‘Shut up.’
Chuckling to myself I sat down again and picked up my laptop. I was going to write my grant application.
Chapter 15
I didn’t hear anything at all about the application for a couple of weeks. I tried to put the grant out of my head and concentrate on Nan, and Tall Trees and The Vine, but I kept checking my emails and picking up my phone to see if I’d had a missed call. The closing date had been and gone and I thought it was probably time to accept that it had been awarded to someone else. It was no biggie, I told myself. No big deal.
But I was still disappointed.
‘So you’ve not heard anything?’ Tara asked one day at The Vine when I was gloomily wiping down the tables. ‘Is that why you’re moping?’
‘I’m not moping, I’m distracting myself.’
She tutted. ‘Is it working?’
‘No.’
I sat down at the table I was supposed to be cleaning and sighed. ‘I really thought this might be the beginning of something for me. A new start.’ I reached out and picked up a beer mat, spinning it on one side absent-mindedly.
Tara came over and picked up the empty glasses I’d stacked up. ‘It still could be. Even the fact that you got it together enough to apply is a new start.’
‘I suppose.’
‘And you got to meet your hottie professor.’
‘I’ve not heard from him, either. He’s doing exams.’
‘Surely he’s done with all that stuff?’ Tara frowned.
‘He’s not taking the exams himself; his students are doing the exams and he’s got to mark them.’
‘Thrilling.’ Tara shifted the glasses to her other hand and knocked the beer mat from my hand. ‘Come on, misery guts. I’ve got you for thirty more minutes and I’m going to work you hard.’
I groaned. I’d not been sleeping well and the thought of going straight from a lunchtime shift at the bar to an evening shift at Tall Trees made me feel tired. ‘Can’t I just sit here until it’s time to leave?’
‘Not if you want me to pay you.’
‘Fine.’ With an eye roll to rival Micah’s best, I got up as my phone buzzed in my back pocket. ‘Hang on.’
I took it out and read the message. It was from Blessing. “Please come and see me when you arrive for your shift,” she’d written. “I need to speak to you about your community grant art application.”
‘Weird,’ I murmured, showing the screen to Tara. ‘I don’t think I’ve even told her about the application.’
Tara put the dirty glasses on the bar and gestured to them. Obediently I followed her and started stacking them in the glasswasher.
‘You didn’t tell her?’
‘No. Why would I?’
‘Erm, how about because she manages Tall Trees and you’ve just applied for a load of cash to cover one of its walls with paint?’
I put my hand to my mouth. ‘Oh God, you’re right. I was so busy worrying about books and rough sketches that I didn’t think to check it would be okay.’
Tara raised an eyebrow. ‘I guess she found out somehow.’
‘Do you think she’s going to sack me?’
‘Maybe. I would if it were me.’
