Chapter 25 #2
I turned to look at him, taking in the olive skin, the black hair, the beginning of dark stubble on his jaw.
And, for some unfathomable reason, my heart did a little somersault.
You know, that lovely feeling you get when you’re in close proximity with a very gorgeous man?
George Sattar? Very gorgeous? What on earth was the matter with me?
One – slightly – handsome man just a few inches from me and I was having fantasies about what it would be like to kiss him?
Was I so deprived of sex (or was it love and affection?) I was now looking at this man I’d berated for the past few weeks as a candidate to fulfil the void?
‘Jessica?’
‘Sorry? Sorry!’ I brought myself back to the moment.
‘You OK? You’ve gone very quiet? That seatbelt bothering you?’ George asked as I started to adjust the belt for something to do with my hands.
‘Sorry, no… Yes… The accident? Blane Higson – that’s the boy on the bike…’
‘I know.’ George stared ahead.
‘Oh?’
‘Dreadful business. That poor kid… If I’d just been a few seconds later or earlier…’ He trailed off.
‘So, any injuries yourself?’ I turned back to him – a good excuse to have another examination of his profile. He appeared to be all in one piece.
‘Only slightly to the car. In for minor repair at the moment – I get it back in the morning. It was a shock, I can tell you. Must have been worse for you with him sliding off your windscreen?’
‘You know about that?’
‘Of course. Robyn told me. I see a lot of her at school. She’s doing a fabulous job at St Mede’s what with this production she’s putting on. Although I hear that’s all off now? Her Danny Zuko going off to Benidorm or somewhere?’
‘Well, hopefully with Joel…’ I trailed off. Should I be explaining about Joel’s whereabouts? Andy had said probably best not to broadcast that I now had a lodger.
‘Joel?’ George continued to watch the road ahead, but I could sense immediate interest at his name. I recalled Joel’s apparent surprise at seeing George at Kamran’s place.
‘Oh, nothing. Just something and nothing…’ We drove on in silence, George seemingly deep in thought.
Eventually, once we were out on the road towards the Pennine hills that surrounded Beddingfield, I ventured, ‘So, where are we going and why are you taking me? Why on earth d’you think I’m going to be able to advise you about anything? ’
‘You’re a cook,’ he said. ‘Or should we be calling you a chef now? So you must know about kitchens. Where they should be situated? What to put in them? Should they be all open plan? Or has that trend had its day?’
I laughed at that. ‘George, I do all my cooking in an area in which I honestly can’t swing a cat.’
‘But you must know what you’d like? If you had the choice? The chance to plan a kitchen from scratch?’
‘Well, yes, one can always dream.’
‘I want a house, Jessica. I’m fed up of living in apartments. I want a garden for my girls and my bees. I’ve encroached on Kamran long enough. And now your mum is there…’
‘I’m sure Mum won’t mind you in the garden. She’s already sorted a pen for Roger.’
‘Roger?’
‘The rabbit. Kamran has put his foot down about having him in the house. Even though he is a house rabbit. Apparently, he’s now got his own heated little bijou residence as near to the main house as Mum could get him.
’ I laughed, recalling Mum’s description of Roger’s new pad.
‘But Kamran’s garden is huge! It’s big enough, surely, for the pair of you to do your own thing without getting in each other’s way? ’
‘Not the point. When someone is about to marry, about to share their life with another, the last thing they want is someone else always there, like a bloody gooseberry, popping up every two minutes to feed the hens. Anyway, I want more.’
‘More what?’
‘More of the good life, I suppose you’d call it.’ He smiled across at me.
‘And your girlfriend – Mina, is it? – wants the good life as well?’
‘We’re here.’ George broke off, not answering.
‘Oh, my goodness!’ I didn’t appear to be able to get any more words out. George had pulled up in the yard of what was some sort of farmhouse with a barn attached. ‘You’re not serious?’
‘Deadly serious.’ George grinned at me, leading the way up a path through an overgrown garden, under an archway of meandering honeysuckle to the farmhouse’s front door.
‘Mum would love to get her hands on this garden,’ I said, taking in what must have previously been a kitchen garden, beds of mint, oregano, chives, sage and thyme determinedly pushing through the choking weeds and grass. I bent, crushing a fresh growth of mint between my fingers.
‘D’you think she would?’ George looked hopeful.
‘I think she’s enough on at the moment what with The White House plot she’s determined to turn into a produce garden. She’ll end up doing too much and become ill again if she’s not careful.’
‘You’re very close, aren’t you? To Lisa, I mean?’
I nodded. ‘So, have you bought this place? Are you buying it? Is this the house your girlfriend was telling you about at the gym? She seemed really enthusiastic about it.’
‘She was.’ George turned back towards me as he struggled with the key in the lock of the huge ancient wooden door.
‘Unfortunately, not this place. The house she’d seen, and is determined to have, is a brand new, six-bedroomed “all ensuite”’ – George air-mimed the words in a high-pitched overexcited voice – ‘monstrosity over in North Leeds. So, no, not this one. When I first brought her up here, six months ago, she wouldn’t even come inside to look round.
She sat in the car on her phone, saying she couldn’t stand the smell. ’
‘The smell?’
‘Countryside smell. They’d been muckspreading that day.’ George indicated the fields behind the house. ‘She already owns an apartment in Chelsea Harbour in London.’
‘But she wants to settle down here in a family home with you in Yorkshire? I get that…’
I broke off as the stiff obviously water-swollen door suddenly gave way and we sort of fell into the farmhouse together. ‘Oh, wow!’
Forgetting George, all I saw was a vision of the most beautiful kitchen that could, one day, be here, and I simply stood and stared, taking it all in, my mind already planning what would go where.
‘Huge bifocal doors here,’ I finally managed to get out, walking quickly over to the bank of windows overlooking the garden, the fields beyond, and further away to the distant hills.
‘Bifold doors.’ George laughed. ‘And no, I could never rip out these traditional farmhouse windows. Come with me.’ He reversed back through the outside door we’d just entered.
‘Look, look, here.’ He led me through a patch of thistles to the adjoining barn.
‘It’s in really good nick, is the barn. Was apparently being used for keeping livestock until only recently. Come on.’
‘Is there a light?’ I looked round. The evening had suddenly descended without my fully realising it, and I couldn’t quite see where we were heading. George unlocked a tiny door camouflaged in the huge wooden barn door, flicking on a light as he did so.
‘This,’ he said, ‘this is where I thought a kitchen could be. What d’you think?’
What did I think? I felt a bolt of pure envy as I immediately understood George’s vision for this place.
‘Huge four-door Aga here…’ I said, moving over to where I would place said stove.
‘Six-door.’ George grinned, folding his arms as I inspected the place.
‘Red,’ I said.
‘Navy,’ he countered.
‘Bifocal doors.’
‘Bifold.’ George laughed once more, taking my hand in his excitement. ‘Massive island here.’ He threw the hand not holding mine to the left. ‘Bank of ovens, coffee maker over there…’
‘Ovens as well as an Aga?’
‘Absolutely. My Victoria sponges and Agas are not the best fit.’
‘Oh, very funny!’ I turned, but could see George was serious. ‘How do you know? Don’t tell me you have an Aga in your apartment?’
‘Kamran lets me bake in his kitchen.’
‘You bake?’
‘I do.’ George reached for his phone, immediately snapping off the light switch and reaching for his keys as a volley of messages came through. ‘Sorry, need to get off, Jessica. I’ll drop you back down at your car. You’ll still have time for a drink with the others.’
Why did I feel utter disappointment that George was so suddenly eager to get off?
We drove, almost in silence, back down to The Dog and Duck.