Page 77 of New Dreams for the Village Nurse
‘Not very talkative this morning,’ Ann said apologetically. ‘Some days it’s like that.’
‘That’s all right,’ Ottilie said. ‘As long as he’s content and well, nothing else matters.’
‘Seems to be. It’s nice for things to be on an even keel for once.’
‘I’m sure,’ Ottilie said, wishing her own keel could be nice and even for a while too.
Ottilie bid Corrine, Ann and Darryl goodbye and headed out to work, her sandwich tucked into her satchel and smelling so good she could have torn it open and devoured it on the spot. But it would have to wait, because she was already running late and if she didn’t get a move on she’d walk into a waiting room full of annoyed patients. She often wondered if half of them had anything to do other than visit her, because they always arrived far too early, treating the waiting room like some kind of social club where they could catch up with the latest gossip. On more than one occasion she’d even walked in to find Lavender serving cups of tea to the older ones while they chatted away to whoever else was in there.
As she made her way to her car, her phone pinged the arrival of a text. It was Heath.
My mate has some spare tickets for that band you wanted to see. Thursday night in Salford. A bit short notice but I can buy them from him if you fancy it. X
Ottilie frowned. She couldn’t think which band he meant, but even if she’d been desperate to go she’d already committed to helping out at the community kitchen on Thursday evening. She supposed they’d manage without her if she explained the situation, but the idea of leaving them short-handed didn’t sit well with her.
Sounds great but I can’t. I’m so sorry, I’ve already told the kitchen I’ll help them on Thursday night. X
Can’t you get out of it?
Ottilie could have replied, but she really didn’t have the time. Besides, she’d said she couldn’t go. Heath knew how important her community projects were to her and how she felt about letting people down. But she also understood that perhaps he was trying to make up for his mistake the previous night more than anything else. She’d call him when she got a moment and reassure him that all was well, the incident had been forgotten and he didn’t need to shower her with gifts for them to move past it.
She got into the car, tossing her phone onto the seat before she started the engine, and as she did she noticed a follow-up text from Heath. That one was going to have to wait too.
For one reason or another, Ottilie hadn’t seen Heath that week. Thursday night arrived, and although they’d spoken on the phone and she’d asked him if he might like to help out at thekitchen and had been perfectly transparent about the fact that Simon had offered his services and would be there, Heath had declined and sounded a bit miffed about it all. She wondered if he was sulking about her refusal of concert tickets or whether he was annoyed she’d chosen the community kitchen over his offer, or if she was simply imagining it.
After some consideration Ottilie decided she might be reading too much into the situation and so thought no more about it, but the fact she hadn’t seen him and so she didn’t feel they’d truly been able to clear the air nagged at her. She was too busy for it to worry her for long, and when she realised she wasn’t worrying enough, that worried her even more. If she could so easily set it aside, what did that say about her relationship with Heath? Was it less than she’d imagined? Was it more fragile? Was it built to last after all?
When she arrived, Magnus and Stacey were already there.
‘Hello,’ she said, going over to them both as Stacey peeled some potatoes and Magnus chatted to her.
Then the door to the kitchen opened and Simon walked in, immediately greeted with enthusiasm by those closest.
‘Am I late?’ he asked, looking round. ‘Sorry if I am – paperwork, you know…’
‘It’s never too late here!’ Janet, the organiser of the community kitchen, smiled at him. ‘Even if you arrived after service there’d be cleaning down to do. Any help is welcome, no matter if it’s three minutes or three hours.’
He glanced over at Ottilie with a nod of acknowledgement, but when Stacey looked up, he broke into a warm smile. It was then Ottilie noticed that Stacey seemed to be wearing more make-up than usual. She didn’t have her usual jeans on either but wore a flowing dress beneath her apron. Something was definitely going on between these two – there was no denying it now. Ottilie exchanged a look with Magnus. She wonderedif he could see it too. Ordinarily he and Geoff had a radar for budding romance and went out of their way to facilitate it, but she couldn’t see any signs he’d noticed it yet. Perhaps he was too preoccupied with other things.
‘What would you feel comfortable doing?’ Janet asked.
Simon turned back to her and cleared his throat; he looked guilty, as if he’d been caught doing something he wasn’t meant to. ‘I don’t know. I can probably handle most tasks. Point me to whatever needs to be done and I’m sure I can get on with it.’
‘Brilliant…why don’t you help Stacey with the potatoes?’
‘Sure, I can do that.’
Stacey looked up and blushed. ‘I could do with the help too – there’s thousands of these things.’
Janet went to get Simon an apron.
He turned to Ottilie and Magnus. ‘What duties did you get?’
‘I’ve only just arrived myself,’ Ottilie said. ‘I expect Janet will find me something suitably mind-numbing to peel or shell.’
Simon laughed as Janet returned with his apron. ‘If you’re all right with peeling and chopping then I’ve got plenty to be going on with. Onions, perhaps?’
‘Watch out,’ Stacey said. ‘If Flo gets here she’ll have you sucking on a spoon.’
