Page 28 of Fixing a Broken Heart at the Highland Repair Shop

The next day, before the shed opened to the public, Ally was ready, clicker in hand. The slide deck was loaded and displayed on the screen she’d rigged up. The chairs were set out in a semi-circle in front of her workbench.

After Sachin, the volunteers had arrived in twos; the Gifford sisters, her parents, then Peaches and Willie, leaving only Cary Anderson who came in last and by himself as always.

Ally had deflected their intrigued comments until everyone was sitting, happily taste-testing Senga’s new sweet, crumbly tablet squares with walnut chunks that were being passed around in a greaseproof wrapping and everyone had agreed this had to be her best tablet yet.

Ally began, advancing through her slides, showing them images of their town overlaid with alarming statistics she’d got from government and charity websites detailing the extent of the loneliness epidemic sweeping rural parts of the country. She talked through them as she clicked.

‘One in seven people report being lonely either some or all of the time,’ she was saying, and this was met with a good deal of agreement and concern from her listeners.

Cary Anderson listened in characteristic placid silence and yet no one in the room would have guessed he’d have counted himself amongst that number of lonesome, isolated Highland residents suffering for want of a companion.

‘What a shame for them,’ Rhona had said, unable to imagine such a state of affairs, while her sister informed her wisely that there were ‘plenty folk without the good fortune to have an older sister to stay with’.

Ally went on outlining her plan. ‘More than anything,’ she was telling them, ‘we need to reach isolated people.’

‘The crofters?’ said her dad.

‘Yes, partly it’s for them,’ Ally confirmed.

‘And some of the rangers on the mountains? They can seem lost when they come down into the town, as out-of-place as a yeti,’ said Sachin.

‘Why not? But I’m thinking about the people who might not look isolated, but actually are. People like I was, if I’m honest. People working remotely, living virtually, stuck socially or financially…’

‘Ally…’ her mum said, her mouth turning down at the corners.

‘I don’t feel so stuck now , Mum. Not now I’m making all this stuff happen,’ Ally hurried to comfort Roz who, it was only just dawning on her, hadn’t fully understood the extent to which her daughter had felt left behind and overlooked, which is precisely why Ally had to do this.

‘It’s too easy to assume a person is OK,’ she went on, ‘when underneath they’re screaming out for help.

Take my friends, Jo and Brodie. They appeared to me like they were racing up all the ladders society has propped up for them, but it turns out they were discovering the ladders are covered in grease and they couldn’t stop themselves from slipping!

Then there’s another pal, Mhairi, who’s feeling even more cut off than them.

No family nearby, no support network. We need to reframe how we think of this repair café – it could become a place where we restore broken connections as well as fixing broken things. ’

There were murmurs around the semi-circle, nods and notes taken. Ally took this as a good sign and talked on, changing slides. ‘And we have to be properly accessible too, literally and financially, with a website listing our events, and we need comfy places to sit…’

‘Are we talking… expanding the café?’ Senga cut in.

‘Probably, yes, but if that’s not an option, at least letting more people know we provide a warm, welcoming place, even if they don’t have spare money for their coffee and rock buns.’

‘Free buns?’ Senga’s lips pinched in protest.

‘I was thinking more of a pay it forward scheme, where people can choose to pay for their own drink and put money in the till for someone else’s, someone who’s not feeling so flush that week.

Loads of places are doing it, look it up; some places call it suspended coffees .

And we could have some items on a pay what you want arrangement. ’

‘We’ve wanted to try doing toasties?’ Rhona put in, wiggling in her seat with eagerness.

‘Pay what you want toasties?’ Senga wasn’t convinced.

However, McIntyre was determined to prevent the wheels coming off his daughter’s presentation. ‘You are the best baker in the Highlands, Senga. Increased footfall will only spread that reputation further, and more than make up for any shortfall in ingredients costs to subsidise a few freebies.’

Senga looked like she might object, but then fell to thinking. ‘I am a fine baker,’ she said, cannily.

‘No disputin’ that,’ said Sachin, crumbs on his lips from the tablet.

‘I could pass those baking skills on, you know?’ said Senga, always amenable to praise. ‘In a baking basics class?’

‘How would that work without ovens on site?’ said Sachin.

‘Oh! Sweet traybakes they could mix here and take home to cook?’ suggested Rhona.

‘Or you could use our kitchen?’ said Roz, inspired. ‘The range fits six shelves. Sharing it for a few hours a week couldn’t hurt.’

‘And I’d help,’ Rhona practically bounced. ‘I’d have made a braw home economics teacher, if I’d had the chance.’

Senga, for once, pulled her lips into a smile of understanding for her too often overlooked wee sister.

‘Once a month, then?’ Senga asked Rhona, securing a nod of agreement, before turning to McIntyre. ‘If you think we can afford the extra ingredients?’

‘We’d budget for it,’ said McIntyre.

It was actually working. They were on Ally’s side.

‘Any other suggestions?’ she tried.

‘I could add automotive skills to our offering?’ said McIntyre. ‘A sort of learn how to change a tyre and do an oil change sort of thing? One-to-ones or small groups, out on the driveway. Reckon that’d be popular.’

‘That would be so helpful,’ Ally said, her voice bubbling with happiness. ‘I’ve no idea how to do those things so there must be others like me.’

‘There we go, then. Decided.’ McIntyre stretched his legs and crossed his ankles.

A hand lifted in the semi-circle. All eyes turned to the quiet and unassuming Cary Anderson. He’d listened patiently to all these ideas and seemed to be striking upon one of his own, if the gleam in his eyes was anything to go by.

‘Yes, Cary? Go on…’ Ally prompted gently.

‘Well,’ he began, his voice so scratchy and low the repairers leaned in and fixed their faces in concentrated listening.

‘I learned carpentry from my grandad. He’d been an apprentice at the old sawmill at fourteen and was a foreman at forty, building house frames and floorboards and fitting cabinets and stairs, the lot.

Half the builds in the old estates were Grandad’s, and then my dad followed after him as a draughtsman, but who’s teaching the kids these skills? ’

‘There’s a definite skills gap on the horizon if we don’t teach young people these things now,’ Ally said, hoping this meant he was about to volunteer more of his time.

Cary thought for a second before saying, ‘I could build a few workbenches with woodworking clamps, at a child’s height, and teach the beginnings of it all; measuring, sawing, sanding, joining, if you can bring in the younger ones to learn it?’

‘A woodworking kids’ club?’ said Ally.

‘Is it a daft idea?’ Cary asked, his handsome brows crumpling as doubt struck and he slipped into silence again.

‘No! It’s a brilliant idea! Let’s try it,’ McIntyre jumped in. ‘I’ll help with that too.’

This set off a little ripple of applause. This was going better than Ally could have dreamed.

‘I could host a sewing circle?’ Roz said.

‘Or a design masterclass?’ added Willie. ‘Your creative darning repairs are the best I’ve seen, Peaches.’

His fellow fashion student accepted the compliment with a huge smile. ‘I don’t mind showing people how to do those. Easy,’ she told the group with a shrug. ‘I already demonstrate Swiss darning techniques and Japanese Sashiko embroidery on our socials.’

‘And I can easily teach anyone how to crochet a granny square,’ chimed Willie.

‘That’s true, he can. He taught me in, like, ten minutes,’ Peaches concurred.

‘We could call ourselves the Highland Happy Hookers!’ shouted Rhona, lifted to her feet with inspiration, before realising it didn’t have quite the right ring to it and lowering herself sombrely into her seat once more, Senga greeting her with a kindly pat on the knee.

‘We could do with some kind of recruitment drive for new repairers generally,’ concluded Sachin, who’d been listening carefully to all of this.

‘That’s exactly what I’m proposing,’ said Ally.

‘So… what we’re talking about is opening the barn up for these…’ McIntyre circled a wrist looking for the vocabulary.

‘Mixers?’ tried Sachin.

‘Community classes?’ tried Cary quietly.

‘Skill shares?’ Peaches suggested.

‘Welcoming, safe spaces, and… everything you just said!’ Ally was grinning again. ‘That’s exactly what I’m saying, and not just on repair Saturdays, but on other days of the week too. For people of all ages and backgrounds and from all over the region. So what do you think? Should we try it?’

‘No harm in trying,’ McIntyre said.

‘We’d need more space for all that,’ came a voice that made everyone whip their heads around to face the doorway.

Murray dropped his bag from his shoulder and stepped inside.

‘You’re here!’ Ally gasped in relief at the sight of him.

Roz had crossed the floor in a second to hug her son.

‘That I am.’ He looked exhausted, like he’d travelled a long road. Roz ushered him into the circle, finding him a chair.

‘Are you on leave again?’ Ally asked, not wanting to give away the things she’d gleaned from Andreas, at least, not in front of everyone. ‘Are you staying?’

‘If you’ll have me?’ he said sheepishly.

‘This is your home, always,’ said their dad, leaning across to pat his back.

‘You were saying?’ Ally fixed her twin with an intent look. ‘About us needing more space?’

Murray was sitting down, unzipping an expensive looking sports jacket. ‘From what I caught of your brainstorming exercise, if you’re going to host all these events, and you want them to grow, you’ll eventually need more floor space.’

‘That’s what I was saying,’ tutted Senga.

‘An extension to the barn?’ Roz didn’t look too sure. ‘That would be a lot of work, and expensive.’

‘If you applied for funding, you might secure a small sum to expand at the back.’ Murray pointed into the depths of the shed behind the café where his dad’s collection of parts and spares were stored on their tall shelves.

‘If you had someone with experience in writing funding applications…’ he tailed off into a cunning smile.

‘That’s Murray’s job settled, then,’ Ally said before he could back down and run off to Europe again.

‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,’ Murray stopped her. ‘We have to prove there’d be a demand for these new services. You can’t just turn up in a community and do things to it. You have to be needed and offer something that’ll have a measurable impact.’

‘That’s why we need a great big repair café open day to launch our plans so far and to field local opinion, ask folk what they want and need from us.’ She hit a button on her laptop and a slide materialised that made Roz clasp her hands in delight. It read:

Cairn Dhu Community Repair Shop and Café, Open Day, Saturday 9th August, 10a.m. – 6p.m., come along to our Skills Share recruitment drive and Societies soft launch. All welcome. Always Friendly and Free.

‘You’ve got it all figured out, sis,’ said Murray, and the whole shed agreed.

‘Not everything, I don’t,’ she said meaningfully, peering right at him. There was still the small matter of her brother going AWOL from work to get to the bottom of.

‘Uh, right, well…’ He stood. ‘If we’re finished here, I’ll, uh, get unpacked,’ he said, hiking a thumb towards the exit, shouldering his bag.

‘And that’s the end of the meeting,’ Ally blurted at lightning speed, following in the wake of her brother as he dashed for the door.

He wasn’t going to get away with disappearing and reappearing on a whim like this, especially if he reappeared seemingly without a job, and without telling her at least some of what had happened.

But as the twins reached for the door handle and yanked it open together, they were halted by a great big body in black, his hand raised to knock.

‘Allyson McIntyre?’ said PC Andrew Mason.

‘Andy, we went to school together, you know who I am. What are you wanting?’

He dropped the formality immediately. ‘It’s Jamie Beaton. He’s in the Infirmary, assaulted while attempting to apprehend a suspect late at night in the Garten Valley. And he’s asking for you.’