by Laura Wood
Kit nods. “She would,” he says. Then he pushes through the doors to the next room. “Look at this!” I hear him call and I follow the sound of his voice. Stacked neatly on their sides, against the end of the room, are dozens of pieces of scenery, hand-painted and beautiful. There are intricate woodland scenes, fairy groves, deliciously detailed drawing rooms, even desert sands shimmering under an achingly hot sun.
“I think a lot of these are quite old.” Kit’s voice is low, reverent. He handles the fragile painted flats carefully. “Some of them may even be from when the theatre opened.”
“This whole place is magic, isn’t it?” I say.
“Absolutely magic,” he agrees.
We leave and climb up dozens of narrow steps until we’re high above the stage. When he reaches the top Kit turns and holds out his hand, his fingers wrapping around mine as he pulls me up to join him. We sit up there, where the ropes for the rigging live, our legs dangling over the side. I produce a slightly squashed piece of cake that I had taken from Mr Pennington’s hamper and wrapped in paper, and we share it between us.
“One day they’ll put your plays on here,” I say.
He laughs. “You’ve never even read my play. It might be terrible.”
“It won’t be,” I say, and I’m sure of it. Then, after a pause, and because I’ve been dying to ask: “Could I read your play?”
“If you like.” Kit seems totally unruffled.
“You don’t mind?” I ask, feeling a little put out by his relaxed attitude. “I thought writers were meant to be all tortured about this sort of thing. I’ve been wanting to read it for weeks. I thought you might ask me to.”
He grins. “I suppose someone has to read it some time. I’d like it if it was you.” Then he looks at me, his eyes dancing. “I’m sorry I didn’t ask you earlier, I had no idea you wanted to.”
“Yes, you did!”
“No, I didn’t, honestly. I’ve been hoping you’d ask.”
We sit in companionable silence for a while until somewhere in the distance a clock strikes five. When we return to the dressing room we find only Nora, sprawled across her bed, a magazine in her hands and a half-eaten bar of chocolate at her side. Her feet are bare and I notice her toenails are painted a dark, vampy red.
“My sister Lou writes for that magazine,” I say. “She writes the Lady Amelia story.”
“Your sister writes Lady Amelia?” Nora says, laying down her magazine. “But Lady Amelia is too thrilling! Wait, don’t tell me you’re Lou’s sister?”
I nod. “Yes, I am. I’ve mentioned her to you before.”
“Oh, but I didn’t put the pieces together at all!” Nora exclaims. “I’ve only met her once or twice at parties. She’s wonderful. And what a talent.”
“I suppose,” I say grudgingly, as only a little sister can. Nora is mine and I don’t like the idea of Lou knowing her first one bit. I know I’m being childish, but this is the first time in my life I’ve carved out something away from home and my family, and even though I love them, I want this to be just for me.
“She’s a great writer,” Kit says admiringly. “To keep a serialization like that going at the pace she does is quite something. I heard she was turning it into a novel.”
“Maybe,” I say doubtfully. My sister, the novelist. It makes her sound awfully grand.
“Where have the others gone?” Kit asks then. I think he is changing the subject on my behalf.
“They’re on a mission to find a hot meal,” Nora says. “If they manage to find one, they’re going to send someone back for us.”
“I hope they do,” I say fervently. “I’m famished.”
“You shock me,” Nora replies. She pushes the chocolate bar over to us. “Have some chocolate.”
We break up the chocolate and sit, sharing it and chatting contentedly for a while, before there is a thumping on the door, and Dan appears, muffled up to his eyes in an enormous blue scarf, and looking like some sort of Arctic explorer.
“They’ve taken pity on us at the pub,” he says. “The landlady says she can rustle us up some beans on toast. Wrap up – it’s a blizzard out there!”
The four of us battle our way out and along the street to the pub where the others are waiting. We’re the only guests.
The pub is warm, and the landlady, Sophie, is extremely welcoming. Sophie is small and round with luxuriant gold hair and green eyes that tilt up a little at the corners like a cat. Nora has been staring at her ever since she arrived, uncharacteristically tongue-tied.
We sit at a long table in front of a merrily crackling fire, and Sophie places steaming plates in front of us, thick toasted brown bread spread with butter and topped with baked beans from a tin. It is, honestly, one of the best meals I’ve ever eaten.
“I’m only sorry I couldn’t sort you anything better,” Sophie fusses. “I had no idea anyone would need feeding tonight. You must have been so put out not to have a proper room waiting for you.”
“This is wonderful,” Alma says, her eyes briefly closing. The rest of us murmur in agreement.
The spell that has been cast over us all seems to hold. Even Viola is happily attacking her food with gusto.
We talk and laugh, and a heavy, drugging warmth creeps through my bones.
Kit and I tell the others about what we found on our exploration through the theatre.
“I can’t get over that place,” I say, shaking my head. “It’s so special. No wonder Mr Cantwell wanted to come.”
“I heard he staged his first production here,” Dan says, taking a swig of his drink.
“How romantic that he’d want to come back,” Alma sighs. “All these years later when he’s a big success.”
“It’s just a shame that no one will get to see it,” says Russ.
After eating and drinking our fill, we decide to head back to the theatre. Nora offers to stay behind and help Sophie clear up.
Everyone is in good spirits, and we sing – a little rowdy – as we make our way back down the quiet, snow-softened road.
“Let’s raid Mr Pennington’s supplies,” Alma suggests when we get back to the theatre. “I’m not ready for bed yet.”
“We can have our midnight feast!” I exclaim.
“Finally, the boarding school experience I’ve always longed for,” Dan drawls, delighted.
We return to our dressing rooms and gather our quilts and pillows, arranging them in a circle on the empty stage like a nest. Viola lights some of the candles, and Russ opens a bottle of elderflower wine with a pop that makes us cheer.
We stay up late, telling ghost stories that become increasingly bloodthirsty and outlandish, until I’m shaking with a curious mixture of fear and laughter.
I think Viola will be the best at telling ghost stories, but it’s actually Alma, her eyes lit with ghoulish glee as she has us all screeching.
There’s something so nice about the whole evening, from the beans on toast to the midnight feast. It feels like we are all naughty schoolchildren up past our bedtime. An uncomplicated sense of happiness settles around us.
Eventually, yawning, we make for the dressing rooms. At the door, Kit stops. “Wait here,” he says, and ducks into the room. He returns and hands me a sheaf of papers, neatly bundled together. “My play,” he says, his grey eyes serious and no hint of his dimples on display. “If you’d really like to read it?”
“Of course I would.” I take the bundle and hug it to my chest. “I’m going to start it right now.”
“It’s late,” Kit laughs.
“I’m not tired,” I say. And, suddenly, I’m not.
“Well … then I await your verdict. Goodnight, Freya.”
“Goodnight, Kit.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The next morning, I wake to the sound of the others moving around. I have fallen asleep with Kit’s play underneath my pillow, and as I stretch and open my eyes, I hear the crackle of the pages near my ear. I stayed up reading it, burrowing under the covers
with my torch so as not to disturb the others.
“What time is it?” I manage, blinking owlishly.
“Only just gone nine,” Nora groans from her bed. “Why aren’t you all still asleep? Young people today are far too up and at ’em for my taste.”
Alma plonks herself down on the foot of my bed. She’s wearing slacks and a jumper, and her cheeks are flushed with excitement. “I looked outside. It’s stopped snowing!”
“Do you think we’ll be able to leave?” I try to keep the disappointment from my voice. I don’t want to leave this magical place, so cut off from the outside world. I want to sleep another night in my camp bed and drink elderflower wine and wander through this beautiful old theatre.
Alma shakes her head. “There’s a drift of snow out there. I don’t think we’ll be leaving any time soon. Unless we can dig ourselves out.”
Alma’s prediction proves correct. It’s perhaps an hour later when the six of us, without Nora (who has declared firmly her intention to stay in bed “where it is warm and does not resemble deepest Siberia”), are trying to push our way out of the stage door.
Russ is wielding the coal scuttle which is the closest thing we could find to a shovel and digging with his shirt sleeves rolled up. “If I just dig a little more here,” he pants, “I think I’ll have it.”
“Come on, put some effort in,” Viola says. “Try to get further round towards the middle.”
“Sadly, my dear, the laws of physics make that impossible,” Russ drawls. “So you can take it up with them.” He looks dishevelled this morning, but no less handsome for it. “Obviously, not all of us have your flexibility.”
“You’re doing a wonderful job,” Alma says encouragingly, her eyes shining. “I think you’ve almost got it.”
After a bit more complaining, and huffing, and swearing, the door finally swings forward with an unhappy groan.
“Freedom!” Russ waves the coal scuttle in the air. He tugs on his thick, grey woollen coat, and then holds out his hand to help me through the gap and into the pure white snow. He pulls me towards him, so that I fall briefly against his broad chest.
“Russ!” I laugh, disentangling myself.
“Clumsy me,” he smiles, with his wolf smile.
“Come on,” Alma says quickly, tucking her gloved hand through my arm, and pulling me away from Russ. “We’ve got exploring to do.”
It is impossible to describe the scene that greets us this morning. Impossible to capture the dreamlike feeling of emerging into a world transformed so completely.
The previous day our excursions had been spent head down, battling through freezing winds and icy rain. Now, the sky is a celestial blue, arcing above us and punctuated by the odd wisp of white cloud. The sun is pale beaten gold, weaker than on the kind of miraculous blue-sky days you find in summer, but all the sweeter for that. We crunch through the snow, our footprints the first footprints, breaking through the crisp crust like a spoon tapping against burned sugar.
We make our way slowly, arduously, through winding streets and past small, stone cottages. Underneath their blanket of snow, they look like something you might find on a Christmas card.
Eventually, after much puffing and panting, we round a corner on to a steep road sloping down and away from us.
“Look,” Kit says, his eyes instantly seeking mine, full of pleasure. “Look, Freya.”
I catch my breath.
The sea.
I feel a rush of emotion at the sight of it. The road we’re on now angles down towards the harbour, with its long stone wall. Out to the sides the beaches spread, the tide out and the sand covered in an icing sugar dusting of white snow. The sea itself is grey and wild, crashing against the harbour wall with a roar of defiance. I was right, I realize in a flash, to compare Kit’s eyes to a winter sea.
But there’s no time for that now.
With a cry that I don’t intend to make, I stumble down the hill, laughing and sliding through the snow, steadying myself as I go with the black iron handrail, the old-fashioned lamp posts, anything my hands scramble over. It is far from dignified, and more than a little of the journey is achieved flat on my bum, but I don’t care. I can hear the others scrambling behind me, making their own whoops of exhilaration.
When I reach the bottom I fly on to the beach, right up to the edge of the water, the sound of it filling my ears, the wind whipping my hair around my face and the sharp taste of salt on my lips.
“Aaaaaoooooooooooooooo!” I shout into the sea, howling like an animal. The noise is instantly snatched away from me, spiralling out into the waves and the sky. I shout again, louder this time.
Viola appears at my side, her nose pink, her eyes wide with delight.
“Aaaaaaaaooooooooo!” she howls with me. We grin at each other, for once completely in harmony. On my other side, Alma appears. I find that the three of us are holding hands. Soon all six of us stand in a line, hand in hand, tethered to each other like a string of lobster pots, shouting and laughing as the wind snaps and growls around us.
We break apart, wandering over the sand, picking our way across the rocks.
I bend down over a large rock pool and tug my glove from one hand, touching my fingers to the water, an ice cold kiss, that leaves me tingling.
“What can you see?” Alma asks, coming to stand beside me and leaning over the pool.
“Anemones,” I say. “Loads of them. That one,” I point to a red sea anemone, clinging to one of the rocks, its tentacles waving gently in the water, “is called a strawberry anemone. For obvious reasons.”
“It does look just like a strawberry!” Alma is delighted.
Russ appears, peering over the side. “What’s that?” he says. “It’s got red eyes!”
He plunges his hand in the pool. “No! Russ!” I exclaim, before he violently withdraws his hand, sending a spray of freezing seawater over me and Alma, a string of curse words falling from his mouth.
“It’s called a velvet swimming crab,” I say, half in sympathy, half-laughing at the outraged expression on his face. “They’re notorious for giving you an angry nip if you bother them.”
“A nip?” Russ’s eyebrows raise incredulously. “That thing almost had my hand off!”
I take his hand in both of mine, rubbing it gently. “It hasn’t even broken the skin.” I look up at him.
He smiles lazily. “But it hurts. I think it needs further ministrations.”
“What seems to be the problem?” Dan arrives.
“Russ has hurt his hand,” Alma says drily. “He appears in need of a nurse.”
“I volunteer,” Dan smirks.
“No offence, Daniel, but yours is not exactly the tender care I was hoping for.” Russ pulls his hand away, a reluctant huff of laughter in his voice.
He and Dan climb further along, daring each other higher and higher up the rocks.
Alma and I watch them for a moment. “Be careful,” Alma says finally.
Her tone is so serious that I look at her in surprise.
“Of what?” I ask.
She squints up at the boys. “Of Russ. There’s something…” She trails off, and then looks at me again, her gaze earnest. “Just be careful.”
I don’t know what to say to that, but we’re interrupted then by the sound of the boys hollering and beating their chests, showing off how high they’ve climbed.
I notice Kit and Viola walking by the edge of the sea, their heads turn towards Dan and Russ too, and Viola lifts her hand in a wave. She looks happier than I’ve seen her down here, by the sea, her eyes sparkling, her hair being ruffled by the playful hand of the breeze.
“Let’s skim stones,” I say suddenly.
“I haven’t the faintest idea how to skim stones,” Alma replies. “Not a lot of sea in London.”
I laugh and lead her down to the shore. I think I see a flicker of annoyance in Viola’s eyes, but Kit greets us easily. I can hear snatches of Dan and Russ squabbling as they climb back down to join us
. Soon I’m teaching all of them how to skim stones across the surface of the water.
Kit watches quietly as the others’ stones sink with sad splashing sounds. Then he pulls a stone from his pocket and sends it skipping across the water.
“Six bounces!” I exclaim. “You’ve been holding out on me!”
“All those summer holidays in Devon,” he grins, the freckles on his nose scrunching up.
“Pah! Cornwall knocks Devon’s socks off every time.” I begin to search around for a likely looking stone, determined to best him. Which I do, of course.
“Nine!” Kit lets out a low whistle. “I bow before the master.”
I don’t know how long we’re there in the end, on the beach, laughing like children, exploring, but eventually the others start to peel away.
“I’m freezing,” Viola says through chattering teeth. “Do you think we should go and see if Sophie’s got the fire going at the pub?”
“Oh, yes, that sounds like bliss,” Dan agrees.
“I’d kill for tea and toast.” Alma tugs Russ’s arm, and he wanders off with her, talking about lunch.
Finally, it’s just Kit and I left. I’ve been waiting for this moment all morning.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“I read your play,” I say baldly. “I loved it.”
He stands very still, his lovely tousled hair blowing about his face, and the look that flashes in his eyes then, just for a second, is one that I’ll remember until the day I die.
“Thank you.” His voice is little more than a low rumble.
“Now let me tell you all my thoughts,” I say. “Because I have so many. Starting with how clever I thought that second scene was.” Kit laughs, and we walk, heads close together, him pulling me in to his side as we move and talk, shielding me from some of the cold with his long limbs.
I have only told the truth about Kit’s play. I did love it. It surprised me. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I suppose something quite earnest and worthy. Instead, Kit has written the funniest comedy of errors. I spent most of the night biting down on my knuckles to keep from waking the others with my laughter. It is witty and warm, and clever in its simplicity. There are only five characters – two couples who become increasingly tangled up in misunderstanding, and a narrator, who speaks directly to the audience. Her part is the best, full of wry observations and the occasional stinging critique of the lovers’ ineptitude.
