Bad Bad Decisions

Oh god, worst thing to happen ever. I feel.....oh god I’ll just tell you.
I blame the entirety of what happened on alcoholic beverages in general and vodka in particular.
I went out shopping, mainly to avoid thinking about all the Arthur stuff going on. I stopped for a rest and had stashed my things under a table in a pub because I thought I deserved a drink after the last few days of total misery. I ordered my first vodka and coke (the first on many) and was about halfway through drinking it when someone sat down in the chair opposite mine. It was Daniel Shield.
“Hello again.” He greets me before I can pretend that I was just leaving.
“Hi” I reply, awkwardly, taking another gulp of my drink.
I have never liked this guy, I realise I only met him once in person, but still there are some people, in fact, most people in my case, who I hate on sight. Daniel Shield looks like the kind of person most people detest. Clean cut, organized and successful overlaid with smugness because he knows how clean cut, successful and etc he looks.
“Everything going well I trust?” he asks, as if he’s a minor royal talking to a shrimp factory owner.
“Excellently” I reply shortly
“No problems with the locals then? They can be rather...off-putting.”
“And you would know this from your long years of study” I can’t help retorting. I instantly regret it. There are some people you can banter with, arguing lightly and insulting them a little just for the fun of the confrontation. Mr Shield didn’t exactly look like one of these people; he looked like someone who had their lawyer on speed dial just in case someone mocked his one sixteenth Norwegian heritage.
“I actually come from Ilensay, I grew up there.” He smirks, knowing that he has pinned me conversationally, as the mental comeback count begins I realise that I have nothing suitably cutting to say.
“I had heard that there was a slight problem with Arthur, he holds quite a prominent position as the head of the council there.”
“I know” I snap, resenting his patronising tone.
“So punching him was, you agree, a fairly foolish idea?”
Bastard
“Do you want another drink?” his sudden offer catches me off guard and he takes my silence for a yes, plucking my glass from my hand and heading for the bar.
My mind is working furiously. Why would he....? Then it hits me like a cold sheet of water thrown up by a speeding hearse. He can’t be...flirting. The thought makes me want to laugh out loud, but also makes me almost sick with dread. So this is it, after all this time, and the only person who finds me attractive is a patronising stuffed shirt who thinks of flirting as verbally subduing your quarry and making them feel inadequate. Wonderful.
Ok so I have a teeny confession to make, I have never actually been in a relationship. Scratch that, I have never even been, almost-very nearly-potentially-possibly in a relationship, full stop, which makes this cosmic joke of a “date” even more humiliating and awful. Even more awful is the fact that this guy is my age, or very nearly my age, give or take a year. As opposed to he who I’m not even mentioning, who is my age give or take a decade and who I actually might have considered possibly liking. But look which one I end up with. Typical.
So I sit and drink my drink, convinced that I should be mildly grateful for the long overdue attention. I allow alcohol to slowly dull the receptors in my brain that are screaming, “Push over the table and run you idiot! This guy is awful and so not worth your time.” I just sit there, aware that I have been defeated, listening to his long winded and one sided conversation that I suppose is intended to put me in awe of him, but instead leaves me with the strange impression that he wants my vote in the next general election.
When he offers me a lift back to the boat because he is staying on the island overnight at, “the old family stamping ground” – which I assume means “house”, I accept. When we are on the boat and a sudden lurch pushes us together I don’t pull away fast enough to make it perfectly crystal clear that he should not be that close, which is why his hand ends up on my leg, and why I end up in the "old family heirloom" which I presume means bed.
So in conclusion, I wake up with a pounding headache and a dry throat, in a strangers house. Looking at my clothing strew across the floor and wondering why everyone thinks teenagers love one night stands, because it is certainly not an experience I will be repeating.
I hastily shove on my clothes and tiptoe downstairs, where I see one of my shoes in the middle of the living room. I hurry over to grab it and jam it onto my foot. I feel awful, cheap and disgusting and just…awful. I never did anything like this in school, I never got drunk or did…other stuff.
But that’s not the worst part.

“Emma?”
I turn in disbelief to see Arthur standing in the doorway in a rumpled T-shirt, jogging bottoms and sleep tousled hair. He puts his coffee on a little side table but continues to frown at me.
“What are you doing…?”
“There you are!” Daniel breezes in with another cup of coffee which he presses into my hand. “Oh, hi Dad”
No, please no!
“Daniel” Arthur say’s evenly, still looking at me.
“Dad this is Emma, but then you already know her.”
Ha bloody Ha!
“No I really don’t” murmurs Arthur, before saying, louder “I actually have some things that I have to do, I’ll see you later Daniel.” and then he’s gone, just like that. Daniel turns to me.
“Just us then, listen I was just…”
“I have to leave, actually” I thrust the coffee at him briskly, striding out into the hallway.
“Right, well, maybe we can…”
“Daniel, no, just no.” I sigh, jerking open the door “Nothing, again, ever.” I stress the last word, stepping out into the cool morning air and shutting the door behind me.
Of course then I tiptoe through the shrubs to get to the back door. I need to talk to Arthur, I need to explain. The door opens onto the kitchen, floored with fat terracotta tiles which make my shoes clack. The hall is carpeted and painted the same bland cream colour as the kitchen, though it is livened with a few pictures in gold frames. I hear sounds through a partially open door, a peek through shows me that it is a study, and Arthur is there, staring blankly at a computer screen.
Unlike the rest of the house, this room is slightly modern with blue walls and a chocolate brown carpet. The shelves are filled with novels, mostly Stephen Kings and detective thrillers. It’s oddly endearing, to see that he is a little less grown up than he thinks he is. I push open the door and step inside.
“Arthur?”
He spins round in the squishy beige chair, bare feet steadying him on the carpet. Now that he is actually looking at me, it makes things harder, all my words are sticking in my throat.
“Emma” he replies evenly.
“I wanted to…explain, about Daniel and everything.”
“You mean you didn’t sleep with him?” I can see now where Daniel gets that cold voice and glare from.
“Yes, I mean, I did, but I didn’t…”
“Emma, you don’t need to explain, because there is nothing to explain, I don’t owe you anything and you certainly don’t owe me anything. So there is nothing to talk about.”
I’m totally stunned, he just cut me off, right there, like everything is suddenly meaningless. I nod mutely and manage to walk out of the room and out of the house before my eyes start to burn. Perfect. Well if any future hope of a potential relationship was still flopping limply, beached on a far off shore, this was pretty much a rock to its head.
I make it back to the site in time to make a vat of porridge for the campers, then I have the longest ever shower and bundle up in fluffy socks with an enormous mug of hot chocolate. My head is pounding, I literally feel like I’m dying, how do people do this every weekend? I dig in my cupboard for a forgotten packet of liquorish allsorts, if I’m going to do this kind of thing regularly then I think avoiding sugar is a lost cause as well.
How could I behave like such a slut? Arthur thinks I’m too young for him, so my solution is to act like the typical irresponsible teen? Very mature. I can’t even bring myself to go and see him, to try and explain. Everything is ruined, my bright shiny new life is just a joke, a stupid little fantasy for the stupid little girl. I pick the packet of sweets up and throw them across the room, followed by the mug and a shower of magazines which slither down the wall into the steaming puddle of chocolate.
For a while I just stare at the mess, then I get a cloth and wipe up the liquid, tossing the broken china into the bin, followed by the damp magazines. I feel embarrassed by this tantrum, as if it proves all the bad things my mind is saying about me. I get the little pie plate from it’s place above the stove and start to make pastry with the ingredients still strewn across the table. Adults don’t sit around in pink fluffy socks eating sweets, they carry on and make do. Just because this life is fractured doesn’t mean it’s not worth living, people have to stick with their choices.
I spoon bruised and bleeding berries into the lined dish, slowly flattening them, watching the juice squirt out under the spoon. This so isn’t helping, of all the things I could have baked, why pie? Arthur was right, the whole island is too small, all my memories of it bleeding together so that every place is inhabited by Arthur. It’s ridiculous. I slash pastry ribbons to cross over the top of the fruit. Totally stupid, I’ve been with him (not even with him) for a grand total of about an hour, and for half of that he hated my guts. That’s not a relationship, that’s not even a long lunch.
But still, as I begin to work on my second pie mechanically, I can’t help but see him in my head. Ok, so and hour isn’t that long, but I spent more than double that with Daniel, and that doesn’t mean we got any closer. I met Vikkie on our first day at school, within the first fifteen minutes, and we’ve been friends for nine years. My hands still over the floury table, the pastry falls into a tangled lump. Maybe, sometimes, when you meet someone, it’s not about time spent together, or age or anything else for that matter. Perhaps it’s about meeting them, and that’s it.
But it doesn’t matter does it? I could have realised this days ago, I could have made him see. Now he hates me and nothing matters anymore.
I notice yesterdays clothing, rumpled and discarded on the floor. The thought of wearing it again makes me feel slightly sick; as if it’s a skin I’ve discarded which is slowly putrefying. I pick up the shirt and the shoes and go outside, the skirt trailing from my arm. I reach the curved wall behind the house and look down at the dark points of rock standing out in the churning froth. I throw the bundle of soiled fabric as hard as I can, watching it tumble over and over, the wind shredding it into it’s components and then strewing them over the waves.

So I decided that I need a holiday from everything, a little break to remind me that there is life away from the island. The campers have decided to cut their stay short because of a weather warning that’s been issued, a storm approaching. So I’m free to do as I please. I’ve decided that I should visit Glastonbury. A couple of days of vegetarian food and interesting shops and I’ll feel more myself again, I’m sure.

Bread! and lots of it folks!

Well, this is defiantly the most interesting thing that’s going on right now, so I return to the Arthur saga.

After a few days the island air got to me again and I returned to my state of pre-church confrontation euphoria. Living in such a beautiful place, in such an old-fashioned way, and with a group of men depending on me for food; I started to feel the need to embrace the long forgotten domestic arts. I began to bake cakes of all descriptions, coffee and walnut, lemon drizzle and strawberry stacks, some even survived the demands of the campers to make it down the hill to Pam and the other people at coffee morning. After a while I began to get rather bored with simple recipes and scoured my three cookbooks for some more challenging things to fill my empty time. Having already made mass quantities of jam at home, it seemed silly to make more, so I moved to the next logical step, Bread.
According to my cookery book, it is one of the easiest things to make, having only a handful of ingredients and taking very little actual work and lots of waiting. So I heat up the water to the right temperature, mix the yeast with the warmed flour and some salt, then dump the whole lot onto the table for kneading. This actually takes a lot of effort, so by the time my dough has developed “a nice sheen”; my arms feel stringy with aching muscle. I drop the ball of dough back into the bowl, cover it up with cling film (that’s a whole separate battle) then leave it on the tiled windowsill to rise in the sun. The book says this will take two whole hours, so I tidy everything up and lie down on my bed to read another, less floury, book.
After two hours I’ve read nearly half of my book and am feeling impatient. The whole room smells of slightly warmed dough and yeast, so I open a window to let some fresh air in, then I go to uncover my dough.
Well....at least it’s risen.
This is actually an understatement; instead of doubling in size as the recipe book said it would, my bread has quadrupled, then doubled. It has risen nearly four whole inches above the rim of the bowl, and when I prod it, it hisses with trapped air and neatly heals the impression of my finger. I’m actually quite afraid that it is going to eat me.
I only have one, two pound, loaf tin. So I have no choice but to heap the whole swollen monstrosity into it and hope for the best. Optimistically I sprinkle the top with flour and a handful of poppy seeds, ok so it isn’t perfect, but home cooking is functional, not pretty.
I somehow manage to get it into the stove’s oven compartment, and then set my chicken shaped oven timer to fifty minutes. Instead of waiting inside for my bread to cook (and maybe throwing in a few Hail Marys for good measure) I decide to have a potter in the garden, if only to watch the caterpillars slowly munching their way through it. I’ve been settled on the wall for quite a while, drinking some tea and flicking to the best articles in one of my old magazines, when I notice Arthur struggling with the gate whilst holding a lumpy pile of stuff.
For a moment I’m a little thrown, I haven’t actually seen him around since he came to apologise and then nearly kissed me. Not that I’m keeping track or anything.
I pick my way through the lines of vegetables and take the things from him, recognising the tins and plates which I had taken cake to Pam with. The problem with stress cooking being that if it isn’t coupled with stress eating then it’s really just a waste.
“Hi” I say, depositing the heap of tins and plates onto the wall, “You didn’t have to bring all those up, I was going to collect them tomorrow.”
“I wasn’t going to; it’s just that I was coming up here anyway”
“Really and why’s that?” It is only in situations like this that I realise how much I suck at flirting.
“To see if you knew about all the smoke coming from your chimney.” He says with a touch of amusement.
I whip round. “Shit! The bread” I yelp, running back into the house. There is indeed a column of dark smoke pouring from the chimney. Arthur follows behind me, carrying the heap of things with an amused little smirk on his face.
I duck inside and grab my oven mitts, yanking open the oven door and trying to heft the loaf tin out. I feel a kind of tremor along my arms and the tin gives, but the top half of the mammoth loaf is left stuck to the roof of the oven. I dump the tin on the table, realising too late that it will burn the wood, leaving a large oblong of seared black. Arthur, in an attempt to be helpful rather than just lean in the doorway watching me in amusement, gets a spatula and makes a move to start scraping the remains of the loaf out of the oven; only I’m still in the way. We collide as I straighten up from the stove, having pulled all the shelves out to dislodge the bread. At first we both just clash and apologise repeatedly, disentangling limbs and spatula respectively. But after a second we both seem to realise our proximity to each other. My face is turned upwards towards his, which is tilted down. His hand brushes my side as it falls back to his and my heart hitches. The kitchen is silent and for a moment our breathing, loud and irregular, is the only thing I can hear. Then Arthur blinks and ducks down to the stove, working briskly.
I shake off my daze and go back to my loaf. Powdery traces of bread reduced to charcoal skitter across the floor as I wrangle the loaf, still as hot as a flame heated stone, out of the tin and onto a cooling rack.
Once Arthur has finished clearing out the oven and thrown the broken pieces of bread into the bin, he comes to look at the remains of my loaf, keep a cautious distance between us as if I’m a crazed nymphomaniac.
“I knew I shouldn’t have added more yeast. You just don’t argue with Delia, the universe can’t take it.” I laugh, trying not to feel hurt at his rejection.
He leans over and rips a piece off, popping it into his mouth.
“It’s not that bad” he mumbles through a mouthful.
“Really?” I ask, hopefully.
“Its bloody awful.” he says, and then splutters with laughter as I swat him with the spatula. After a second he seems to collect himself enough to reassert the barrier between us. These lapses into familiarity, as though there isn’t a day’s difference in age between us, somehow make it harder to go back to the prescribed elder-younger relationship.
“I should probably…”
“Yeah” I gesture to the door, giving him leave to go.
“Don’t burn the house down.” he calls, as he goes down the path.
Still chuckling I begin to measure out a fresh lot of ingredients, practice makes perfect after all.
When the second batch of slightly ill-fated bread is safely rising in its bowl, I decide to take a walk around the island, I always think better when I can walk around, and the whole Arthur thing was starting to give me a headache. I set off, the wind tangling my skirt around my legs and throwing my hair across my face. I round the edge of the cliff and look out across the vast expanse of wind tussled grass. It’s quite cold and I’m really starting to wish I brought a jumper when I catch sight of someone a few yards ahead of me. Arthur. He’s hunched against the wind, collar turned up and a cigarette smoking viciously against the blasts of sea air. As I get closer I spot a pile of spent cigarette ends balanced on top of an empty packet.
“Avoiding you would be easier if this island wasn’t so bloody small” He calls out against the shrill wind. I smile and sit down on the rock beside him.
“And we’re avoiding because?”
His face twists into an expression that’s half playful and half serious.
“Because you are growing on me and I am too old to entertain the notion of…”
“Gardening?”
He smiles weakly.
“And old is relative, I mean mentally I’m a forty year old nag”
I look up, smiling, and for a second our eyes meet. I can honestly say that up until just then I had never, ever felt as attracted to anyone as I did to him. He reaches a hand up and brushes it over my hair, before letting it fall back to his side. He sighs deeply and I let my eyes find the horizon again, wondering if maybe, just maybe we would have been happy in another universe.
“I’ll try to get better at the avoiding thing, I promise.” I whisper.
“I’ve got to…” he motions towards the village and I nod
I stay up there for hours, and it’s weird, but I feel as if I’ve lost a relationship that had lasted years, rather than the mere possibility of one a paltry hour long. The only person who I have liked, who ever liked me back, thinks he can’t have anything to do with me. The terrible thing is, deep down, I know it too.
God I feel so bad going on about this like a nauseating adolescent, but that’s what I am, so it’s difficult to tell it any other way.

Confused.com?

Another couple of odd events, but in a completely different way.
I hadn’t realised before, maybe because I wasn’t before, but now I’m lonely. I want to talk to someone about everything that’s happened. I need to share it with someone before I explode. But there’s no one. I don’t dare go down to the village; God knows what Pam thinks of me now.
I flip open my laptop and check on my website. There’s a message on it. A glowing white envelope of heaven sent correspondence. I click it open to find a booking request, my first. Four hikers who want a pitch at my new campsite, for two weeks starting in three days time. I close my eyes in thanks to whatever higher power exists.
With renewed vigour I go about my business, ignoring the village below and the spectre of ‘Arthur’. I clean the now completed toilet block, washing away the dust that clings to the fresh tile with long slow strokes to reveal the gleaming surface beneath. I tidy my house, washing the dishes and scrubbing the floor until my fingers are red and withered by the soapy water. I pick great bunches of fresh green herbs and put them in a jug on the table to scent the room.
The work makes me tired and so sleep is easier. For once I put aside my chick lit books with their Easter basket coloured covers, and open something a little more complex. I re-read a few of my course texts because their characters suffer so much indecision and angst, much better than the accusing and trashy happy endings that grate on every sore spot I posses. The days fill themselves with little pleasures, gradually blocking out all the pain of the past few days; cup of tea in the sun with a novel, winning an item on eBay and the oozing yolk of a perfectly boiled egg. (Well obviously not, but I tried)
The first I see of my visitors, some days later, is a procession of tiny green and beige clad people slowly making their way up the hill towards me. I make myself presentable and open up my spreadsheet so that I am prepared to enter their details. At last a knock comes and I open the door to four men in shorts and cagoules. Four rather weedy men it has to be said, but still, people.
“Hi! We’re the Kinden party?” the first guy, dark haired with glasses, says.
“Hello!” I shake his hand and move to one side, allowing them to enter.
“You must be tired; can I get you some tea?” I ask, perhaps a little too eager to please.
“No, thanks.” he holds up a hand to deter me “We really have to get the tent up, but we would like to know when dinner will be.”
“Any time you like” I say, baffled by this, like he needs my permission to make dinner.
“Brilliant” he grins “Will you be able to have it done by around seven?”
My entire face freezes. What? Why the hell do they think I’m cooking for them? As if he senses my shift in mood he frowns and produces a computer print out.
“That’s what it says on your website, “Let us feed you”? I thought it was a little strange, but never look a gift horse in the mouth, right?”
It’s a printout of my website, but it’s wrong somehow. One of the pictures has shifted to the side to fit on to the screen, blocking part of my slogan. He’s right it does say “Let us feed you” now, rather than “Let us feed your spirit.”, why can nothing ever go right?
I try to return his friendly smile and enter his name and the charges into the computer. At least he’s paying a decent price. When he and his friends have trooped outside to erect their tent I close the door.
Buggerbuggerbuggerbugger!! What am I going to do? I search through my ingredients, trying to conjure an idea. What can I cook for four people? I’ve grown used to my always slightly off concoctions. Over thick gravy, burnt pastry and over cooked pasta are tolerable when you are the one who has cooked them, not so much with other people.
Eventually I decide on a rustic supper of goat’s cheese potato bread with fruit and grilled vegetables on the side. There is no possible way that I can screw that up.
Oh God! Why do I ever open my mouth!
An hour later and I have made what looks like the most mutated pizza ever to grace the surface of mars. My grilled vegetables have become parched little slugs that taste of stove fuel, and my fruit…well the fruit is ok, even I can’t mess up fruit, but everything else is a disaster. I eye the failed bread/semi-successful pizza with distaste. Someone knocks on the door.
Bloody campers! I’ll just have to tell them that the food is out of the equation, that there is just nothing I can do. I dust off my hands and open the door.
It’s Arthur.
For a few seconds I’m too astonished to move, and then I come to my senses and start to slam the door. He jams his foot in the way and I look up, annoyed. It’s then that I notice what he’s holding. My pie.
Is he going to kill me with my own pie? The thought flashes wildly through my brain. Even as it does he inches the door open until we are looking each other in the eye.
“Did you make this?”
I’m pretty sure that I’m hallucinating from the fumes of burnt goats cheese.
“Yes” I say, as if this should be obvious.
“Ok” There’s a slight pause where I feel I should say “Ok, what? You psychotic weirdo pie thief”
“Well I’m a bastard” he sighs and runs a hand over his face.
“Obviously” I say before I can stop myself, letting the sarcasm that runs through my veins like blood infect my voice.
A slight rueful smile twitches at the corners of his mouth.
“I’m sorry, for…pretty much everything I have ever said to you, ever, alright? I’m a moron, can I come in?”
“If you keep saying things like that…yeah”
Wordlessly I move out of the way and he steps past me to stand in the middle of the room shifting nervously. I close the door and sit down in one of the chairs at the table. After a moment he takes the other and sets the pie on the table between us.
“So…you’re a bastard” I prompt.
“Yes” he snaps to attention and I realise he’s just been staring at me.
“And you are a bastard because…”
“Because…I was very wrong about you. I thought you were going to change the island, make it into a tourist trap to supplement you’re trust fund or whatever. I didn’t realise you were…like us, someone who likes this place just as it is.”
“Well I do, so that blows your first theory out of the water.”
“I’m working on my second.” He cocks his head playfully.
“Which is…”
“That you like this place just as it is, and so don’t pose a threat to the island. That you bake and…you punch harder than I do.”
“I’m a kicker too.” I allow myself a smile, this guy isn’t as bad as I thought he was, granted I thought he was the devil, but still.
We both seem to realise that we’ve leaned closer at the same time. For a second or two there is only an inch between us, then less, and I realise his eyes are slightly closed, just like mine. I can just feel his lip touching mine before he pulls away sharply. One moment I can feel warm breath on my face and my vision is filled with him, the next we have both pulled away.
“Do you want some tea? Or pie?” I ask, suddenly awkward.
“Sure” he gives a smile which is more like a grimace and swiftly looks away.
I busy myself with the kettle, getting out large blue and white striped mugs and matching plates.
“So…uh…” He gestures, wincing a non-verbal apology at his ignorance.
“Emma” I fill in.
“Emma, how old are you?”
Although it seems like idle conversation, I can still feel the tension in the room. For a few moments I agonize over the answer, to tell the truth is to put up a boundary, to lie is to put up a different one. Despite myself I feel that I’m starting to quite like this guy, and not just in the friendly “I no longer suspect you of being capable of murder” way.
“I’m 18, nearly nineteen”
Was it my imagination or did I just hear a sharp intake of breath?
“I’m 31” he says conversationally, but I can hear something else in his voice, an edge of regret and finality. I set the tea down on the table.
“I should actually be going…another time maybe.” he gets up and brushes past me, I feel a leap of excitement as he passes. How could this have happened? In the space of ten minutes I had gone from hating him, to not minding him, to very nearly kissing him. Bloody sea air.
“Miss Glades?” the voice of the lead camper pipes from outside.
Oh right, dinner.
I hastily throw together a platter of fruit, cheese and the less scorched vegetables. I open the door to the campers, wielding my very best hostess smile and hand the plate over. I make a plan to go into town to buy more supplies, as it looks as if I’m going to mess everything up at least twice. By the time I’ve eaten my own dinner and cleared away I’m hardly thinking of Arthur at all.
Well that’s a lie. To tell you the truth it’s really confusing, and I keep returning to the moment in the kitchen, playing it through again. I have no idea what’s going on with me, or him come to think of it.