And then she hears it: a scratching sound in one of the trees. She looks up, and there he is, stuck and scared. Lexi laughs, relieved: ‘Pippin! What are you doing up there?’He’s alive. But elation quickly turns to dismay as she realises she has no immediate way of getting him down from the tree. She has two options: walk back to the shop, head down to the basement, retrieve her ladder, and lug it all the way here. Or, go round the corner, mere feet away, and see if Sam has a ladder she can borrow. Either way, she’s going to have to go up a ladder, and she feels woozy just at the thought of it. Anything for this cat, though, right?
The thought of trekking all the way back to the basement of Pemberley Books seems too much to Lexi right now, after this exhausting day. As does having to interact with Sam, but... marginally less so? Lexi decides that she’ll see if the light is still on in his shop, and if not, she’ll have to resort to another plan. Maybe one involving a hot fireman? She’s heard they’re good at rescuing cats– that they spend way too much of their time doing it, in fact.
But Sam’s light is on, so Plan A it is.
Lexi knocks, quietly. Because if Sam doesn’t hear her, that’s another reason to go for the fireman plan.
But he does.
‘Hi,’ he says, with something like tenderness in his voice. But then he remembers they’re fighting. ‘Did you come to yell at me some more?’
Ah, yes. Asking him for a favour after the way they left it last time– Lexi scurrying away after an ill-advised moment of hate-fuelled passion– is perhaps not her classiest move. But what can she say? She’s desperate.
‘No. I have come to you in my hour of need.’ She’s trying to charm him with her wit and with Austen-style dialogue, but really she just wants to fall into his arms and have him hug her.
‘What’s up?’ His face is softer than she remembers from their last encounter.
‘My cat, Pippin—’
‘The bookstore cat?’
She nods. ‘Yep. He escaped somehow, and now he’s stuck up a tree. That tree over there in fact,’ she says, pointing in its vague direction. She pauses, hoping he’ll fill in the gaps. But he doesn’t say anything. ‘I know you probably hate me, but I was hoping that you might have a ladder I can borrow and that if you do, you might be able to be the bigger person here and help me out.’
Despite himself, maybe, he breaks into a smile. And oh, Lexi has missed that smile. ‘Sure.’
Sam disappears into the shop and comes back with a metal ladder. Lexi swallows hard. She hates those things. As if in sympathy, Pippin, watching on from his perch, gives a plaintive meow.
‘I’m coming,’ she shouts towards him. Trying to sound soothing while shouting is definitely a challenge. Lexi isn’t really sure she’s managed it. Then she swallows hard, preparing to ask Sam a favour. ‘Would you mind holding the ladder while I climb it?’
Sam smiles again, amused. But not mocking. At least Lexi doesn’t think so. ‘Sure,’ he says again.
He locks the shop door behind him and she leads him to the tree. Sam leans the ladder against it and Lexi looks at it, willing herself to be the kind of fearless woman who isn’t remotely fazed by the prospect of climbing up a ladder.
But, in fact, sheisfazed. Very fazed indeed.
Still, in an effort of bravado, she makes it up the first five rungs. Pippin sees her, his eyes flashing dark, mirroring her own fear.
‘It’s okay, little one,’ Lexi says, as much to her inner child as to the cat. And then she realises that in order to grab hold of Pippin, she’s going to have to let go of the ladder, and she freezes to the spot, her legs jelly-like at the prospect.
‘You okay?’ Sam asks. His tone is kind. For a second, she lets herself believe he is a safe place.
‘I don’t like heights,’ she tells him.
‘Here,’ he says, without hesitating. ‘Let me.’
Feminism be damned, she doesn’t need to be told twice. Any excuse to get off that ladder. She is not above being rescued if it means not having to deal with heights.
Lexi clings to the ladder until her legs feel steady again and the nausea recedes. ‘Please don’t judge me,’ she says. ‘There are lots of things I’m good at. Heights just don’t happen to fall into that category.’
‘I know that,’ he says. ‘It’s okay.’
Going down the ladder is somehow even worse than going up it. On a day like today, in a week like this one, it’s a miracle she’s still standing, quite frankly. She has to take it very slowly. She can feel her cheeks burning from the embarrassment. She is a strong and capable women, and yet.
‘I’ll catch you if you fall,’ Sam says. ‘I’m right here.’
Something about that sentence makes her woozy, and this time it’s not the height. It’s the fact that he hasn’t made fun of her or made her feel ridiculous. He’s acknowledged her very real fear and let her know that he’s here for her in the midst of it. She’d want to kiss him, if she didn’t hate him so much. Gah– maybe she should have just called a hot fireman instead?
She has a flashback to her first memory of Stephanie grabbing her hand and pulling her back from the road she was getting ready to run across. In her mind now, there were thousands of cars rushing towards them. But memory is a funny thing; maybe that wasn’t the case at all. Maybe the risk, then as now, was in fact minimal. And still, she was kept safe by someone she loved.
