Bringing the Summer (4 page)

‘I don't know. It's like, that's what adults think will
engage young people
, or something. That we're all into conflict, and dark stuff; graffiti, street art; rebellion. It makes me laugh. Some ancient examiners will have sat round a table and come up with it as the theme for the exam, and been all excited about what a good idea they've had.'

I frown. ‘I hadn't thought of it like that. It's actually quite interesting. Gives us lots of scope. I think it's a good topic.'

‘Sorry. Didn't mean to come over all cynical. I'm not, usually.'

‘So, what's your work all about, then?'

‘Colour. Colour and light.'

‘Can I see?'

He shows me the huge abstract painting he's working on: luminous greens and yellows, with a splash of dark purple in one corner. Acrylics and oil paints. I leaf through his notebooks, full of pencil sketches of plants, and gardens, and then pastel colour sketches. I can see the way his abstract images emerge from the real-life drawings, so what you end up with is shape, and colour, and something more . . . His painting is full of joy.

‘Where did you do the sketches?' I ask.

‘Home, mostly: the garden, and the fields around where I live.'

‘In the countryside?'

‘Yes, though it's not that far from town, really.'

‘It looks amazing.'

‘It's not really. I mean, the garden's a kind of jungly mess. It's not like a perfect garden or anything. But it's a mass of colour in summer.'

‘Sounds nice.'

‘It is. You should come and see it some time.'

‘I'd love to,' I say.

People are spilling out of hot classrooms into the corridor, suddenly. It's the end of the college day.

‘I'm going home now,' I say.

‘Me too. Want a lift?'

‘You've got a car?'

He laughs. ‘No. A scooter. Vintage Honda. Very slow, very old.' He picks up a shiny black helmet from under the table. ‘So?'

‘I'm fine walking, thanks!'

I look back, once, and he's still standing there, at the college entrance, the helmet dangling from his hand, watching me. I wave.

 

Miranda catches me up at the end of the road. ‘What happened?'

‘We had coffee. We talked. He showed me his studio space.'

She grins. ‘Not bad. Worth missing English for?'

‘Definitely. What did I miss, exactly?'

‘New book: by George Eliot, who is a woman not a man.
The Mill on the Floss
. We're supposed to read as much of it as we can over the weekend. It's really old fashioned. Heavy going. But Nigel says it's worth it. Now, tell me more about Gabriel. When are you seeing him next?'

‘I don't know. We didn't arrange anything
specific
.'

‘Honestly, Freya! You are so totally hopeless! Did you swap mobile numbers?'

‘No, course not.'

‘I'll find out his for you. Charlie might know.'

‘You just want an excuse to talk to Charlie.'

‘Of course!'

We've got to the corner of my street. We both stop, hug.

‘OK, see ya! Call me later, yes?' Miranda carries on up the main road.

I walk down our hill, not walking on the cracks between the paving stones, like we used to do, Joe and I, when we were little. Lines from a song flit into my head. Something Mum used to sing. Carly Simon? Joni Mitchell?

She'll be waiting for me, wanting to hear about my day. I prepare myself. I won't mention Gabes.

Six

Miranda would be proud of me. Yesterday at college Gabes asked me if I wanted to go and see his house and the garden in his paintings, and I said yes.

I check my watch. It's seven thirty already. People are heading down the street to the multiplex cinema. I walk along a bit, next to the wall, and lean against it under the tree.

I hear the
phut phut
sound of the bike engine before I see the bike. Only Gabes could make an old scooter bought off eBay look cool. But he does. Even in his funny old-style bike helmet. He's wearing the white shirt I like, skinny jeans and blue Converse.

He unbuckles the spare helmet for me. ‘Been on the back of a bike before?'

‘Never.'

‘It's perfectly safe. I'll drive very slowly. Especially uphill.' He laughs. ‘You'll have to hold on to me. And lean the same way as me and the bike, don't try to counterbalance.'

‘How far is it?'

‘Not very. Takes about twenty minutes.'

Gabes leans forward to help me fasten the strap. So close up, his breath is warm on my face. His skin smells slightly sweet, like soap. ‘There!' he says. ‘Ready?'

He gets on first, to balance the bike while I climb behind him. I put my hands lightly on his waist.

Everything about this first journey is exciting: him, the bike, the speed, compared to my old pushbike – and it gets more so as we climb out of the city and leave the main roads for small leafy lanes between high hedges. It's so green! A green wash of light through leaves, the lane making a tunnel under arching tall beech trees, and then the trees give way to open fields on either side, and down a steep valley, across a bridge over a stream, up the other side so slowly that I'm afraid the engine will give out altogether, though it doesn't. Next comes another long flat stretch through woods. I don't know this side of the city so well. I don't really know where I am, and then suddenly we're turning off the lane, down a steep, stony drive, into a cobbled yard and I see the house.

It's very old, built of stone, with small windows and a low, stone-tiled roof. It's like stepping back in time. Swallows swoop across the yard and up under the eaves of the roof, back and forth in criss-crossing lines.

Gabes turns off the engine and silence folds back in, except for the
tick tick
as it cools down. Gradually I hear other sounds, too: birdsong, and the hum of hundreds of bees on a tall bank of white and pink wildflowers. For a moment we just sit there, and then I take my hands off Gabes' waist, and climb down, and he parks the bike on its stand. I take off my helmet and fluff out my hair with my hands.

The door is open. I will discover, later, that it's almost always like this, unlocked. That Gabes' parents trust that things will be all right, that there's no need to worry about locks and property and possessions. We step over the threshold into a big kitchen, with a wooden table in the middle, a jumble of plates and mugs and books and piles of paper, and a china jug of the wildflowers I saw outside, spilling dusty yellow pollen over the wooden surface. The cushions on the chairs – all different, not matching – are faded as if they have been left out in the sun too long. I take it all in: the row of boots by the door; a big dresser with china plates and cups and saucers, bits and pieces from different sets, as if they've been picked up over many years from different places, or handed down through many generations. Tiled floor. Double stove, a row of wooden cupboards. A big bowl of ripe fruit – Victoria plums, from their own orchard, his mum tells me later, and another bowl, of their own eggs.

Gabes puts his bike helmet on the table on top of a pile of papers, flicks on the kettle, opens the fridge and peers inside. ‘Hungry? Want a sandwich? Supper won't be for ages.'

I shake my head. ‘No thanks.' I pull out a chair and sit down.

Gabes butters bread, cuts a thick slab of cheese, piles on pickle and tomatoes, takes big, hungry bites. ‘How was your first ride, then?'

‘Exciting!'

‘Good,' he says through a mouthful. ‘We almost didn't make it. Hardly any petrol. I only realised that halfway back. But I didn't tell you, in case you got worried.'

I think of my journey home, later, but I don't say anything. Instead, I ask, ‘Where is everyone? Are they expecting me?'

‘Of course!' he says through another huge mouthful. ‘They're around somewhere, I expect.'

In this house, visitors are obviously no big deal. If this were my home, Mum would be hovering, waiting to say hello the minute we arrived, wanting to be hospitable, but never really relaxed: offering drinks and food and not knowing what to say, and ending up just being in the way. She doesn't realise what she's like.

‘I'll show you round, in a bit,' Gabes says. ‘If you want.'

I do.

‘How old is it?'

‘The house? Pre-Domesday.'

‘Really? Which means what, exactly?'

‘Eleventh century, in the very oldest part. Other bits were added on: each generation added more. The Domesday book was 1080-something. You know, when they made a census of all the people and houses in Britain.'

I try to imagine what it would be like to live somewhere so extraordinarily ancient. Do houses have memories? I used to think so, that places hold an imprint of the things that happen in them, of life and death and love and all the things between.

‘How long have you lived here?' I ask.

‘My whole life. I was born here. Literally. Upstairs, in the little back bedroom. Same for Theo, and Kit, and Laura and Beth.'

‘Your brothers and sisters?'

‘Yes.'

‘So, who's who?'

‘Theo's twenty-one. He's at university. Kit's sixteen. Beth's married to Will and they have twin babies, Phoebe and Erin. They live in Oxford, though lately Beth's been staying here a lot. Laura lives in London with her boyfriend, so they just visit. Most weekends, in fact. Laura doesn't like London much.'

I'm suddenly really jealous. Why couldn't I have a proper big family like this?

‘What do your mum and dad do?' I ask.

‘Dad's a vet. Mum writes books.'

I look up as the door opens, and a woman comes into the kitchen as if on cue. ‘Who writes books?' she asks.

‘You do,' Gabes says. ‘Remember?'

Her hair's wet, as if she's just stepped out of the shower. She's wrapped in a blue cotton dressing gown, so loosely done up that when she sits down at the table opposite me it flaps open and I have to try not to notice how naked she is underneath.

‘Hello, Freya,' she says. ‘I'm Maddie. Gabes' mum.'

I'm suddenly shy. She doesn't seem to notice. ‘I hope he drove very carefully and slowly,' she says.

‘He did.'

‘Good. That's the one advantage of having such an old bike,' she says.

Gabes pulls a face.

‘I'll get dressed in a minute,' she says. ‘I had a bath and then I nearly fell asleep, reading on the bed. I'll start supper soon. You two could go and pick some beans for me. Has he shown you the garden, Freya?'

I shake my head. ‘Not yet.'

‘It's Mum's pride and joy,' Gabes explains.

‘Nick's not back yet,' Maddie says. ‘We'll wait for him before we eat. Laura and Tom are around, I think, and Beth's staying. She's doing the babies right now.' She smiles. ‘Sorry, Freya. Too many names!'

‘No,' I say. ‘I like it – I mean – that there are so many of you –' My voice fades out. It doesn't sound quite the right thing to say.

 

The vegetable garden is round the back of the house – or is it the front? We came in the back, where the yard and the kitchen door are, but the real front of the house with a porch and big wooden door is the other side. The sun has dipped lower in the sky and the light is golden, spreading huge shadows. The swallows are flying low, swooping over the house and garden for flies.

We walk along a grassy path past a bed of herbs, tall spikes of fennel and late-flowering lavender, to the wigwam of beans. We start to pick the long green pods. Gabes' hand touches mine as we reach for the same pod and my heart skips a beat. The evening sun filters through green leaves. The grasses rustle; fine clouds of seeds blow across the garden. A petal falls from a wild red poppy. Music drifts from an open upstairs window.

Even as it happens, I'm thinking about it, aware of it happening. I'm falling in love: with a place, and a family, and a boy with curly hair and blue eyes.

Why do we say
falling
in love?

Like
falling
asleep.

The suddenness? The lack of control?

Seven

Halfway through the meal and I'm drunk with happiness. Not with alcohol, though that is flowing freely enough among the adults: Nick and Maddie, at opposite ends of the big oak table, are passing a bottle of red wine between them, via Beth, and Laura and her boyfriend, Tom, who are sitting along one side of the table, opposite me, Gabes and Kit. Nick's only just come from work at a farm three miles away: a sick cow. When Gabes mentioned ‘vet' I'd thought of a town practice: cats and dogs and guinea pigs, but I've learned already that most of Nick's work is on farms. The roast lamb is a present from a satisfied customer. We're having it with the beans we picked, home-grown potatoes and mint and Maddie's home-made redcurrant sauce.