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I discover that Rae doesn’t have one, but if he absolutely had to pick, he’d choose sea green. “Like the water down here in Cornwall. Never seen anything like it.” I also discover that I just missed his birthday. The girls share their own birthdate, excited for it only being a week away, and even more excited about the present I sent them early.
“Concert tickets from Hayden!” all three of my Swifties shout.
Kirsty turns the phone her way again. That pink fluff I saw on the table now wraps her neck. “A feather boa,” she explains. “For the concert.”
Rae sucks his teeth and eyes me. “All four of you are going?” Maybe he has an idea about how much that cost me. His gaze slides to my Land Rover in the car park.
That vehicle, one tent, and my tools are all I have to my name, and he knows it.
His eyebrows rise when Kirsty says, “It’s good you’re doing so well for yourself, love. That you’ve got work coming out of your ears year-round, but donotsend the girls any more money for merch. One, it’s all overpriced tat, and two, we don’t have room.” Her eyes narrow. “Unless you’ve found a gap in your schedule and are coming home to build that bigger wardrobe for them, I know you’re booked solid until after Christmas.”
Again, Rae knows different.
He stays silent as she lowers her voice.
“But you know what matters more to the girls than concert merchandise or money?”
I’m the one with the axe and bramble cutter. She slices through me with a single sentence.
“They’d give anything to see you sooner.”
More kids have joined Teo on the pitch. I’m vaguely aware of their continuing practice. Of Teo yelling coaching instructions. Of the thump of kicks, and the double-time thump of my heart as Kirsty tells Rae about a person he absolutely has to know is a work of fiction.
This success at business she describes as always spoiling his family. Always sending treats and cash and?—
“Look at these flowers.”
Sunflowers fill the phone screen. These miniature blooms are much smaller than the giants Dad grew every summer in our old garden. They didn’t grow half as well in the shady backyard of the rented house that was only ever meant to be temporary—a stepping stone between my training wages and a contract that was written in my stars.
Now her face is as sunny as if those stars hadn’t fallen to earth. She’s delighted when she points the phone at herself again, which is what I’d hoped after sending her flowers on what could have been a sad day. “For my wedding anniversary.” She gently chides me next. “One bunch would have been enough. You didn’t have to send one to each of us.”
I know that.
I know this too. “The girls have to share a lot already. A few flowers was nothing.”
She tells Rae more things about me that he has to know can’t be true after he’s seen where I stay between jobs in winter and we’ve had conversations about me needing to make hay because the sun won’t shine for much longer. Now he’s got to see why I’m so driven.
My four reasons are right there on my phone, fighting over who gets to wear a feather boa, and I can name what crosses his expressive features—he’s confused.
More than that, he’s…
Impressed.
He also gives off strongthere’s more to this storyvibes, and I’ve seen that spark of his curiosity before. It flared the moment I cut a path through a Cornish jungle for him. I saw it crackle again in a river after I showed him that pool. He was impressed then too, wasn’t he?
By me.
That curious spark flares again now in the coal of his eyes. Laughter joins it. “Ticketsandflowers for four? Didn’t realise I was seeing an actual millionaire in the making.”
“You’re Hayden’s boyfriend?”
Kirsty doesn’t ask that. It’s the girls shrieking in high-pitched triplicate, but here’s why I always picture diamonds when I think of their mother—of what takes real pressure to form—Kirsty’s eyes sparkle as she diverts them. “Time to get to school!”
It is, thank fuck. The school bell rings here to give students a half-hour heads-up before lessons, and it’s a reprieve from another conversation I’m not ready to have.
Not about money.
About where this is headed when both Rae and I know he’s only a few drawings away from leaving.
