“MUM.”
“Yes?” I call back.
“Is it breakfast?”
“No.”
“Is it nearly breakfast?”
“Yes.”
A pause.
“I’m starving.”
“Shocking.”
I push myself upright and unzip the tent, blinking slightly against the pale morning light spilling across the clearing. The campsite looks like the aftermath of a small but cheerful disaster. Boots scattered around the fire pit. Someone’s hoodie draped over a log. The faint curl of smoke still rising from last night’s embers. Theo is sitting cross-legged on the grass beside Isla with a cereal bar already half demolished.
“You said breakfast wasn’t ready,” he says accusingly.
“That’s not breakfast.”
“It’s pre-breakfast.”
Around us the clearing slowly begins to stir into life as parents and teachers crawl out of tents with the resigned expressions of people who have slept approximately four hours and now have to supervise energetic children in cold weather. Someone starts boiling water on a small camping stove. One of the instructors is already doing a lap of the site reminding everyone that bags need to be packed and on the coach by ten.
I glance around. Rory is near the equipment shed, talking to one of the other dads while coiling up a length of rope. He looks up. For a second our eyes meet across the clearing. And something small but unmistakable passes between us. Not awkwardness. Not regret. Just the quiet acknowledgement of two people who both remember exactly what happened the night before. He gives a small smile and I smile back. Then Theo decides this is the perfect moment to loudly accuse Isla of stealing his torch and the moment dissolves into normal life again.
Breakfast is chaos. Packing up is worse. Unpacking and putting tents up is hard work but it’s fun, exciting and new. Taking it all down again is just cruel.
Children are attempting to stuff damp clothes and muddy boots into bags that were clearly not designed to contain this much evidence of adventure. Teachers move between tents checking under groundsheets for lost items and reminding everyone that, no, the coach driver will not wait while you finish building a stick fort.
I’m crouched beside Theo’s bag attempting to compress a sleeping bag into submission when a shadow falls across the ground beside me.
“Need a hand?”
Rory’s voice is calm, casual, like we didn’t completely rearrange the emotional landscape of our friendship about twelve hours ago.
“I’ve got it,” I say automatically.
“You don’t.”
He crouches beside me anyway and takes the sleeping bag before I can argue further, rolling it neatly with his huge, strong hands and tightening the straps in about half the time it would have taken me.
“I was getting there,” I mutter.
“Eventually.”
Theo watches this exchange with deep suspicion.
“Did you two argue?” he asks.
“No,” we both say at the same time.
Jesus, we did quite the opposite. But I’m not going to tell my eight-year-old that.
Theo considers that for a moment like a small detective. “Okay,” he says eventually, before wandering off in search of Isla.
