The elderly lady– who I now see is very elderly indeed– sits upright and grins at me. Her blue eyes almost disappear into her wrinkles, and she straightens her wonky crown. ‘Flowers!’ she says, gazing at the dahlias. ‘Thank you very much!’
She is a tiny woman, her grey hair short and tightly curled, her whole body encased in shades of beige. She raises an eyebrow at me and holds out a hand, and I feel like I have no option at all other than to hand the bouquet over to her. I almost curtsy, but catch myself at the last moment.
She cackles, an outrageously raucous sound coming from somebody so small and frail looking, and says: ‘Oooh, I got you there, didn’t I? Don’t worry, I won’t steal your beautiful blooms!’
She offers them back to me, and I find that I no longer want them. I want her to have them.
‘No, please, Your Highness, I would be honoured if you would accept this small token of my esteem and respect,’ I reply, bowing deeply. I have no idea what’s come over me. It’s probably the after-effects of that cake at the café. Or the cake I had for supper. Or the cake I had for breakfast this morning. Maybe it’s simply seeing a woman of her amazing age laughing so hard she has tears in her eyes. What’s not to love about that?
‘Now, Auburn, you see,that’show you should speak to your queen!’ she says, wagging a finger at the lady in the white coat. She stands up, deep red hair streaming over her shoulders. ‘I was on my knees feeding you grapes, woman, what more do you want? You’re not a queen, you’re a dictator! It’s time for a revolution… I’m going to order a guillotine from Amazon! I bet they’ve got them on Prime…’
Edie cackles some more, and Katie shakes her head in bewilderment.
‘Don’t worry,’ she says calmly, ‘it only gets more surreal. Auburn, Edie, this is Sarah. She’s moved into the empty house over the road. My old place.’
‘We’re almost neighbours!’ declares Edie, hoisting herself to her feet and looking up at me. ‘Don’t be knocking on my door complaining about my rap music, you hear? I’ve earned the right to play my Nicki Minaj records as loud as I like!’
I stare at her, not even remotely sure if she’s serious or not.
‘Kidding!’ she announces. ‘I’m more of a Missy Elliot kind of girl!’
‘Ignore her,’ says Auburn, clearing up grapes from the floor. ‘She’s messing with you. She looks all cute and harmless, but underneath she’s pure evil. How are you settling in? Do you want some tea or some biscuits? Or a pumpkin scented candle?’
‘Um, no thank you. And I’m settling in fine I suppose. Though I did get visited by a very large ginger cat last night.’
Katie pulls a face and looks embarrassed. ‘Did he have part of his ear missing? And behave like your lord and master?’
I nod, and she says: ‘That would be Tinkerbell. Technically he is my cat, but obviously he belongs to whoever he chooses. We haven’t lived in that house for ages. We live over the fields, but he likes to keep an eye on the place. I’m so sorry.’
‘Not a problem,’ I respond, feeling a slight hint of disappointment. Maybe I’d secretly and irrationally been hoping that Tinkerbell was a stray and that he would adopt me. That we would rescue each other a little bit. ‘He’s welcome any time. Anyway… I’d better be going. I have work to do.’
I make a sharp exit before any of them can ask what I do for a living, waving as I dash out of the door. I didn’t get my antihistamines and I lost my flowers, but I escaped intact at least. The minute people find out what I do for work, they make ‘Oooh, how interesting!’ noises and ask me lots of questions. They often seem to think that it’s a super-glamorous life full of parties and awards ceremonies and red carpets, but the truth is far more mundane. I do sometimes get invited to those kinds of things, but I say no; I prefer being at home, actually writing the books, rather than out in the world talking about them. Sometimes I just lie and say I work from home doing accounts for a cement supplier. That’s so dull nobody ever wants to know a thing about it.
I let myself in, and as I close the door behind me decide that I should get some better locks. This one really is awkward and not very burglar-proof. I probably need to get a home security firm around to install an alarm as well. I haven’t spotted the tell-tale plastic alarm boxes outside any other houses here, and I’m sure it’s not exactly rife with crime– but it will make me feel better, especially if my guard cat isn’t around.
I put my shopping away and work solidly for the next five hours. I don’t even stop for lunch I’m so in the zone, and emergefrom my fictional world bleary-eyed and confused. It’s a strange life, spanning the real world and my imaginary one, and when I’ve been immersed in my writing for too long I actually start to wonder which is which.
I glance at my phone and see that it’s already mid-afternoon. Idly, as I transition back to the here and now, I browse the internet for information on my new home. Knowledge is power, right? The world wide web has made it so much easier to stalk people, which is one of the reasons I don’t do social media and keep my profile as low as my work will allow. My publicist loves that about me.
I find the Comfort Food Café has an Instagram, and drool a little at the pictures of cakes and milkshakes. I discover that Cherie Bloom doesn’t just own the café, but also a holiday complex nearby called The Rockery, as well as several other properties and businesses– so despite looking like she’s lived her whole life in a VW camper van at Woodstock, she is clearly a successful entrepreneur too. I find a news archive piece about a Frank Farmer’s death that fits with her account of it, and feel surprisingly sad. He was obviously a stalwart of the community, and I well up a little as I look at pictures of the man throughout his life– as a little boy at a street party for VE Day, as a young man winning awards for his prize-winning turnip crop, later on as the face of the Budbury Summer Fete committee.
There is a video clip from the funeral, the procession going all the way down the high street, past the very house I am sitting in– a miles-long stream of cars, trucks, tractors, combines and quad bikes, all beeping their horns and flashing their lights in farewell to a man who was clearly very well loved by the whole village. No wonder Cherie feels the loss so keenly. ‘He leaves behind his widow, Cherie Bloom, his son Peter, and two grandchildren,’ the article says. It sounds so simple, doesn’t it? ‘Leaves behind’– as though she will eventually catch him up. Isuppose that’s true, but the time in between seems to be making Cherie sad, and I hate that. I resolve that even if I’m not exactly Mrs Social Whirl, I will make the effort to see Cherie. She is ‘left behind’, and if I can provide a bit of company when she needs it, then I will.
I move on in my internet journey, and discover that Matt, the Harrison Ford look-alike and Laura’s husband, is also the local vet, and that Sam is a ranger for the whole of the Jurassic coast. Edie turns out to be Edie May, and she’s had her fair share of time in the spotlight as well– running the local library, being in charge of all kinds of community events, and then helping to archive items from a nearby historic house called Briarwood. Briarwood now seems to be some kind of hot-house school for budding inventors and young scientists. That sounds like fun, and I wonder if I could go and visit one day. Maybe, like the cats, they’ve discovered the key to teleportation. Or invisibility. Or figuring out why when you drop toast it always lands butter-side down.
I read all of this within half an hour, and then drag myself away. For someone who is so fiercely protective of her own privacy, I really enjoy invading other people’s, it seems. I amble down the stairs and make myself a cup of ginger tea to take outside. It’s another warm, clear day, and at this time of year you have to grab them when you can– in the blink of an eye it will be torrential rain and snowstorms. I sit at the little table, and stay very still as I watch the robin perched on the branch of the lilac. He’s watching me too, tiny shining eyes in a twitching head, looking for signs of threat.
‘I won’t hurt you, little pal,’ I say very quietly. ‘Just listen out for the bell around the cat’s neck, though.’
I swear he seems to nod at that. I wonder if he’s thinking ‘yeah, that cat is a complete arsehole!’ I wonder if robins think at all. So many mysteries in life.
I finish my tea and do a few stretches. I haven’t unpacked my yoga mat as yet, and am starting to suspect that I might have forgotten to bring it. I try and do a little every day, because it irons out the kinks both physically and mentally. I’ve tried all kinds of sports and hated pretty much every single one of them. I can’t abide the gym, with its loud music and clanking metal machines and huge men, and I’m very much not a team sports kind of person. I don’t run unless I’m late or trying to catch a bus, and find any kind of organised exercise class to be a special type of hell. I love walking, and other than that and the occasional cycle, yoga is pretty much the only activity I’ve been able to maintain. Though I’m rubbish at the meditating bits at the end.
The robin flies away as I do my stretches, obviously correctly deciding that I’m a lunatic. I go back inside, intending to have some proper food and look for the mat. As I walk by the front door, I notice a little envelope has been pushed through the letter box. Getting mail like this is a novelty– my flat in London is in a serviced building with a doorman, and everything gets put into a lock box for me. And too often they were things I really didn’t want.
I stare at the envelope, a tiny sliver of worry running through me. There was a man, in London, who I don’t like to think about. Who made my life difficult. He used to send me notes, too. Even the sight of this one makes my nostrils flare.
No, I tell myself, shaking it off. This is not him. This is not London. This is not anything to be scared of. And even if it is, what good will ignoring it do? If by some grim miracle he is still looking for me, and has found me, then I need to know so I can deal with it. Last night, when I was lying in bed terrified, I let that terror paralyse me, and that is not an option for every single day of my life. I cannot let that happen.
