Page 28 of Saving Mr. Bell

“Than when you got here. Still think you didn’t need a break?”

“Maybe I did,” I grudgingly admitted. “Speaking of which, I’ve got a question for you.”

Arlo closed the fridge and turned to face me. “Go on.”

“Do you think it’s normal that I don’t even know what country I was going to next?”

“Romania,” Arlo said without a pause. He grimaced. “Which is not what you asked, and me knowing that makes me sound like a stalker. I guess it depends.”

“On what?”

“You have lots of people working for you. No one would blame you for choosing to sit back and let them run your life, while you concentrate on the thing no one else can do, playing the piano like you were born to it.”

I ignored the last part, the mention of the piano threatening to derail this conversation completely if I let it. “What if I didn’t choose it?”

Arlo frowned. “What do you mean?”

“What if…?” I thought about what I wanted to say. “What if I don’t feel like I have any control whatsoever, like someone else makes all my decisions for me?” My father ran my career for me when I was a kid, right?” Arlo nodded. “Which… you’d expect because I was a kid. But at what age does that not become necessary anymore?”

Arlo stared at me until he realized I actually expected an answer. “Erm… I guess some people might say sixteen, but sixteen is still pretty young, so maybe, eighteen. You’re officially an adult at eighteen, so I don’t see how anyone could argue it not being old enough. Unless they were a very irresponsible eighteen-year-old and then it would be different.”

“So it would be a problem,” I said, “if someone was twenty-three and their career was still being micro-managed to the same degree as it was when they were fourteen?”

Arlo’s brow furrowed. “Yeah, I’d say so.”

“Thought so.” I left the kitchen and went over to stare at the bare Christmas tree, Arlo coming to stand next to me. “Are wedecorating this today?” I sensed Arlo was keen to continue the conversation I’d started, but that he didn’t want to push me. For a documentary maker trained to sniff out a story, he could be considerate like that. Both six years ago and now.

“Nah!” Arlo said. “It can wait. It’s not going anywhere. I vote we have some fun instead.”

“Fun?”

“Don’t say it like you think I don’t know the meaning of the word.”

I laughed. “Okay, I’ll bite. What constitutes fun for you? You’re not going to invite me to a front-row seat at the fridge, are you? Because if so, I’ll pass. I’ll put my socks in order instead.”

“You don’t have any socks.”

“I’ll put your socks in order.”

“You know full well I was working out what we could have for breakfast. As for the fun, I saw something in the shed yesterday while I was searching for the pot for the tree.”

“A ghost? A massive spider? A little man who’s made his home there.”

Arlo gave me a you’re-not-remotely-funny look, or at least that was how I interpreted it. “A sledge. It was in the back corner under a load of stuff. It looked to be in good nick, from what I could see. There’s a hill in the opposite direction from the way you ran the other day.”

“I didn’t run.”

“There’s a hill in the opposite direction from the way you went for a long unannounced one-way stroll in unsuitable clothing the other day and nearly froze to death. I thought we could take it out.”

I wanted to say something about us not being children. Except sledging sounded fun, and I had said I wanted to do something more physical, so I’d be shooting myself in the foot. “What about the wolves?”

“I don’t think they’re into sledging. I figured I’d leave them out of the invite.”

I let out a weary sigh. “You know what I meant.”

“It’s not that far, and we’ll keep an eye out.”

“Are you sure you’re not just trying to make me put more clothes on?”

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