Welcome to My World

It didn’t, of course. ‘Wait a minute – Juste Moi magazine? The only person I know around here who reads that tripe is—’

Harri pulled a face and dropped two teabags into the pot. ‘Fancy a biscuit?’ she interjected weakly. ‘I think I’ve got some bourbons in the cupboard.’

Rosemary appeared in the kitchen doorway, face stern and arms folded. ‘What has Vivienne Brannan got you into this time?’

The kettle reached boiling point with a noisy whistling fanfare and Harri was glad of the moment it gave her to formulate her reply. ‘It’s just a project she’s got. A daft idea, really. I only said I’d help her to stop her nagging.’ She placed the teapot, mugs and milk jug on an old rose-printed tray that had been her mum’s. ‘Would you grab the biscuit tin, please?’

Rosemary followed her niece back into the living room. ‘Hmm. If I know Viv, this is probably going to entail you doing a lot of work and her getting off scot-free.’

Harri poured the tea. ‘To be honest, I wish I’d never agreed to the stupid idea in the first place. I should have realised that Viv would try to wriggle her way out of helping. But I have her word this time that she’ll pull her weight, so I intend to hold her to it.’

‘Well, I suppose you know what you’re doing.’ Auntie Rosemary placed a concerned hand on Harri’s arm. ‘But just be careful, OK? Viv’s ideas usually end in disaster and I don’t want you being caught up in the middle of another one.’

Harri smiled at her aunt. ‘I’ll be fine, honest. She’s just thinking of Al, that’s all.’

‘What’s all this got to do with Alex?’

There really was no point concealing the truth from Rosemary. Harri took a deep breath and told her aunt about Viv’s Big Idea. Rosemary listened for a long time, her steady expression masking her true opinion, although Harri could guess what it was. When Harri had told her everything, Rosemary shrugged.

‘I thought that woman couldn’t surprise me any more but I was wrong. That has got to be the most ridiculous idea I have ever heard. Honestly, I swear she never grew out of her teenage phase. Your poor mother was always bailing her out of daft situations. Well, no matter. What concerns me is you, Harriet. I just don’t want you losing a friend over this.’

Neither do I, thought Harri. ‘I’ll be careful, Auntie Ro, honestly. With any luck all the replies will be from complete psychos and Viv will give up the idea.’

Rosemary’s nut-brown eyes narrowed. ‘You don’t believe that any more than I do,’ she observed. ‘You may be setting yourself up for a fall, that’s all I’m saying.’

‘So the police said they weren’t going to investigate the unexplained lights over Innersley any more because of lack of evidence,’ Tom was saying as Harri arrived at work next day.

Nus and George were anything but the rapt audience he was obviously hoping for, but he appeared undaunted.

‘I mean, seriously, what does that say to you?’

Nus inspected her immaculate nails with an air of boredom. ‘That you need to get a life?’

Tom let out a groan and turned to his boss. ‘Aw, c’mon. George?’

George stifled a yawn and slid his ample backside off Harri’s desk, pulling up the sagging waistband of his trousers as he did so. Harri stifled a giggle, recalling a comment Stella had made about him last week: Forty-three with a beer gut to die for and he’s still single? Shockers!

‘Thomas, a busy travel professional such as myself has no time for indulging in idle tittle-tattle. I suggest you turn your overfertile imagination to the task of coming up with irresistible offers on our Summer Coach Spectacular, all right?’

Tom’s frame flopped resignedly. ‘I can’t believe there’s a blatant government conspiracy going on right underneath our noses and none of you is even remotely interested.’ He grabbed an empty brochure box and plodded into the stockroom.

Harri smiled at Nus. ‘What’s all that about?’

Nus leaned down to retrieve her mobile from her bag. ‘UFOs above Innersley, apparently.’ She started to text, her acrylic nails squeaking on the keypad as she did so.

George’s flushed face appeared in the doorway to his office. ‘Harriet, do you have a minute?’

‘Sure,’ she replied, standing up.

‘And bring us a coffee while you’re at it, eh, chick?’

‘Ooh, tea, please,’ Nus said, without looking up from her phone.

‘Hot choc for me.’ Tom’s voice floated in from the depths of the stockroom.

Groaning, Harri collected everyone’s mugs from the office and made her way to SLIT’s ridiculously small kitchen. In truth, the title ‘kitchen’ was incredibly generous for what the room actually was; calling it a cupboard with a stainless-steel sink squeezed into one corner would be more accurate. The green vinyl covering the floor looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in years and stuck to the soles of her shoes as Harri man oeuvred her way around the boxes of brochures that were haphazardly stacked by the entrance. A few brave shafts of light managed to break through the grey grime covering the tiny safety glass window as the old water boiler shuddered and bumped into life. Trying not to inhale the strong smell of mouldy plastic, Harri filled the mugs with hot water and balanced them on a ‘wood-effect’ tray that had once passed for mahogany (but now resembled grey-brown peeling chipboard) along with tea-bags, coffee jar, hot chocolate canister, slightly damp sugar bag and spoons, carefully navigating the boxes to emerge back into the office. Having worked at SLIT for as long as she had, she’d quickly learned that the safest way to prepare drinks was at her own desk rather than braving the kitchen’s cramped confines.