Page 15 of The Christmas Fayre on Holly Field

She was looking particularly pretty this morning, with her hair piled on the top of her head and a few wisps curling around her cheeks. She looked as though she had been in the sun, her face glowing, although that might equally be from the warmth inside the cafe, he guessed.

‘She’s bought a casserole dish,’ Pen called over to him. ‘Harriet, show him.’

Harriet’s glow intensified. ‘Not now,’ he heard her hiss.

‘You’d like to see it, wouldn’t you, Owen?’ Pen persisted.

He shrugged, thinkingnot really, but was too polite to say. He’d known that Harriet wouldn’t be able to stick to her pledge of not buying anything new from now until Christmas, but he honestly hadn’t expected her to cave in quite so fast; it had been less than twenty-four hours, for goodness’ sake!

Maybe his thoughts had shown on his face, because Pen made her way over to him and lowered her voice. ‘She bought it second-hand.’

Owen perked up and sat up straighter. That was more like it! ‘She did?’

‘Uh-huh.’ She turned to Harriet. ‘You might as well show him – after all, you would never have bought it if it wasn’t for Owen and his challenge.’

Harriet looked positively thunderous. With swift, jerky movements, she wiped her hands on a towel, threw it onto the counter, then stalked out the back.

Owen was conscious of the curious gazes of a number of the cafe’s clientele, and he wondered whether Harriet was embarrassed at having bought something second-hand. They were clearly speculating as to what the challenge could be, and he debated whether she’d enlighten them.

He thought not, considering she hadn’t been too keen on the idea in the first place, and he had to admit to being taken aback that she had actually bought a pre-owned casserole dish.

Harriet, carrying a tote bag, stomped up to his table. The look she gave Pen made him wince, but all Pen did was beam at her.

Crossly, Harriet took her dish out of the bag and plonked it on the table. ‘There. Satisfied?’

Owen wasn’t entirely sure she’d been talking to him, so he kept his head down and examined the casserole dish instead. He had been expecting to see a glass one, but this was an enamel pot and it was in excellent condition. A sticker on the side of it declared it to be one pound fifty.

‘You’ve got yourself a bargain,’ he declared.

Harriet glared at him for a moment, then her expression softened and a smile hovered on her lips. She had nice lips – full and pink – and he imagined how it would feel to kiss them. Then he pulled himself together. There was no way he should be imagining kissing Harriet.

‘I have, haven’t I?’ she said, and a grin broke out. She had the most gorgeous smile, and he smiled back at her.

‘When you two have finished making eyes at each other,’ Pen said, ‘can you let me know if you intend to order anything, Owen?’

Harriet huffed. ‘We weren’t making eyes at each other. Pen, I honestly don’t know what’s got into you lately.’

‘Er, sorry Pen, no eye-making,’ Owen said, feeling self-conscious. Had he been that obvious? But even if he had, Harriet hadn’t been looking at him like that. Pen, he decided, had an active imagination. ‘I’ll have the rainbow salad falafel wrap with houmous, please, and a mint tea.’

‘Coming right up.’ Pen took a step towards the counter, then paused, giving Harriet a pointed look. ‘Does this mean you’re going to stick to your vow of not buying anything new from now until Christmas?’

‘I suppose it does,’ Harriet said. She didn’t look happy about it, though, and Owen sympathised.

It wasn’t easy transitioning from buying what you wanted, when you wanted it (within reason, of course), to having to seriously think about everything you purchased. Still, it was better for the planet, and that was all that mattered.

He was still holding the enamel pot in his hands when he realised Harriet was waiting for him to hand it back.

It was then that a major flaw in his plan occurred to him –how on earth was he going to take a photo of this to put on the blog?

Chapter 5

‘Poor baby, have you missed your mam?’ Harriet crooned as Etta scrambled to climb into her lap. She hated leaving the dog alone when she was at work, but she didn’t have a great deal of choice. Sometimes, if she was able, she would dash home on her break and let her out for a wee, but when she did that, it seemed to unsettle the pooch more.

Laughing, Harriet tilted her head back, fending off sloppy, enthusiastic licks, and cuddled Etta to her, holding the wriggling body close.

‘I expect you want to go out,’ she said, getting to her feet and opening the kitchen door to allow the dog into the garden. She left it open, and reminded herself what she was making for tea. There was a menu on the fridge, which she set weekly and stuck to religiously to ensure that she had the ingredients to make their evening meal each day, and that she didn’t waste any food.

Today it was fish fingers and chips, luckily, because what Harriet was going to tell her eldest child over tea wouldn’t go down well, and she was vainly hoping to distract Sara while she was tucking into one of her favourite meals.

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