‘What about Notts TV?’ Dani chipped in. ‘They’re always looking for local-interest stories.’
‘There you go, Mel.’ Bronwyn grinned. ‘We’ll have a hoist sorted in no time.’ She took a satisfied slurp of coffee. ‘What are we looking at, anyway? What does a decent hoist cost? Only the best for Tate.’
Mel cleared her throat. ‘Well, the best one’s a PoolPal…’
‘So how much?’
‘Thirty-thousand pounds.’
‘Right.’ Bronwyn downed the rest of her coffee and stood up. ‘I’m off. I will say this before I go though: you’ve got guts, Amy, to take on a project this size. I wouldn’t have thought you’d got it in you, but I stand corrected. Total respect, and we’re with you all the way. Go Tate!’
She whirled out the door in a gust of wind, leaving me gaping and gibbering in her wake.
‘Don’t worry,’ Mel said. ‘She’ll have forgotten about it by next week. You don’t have to do this.’
The trouble was, I looked in her eyes as she said it. A mother, on her own, like me. Who’d made mistakes, like me, with gargantuan consequences. Who would swim down to the depths of the ocean, cycle up to the moon if it would help her child, if it would help make his life less bone-grindingly tough and bring some much-needed happiness into it instead.
‘I know.’ I smiled. ‘But I want to.’
Mel dabbed another sprinkling of sugar on her face – both cheeks, this time.
‘I’m not doing any press, though,’ I added. ‘I can organise it, but I’m not appearing in the paper or on the radio. And definitely not on television. You can do that bit, show everyone how gorgeous Tate is.’
‘Oh, come on now, Amy.’ Dani stopped on her way out and put her hands on my shoulders. ‘Don’t you want your fifteen minutes of fame?’
‘I most definitely do not. Fame’s not all it’s cracked up to be.’
‘I’ll do the media side of things if Amy doesn’t want to,’ Selena said from the table behind us. ‘I mean, for little Tate, of course. Someone has to do it, and it might as well be someone with no—’
‘Brain?’ Dani muttered as she made to leave.
‘Capacity for human kindness?’ Mel whispered, eyebrows raised questioningly.
‘Chance of actually donating any money herself unless she has something personal to gain from it?’ Dani added, earning herself a discreet high-five from Mel before she sashayed off.
‘Confidence issues,’ Selena finished abruptly, sensing that she was the butt of a joke but not sure what it was.
‘Please, feel free. I’m well aware that I’m nowhere near confident enough to be on television,’ I replied.
Marjory peered around Selena’s brittle ponytail and winked.
Oh boy.
* * *
Despite all the buzz about Bronwyn’s idea, which had somehow in everyone’s head become my idea, I made it outside while it was still twilight. Bright enough to give myself a complimentary pat on the back, while still dark enough that I could wrestle my anxiety back inside its cage without too much trouble.
Also dark enough that when a shadowy figure loomed out of a doorway at the edge of the square, I let out a strangled squeal, jumped about eight inches off the ground and felt exceedingly fortunate to have emptied my bladder only moments before.
‘Audrey! What the hell?’ I felt almost pleased to see her, so relieved at it not being a man in a baseball cap. ‘It’s not okay to jump out at people in the dark.’
She stood in front of me like a mousy-haired mountain. ‘Should I have hidden in your rhododendron bush instead?’
‘I don’t have a rhododendron bush,’ I responded, feebly.
‘This will have to do, then.’
We stood there and glowered at each other, as the sun inched closer towards the horizon, and Selena inched closer to leaving the café and finding her daughter lurking in a doorway instead of in bed with a migraine as she’d been led to believe.
