Page 2 of The Fete of Summer (Tales of Crumbington #1)

January

Ten years later

Dust particles danced between the fluorescent tube lighting fixed to the bare rafters of the church hall.

Above the wooden double doors, the ancient clock smiled ten past ten.

And had done for as many years as Nathan could remember.

Woefully outmatched against the persistent chill of the January evening, a single fan heater sitting on the floorboards rattled out its best to warm the space.

Nathan tilted the hard plastic chair back on two legs, his jeans-clad legs stretched out and feet crossed at the ankles, rocking gently while peering around the empty hall. After a long day on his feet in the bakery, the weightless motion felt liberating.

A croaky baritone to his left droned on about coconuts or doughnuts or donations—at some point, his brain had switched channels.

He closed his eyes and rested his chin on his chest. Faint synthetic odours of plastic seating mingled with the hall’s unidentifiable smells from across the aeons.

But nothing could match the overpowering fragrance of baked dough coming from his body.

No amount of ginger and mandarin shower gel could ever entirely remove the scent from his skin.

His best friend, Polly, had been right. Baked goods defined him like his own personal cologne.

An involuntary yawn escaped him as the one-note chant continued.

He wrenched his eyes open to see if anybody had noticed.

When nobody had, he closed them again. Debates over the optimum number of fête stalls, the depth of coconut shies and whether the threadbare festive bunting needed replacing got very old very quickly.

While others rambled on about one trivial matter after another, he often closed his eyes, making lists of items he needed for the bakery, wondering if he would open them someday in the future to find himself surrounded by a committee of skeletons.

And the clock would still read ten past ten.

“Thank you for that rather comprehensive handover, Father Mulligan,” announced Arlene Killroy, her animated voice waking Nathan from his reverie.

Once a month for the six months leading up to Crumbington Summer Fête, the committee met to discuss the arrangements for the festival and the choice of local charities that would benefit from any money raised.

This year, after Father Mulligan had resigned his post, an unchallenged Arlene Killroy had stepped in as the new chairperson.

Fifty-five-year-old Arlene had moved her family to Crumbington two years ago and had yet to yield to the village’s inherent apathy.

“As your newly appointed chairperson, I’d like to welcome you all to the first official gathering of this year’s committee.

Going forward, I’ll be introducing a more formal online agenda for our meetings, strict timeslots for speakers and an allocated minute-taker.

We’ll have action points assigned to each member at the end of the meeting to keep track of progress. Is anyone familiar with Slack?”

Nobody answered.

“Flock?”

“Wallpaper?” Polly whispered to Nathan.

“Slack and Flock are online teamwork collaboration tools,” said octogenarian Doris Watts, opening her eyes from her meditation.

Kitted out in a powder blue cardigan, she sported a pretty buttonhole of holly combined with a sprig of ivory poinsettia flowers.

“Before you continue, Arlene dear, I ought to let you know that most of our members have only recently discovered the delights of online messaging and entry-level social media.”

Nathan had once heard Doris Watts refer to herself as a War Baby.

Born during the Second World War years, she had lived her whole life in Crumbington.

Her husband’s mother and father had established and run the local florist’s, something they’d passed on to their son.

Like Father Mulligan, she was as much a fixture of the community as the small clock tower on the village green.

With a collection of cardigans in pastel shades of each colour of the rainbow worn over plain dresses, Doris’ trademark was a buttonhole of pretty seasonal flowers.

Polly, the village gossip who seemed to know everything about everyone, had once confided that Doris had developed exotic hobbies since the death of her husband, including exploring a wide range of alternative herbal medicines, communicating with tree and plant spirits and building a home computer from scratch, which had included installing a Linux open-source operating system.

“I see. Well, as this is our first meeting, and unless anyone objects, I’ll record everything on my phone and write up notes and actions when I get home.

Now, before I forget, Michael Shanton sends his apologies--at the very first meeting, of all things--so with us today are Doris Watts, Polly Wynter, Father Mulligan and Nathan Fresher.

Because you already know each other, we can forgo introductions.

But can I say how heartwarming it is to have committee representatives from so many local family-run businesses.

Doris from the flower shop, Michael, our butcher and Nathan, the baker.

If only we had a candlestick maker, we’d have a full complement in our little corner of heaven. ”

As Arlene snorted, Nathan watched Polly roll her eyes.

Tourists stopping off at Nathan’s bakery loved to overuse adjectives like sleepy, heavenly and idyllic to describe the heritage village of Crumbington.

How many times had Nathan heard them liken the place to the backdrop of countless fictional stories centred around rural English settings?

Inevitably they would drop into their soliloquy how lucky he was to live there.

He found smiling difficult on such occasions, tempted to confess that he considered each minute spent in the rural wasteland a day in purgatory.

If not for a sense of loyalty to his father, he would have sold up and moved on years ago.

“Before we get to the first point of order, does everyone have a drink?” asked Arlene.

Instead of being seated around folding tables, Arlene had opted for the tables to be removed, and they sat in a half-moon as though attending a support group meeting. Maybe that had been her intention. At the final word, Doris sat bolt upright.

“Drink?” she inquired, her eyes scanning the room. Father Mulligan, the previous chairman, now relegated to a committee member, had always laid on a selection of inexpensive beers and wines for the meetings, making them far more palatable.

“Tea, instant coffee or orange cordial, Doris. Knock yourself out,” said Nathan. Arlene’s first act as chairperson had been to cut back on unnecessary expenditure.

Nathan almost smiled when Doris deflated and closed her eyes again.

Polly Wynter, sitting to his right, leant her shoulder playfully into his.

Best friends from school, Polly had gone on to become a teacher at Crumbington’s junior school.

She was also one of the few who could drag him out of his bouts of gloom.

“Pub therapy afterwards?” she whispered, as though she’d heard his thoughts.

“Try and stop me. But not a late one. Saturday tomorrow.” Nathan closed on Sunday, and most of his business came through the doors on Friday and Saturday. “How do you feel about getting online agendas for these meetings? Sounds a bit grown up, doesn’t it?”

“Makes no difference. It’s still the same old shit we could do with our eyes closed.”

“Like Doris, you mean?”

The two snickered like school kids until Arlene harrumphed loudly.

“Firstly, I would like to announce the date which has been fixed,” she said. “Father Mulligan?”

“Twenty-fourth of June. Locked and loaded.”

“Now the hard work begins. I hope you don’t mind if I say so, but I think our fête is overdue for an overhaul.

Last year’s event was more a fate worse than death than a fait accompli—if you’ll excuse the pun.

” Arlene punctuated her remark with another guttural snort.

“I attended last year as a member of the paying public, forking out good money to witness a wilted bouncy castle, a tombola raffle, a white elephant stand and various home produce stalls offering sauces, pickles and preserves. Undeniably quaint and traditional. We stayed all of thirty minutes. In total, the event raised two thousand, four hundred and twenty-three pounds.”

A hum of approval followed her pronouncement about a monetary figure everyone knew by heart. A week after the event the sum had been plastered across the fête social media pages, and it had even received a mention on page eleven of the amalgamated Mayfield, Mosswold, and Crumbington Gazette .

“After receiving a late donation of three thousand pounds from a generous but anonymous benefactor.”

“Hang on a minute. Nobody mentioned that. Are you saying we actually made a loss?” Nathan asked Father Mulligan, who merely nodded in embarrassment. Had that been the real reason he’d decided to step down?

“I wondered if people considered this kind of event tired and outdated. Until I found out how much Parsnip Green raised last year for their summer fair. Does anybody know the figure?” asked Arlene.

Everyone peered guiltily at one another as though she had asked a question to which every committee member should know the answer.

“Upwards of twenty-three thousand pounds based purely on sales. Almost ten times as much.”

“Summer fêtes are not a competition,” said Polly. Nathan knew that undertone well. If Arlene’s approach to leading the committee included humiliation, he’d bet good money she and Polly would come to blows before the day of the summer festival.