Seeing Stars (11 page)

‘OK. But I think it’s important you know who’s who in the village as it’s going to be your home.’

‘Is it?’ Lewis smiled down at them – a very
brotherly
smile – pushing his hair away from his eyes. ‘Oh, good. Fern, can you keep an eye on Smoky Slo for me for a minute while
I go back into the pub for Jem?’

Fern nodded. Slo grinned at them both with badly fitting dentures and sat awkwardly on the grass behind them as far out of
Constance and Perpetua’s vision as possible. Amber, realising that she’d been holding her breath while Lewis had been so close,
finally exhaled. Oh sod it. She was not going to fancy him. She really wasn’t.

With a hacking cough and a lot of rasping, Slo lit the dog-end of the cigarette he’d been secreting in the recesses of the
tartan suit. Wreathed in fumes, Amber fanned the smoke away.

‘Enjoying yourself, duck?’ Slo wheezed over her shoulder. ‘Good do, old St Bedric’s. Mind, I prefer some of the others. The
moon-talking is OK, but you gets real magic from the stars. You’ll love Cassiopeia’s Carnival Night – that’s a really special
one. One year, I wished on a shooting star and you’ll never guess what happened – aaargh …’ The story was interrupted by a
burst of coughing. ‘Ergspluff – that’s better … Lewis is a good lad; he knows it’s murder for an eighty-a-day man like me
to be deprived of me fix.’

‘Takes one to know one,’ Fern muttered, ‘only in Lewis’s case his addiction isn’t nicotine.’

Amber simply wondered how quickly Slo would become a customer of his own family company. Maybe Cassiopeia
had magicked up some sort of bronchial protection.

‘There they are!’ Slo gasped wheezily, treating Amber to another blast of spit and badger-breath. ‘Young Lewis and Jem!’

Amber looked up again. Even if Jem was a Keira Knightley clone, she could cope with it. She knew she could.

‘Budge up.’ Fern nudged her. ‘Make a bit of room for Jem.’

Jem, holding Lewis’s hand, and dressed almost identically, had negotiated the crowds in the dusky heat and beamed down at
them.

‘Jem’s been dying to meet you,’ Lewis looked deep into her eyes. ‘Jem, this is Amber.’

Amber read the message and took a deep breath. ‘Er – hi, Jem. Lovely to meet you, too. Come and sit down.’

Slo, lighting another cigarette from the butt of the last, had already made a space.

Smiling broadly, Jem sat between Fern and Amber.

Lewis challenged Amber with his eyes again. ‘Jem isn’t very co-ordinated and he doesn’t speak, but he communicates perfectly
– as you’ll soon find out. And he can hear and understand everything. Everything. As well as you or I. OK?’

Amber felt a lump of shame building in her throat as she nodded and smiled again.

Jem was a young-old man, short and bird boned with a pixie face and a shock of dark hair. His eyes were alight with pleasure
and – a glint of mischief?

Fern was laughing. ‘No way, Jem! Amber is not going to be the next on his list. She’s just told me that she doesn’t fancy
him.’

Jem turned and looked at Amber, shook his head and winked at her.

‘Behave,’ Lewis laughed, sitting beside them and handing Jem a glass of beer. ‘You’re worse than my mum.’

Amber didn’t say anything at all. How could she have
got it all so very wrong? How could she have thought Lewis was merely a self-obsessed, sex-mad, drop-dead gorgeous himbo,
only interested in notching up yet another conquest?

How could she not adore him even more now? Oh, damn it.

‘Hayfields,’ Fern said kindly, ‘is nothing to do with music. We’re not a Country and Western band –’

Jem put his beer down and played air guitar with a flourish.

Fern flapped his hands away. ‘Give over for a minute, Jimi Hendrix. I need to explain to Amber what Hayfields is all about.
She’s a bit – er – confused. Hayfields is a halfway house. It’s what we do. There are a dozen residents and a dozen of us.
Martha is the House Mother so she takes over on our days or nights off. Otherwise we live in self-contained flats on a one-to-one
basis with the residents. It means they can live normal lives.’

Jem giggled and pulled a face.

‘Oh, shut up,’ Lewis said cheerfully. ‘We have a great time. Even if your cooking is better than mine.’

Jem laughed and made a finger-down-the-throat gesture at Amber.

‘Really?’ she smiled at him. ‘Is his cooking that bad?’

Jem nodded vigorously and pointed at her.

‘Pack it in,’ Lewis said. ‘She’s not going to cook for us. You don’t need anyone else spoiling you rotten.’

‘And neither do you,’ Fern added. ‘You’ve got a queue of ladies a mile long waiting to cook your breakfast.’

Jem sniggered.

‘SLO!’ Constance Motion suddenly roared across The Weasel and Bucket’s garden. ‘Did I see a cigarette glowing over there?
Are you SMOKING?’

Slo quickly dropped his cigarette in his beer glass and shook his head. ‘No way, our Con. Of course not. I’m a non-smoker
now. You know I am. It was Lewis.’

Jem’s eyes opened saucer-wide in indignation.

‘A bad influence, as always,’ Constance stood up and beckoned. ‘You come over here and join us. I’ve told you before about
hanging around with those
young
people.’

‘Sorry,’ Slo mouthed as he groaned to his feet.

‘It’s OK,’ Lewis grinned up at him. ‘She scares the shit out of me, too. See you later.’

Jem by now was jigging with impotent fury and tugging at his hair.

‘Don’t worry, Jem.’ Lewis touched his shoulder. ‘I don’t mind getting the blame. I’m used to it. What? No, I don’t think so
– even though I must admit setting fire to Constance’s wig does have a certain attraction.’

‘Lewis doesn’t even smoke any more,’ Fern whispered to Amber. ‘Slo hides his cigarettes all over the show so that Constance
doesn’t find them during the body searches.’

‘But surely no one should be encouraging him to smoke?’

‘Give over! He’s nearly eighty. He’s smoked since he was eleven. When he stopped smoking he was so bloody miserable – and
by God he has enough misery living with Constance and Perpetua – what extra harm can it do him now? And anyway, Lewis’s is
only one of his stashes. Lewis, even though he doesn’t like anyone to say it, is a pretty good guy.’

Jem nodded and held up both thumbs in agreement.

Fern returned the gesture. ‘Anyway, have you got the Hayfields picture now?’

‘Full frame,’ Amber nodded. ‘And I wish someone had told me before.’

‘Sorry, I just assumed Gwyneth had told you – and then it seemed so funny that you thought we were a band.’ Fern peered into
the array of empty glasses. ‘Oh dear, we seem to have drunk everything and I’m ready for a refill. Anyone else?’

They all nodded. Amber fumbled in the pocket of her jeans and pushed some notes at Fern. ‘No, please – this really is my round.’

‘OK, thanks – if you’re sure … I’ll just take pot luck.’ Fern scrambled to her feet. ‘Hopefully they haven’t drunk the pub
dry – yet.’

Jem waved happily as Fern picked her way across various prone Fiddlestickers, then nudged Amber and pointed at the moon.

She leaned towards him. ‘I made a green-cheese wish tonight – did you?’

Jem nodded, then gestured towards her with a thin and twisted forefinger.

‘What? Oh, what did I wish for? Am I allowed to say?’

Jem nodded vigorously.

Amber, aware that Lewis was watching the interchange with interest, grinned. ‘Well, I wasn’t sure what I should wish for.
I mean I’ve only just arrived here and I didn’t really understand about St Bedric – but even though I felt pretty silly doing
it, I made a wish that my life would get sorted out. Here. In Fiddlesticks. Does that make sense?’

Jem nodded again.

‘Not that any of this makes much sense to me. I’ve never seen anything like it. Everyone talking to the moon. Completely barmy
…’

Lewis looked at her over the rim of his glass. ‘Well, it figures. Where do you think the word lunacy comes from?’

Clever sod, Amber thought, before smiling at Jem again. ‘OK, so I’ve told you my wish. What about you two?’

‘No way,’ Lewis said. ‘My wish stays secret.’

Jem frowned at him and shook his head.

Amber shrugged. ‘Never mind him then. What about you, Jem? Did you wish for something nice?’

Jem nodded and turned his head to stare at the crowds outside The Weasel and Bucket. He studied the groups carefully, then
pointed at a family of mother, father and two children sitting at one of the tables.

Amber knew she mustn’t get this wrong. She felt she’d managed OK so far. ‘A family? You want to be part of a family?’

Jem shook his head and hugged Lewis’s arm.

‘Ah, OK – Lewis is your family. So …’

Jem pointed at Lewis, then again at the family group, moving his finger through the air until it reached the man. Then he
smiled at Lewis.

Amber bit her lip.

Lewis sighed and came to the rescue. ‘Jem has never known his parents. And don’t flinch like that – I’m not being brutal.
It’s a fact – Jem knows about his past. He’s happy with it. We get on so well because we’re honest. For as long as we’ve known
each other Jem has been fascinated by family stories – you know, cosy groups, continuity, happy ever afters …’

Jem beamed broadly and nodded.

‘Sounds great,’ Amber said softly. ‘I like those sort of stories myself. And having a family is pretty important as I’m just
discovering. You take them for granted but then when they’re not around …’

Jem patted her hand gently in sympathy. Amber returned the gesture.

‘What Jem wished for,’ Lewis shrugged, ‘wasn’t for him. He reckons he’s got everything he wants. He wished for me. The same
St Bedric’s wish he’s wished for the last three years. Ever since we’ve known each other even though I tell him not to bother.’

Jem smiled and indicated that Lewis should continue.

‘What he wished for was that I could find my father. He knows Zillah is my mother and can’t understand why I don’t have a
dad like in his favourite stories.’

‘Oh, right … And is that likely? I mean –’

‘About as likely as hell freezing over.’

‘But surely, if you want to meet him, can’t Zillah, your mother … I mean –’

‘Zillah won’t even tell me his name,’ Lewis said coldly. ‘I doubt if she knows it. She’s always refused to tell me anything
about him at all. Apart from Zillah, I have no family at all. And, whatever Jem thinks, I have no interest
in knowing about them. Especially not about my father. Not now, not ever. And I hope, if you intend staying here and getting
involved in the village gossip, you’ll remember that.’

Midsummer Moon Madness

Midsummer morning dawned hot and gauzy, still and silent. Watering the drooping plants in her front garden before the heat
of the sun scorched them further, Zillah thought Fiddlesticks looked like a film set.

Such a shame the rest of her life couldn’t have been scripted to match: with high passions, nail-biting moments and a crescendo
of cliff-hanging tension before the final satisfying dénouement, leading, of course, to the happy-ever-after ending.

Ah well, she thought, chucking the final silver arc of droplets across the multicoloured star petals of the mesembryanthemums,
she’d had some of it, hadn’t she? Even it was years ago. Most of it, in fact. All played out in glorious Technicolor and surround-sound.

Honestly, if truth be told, the only bit missing from her personal epic was the happy-ever-after. And how many people really
got those?

‘Morning, Zil!’ Billy Grinley leaned from the cab of his bin lorry and flashed a lascivious smile. ‘Hot enough for yer? I’ll
be finished by eleven this morning. See you in the pub?’

‘Oooh, let me see – yes, probably – unless someone rich, famous and gorgeously handsome makes me a better offer in the meantime.’

‘Can’t do the famous,’ Bill leered, ‘but I’ve got a nice bit salted away in the Nationwide and the ’andsome bit goes without
saying. I’d show you a good time, Zil love. Just say the word.’

‘The word being no?’

‘Get away with yer! I’d make you smile a lot more than that long streak Timmy Pluckrose! You think on it, duck. You could
be the third Mrs Grinley this side of Cassiopeia if you plays your cards right.’

Zillah watched the lorry choke away in a cloud of dust. Mrs Grinley? Mrs Pluckrose? She certainly wasn’t short of offers.
Billy was a non-starter of course, but maybe she really should think about accepting Timmy, despite Mitzi’s exhortations to
the contrary.

No … she shook her head. How could she? How could she marry anyone? Ever?

With her long skirt swishing the tops of the scarlet geraniums, she headed back towards her front door and the first boring
task of the morning’s boring housework.

Fiddlesticks was yawning and stretching and coming to life all round her, although next door the curtains were still pulled
in Amber’s Moth Cottage bedroom even though Gwyneth had been up since first light as usual.

‘She’ll still be asleep, duck,’ Big Ida loomed across the box hedge, a muck-and-straw-encrusted egg in each hand. ‘Them city
girls don’t keep country hours like we do. She’s a lovely lass, though, don’t you think? Even if she does go a bit heavy on
the powder and paint. Fitted in nicely with the youngsters, I thought.’

Zillah nodded. Amber had certainly done that. Since St Bedric’s Eve, Amber seemed to have fitted into the village very nicely
indeed.

‘You were a bit hard on her, Zil, I reckon. And you was wrong about her becoming Lewis’s latest fancy – ’e don’t seem interested
in ’er at all.’

No, he didn’t. Zillah grabbed a crumb of comfort from that. And she refrained from reminding Big Ida that it was
in fact she who had first said Amber wouldn’t be safe within a mile of Lewis’s lecherous clutches.

‘Timmy got a bit of a do on tonight, ’as ’e? At the pub? For Midsummer?’ Big Ida started to walk up her path. ‘Or is he saving
it for the next lot of proper star magic on Cassiopeia’s?’

‘Probably,’ Zillah shrugged. ‘There’s nothing official planned for tonight. Fiddlesticks doesn’t do a lot for midsummer, does
it? Not like some places. Not so soon after St Bedric’s. I doubt if many’ll turn up so hopefully I’ll have a quiet night.’