* * *
Once my legs are as limber as I can get them, I set to cooking my own dinner: another appetising meal of spiced lentil mush that gives me about as much pleasure as chewing cardboard. Never mind. Tomorrow night we’ll be in Fort William and I’ll treat myself to a bowl of mussels the size of my head.
One more day.
It isn’t enough.
Most years, the five days feel like plenty, time to recentre myself, to reconnect with feelings and my thoughts. The last few years, it’s let me remember Da the way I want to, the way he was before, but this year it’s all gone by in a rush. I’m not ready for it to be over. I want more time. More time with the walk, with the dirt and the grass and the gorse, more time with the clouds scudding low over the mountain tops.
After tomorrow it’s back to the farm, back to worrying about balance sheets and whether this wedding is something we can really pull off. Back to a list of jobs longer than I am – fixing the barn roof, and the new tyre for the tractor, the nail that needs hammering in by the guest bedroom door, and always more forms, taxes and invoices and spreadsheets to watch our fortunes tick up and down, each season worse than the last.
Stuart’s investment has saved us for now, but one wedding won’t be enough to put us back in the black. We need more:more reviews, more bookings, more word-of-mouth, and it will be years before I feel safe, before I won’t be looking over my shoulder every month, afraid that this is the one that will see us sink.
The weight of it bows my shoulders even now. A pressure so deep it runs through my bones. I’ve been carrying it for so long, I’ve forgotten what it feels like to set it down.
A few scattered drops of rain plink into my bowl, and I look up, finally noticing the fast-gathering clouds. Judging by their dark, almost bruised, tops, we’re in for one hell of a storm. The wind picks up quickly as I gather the rest of my things and throw them into the tent, staggering over to the campsite kitchen to wash my plate and bowl.
By the time I’m done, everyone else has hunkered down, and I can see why. The rain whips my exposed face and hands with icy sharp needles, and even the short walk is enough to soak me to my skin.
As I’m settling into my inner compartment, Rowan’s tent zip lowers, and she emerges, phone torch in hand. I can’t make out exactly what she’s doing through the screen, but she appears to be scanning her tent, poking the outer lining.
And every second she’s getting wetter.
“What the fuck are you doing, London?” I hiss.
She jumps, searching behind her for where the noise has come from. Idiot. Of course she can’t see me: I’m behind two layers of fabric without a light on. Then she returns to her frantic search.
“Are you out of your mind?” I lean out of my own tent, shining my torch towards her. “Go back inside!”
She spins around. She still has no raincoat. Her hair is plastered over her face and neck. Even from here I can tell she’s shivering.
“I can’t! I have to find the leak in my tent.”
Well, shit.
If there is a leak, there’s no way she’ll find it in these conditions. And even if she does, what is she planning to do? Sew it shut?
“How bad is it?”
She won’t meet my gaze. “It’s pretty bad.”
“All the way inside?”
She nods. A stream of water runs down her forehead and she wipes it out of her eye with one hand. Every inch of her is dripping. If her tent is wet, there is no way she’ll be sleeping tonight. And even if she does, she’ll be miserable. She isn’t coming out of this without at least a cold, if not something else.
There’s no other option.
“Get your things.”
“What?”
“Grab everything that isn’t completely soaked and get over here.”
“And do what?”
“London!”
“Stop calling me that! I have a name!”
