The Things I Know(62)

‘Call me any time,’ that’s what he’d said, ‘if ever you need anything, anything at all, and I will always, always, try to make your life the best it can be. If I can do anything to help you, then I will, because that’s what you deserve, Thomasina.’ The thought that there was someone thinking about her, there for her, no matter that he was all that way off in London, made her smile.

But also she remembered that, no matter how grand his words or his intentions, he would still have to navigate his mother’s moods to make anything happen in actual fact. She wished things were different for her and for him, wished he would do the right thing and jump ship – and this thought brought her back to the very beginning: how she could so easily make the suggestion and yet struggle to act on it herself.

‘It’s complicated, Buddy boy! That’s what it is!’

The hens enjoyed their afternoon corn and were perky, seemingly not missing Daphne a jot. In fact, if anything, Little Darling seemed to have found her voice and was walking around like queen of the coop now that the competition for prettiest hen had taken a step in her favour.

Poor little Daphne . . . Thomasina felt guilty that her hen had had a rather crude burial in the back of the pub car park. Shelley had stood at her side, smoking a cigarette, as she laid Daphne in a shallow grave. It was hardly the fitting end she’d envisaged for the beautiful bird.

Calmer but no less forgiving, she was relieved not to have seen Emery since she’d got back. He was apparently out with the tractor, cutting the hedgerows back on the lower fields. Thomasina walked back to Big Barn to get the dry bedding from the tumble dryer. As she looked up towards the yard she saw the unmistakable shine of Tarran Buttermore’s sleek new black Range Rover pull in through the gates. Ordinarily, she would have rushed to a mirror to fix her hair, splash her face and wash the animal shit from under her fingernails, but today she could only recall the way he and his moronic friends had heckled Grayson and didn’t think twice about what she might look like. He wasn’t the one who made her feel beautiful; he never had.

Tarran jumped down from the car and walked in a determined stride with his hands on his hips, looking up at the farmhouse and then down over the field. His stance irritated her beyond belief. He didn’t own the bloody place, not yet.

‘Emery still not back?’

As usual when sober, he addressed her in this businesslike, matter-of-fact manner, as if they were strangers or she were of no consequence. His cool delivery always made her feel grubby, turning their brief shared history into something even more sordid, if that were possible. Not that it mattered now; she’d found something so much better.

She’d found Grayson Potts.

‘No, he’s not.’

‘He’s borrowed our flail arm for cutting and we need it.’

‘As I said, he’s not back.’ She stood firm, taking in the confident, almost cocky swagger of the boy, who thought he was the bee’s knees, all because he was blessed with a pretty face, a pocketful of cash and drove a fancy car.

‘Anything else, Tarran? Or can we both get on?’

He smiled at her, a crooked smile that managed to convey the fact that he was both insincere and irritated. ‘Tell Emery I’ll see him later.’

She had no intention of playing messenger and said nothing. He looked her up and down.

‘Shelley told me you were freaking out over a hen. Is that right, Hitch?’ He laughed now. ‘Just wanted to say you should get your facts right. Lots of birds dropping down dead for no reason all over the county. The Reedleys have had to get rid of their whole brood of hens, and I don’t reckon your cousin is killing them all, do you?’

‘My name is Thomasina.’

‘What?’ He looked at her quizzically.

‘I said my name is Thomasina. I don’t want people to call me Hitch any more.’

‘Is that right?’ He shook his head, laughing to himself, and climbed up into the car, slamming the door before roaring off up the lane.

‘Arsehole!’ she called out as his licence plate disappeared from view.

‘Who’s an arsehole?’ her mum asked, head down, as she trotted by on her way to the compost with her little enamel bucket full of vegetable scraps.

‘Tarran Buttermore.’

‘Oh yes, he is,’ her mum said, heading off up the yard. ‘A proper arsehole.’



The walk along the riverbank with Buddy restored her calm. It was not only beautiful, the sky clear and the water lively, but every step reminded her of being there with Grayson. She liked to think about his mannerisms, his scent and the way his hand felt in hers. She took her time on the flat rock, throwing stones out into the current.

‘I was just thinking that we can still come down here, Bud, whenever we want. It’s public land. We might not own the farm in the future, but nothing’s going to stop me coming down to the edge of the water and chucking in stones. I’ve been doing it since before I can remember. It’s our special place, isn’t it?’ She pictured herself and Grayson, holding each other close on the tartan rug.

Buddy made a groaning sound.

‘It won’t be the same, I know, but the flat rock will still be here and no Buttermore dickhead can stop me coming to sit on it.’

She checked her phone intermittently for a text message. Doubt crept up on her, loud and destructive over her thoughts. What if Grayson didn’t call? What if he was just being kind when he said those things? What if his terrible mother had put her foot down again and he’d listened to her horrible words, like ‘floozy’? It was not going to be easy, this long-distance relationship, especially when one of them worked rigid hours in an office environment and the other lived on a farm with the crappiest phone signal in the whole wide world.