500 Miles from You (Scottish Bookshop #3)(70)
Piotr wasn’t 100 percent up on the difference between South Korean and Japanese but thought she might like it, and he was right, she did.
Buried deep in Holland Park, well off the main thoroughfares and hard to find unless you already knew it was there, was Kyoto Garden, its colors burnished and bright in the West London evening, full of exotic plants and knotted trees and streams with little bridges. There was nobody there, but a pair of cranes nested at the water’s edge, just below the waterfall. It was breathtakingly lovely.
Piotr opened the rucksack he had been clunking all the way from the tube station, and he pulled out one large bottle of brown beer, one smaller one of vodka, a bag of dumplings one of his substitute aunties at the Polish club had rustled up for him, a box of sushi just in case, and a family-sized bar of Dairy Milk. Kim-Ange grinned widely and grabbed the vodka and the chocolate.
“Normally I hate picnics,” she said, looking around at the tranquil site, the water trickling through the curves of the beautifully made little streams with wooden bridges, smooth rocks, and carp. “But I might make an exception for you.”
And some time later, Piotr was sitting giving bits of dumpling to the fish until Kim-Ange made him stop and they found their two hands together, and their heads even closer, and suddenly, as the fish bubbled in the water and the waterfall tinkled overhead and there was a faint rustling of perfectly manicured fronds, but nobody else at all, they kissed, and even if there was a whole London, a whole eight million people, around them, they were not aware of another soul.
STROLLING BACK TO the tube station, giggly, tripping over their feet, clutching hands, Kim-Ange whispered something into his ear. Piotr shook his head.
“To me, you are only yourself,” he said stoutly, for his diminutive figure, his narrow hips and short height, belied a man with the heart of a lion. “Only yourself.”
Chapter 54
Lissa supposed people liked fairground rides for the same reason they liked scary films: the freedom of knowing that you felt a little frightened but you were actually incredibly safe.
But these rides—these were more than watching a horror film. It was stupid, and she felt she was making up for her childhood, but it was the wind in your hair and, in fact, the view you got, even when the ride paused for only a little bit at the top—it was like a double-edged sword, and everybody else was screaming their heads off with delight or horror.
She, by contrast, liked to try to hold the sight in her head; it was the best view she had had of the absolute vastness of the loch. It seemed to go on forever, and even though the day was still bright, the center of it was pitch dark. No wonder, she thought. No wonder they thought there was a monster in there. It was magical. She almost forgot to scream as they plummeted like a stone, until it looked like they would hit the ground, then just in time brushed past it and were on the rise again, and the view would unfold like a magnificent carpet, and she could see farther and farther as she turned her head: the rolling roofs of the little cobbled village, undulating over the fell; the neat layout of the farmers’ fields stretching ahead; the long line of the railway with a dark red train hurtling down its tracks; and the great body of water. She felt like she could touch the clouds. She wanted to stay up there all day.
Jake thought he’d have to put his arm around her—it was, he was finding, a very intense ride indeed, particularly when you’d just eaten three Scotch eggs and four Penguin biscuits, as pressed upon him by the good ladies of the St. John’s Ambulance. He felt distinctly queasy and wished the damn thing would stop. He shut his eyes to make it pass.
Lissa, meanwhile, couldn’t have enjoyed it more and wished it had lasted longer. She was absolutely blown away by the beauty and drama of the landscape; the ride had made her feel as high as the mountaintops, as close to the birds that circled in the updrafts. She sighed with something perilously close to happiness.
“That was amazing,” she said, when they finally got unclipped and rejoined the music and flashing lights and commotion of the fair at ground level. “I’d be happy just to be up there all the time!”
Jake couldn’t answer; he was very busy simply trying not to throw up and wiped the sweat off his brow.
“Are you okay?” said Lissa.
Jake nodded, wishing he could sit down.
“Do you need . . .” Lissa smiled. “Do we need to go back to the St. John’s tent?”
The thought of more Scotch eggs was simply too much for Jake. He held up a finger and charged off into the woods.
Lissa, surprised, smiled to herself. Then she glanced at her phone—out of habit, more than thinking anyone would be in touch. She wasn’t missing Instagram and Facebook, not usually. But she would have liked to have posted the view. It was quite something.
There was nothing there, of course, except a little dot on her WhatsApp. She opened it. It was a picture of three white spherical things, hard to make out.
Meat buns, she read, 90-minute wait. Excellent!!!!
She put her phone back, smiling. Well. Someone was having a good date, she supposed.
CORMAC COULDN’T HELP it. He was distracted, and that wasn’t fair. Ironically, of course, it was Jake who had told him all along: don’t be distracted, stop just falling into things. Think about the person you’re with.
He looked up at Yazzie, who smiled back at him nervously, aware this wasn’t going very well. She’d started a long story about the worst wound she’d ever seen, which, on balance, she really wished she hadn’t, especially as she had to shout above the insane noise levels in the bar. They were crammed into a tiny corner space. At least, she thought, the food was amazing—and it truly was, Cormac had never tasted anything like it; every herb and flavor superbly delineated, tasting fresh and light—so that was something.