Page 29 of All Wrapped Up

‘Well,’ I shrugged, ‘either way, I had the best time after saying my brief bit and so did everyone else. Tills were ringing all day in the shops and on the market and the pub and café were packed out, too. It was a fabulous start to the festival and my new life here. I’m so happy now—’

I immediately stopped talking and hoped that Mum wasn’t going to question why I’d said that.

‘But you were happy before, weren’t you?’ She frowned.

It had been a vain hope.

‘Of course,’ I said quickly, feeling annoyed that I’d got so carried away when for the last eighteen months I had been so careful.

‘And your new life in Wynbridge started a lot longer ago than yesterday, didn’t it?’

She sounded justifiably confused.

‘Of course it did.’ I smiled. ‘But yesterday felt like the cherry on the cake, I suppose. It isn’t every day that you get asked to do something like organise an entire festival and then launch it, is it?’

‘I suppose not,’ she said, looking at me more closely than she had in a while.

‘Don’t go reading anything into what I just said, Mum,’ I started to say, hoping to head her off before her thoughts spiralled.

‘I’m trying not to, love,’ she sighed, ‘I really am, but I can’t help thinking how different you are all of a sudden. How different you’ve been since you started talking about this friend of yours, Lizzie.’

‘Well, that’s because she’s the one who roped me into sorting out the festival.’

‘But before then, you’d never mentioned anyone in particular and you’d never shared any photos like the dozens that landed last night—’

‘I thought you’d be pleased to see them,’ I unfairly snapped.

I felt as cross with myself for opening this can of worms as I was with Mum for taking the bait I’d unwittingly dangled in front of her.

‘You just seem to have changed all of a sudden, Clemmie,’ Mum went on, ‘and it’s made your father and I worry that you weren’t quite as involved in things as you made out before.’

‘But what does that matter, if I’m involved now?’

‘Of course it matters,’ Mum responded. ‘You’ve been living there almost two years!’

‘And they’ve been two essential years in my recovery, Mum,’ I said, going for broke because there was no point in carrying on pretending now she wouldn’t let the topic drop.

‘The truth is, I hadn’t immersed myself in local life before, but now I am.

I wanted to walk before I could run and I took the time to find my feet when I got here, so that when I started taking part, it would be in a way that worked for me. ’

Mum looked shocked and I thought back to what I’d said about my time at the cottage alone to Ash. I had made out to him that my parents had supported the choice I had made to isolate myself, but in reality, they simply hadn’t known the extent of it.

‘Please don’t make something out of this, Mum,’ I said, starting to feel upset rather than annoyed. ‘I’m the one who has walked this path for the last three years and I’ve taken the steps I needed to and at the pace that’s been right for me.’

‘Well,’ she swallowed, ‘judging by the photos, you’ve found your feet now, so I’ll try not to fret over all the other months when I thought you were getting on with life—’

‘I was getting on with life,’ I butted in. ‘I was living it exactly how I needed to.’

‘In that case,’ she said, with a small smile, ‘we’ll say no more about it.’

We looked at each other for a moment longer and I knew she wasn’t going to hold my decision not to tell the truth against me.

‘I take it Dad has seen through me, too?’ I sighed.

Mum rolled her eyes at that. ‘Since when have men ever noticed anything?’

I couldn’t agree with that. Callum had always been pretty perceptive and Ash, though he was completely different to my husband in so many ways, was a guy with an eye for the finer details, too.

‘In my experience, men notice things just fine,’ I therefore replied.

‘Yes, well,’ Mum sighed. ‘Not all men are like your Callum was.’

I decided then wasn’t the moment to tell her about Ash. We’d covered enough new ground for one Sunday morning.

‘Now,’ she then said, ‘where’s Pixie? Let me see my favourite girl.’

‘I thought I was your favourite girl,’ I joked as I picked up Pixie, who was never far from my side, and sat her on my lap.

‘Well, I’ve got two now,’ Mum cooed. ‘Aw, there she is!’

I wasn’t really sure what it meant to set an intention, or how the lunar cycle could impact on it even though I did keep up with the waxing and waning of the moon, but after a quick search online, I soon had a little knowledge.

Hayley had been right about a new moon being the perfect time to set what I interpreted as basically a goal or aim, and I decided that I’d give it a go.

I still didn’t have a name for my fairy, but feeling a sudden desire to reread the note that Callum had written the day after we’d been treated to a stunning show of the Northern Lights from the comfort of our own back garden, and he’d romantic-ally named me as his sun and moon, soon provided one.

‘Aurora,’ I said aloud, as I held the fairy up. ‘That means dawn in Latin, Pixie,’ I added, and she cocked her head as she listened. ‘Our fairy friend has arrived right at the dawn of my new beginning, hasn’t she? And yours, too. And therefore, Aurora feels like the perfect name for her.’

Pixie barked in agreement and then settled back down while I lit a candle and, following Callum’s love of sharing notes, wrote, in the simplest of terms, what I hoped to achieve by the time the autumn festival came to a close in November.

In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t groundbreaking, but it meant a lot to me. My intention was to carry on along the new path I had already started to walk, but also continue to allow myself to take time out if I needed it.

Given that I had been home alone for a year and a half and had recently been thrust, quite literally, into a huge patch of limelight, I thought I had coped surprisingly well and my ability to take the changes in my stride, was a reminder that the fun-loving and gregarious young woman I had once been was still there.

Life might have knocked me about in the last few years, but at my core, the essence of who I was still existed and that was heartening. It was time to bring her out again and let her properly shine, but also look after myself while I did it.

I carefully pinned the intention to Aurora’s skirt and then sat back in my armchair. My thoughts were initially all about Callum but they slowly drifted to include Ash and as if I had somehow conjured him, a few minutes later, he called.

‘Hey, Clemmie,’ he greeted me and I could tell he was smiling. ‘How are you?’

‘I’m good,’ I happily responded, feeling relieved that my spontaneous kiss hadn’t apparently done any lasting damage after all. ‘How are you?’

‘I’m great, but I wanted to check in to see if you’d recovered from yesterday.’

‘What do you mean?’ I asked, as I set Aurora aside.

‘From the festival launch,’ he elaborated. ‘It was quite an intense start, wasn’t it?’

‘It was,’ I agreed, and I realised how wonderful it was that Ash had the sensitivity to appreciate that it had been a lot for me, having gone from seeing literally no one to then addressing a huge crowd. ‘But I loved every minute of it. And having you there with me made all the difference.’

‘It did?’

He sounded touched.

‘It really did.’

‘Crikey,’ he said, then went quiet.

‘And now I can’t wait for the feast at Fenview Farm,’ I eventually said, when it was obvious that he, for some reason, was lost for words.

The feast was happening on Thursday evening and then Lizzie was running more craft workshops on Saturday.

There were going to be a few autumn stalls set up on the market, too, but there was nothing really full-on happening.

It was a slow lead in to October which I was grateful for because that was going to be an extremely busy month and hopefully by then I’d be well enough acclimatised to consistently keep up with it all.

‘I’m looking forward to that, too,’ Ash finally said. ‘Events at the farm are always brilliant and I know you liked the venue when you visited.’

‘I loved it and Fliss was great. And she promised to have the barn dressed for autumn by Thursday, so it’s really going to look the part.’

The mention of dressing the barn made my heart skip. I was going to be decorating the cottage the next day, which was the equinox. It looked autumnal already, but with my many seasonal additions festooned and arranged about the place right up until Yule, it was going to look even better.

‘Talking of autumn…’

‘Do we ever talk of anything else?’ I laughed.

‘It’s beginning to feel that way, isn’t it?’ Ash laughed, too. ‘It’s the equinox tomorrow.’

‘I know.’

‘Of course you do.’

‘I’m going to be dressing the cottage and I can’t wait.’

‘Will it take you all day?’

‘Probably, given the amount of stuff I’ve got, and into the evening, too.’

There were as many boxes of autumn decorations as Christmas things stowed in the loft. I wondered what Pixie was going to make of them all. I hoped she wasn’t the sort of pooch who had a penchant for wrecking decs!

‘Oh,’ Ash then sighed, ‘that’s a shame.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I was going to suggest we take a walk. Jake and Amber at Skylark Farm have set up a nature trail around the farm and through the woods attached to the land that Moses used to own that abuts theirs and I wondered if you might fancy checking it out.’

I was tempted, but I had my plan for the day in place and really wanted to stick to it.

‘On any other day,’ I told him, ‘I’d be there like a shot, but dressing the cottage for autumn is an equinox tradition with me now and I want to spend some quality time with Pixie, too.’

‘Well,’ said Ash, and I could hear his smile was back, ‘I can hardly object to that, can I?’

‘You don’t mind?’

‘Of course not. I still might go, but we can definitely do it together another time.’

‘Okay.’

‘You really are all right, aren’t you?’ Ash asked.

I could hear the concern in his tone and it made my heart melt a little.

‘Yes,’ I promised. ‘I’m fine. And Pixie is, too. I’m just pacing myself a bit before October lands and the festival really gets underway. You’ve seen the schedule, so you know how busy it’s going to be.’

‘Well, that’s all right then,’ he said, sounding reassured. ‘You’re very sensible, Clemmie.’

I groaned at that.

‘What?’ he laughed.

‘Does that mean boring?’ I grimaced.

‘Not in my book.’

‘Well, that’s all right then.’ I swallowed as I repeated what he’d said to me and my cheeks grew hot.

‘How’s your fairy, by the way? Is she settling in?’

‘She is,’ I told him and I looked at her. ‘Just like Pixie, she seems very content.’

‘I’m sure she is, living with you and Pixie in wonderful Rowan Cottage. Have you got her name for her yet?’

‘Aurora,’ I softly said.

‘That means dawn, doesn’t it?’

‘It does,’ I confirmed, feeling impressed that he knew.

‘Perfect.’

‘Perfect,’ I echoed.

I didn’t need to explain why I’d called her that because he obviously already knew.

‘Right,’ he then said. ‘I’d better let you go. I hope you have a wonderful time putting your autumn decs up tomorrow and chilling at home.’

‘You really don’t mind about the walk?’ I asked one last time.

‘Of course not, Clemmie. In fact, I admire you,’ he said. ‘All too often we know what we need to do to look after ourselves, but we seldom allow ourselves the time and opportunity to do it. Going forward, I’m going to try and take a leaf out of your book.’

‘Well, that’s made my day.’ I beamed. ‘I’ll see you soon.’

‘Yes,’ he responded. ‘We’ll see each other soon.’

We ended the call on that happy note and I couldn’t help thinking how wonderful it was to have a friend who accepted and understood my desire to hibernate when I needed to. It was beginning to feel very much like Ash had landed in my life at exactly the moment I needed him.