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R ose’s phone rang just as the screen went blank. She answered it, wiping her face with the palms of her shaking hands. Strands of her hair were caught up in the tears.

She composed herself, looking out of the kitchen window at the surreal unreality of a mundane summer’s day before picking up the phone.

The caller’s number was unfamiliar.

‘Hello?’

‘Hello Rose, it’s Patrick. I’m ringing about the car.’

‘Of course, yes, I’m sorry, I forgot to ask Rob for your number…’

‘Och, it’s no problem. This morning was the first chance we got to look at it.’

‘It’s really kind of you. It didn’t need to jump the queue.’

‘Uh-huh. No worries. Anyway, the thing is, I can’t work out what caused the fault.

Everything seems fine. It’s weird, like Saoirse’s…

sorry scratch that. Point is, it must have been some electrical fault that sorted itself out.

Bit of damage underneath where you parked on a boulder, but apart from that, nothing. ’

Rose rubbed her biceps. They still ached from hauling on the steering wheel. She glanced out of the window again and saw Rob. He spotted her and raised his arm in greeting. She gave him a vague wave, glad he couldn’t see her streaked face.

‘Anyway,’ Patrick continued, ‘you can come and collect it any time. No charge. Fellow musician and all that.’

‘You can’t…’

‘Don’t be silly. You had a scare. See you Friday.’

Simon had come into the kitchen and was watching her as if poised to speak, but as the call ended, he turned to peer into the fridge. ‘Aw Posie, there’s nothing to eat. You could have done some shopping while I was away. ’

All this time, she’d wanted to know what had happened, had begged him to talk about it and now it was too big to discuss. Bickering plastered over the cracks and stopped the pain from seeping out.

‘Can you drive me into town?’ she said. ‘I’ve got to pick up my car and some other stuff. Then you can get the shopping and meet me back here. Has the Guild told you when they want you to do the talk?’

‘The eighteenth of September. I need to get on with planning for it.’

Rose checked the calendar. ‘The eighteenth of September? That’s only a couple of days before full moon!’

‘I’ll be fine. As long as I’m safe in bed by midnight like a good boy, there’s nothing to worry about. Rose…the film…’

‘We’ll talk later shall we?’

Rose collected the car from Patrick, expecting him to tell her that she must have been imagining everything, but he didn’t.

Patting her on the shoulder, he handed back the keys, his eyes focussed on something behind her and said to go careful.

She couldn’t help but look round, but there was nothing there, just the town, warm in the sun, going about its business, birds wheeling in the thermals, a kestrel hovering over a garden, clouds wispy high in the blue.

She drove to Higgins and collected her paint and the paraphernalia to go with it.

She poked around as promised to see if there was anything she needed for the house, which seems unlikely, and finally settled on a large punch bowl and cups dusty from forty years of indifference.

She had no idea when she’d use such a thing.

Maybe she’d go for a retro theme for the house. Only without an avocado bathroom.

She was getting back into the car ready to drive home when Iseult called to her from the pavement.

She was standing with another woman, also tall and slender, with similar colouring and style.

She looked vaguely familiar, but whether that was because she was a poor doppelg?nger for Iseult or because she’d seen her around town, maybe in the book group, Rose wasn’t sure.

‘I’m glad you’re OK,’ said Iseult. ‘Imogen,’ she indicated the other woman.

‘saw your car on Friday along the road out of town after you left the coffee shop. She thought you’d broken down.

I was worried about you. I was going to ring the police but I rang Rob first to check you were home and he said you were fine. What happened?’

‘Oh, some electrical fault,’ said Rose. ‘It’s fine now.’

‘I called your name, but you must have been rescued by then,’ said Imogen.

She stood with her head a little to one side smiling.

‘I’d just missed meeting you earlier. I bumped into Iseult at the coffee-shop and she said you were off to the city.

It was a shame because so was I. We could have gone together.

‘Mmm,’ said Rose.

‘Have you got anything on just now?’ Iseult asked. She had a sort of conspiratorial twinkle in her eye.

‘Going home, that’s all.’ Going home to talk about the film or not talk about it; to plunge into the depths of that forest or edge round it.

‘You could stay out and come to a talk I’m giving instead. No pressure, but you might find it interesting. We occasionally have daytime events for those who can’t come in the evening. It won’t include business analysis, I promise.’

‘Cookery?’

‘Maybe - come and find out.’

Imogen was fidgeting. ‘Shouldn’t we go and open up and make sure the urn is on?’

‘Probably.’

Imogen fidgeted a bit more. ‘I’ll go shall I? You’ll be along in a minute?’

‘That’s a good idea. See you in a bit.’

Imogen hesitated then walked off down towards the community hall.

‘How did she know it was my car?’ asked Rose.

‘She probably didn’t. I’d just been talking about you, she drove off a few minutes later, she saw an unfamiliar car, put two and two together.’

Rose clenched her teeth.

‘Don’t get the wrong end of the stick,’ said Iseult.

‘I’m not the gossiping sort. I said something along the lines of “what’s the book we’re supposed to be reading for bookclub?

I’ve just invited someone who’s just moved here” and she asked how you were finding the place and I said “limited as to resources. I think she might have gone off to Stirling for decorating supplies.” Imogen’s lovely.

I’m glad you’re ok. You seemed very tense on Friday. By the way, how did you get home?’

Rose opened her mouth, wondering what was going to come out of it, when a blast on a horn made them both jump. A car pulled up alongside.

‘Posie!’ called Simon. ‘They’d run out of lentil-furters, but I’ve got everything else except wine. Can you pick some up? See you later.’ He smiled, nodded at Iseult and drove off.

‘Lentil-furters?’ asked Iseult.

‘I’m a vegetarian. It’s his idea of a joke.’

Iseult looked at her watch. ‘Och look, I’ll have to go. Honestly, come and listen. Sit at the back and slope out if you get bored. It’s not all cupcakes and country crafts.’ She smiled and walked off without looking back.

Rose looked at her own watch. She had been stuck at home for two days and when she went back, all there was to look forward to was decorating and skirting round talking about the film.

Flashes of it popped into her mind and she mentally stamped them down.

Going to the talk would be research for Simon, she thought.

The hall, when she entered it to slink into a back seat, was much as she’d expected. At the door, a short curvy woman waived Rose’s entrance fee on the grounds that it was her first time and handed her a leaflet.

Emblazoned on the front was a photograph of Simon, presumably swiped from the internet, and the date of his talk.

Oh Simon, thought Rose, what were you thinking?

There was a lot of battered parquet flooring and badly hung orange curtains, which were currently shut.

Rows of chairs designed for no natural human frame were lined up to face a stage.

A number of the ladies, Rose noticed, had brought cushions to sit on.

A small side room was being used as a crêche.

Pushchairs had been corralled outside in a kind of pen and the image of them tussling with each other when no one was looking, made Rose chuckle.

Perhaps the cheaper ones would collapse on their inadequate hinges and be trampled by the heftier off-road versions while the designer numbers sneered about the others’ low-cost trimmings in an exclusive corner.

From behind a steaming urn and institutional green cups at the back of the hall, Imogen waved and grinned.

Rose sat. Dust spiralled in a shaft of light coming through a gap in the curtains and landing on her knee as she squinted into the gloom.

In the front row, Emmeline’s neat frame could be made out.

She was sitting on one side of the aisle.

On the other, the seat at the front had been replaced by a wheelchair and the woman in it was bent in conversation with Hester.

Iseult was seated on the stage, next to a laptop and projector, over which another woman in hippy chic was fussing.

Iseult spotted Rose and smiled, raising her finger in discreet salute.

It was not discreet enough. Emmeline turned and scanning the audience settled her gaze on Rose and nodded.

The urge to get up and leave was overwhelming. Rose turned, but the doorway was blocked by a late influx of women. It would be impossible to leave without making a spectacle of herself.

The first part of the meeting was predictable enough.

Emmeline rose to give updates on sickly members, deceased members’ relations, requests for entries for competitions, polite reminders about parking, mentions of upcoming events including the ceilidh on the twenty-first of August and the talk on the eighteenth of September by the wonderful, marvellous, unique TV personality Simon Henderson.

I’m not telling him that bit, thought Rose.

She counted on her fingers and giving up, looked at the calendar on her phone.

The twenty-first of August was full-moon. She couldn’t do the ceilidh and leave him. She’d have to back out. Great. One more thing gone.

‘And of course, Simon’s very talented sister has moved here too -’ she nodded in Rose’s direction ‘-and I’m sure we’d all enjoy a recital of classical cello music later in the autumn.’

What? Hang on, thought Rose.