Halfway across the shop floor I hear the music, something delicate and jazzy coming from the café. I lower my head to get through the little door and there’s Elliot jumping to attention, looking surprised.
‘Aww, you’re here already. I’m not quite finished,’ he says, before standing aside to reveal the little table set for two. He’s unpacking a big wicker hamper and inspecting each item before laying it on the café counter. And he’s changed his clothes. Black pants and a shirt, open at the neck, and sleeves rolled up, the thin white cotton under as much stress from his arm muscles as I am right now.
‘What’s all this?’ I say, stuck against the doorframe, my feet not wanting to move.
‘Jowan dropped it off, to say thank you for saving Aldous. Look, it’s all Devonshire produce. There’s cheese, bread, loads of deli stuff. I don’t knowwhatthese are.’ He turns to me and holds out a plastic tub containing something wrapped in some kind of leaves, but as he does so, he freezes, just for a second.
‘You weren’t wearing that when you went out.’ His eyes scan down my body and when they reach the floor he seems to jolt out of his thoughts suddenly. He turns back to the hamper, rummaging again, eyes narrowed with renewed concentration. ‘You look beautiful. Is that new?’ he says, failing to convince me he’s examining the label on a bottle of wine.
I ramble for a while, telling him about the shop I found and he listens in silence. ‘Let’s open this,’ he says when I’m done, but not before throwing a sidelong glance at my dress again while I pretend I’m absorbed in straightening the cutlery at the little table.
‘I’ll get the glasses,’ I say, making my way through the shop and into the little kitchen which we haven’t cooked in yet, not even once since we arrived.
I imagine myself for a second, my hair wrapped up in a towel maybe, and Elliot in a robe, standing at the little hob making bacon and eggs for two. I shake away the domestic daydream and grab the only two glasses there are, mismatched vintage tumblers, from the little yellow cabinet, and make my way back through to the café and to Elliot.
It’s exactly this kind of homely fantasy that got me into so much trouble with Mack, I remind myself – the man who, it turned out, was actually a stranger to me. Just like Elliot.
I ask myself, what do I even know about my fellow bookseller, really? But the answer gets away from me when I dip back into the café and find Elliot has drawn the lace curtains a little and is lighting two tall white candles in silver holders between our place settings.
‘There… were candles in the hamper?’ I ask. I don’t know what I’ll do if he says the romantic lighting was all his idea. Actually, I do know. I’ll die here on the spot.
‘Yeah, is that usual with hampers?’ he says, quirking a brow.
‘Umm, not really.’ I put the glasses down and immediately pour the wine, strawberry-jam red and smelling utterly gluggable. ‘This was nice of Jowan,’ I say, standing over the now candlelit table, side by side with Elliot.
Elliot doesn’t look at me when he answers. ‘I think he was feeling decidedly guilty about letting Aldous have his own way all this time. Maybe now he’s realised his lenience was actually neglect.’
The music emanating from Elliot’s phone on the counter switches to something deep and soulful with a Motown vibe. We both freeze, looking at all the food laid out so invitingly, but neither of us sit.
‘Should I open the curtains again?’ Elliot says, as though suddenly unsure of himself.
I tell him its fine and force his wine into his hand. Maybe if we drink up it’ll make this a little less strange.
‘Cheers,’ I say, before diving into my tumbler. Surprisingly, Elliot doesn’t neck it, like everything else I’ve seen him taste so far. I watch him over the rim of my glass. He’s savouring a mouthful, swallowing slowly, closing his eyes.
After that, I can’t concentrate on much. I feel as though my eyes are somehow fixed to his mouth by an invisible electrified wire, and from there it connects to the pit of my stomach.
Daniel’s words of yesterday dance through my head as Elliot suggests we sit down to eat, and I think maybe my friend is right, Icouldhave a holiday romance. Why not? I’ve already treated myself to something frivolous today. I could do it again.
But that thought doesn’t quite land correctly. It feels like a misfire, especially when Elliot tops up my glass and leans over all the lovely food and asks, ‘What should we try first?’
He’scapable of acting like a normal human being. I need to as well. ‘The obvious answer is the bread and cheese,’ I quip, ‘closely followed by anything else with carbs.’ I’m giving away my nervousness, I’m sure of it.
I try to be sensible and focus on our meal. We fill our plates with crumbly white cheddar, chutney, pâté, and great hunks of bread torn from a rustic sourdough loaf. There are greenhouse tomatoes too, and olives and sweet peppers in herby oils.
‘I could live off stuff like this,’ I tell Elliot, who smiles back, his hands hovering over his cutlery, again taking it slowly, like he’s here to savour everything this time.
No sooner do I have a mouthful of food than Elliot asks me a question. ‘Did Mrs Crocombe say anything to you, after I’d left?’
‘Mmmm… nope,’ I force myself to swallow, shaking my head and digging into the potato salad and the little pancake things topped with salmon and frilly dill fronds. ‘She disappeared sharpish, like a woman on a mission.’
‘That’s what worries me. I think her and Minty are in cahoots. I just… I don’t like being talked about.’ Elliot pushes some baby leaves around his plate.
‘I think that’s unavoidable around here. For the past four days I’ve felt as thoughwewere the most interesting stories in the shop, for the locals, I mean.’
‘Hmm,’ Elliot doesn’t smile at this. In fact he looks pretty miffed.
I take a deep breath before I say what’s on my mind. ‘Look, if I tell you something, do you promise not to run off and hide every time you see the volunteers?’
