Page 4 of Highland Games
There was so much to do but she was up to the challenge. She took her laptop out of her bag, flipped it open and made a list.
Zoe’sfirst port of call was to be Inverness, about forty minutes south of Kinloch by car. But before she could get there, she needed to phone home. With no signal at the cabin, she hadn’t been able to ring her parents last night when she arrived and knew her mother would be having kittens. She crept along the narrow winding roads until her phone beeped with notifications. She pulled over into a lay-by and called home.
It picked up after the first ring.
‘Hello!’
‘Hi, Mum, it’s me.’
‘Oh, darling, we’ve been worried sick! ARNOLD! IT’S ZOE! SHE’S ALIVE! Your dad said there wasn’t much signal, but I couldn’t remember, so of course have been imagining the worst.’
‘Mum, I’m fine! It’s all good!’
‘Is it? Hang on, love, your dad’s here, let me put the phone on loudspeaker so he can listen in. Just a minute. Arnold love, I can’t see which button to press. Why do they make them so small? Have you got your glasses? Here, you take a look.’
Zoe grinned as she heard her dad take the receiver.
‘Which button is it, Mary? There’s one that looks a bit like a rainbow, shall I try it?’
Zoe could hear the beep of a button being pressed, then her mother was back, speaking slowly and loudly.
‘Zoe, it’s Mum! Can you hear me?’
‘And I’m here too! It’s your dad! Can you hear me?’ said her father, as if reading the shipping forecast.
Zoe was so full of love for her parents, her eyes began to sting. She couldn’t cry or she’d never stop, then her mum would be set off and her father would feel torn apart, with the two most special people in his life upset and in different countries.
‘I can hear you both loud and clear!’
‘Wonderful, darling, now tell us all about it. How is the cabin holding up? Your father told me, when we left, the front door was hanging off by its hinges.’
‘How’s the roof, love? Any leaks? Got the Rayburn going yet?’ interjected her father.
‘The front door is great,’ Zoe lied. ‘And the Rayburn is running perfectly. The roof only has one small leak from a couple of detached shingles, but I’m getting them replaced later today.’
‘Well, if you’re sure, love?’ replied her mum. ‘You know we can come up, we just need to book the time off work.’
‘No bother, love, no bother at all. Just say the word,’ agreed her father.
She felt so loved, so safe and protected by their unconditional kindness, but the last thing she wanted was for them to come up and discover their darling girl was heading into a Scottish winter, camping in a wooden colander with no front door. They were freaked out enough already by her decision, plus the fact she’d kept them in the dark about it.
Her parents had always wanted her to have a career, something that would never go obsolete, or be outsourced to another country. They had learned this lesson the hard way when her father had been made redundant from his manufacturing job on the wrong side of forty. They had lost their house, then Zoe’s mother had been diagnosed with cancer. It had been the worst time of their lives. When it was over, and they had a new roof over their heads, they wanted to know Zoe would be able to provide for herself. Music, history, languages, all had to take a back seat to maths and science.
They were helicopter parents; hovering, helping, pushing Zoe down paths she may have never chosen for herself, never quite trusting her to chart her own course through life. Zoe loved them, understood their motives, wanted to please them, but now she needed to make her own decisions, no matter how crazy they seemed. The pressure had been building for the last few years, to the point where life was feeling unbearable. Willie’s death and legacy was her release.
She reassured them whilst gently putting them off, got off the phone, took a few more photos for Instagram and set off for Inverness, for possibly the last drive she would have in Siena.
After the wilds of the cabin, it seemed as busy as London. Within a few hours she had traded in her beloved sports car for a fairly shabby navy Toyota pickup truck, with bull bars and an extended three-year warranty for reassurance. It felt enormous and she crept along the roads convinced she was about to take out anything that came near her. After trips to a hardware store, builders’ merchants, camping shop and a large supermarket, she managed to park it and treated herself to a roast dinner in a pub she remembered coming to decades before with her parents. At least that hadn’t changed. The pictures on the wall, depicting hunting scenes, were still the same, as were the faded burgundy velour chairs. She sat at a table by the window, filling her belly, and watched the world go by.
In some ways, it wasn’t much different from what she had left behind. The same shops on the high street, the same grey sky, but just in an unfamiliar setting. She got out her phone and flicked through the photos she’d taken that morning by the cabin. The brightness, the colour, the openness of the landscape. She uploaded them to Instagram with the ironic hashtag #braveheart2 then opened her messages.
She smiled as she read through them. They were from Sam, the best friend she’d met in university halls and who she’d spent three years sharing a house with. Sam had studied theatre studies and was an actress, finally getting her big break with a small part on Elm Tree Lane, a popular soap.
Sam: Yo! Babe! You alive? Wearing a kilt yet? xxx
Sam: Do they really eat deep-fried Mars Bars? Lol
Sam: Have you had any salty porridge?
