It was Delphine shouting from across the square, arms fanning out like the feathers of an excited peacock.
‘There is either a fire, or she has something to show off,’ Jacques told Orla. ‘It is the same expression.’
‘Well,’ Orla said. ‘No one else is moving with any form of fear so?—’
‘It is the reindeer!’ Delphine shouted again. ‘It is here!’
31
Orla couldn’t believe it. Despite her sole reason for being here being the reindeer, the fact it was actually here and right in front of her felt like a Christmas miracle.
‘I’ve not seen a real-life reindeer before,’ Erin commented. ‘It looks bigger than the ones on Christmas cards.’
Tommy laughed. ‘You would freak if you saw an elk. Those guys are a lot bigger and definitely meaner.’
‘What’s your brother doing?’ Orla asked as she watched Jacques.
The reindeer was behind Delphine’s café, having been moved away from the inquisitive villagers at Jacques’s request. But he was now prowling around it like he was doing a pilot walk around the plane prior to captaining it into the skies. Any second now she expected him to attempt a reconnaissance of the reindeer’s undercarriage.
‘Getting closer to it than I would,’ Tommy answered.
Orla watched him some more. He was touching its fur one minute, then standing back and assessing, then moving to another angle, running a hand down each leg in turn like it might be a piece of antique furniture he was consideringbuying.The kitchen table. Suddenly she was only thinking about furniture in the context of how Jacques had pinned her down and held her wrist. What would it feel like to have his fingers running up and down her leg? Erin’s laugh broke through her thoughts.
‘Are you scared of the reindeer?’ Erin asked Tommy. ‘I’m gonna tell Burim.’
‘You talk about me to your boyfriend?’
‘I’m going to tell him some weirdo I’m stuck here with is terrified of a reindeer. He will think it’s hilarious.’
‘O-K, if you wanna piss him off, I guess,’ Tommy replied, putting his hands in the pockets of his coat.
‘What d’you mean?’
‘Well, Burim doesn’t seem like the kind of guy to like the idea of his girl even looking at another guy, never mind talking about one. What was it he said when you mentioned that footballer? “Why you not talk to this guy instead of me”?’
Tommy had done some kind of Eastern-European accent and Orla’s attention was now firmly with her sister and Tommy, learning as much as she could from this interchange.
‘Have you been reading my messages?’ Erin exclaimed.
‘How can anyone not read your messages?’ Tommy countered. ‘When your phone is out of your hand it’s going off every second with notification after notification.’
‘So what? That doesn’t give you the right to read them! And… and… Burim doesn’t speak like how you did it!’
‘Well, I think Burim’s a jerk!’
‘Well, I thinkyou’rea jerk!’
The reindeer made a noise like someone had blown an Alpine horn and everyone stopped focussing on anything else. Erin jumped towards Tommy who put his arm out to catch her and then, very quickly, Orla watched as realisation of the closeproximity hit Erin and she swiped at Tommy like he was an annoying wasp.
Orla stepped towards Jacques. ‘Is it OK?’ she asked. ‘It’s not going to give birth yet, is it?’ She paused before going on. ‘I mean, obviously the sooner it gives birth the sooner I can go back to the UK but slightly nearer Christmas would be better for the online hits and GMB might pick it up.’
‘It is OK,’ Jacques said. ‘And no, it is not going to give birth yet.’
‘But there’s something wrong?’
She could tell, by the way Jacques’s brow was furrowed and because of the straight expression he was wearing and trying desperately to maintain.
‘No,’ he said.
