didn’t they used to be in a band? PJ and Duncan?!’