It had been an agesince she’d been to purchase supplies from the local traders. The last time had been with her mother when they’d been fully booked for Christmas lunches four years ago. How they’d laughed when the large bag of sprouts her mother had been carrying from the car into the pub had ripped open in the lounge, spilling mini green bombs everywhere. The cleaner had complained of finding the odd sprout, right up until Valentine’s day.
Instead of the usual bucket-load of tears she usually shed when she thought about her mother, this time the memory left her with a beaming smile and warmth enveloping her heart. It was a wonderful experience and Pippa felt as if her heart had healed just a sliver.
First she visited Ben the local fisherman at his small fishmonger business, which he ran out of a wooden hut at the side of his house. She smelt the fresh fish before she raised her fist to knock on his hut door. Ben opened the door with curious eyes that crinkled up at the corners when he recognised Pippa.
‘Well, I’ll be blown over in a hurricane. If it isn’t little Pippa from the pub.’
Pippa gave him a toothy grin. Ben hadn’t changed a bit. He still chewed on a wooden toothpick angled out of the side of his mouth. A toothpick had been a permanent fixture in his mouth for as long as Pippa could remember. His scraggy grey beard was much the same as when she was a little girl and the only difference she noted from his appearance from the last time she’d seen him, was he was now wearing a red woollen hat instead of a navy one, the colour of the hat she’d seen him wear the last time she’d been there with her mother.
‘I’m not so little now and I wasn’t so little the last time I saw you either, Ben.’
He waved her words away with the flick of a very wrinkled and veiny hand. ‘Bah, you’ll always be little to me, girl.’ He turned his back on her and hobbled over to a stool next to a chest freezer and pulled up the knees of his dungarees before he sat down. ‘You’ve missed the day’s catch. Alls that’s left is the fish I didn’t sell, which I’ve frozen.’
‘That’s fine, Ben. I’ve got a group booking I wasn’t expecting, so beggars can’t be choosers, eh?’
He nodded with a chuckle. ‘Where’s your pop? Is he being lazy and sending you to do his dirty work?’
Pippa laughed. ‘No. He had an appointment and Aunt Morgan drove him to it because his arthritis has flared up again. They planned to stop in the city for a bite to eat before they came back. Actually, Ben. I’ll probably be coming to get supplies most mornings for the next couple of weeks...maybe longer.’
Pippa’s comment appeared to pique Ben’s curiosity. ‘Oh ay? Are you planning on moving back, lass?’
Pippa shrugged. ‘Maybe.’
‘How come?’
Pippa grinned. ‘Because I’ve missed your ragged, old, handsome face, that’s why.’
Ben howled with laughter. ‘Hey, less of the old.’ He lifted the lid of the chest freezer. ‘What you ‘avin then, lass?’
‘Just give me two dozen of whatever you have. Some of the guests might not be fish eaters, but I need to make sure I have the supply to meet the demand if I get more bookings.’
‘Got an icebox?’
Pippa lifted what she was carrying. ‘I sure do.’
***
Her next stop was thefarm. Everything there was organic. It was a little pricy for the general public, but there was no arguing against the quality. Pippa had to slow her car to a total stop to let a herd of cows roam lazily across the dirt road as she made her way to the farm shop.
Big clouds of steam billowed from the cows’ wet nostrils in the cold spring air. Pippa shivered. She had the car heater turned all the way up, but the cows appeared to be oblivious to the low temperature outside. The sky was full of dark white clouds, either threatening a downfall of snow or rain. Soon, Phil, the owner of the farm and his son Pharis would bed the cows down for the night.
Pippa spotted Pharis and lowered the window of her car to poke out her arm and wave. She didn’t want to chance scaring the cows with the car horn. ‘Hey, Pharis!’ He waved back.
Pippa had known Pharis since they were really young. Best friends with her younger brother, Nile. He’d been a frequent visitor in their pub and home since childhood—especially when Nile and Pharis became teenagers. Pippa suspected they pulled themselves the odd sneaky pint of beer when they thought no one was looking, although she could never prove it. Pharis had been gutted when her brother had enlisted in the paratroopers and he’d been like a lost sheep ever since.
He walked towards her car, shooing the cows out of his way. ‘Pippa. Wow, it’s been ages since you’ve been back home. It’s really good to see you again.’
‘It’s great to see you too, Pharis. How are things? How are your parents?’
‘Mom and dad are great. The farm is doing well. But I’m bored. I can’t wait for Nile to come home on leave again.’
‘When is his next leave?’ asked Pippa.
Pharis laughed. ‘You’re his sister. You should know.’
‘We might be siblings, but your bond is thicker with Nile than mine is. You two were always inseparable. I’m surprised when you didn’t enlist with him.’
Pharis shook his head slowly with pursed lips. ‘Believe me, if I hadn’t have been an only child I would have, but mom and dad needed me.’
