Soul Love (11 page)

I had been looking forward to touching Gabe’s soft, dark hair. Lately Gabe had developed this habit of taking a strand of my hair and curling it round his fingers as we talked. If he got
agitated about something he would tug at it.

‘Sit still!’ I commanded. Gabe’s legs were still twitching.

‘I’m not sure if this is such a great idea,’ he said, frowning.

‘How can you doubt the skills of a woman who sold the complete works of Dickens today!’ I joked as I firmly grabbed Gabe’s head and waved the scissors.

‘Careful!’ he snapped and added darkly, ‘And remember I only want the ends trimmed.’

‘Relax, then,’ I said in a tense voice as I cut my first piece of hair. The scissors made a rough burring noise as it cut through his hair.

Gabe demanded to see how much I’d cut off. He turned to look and on impulse I kissed him.

At first he kissed back and I moved round to continue the kiss. Then he shifted his position on the stool, throwing me off kilter.

‘I’m sorry, Jenna,’ he said as I struggled to regain my balance.

‘No harm done,’ I said lightly. There was a strange expression in his eyes. I finished trimming his hair in silence.

Afterwards, he stood up. It was very claustrophobic in the bathroom. I took a step back. Gabe wouldn’t meet my gaze.

He muttered, ‘I’d better go now. I won’t be able to meet up for the next few nights. Got things to do. Plus I’m not sure if we should see each other every single night.
Why don’t we cut it back a bit?’

The insides of my mouth dried up and my face ached like it always did when I didn’t want to cry at a sad bit in a film. ‘Sure,’ I said. Something about my kiss had obviously
turned him off.

As we were walking down the stairs, I managed to say, ‘You’re right. It was probably a bit much meeting every night.’

At the door, Gabe looked back at me as if he wanted to say something, but he just gave me a sad half-smile and said, ‘This is not about you, Jenna. It’s my fault. I am screwed up at
the moment. My head’s in bits.’

I shut the door and when the stinging feeling that was circulating through my body eased a little I made myself a large hot chocolate and lay on my bed, sipping it for a long time stroking
Tallulah and trying to work things out.

What was it with Gabe?
He’d
been the one who’d insisted on spending time with me. It was confusing. Deep down I knew that I was in love with him and I knew that Gabe liked me.
I could feel it. But he was holding out on me.

I suppose I was holding out on him too. He’d never once asked me about why I was excluded from school. He’d taken me on face value. I sighed. I suppose I was going to have to do the
same. I was going to have to be mature and calm about things for once.

Chapter Twenty-One

M
y good intentions on the calm and maturity front lasted until half past nine the next morning. On my way to the
bookshop I spotted Gabe and Cleo together. They were walking towards the railway station arm in arm. I couldn’t see Gabe’s face, but Cleo was smiling. They didn’t notice me.

When they were about halfway down Station Road, Gabe stopped and Cleo put her arms around him. I froze. She was carrying a small bunch of those special white roses.

There was definitely something going on between them. I felt a total fool. I should have realised from the start that I couldn’t compete with Cleo. I’d always known that she’d
do anything to keep Gabe to herself. But I’d trusted Gabe and thought he’d felt the same about me when all the time he must have been seeing both of us. And I was the one he had to keep
a deep dark secret. My self-esteem folded like a house in an earthquake. Landslides of anger filled in the empty space. As I stomped back to town I gritted my teeth and said in Sarah-like fashion,
‘What we need is positive action! When do we want it? NOW!’

I went to the café, ordered a large slice of cake and e-mailed Jackson. I told him how much I missed him. Then I sent Mia a message saying that she had precisely one week to do something
or I would.

No one was going to push Jenna Hudson around any more!

As I was leaving the café I bumped into Charlie and Freddie.

‘Yo, my home-girl!’ Freddie exclaimed, grinning.

‘Isn’t it about time you stopped talking like that? It makes you seem ridiculous,’ I snapped.

Freddie looked really hurt and Charlie was stunned.

I wasn’t finished yet. ‘Charlie, if you’re still interested we can go out for pizza tonight. Pick me up at seven.’

I walked off before he could answer.

I spent the rest of the day reorganising the books in the shop. I was ruthless. Everything went into precise alphabetical order.

Julius looked on from the comfort of his chair. He just sniffed and said, ‘No room for surprises, then? I always like to stumble on a book that’s not quite in the right
place.’

‘I don’t like surprises,’ I mumbled and carried on reorganising.

When I got home I carried on the reorganisation in my bedroom. I chucked away the rose that Gabe had left on my windowsill all those weeks ago and that I’d carefully pressed in a book.

I even considered chopping all my hair off, but only got as far as snipping off a few split ends. Picking up the scissors was too much of a reminder about last night.

I never had much time for poetry at school, particularly old stuff, but I was enjoying dipping into
Vintage Verse
. I’d open a page at random and read the poem to myself over and
over until the words stuck in my brain. I found a poem to match my mood. It was a sonnet by William Shakespeare. Repeating the last lines over and over made me feel a lot better.

Then I moved the bed and sorted through my clothes. I even attempted to colour-code them, but as I’d only brought five T-shirts and one hoodie, it was a pretty pointless task.

I had just laid out all my clothes on the bed when Sarah knocked on my door and announced, ‘Charlie’s here.’

I’d completely forgotten about issuing my pizza declaration. I raced downstairs to cancel, but Charlie was wearing a new shirt, freshly washed jeans and no beanie hat. Sarah was asking him
about how I was doing in the band. He didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands as they moved from his pockets to behind his back to dangling in front of his body.

I didn’t have the heart to say I’d made a mistake. So we caught the bus to Netherby.

I wasn’t that hungry, but Charlie didn’t seem to notice. He kept ploughing through his pizza. As long as I kept asking him music questions, he was quite happy to keep on
chatting.

‘How’s Freddie?’ I asked.

Charlie grinned. ‘I left him in his room brooding.’

‘I was a bit harsh.’

‘You were wonderful, Jenna. Your eyes sort of flashed in a scary way. It knocked me sideways, but you’ve made Freddie sit up and think.’

‘I owe him a huge apology. I hope I haven’t scarred him for life.’

‘He’s more scratched than scarred.’

I was beginning to enjoy myself. Charlie was good company. I regained my appetite in time to sample the all-you-can-eat ice cream bar.

The restaurant was small and every table was full. As I glanced around the room it was no surprise to me now that there were lots of familiar faces. We were sitting opposite the vicar and
Sheila, the Netherby Hall tour guide. I wondered what the local gossips would make of that.

On my way to get my third helping of ice cream, I overheard some of their conversation.

‘So do you think I should speak to Lord Netherby about my plan, vicar?’

‘It’s an excellent idea, Sheila, but I should leave it a couple of days.’

‘But it’ll soon be the festival and no one can contact him then.’

The vicar lowered his voice, making my ears prickle. ‘This is delicate, but I’m sure I can rely on your discretion, Sheila.’

Sheila twittered something in response.

‘Today is the anniversary of his first wife’s untimely death, so I don’t think it is proper for you to discuss opening a tea room in Netherby Hall at the moment.’

‘Oh, I see.’

And so did I.

Chapter Twenty-Two

I
woke up early the next morning. Tallulah blinked and purred at me in delight as I filled her bowl with cat food
to stop her meowing and waking Sarah as I sneaked out of the house.

It was a beautiful morning with a light breeze. The air was filled with birdsong. I felt quite chirpy myself. I cut across the field like a regular country person and made my way towards
Netherby Hall.

I wasn’t exactly sure what was going to happen, but I knew that I had to see Gabe. I didn’t want to give up completely on our relationship. Now that I knew about the anniversary of
his mum’s death, I had to try and understand what he was going through. I couldn’t begin to imagine what my life would be like without my mum.

As I walked up the drive I practised what I was going to say. My first idea was to pretend that I’d found a book that Gabe wanted. Then I changed it to a rare record that I’d found
that I thought he could give me some advice on. Or would it be better to say it was something to do with Goats in a Spin . . . I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I didn’t notice the
sound of a lawnmower chugging away and the smell of freshly mown grass.

I looked to my left and could just make out a familiar dark head bobbing over the hedge. Gabe was manhandling an ancient lawnmower around a large tombstone. He was dressed in his tattiest pair
of jean and an old jumper. He badly needed a shave.

‘Hello,’ I said as I walked towards the lump of stone and traced the inscription with a finger.

Gabe turned off the mower and wiped some sweat off his forehead with his hand. He looked at me warily.

‘So this is Septimus Netherby’s monument to his beloved Brutus?’ I said, remembering the time we’d met in the long gallery. Gabe nodded as he walked over towards me.

‘I won’t stay long. I just wanted to say that . . .’ I fumbled around for the right words. ‘It must be hard for you without your mum . . . oh . . . I don’t know
what to say.’

Gabe traced his little finger along the inscription.
To the memory of a beloved friend who stood by me in fair winds and foul, whose loyalty never wavered and who is greatly missed.

Our little fingers touched on the stone. I looped mine around his. He squeezed it back. He had tears in his eyes.

‘Septimus could write with so much feeling about his dog. I wonder how he would have felt if he’d truly loved another human being,’ Gabe said.

‘Or been loved,’ I added.

‘It’s been a tough couple of days for me, Jenna. I should be more prepared for it with each year that goes by, but I’m not – I’m always taken by surprise by the
force of my feelings. Mum had been through lots of bad patches. Trips to the hospital when I’d prepared myself for the worst thing possible to happen. And it never did. She always recovered.
Then when it was a beautiful sunny day and she wasn’t feeling bad she just slipped away when I was out at the shops. That’s the thing that I can’t get over. The way she left me,
Jenna. I don’t ever want to feel like that again. I just can’t bear to get close to anyone and then have it all fall apart again.’

I put my arms around him and held him. I felt closer to him than ever. After a while I said, ‘Why don’t we play truant for the day? Go off on a big walk or something. I could leave a
note for Sarah and make some sandwiches. They’d have to be tomato because that’s all we’ve got in the house.’

‘I’d love to.’

We started meeting up again every evening after that.

Chapter Twenty-Three

I
was finding out all sorts of things about myself. Who would’ve thought that I would become an expert
haggler? When people brought books in to sell or wanted a discount I would drive a hard bargain. Julius called me ‘top notch’, which I’m pretty sure is a compliment.

I was reading a lot more too. I had chomped through some old battered Penguin Classics books and a modern cult novel that made more sense when I read it backwards. I had attempted to teach
myself Russian, but the accompanying tape had got all chewed up.

One day Ava asked me, ‘Don’t you miss being in London? When I was fifteen I longed to be a sophisticated city girl.’

For the first time in ages I thought about my life in London. ‘I do miss browsing in clothes shops, eating junk food and being in a crowd of people where you don’t know
anyone.’

‘Netherby has its comforts and consolations,’ Ava said, smiling knowingly at me.

It was comforting to be there. Sarah would’ve pined dead away, and Tallulah would’ve been all fur and bones without my trips to the Mini-Mart to replenish her food. The bookshop
would have gone to rack and ruin. And I was singing again. And there was Gabe.

As my relationship with Gabe got deeper so did my interest in
Vintage Verse.
I loved some of the lines by Arthur Symons:

I’d never realised before how useful poetry could be in expressing how you feel, when ordinary words sounded corny or cheap.

There was also the battered book of quotations. I felt sentimental about it and kept it by me on the counter. ‘Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast’ being my favourite
quotation, of course!

I was enjoying spending time with Ava. She was teaching me the correct way to trim hair and how to do her trademark bouffant hairstyle. She also showed me how to make pom-poms. This had given me
a brilliant idea for an art installation. I was going to cover Mrs Kelly’s office in pom-poms!

What was I doing planning on going to back to Coot’s Hill? Even if they begged me I wasn’t going back there. Mum had hinted in her e-mails that she had a few new school options
arranged for me, but I hadn’t asked her about them. I wasn’t ready to think about them just yet. I had a few ideas of my own and I wanted to see how things developed with Gabe.