Page 65 of The Island in Bramble Bay
Charlie sighed. ‘I don’t know. I don’t think Maggie wants me to.’
‘Did she say that? Because she’s been looking pretty miserable since you left.’
Charlie didn’t want to wish misery on Maggie but he was glad to hear that she hadn’t shrugged off the break-up as if it didn’t matter. Maybe she was finding it just as bad as he was.
‘She called it a day.’ He could hear Josh whispering to someone, presumably Megan.
‘Oh, well that might explain it then.’
‘What?’
Charlie could hear Josh taking a deep breath. ‘Eric overheard Maggie crying in the office yesterday. I probably shouldn’t have said anything but Meg thought it was the right thing to do.’
It broke Charlie’s heart to think of Maggie feeling that way because of him. ‘Do you think she’s okay now?’
‘I don’t know. Meg seems to think you should come back.’
‘Shit, Josh. I don’t know if I can sweep in and you know…’
‘Give me the phone, let me talk to him,’ he could hear Megan say in the background.
‘Hi Charlie, it’s Megan. Look, you need to get your arse back here. What are you doing?’ Wow, she was really angry with him.
‘Hey, Megan. I don’t think that’s what she wants. She told me not to come back.’
‘Really? Look, I know it’s like, none of my business.’ Charlie rolled his eyes. ‘But she said you should finish up the High 5 stuff and not come back until then. Is that right?’
‘Uh-huh.’ How did they know what she’d said. Did Maggie tell Megan?
‘And Josh says you just said you’ve finished. So, I don’t get what the problem is?’
‘Okay, I hear you. I’ll call her and straighten it out.’
‘Come on Charlie, we’re way beyond that now. Do you want her back or not?’
61
MAGGIE STOOD ON the beach watching Eva Ranj interview Ben, who had been heavily briefed by Nick, about the woodland and how important it was to the fabric of the island. She had butterflies in her stomach because, in a minute, it was going to be her turn.
‘Right, let’s change for the shots by the water’s edge!’ someone from the TV crew shouted once Ben and Eva had finished. Eva headed over to Maggie, smiling; they’d met very briefly earlier.
‘Okay, Maggie. Are you ready for this?’ she asked.
Maggie was slightly star-struck. She loved Countrycase and even if she’d secretly been hoping it would be Joe Davis coming to see them, Eva was a good second best.
‘Yes, I think so. We’re going to talk about how we came up with the houseboats idea and about the crowdfunding.’
‘Perfect! And don’t be nervous, you’re a natural once you start talking about the project. Just pretend the cameras aren’t there.’ Eva walked down to the water’s edge to help them decide where to position the next segment.
Easier said than done, Maggie thought. But at least she was armed with facts about their crowdfunding. Nick had pulled all sorts of stats together about other crowdfunding the Trust had tried which showed how successful this round of funding had been. She was ready with an update of the total raised and how they were continuing to run the crowdfund until the deadline, with a plan to use the extra money to improve the fabric of the island and to have a pot for future maintenance of the houseboats.
‘Maggie, you’re the park manager here on Bramble Island and it’s your idea which has saved the woodland.’
‘Yes, my partner’s idea, really. We went across the harbour to Shell Bay and there are a couple of abandoned houseboats near there. From having the idea, we looked into the feasibility of having the holiday lodges on the water rather than in the woods.’
‘But that’s a much more expensive option.’
‘Yes, it was way over the amount which had initially been set aside so we decided to crowdfund, to save the woods.’
