My Not So Perfect Life(76)

“Look up,” I keep exhorting her. “Look up.”

Everything becomes boggy around here. And very slippery, even before it’s been laced with hemp oil. It’s OK, as long as you’re careful, don’t walk too fast, and don’t even think about running.

Which is why I’m about to make Demeter run.

“Oh wow!” I whisper as though in sudden excitement. “Can you see the kingfishers? Millions of them! Hurry!” I up my pace to what looks like a run, although I’m careful to plant my feet carefully and stay balanced. “You go first.” I turn and make a generous gesture to Demeter. “Go ahead of me. But hurry! Hurry!”

Like a shopper at the Harrods sale, Demeter starts pegging it in a tiptoe run, her eyes fixed upward, gathering momentum. She doesn’t see the point at which soggy mud turns to oil slick. She doesn’t even notice when she starts to skid—until her feet finally hit the slipperiest bit of the oil slick, and she hasn’t got a chance. She slides down toward the swamp, flailing her arms, looking like a really terrible snowboarder.

“Oh my God!” she gasps. “Oh my—oh God!”

“Careful!” I call out cheerfully. “It gets slippery….Oh no!”

I’m watching with all my attention, not even letting myself blink. I want to enjoy this fully. I want to see every single moment: Demeter thrashing her arms in panic…Demeter sliding off the bank…Demeter poised in midair…Demeter’s horror as she realizes what’s about to happen…



And Demeter landing in the swamp. With not so much of a splash as a thwump. It’s three solid feet of mud, and as she crashes into it, the mud sprays up in great gloopy splatters, landing on her face and hair. There’s green weed on her head and down her cheeks, and I can see some sort of bug crawling along her shoulder.

Yes! This could not have gone better. Look at her!

She immediately tries to scramble to her feet, but it’s not so easy—and she falls several times before she manages to stand up. By this time she’s in the middle of the swamp, and if I’d planned the perfect photo op, then this would have been it. Demeter looking drenched, muddy, undignified, and furious.

“Help me out!” She waves an indignant hand at me. “I’m stuck!”

“Oh dear!” I call back, getting my phone out. Trying to hide my euphoria, I take a few photos, then carefully stash my phone back in its bag.

“What are you doing?” shouts Demeter.

“Just coming to help you,” I say soothingly. “You know, you should be careful around swamps. You should never hurry.”

“But you told me to hurry!” Demeter explodes. “You said, ‘Hurry!’?”

“Never mind. We’ll soon get you back to your yurt. Come on,” I beckon.

“I’m stuck,” Demeter repeats, giving me an accusing look. “My feet have sunk into the mud.”

“Just lift up your leg.” I mime pulling a leg out of a swamp, and Demeter copies—but as she wrenches her leg out, her wellie is missing.



“Shit!” she says, flailing her arms again. “My boot! Where’s my boot?”

Oh for God’s sake.

“I’ll get it,” I say, feeling like a mother with a three-year-old. I wade into the swamp, reach Demeter, and feel around in the mud for the boot. Demeter is meanwhile standing on one leg, clinging to my arm. “Here.” I fish out the missing wellie. “Shall we go?”

I turn toward the bank, but Demeter doesn’t turn with me.

“Why did you tell me to hurry?” she asks in even, ominous tones. “Did you want me to fall in?”

I feel a tiny spasm of alarm, which I quell. She can’t prove anything.

“Of course not! Why would I want that?”

“I don’t know,” says Demeter in the same ominous way. “But it’s weird, isn’t it? And you know what else? I feel like I know you from somewhere.”

She scrutinizes my face and I bow my head hastily under my baseball cap.

“Well, that’s ridiculous.” I give a hasty laugh. “I’m a Zummerzet girl. Never been to Lunnon town in my life. I don’t even know where Chiswick is.”

“Why did you say ‘Chiswick’?” snaps Demeter.

At once I curse myself. Shit. Idiot. I’m losing concentration.

“Didn’t you say you work in Chiswick?” I answer as lightly as I can. “Summat like that?”



“No, I never mentioned it.” Demeter holds my wrist so tight that it hurts. “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m Katie!” I try to wriggle out of her grasp. “Now, let’s go and have a nice slap-up cream tea…or cake…jam tarts….”

“You’re hiding something.” Demeter gives me an angry wrench and I lose my footing.

“Aargh!” I land in the swamp and feel mud slapping onto my face. Oh my God, this is gross. I scramble into a sitting position, wipe my eyes, and glare at Demeter. All my self-control has gone. I feel as if my kite string has snapped; the kite is soaring away.

“Don’t you dare do that!” I slap swamp mud at her.

“Well, don’t you fucking dare!” Demeter slaps mud back at me. “I don’t know what you’re up to, but—”