Chapter 37
37
Jacques still didn’t know how chickens could escape from a shed with more security than a bank vault but here they were, rushing away from him across the glistening white ground. Hunter had barked to alert him, then the dog had whined at the window of his bedroom and he had immediately seen what was going on. His first thought had been to fly out of the house and catch them but the next thought had been: how did you corral chickens with nothing or no one to help you except a dog who seemed to think you wanted to play?
‘What can I do?’
Suddenly there was Orla, boot laces undone, coat open, no hat.
‘Go back inside,’ Jacques stated. ‘It’s too early. Too cold. You will freeze.’
‘I’m not abandoning Ginger and Baby and Posh… or Zayn Malik.’
He shook his head. ‘You are crazy.’
‘So tell me what to do to get them back in the barn.’
‘I have no experience in catching chickens. They have never escaped before and when I move them into the barn for the winter it is a well thought out procedure.’
‘Well, how do you do that? Can we think about it quickly before they run all the way down to Saint-Chambéry?’
‘Food,’ Jacques said. ‘That is the only way. The feed is in the barn.’
‘I will go and get it.’
‘And I will catch the ones who have run furthest away.’
He watched Orla turn and head back to the barn before he set off in the other direction.
It took a while, but, by the time Orla had re-joined him, he had a chicken under each arm and a few were bobbing about by his feet.
‘Sprinkle a little of the feed on the ground and we will keep going, like dropping breadcrumbs to lead them back to the barn.’
‘OK,’ Orla said, taking a handful of the feed and doing as he said. ‘Come on, chickens, let’s get you back somewhere warmer than this. Come on, eat the food.’
He watched her, dropping the pellets, her hair falling over her face, enthusiastically encouraging his poultry to comply and all his thoughts went back to last night. He had kissed her. Without any holding back. And it had been more than he could have imagined. Because that action, coupled with the fact he had opened up about his previous occupation and told Orla a part of what he had been through, was something he had never done, even with Katie. And it was something he never thought he was going to be able to do. Everything had been heightened ten-fold since last night when Delphine had said she was sick. Everything had at first felt insurmountable and then suddenly, with the kind of clarity bad news always brings arriving at top speed, his heart and head had been challenged to take a chance and trust his feelings. Except now, in the very cold light of day, he was questioning that decision-making all over again.
The birds in his arms squawked.
‘So, how pregnant is Noble?’ Orla asked him.
‘What?’
‘I looked it up. Reindeer are usually pregnant for around seven and a half months and, you were right, usually they give birth in May or June.’
‘Oh, well,’ Jacques began. ‘I would say this one is… going to give birth…’
‘Yes?’
Her expression was so hopeful. He knew he should tell the truth because, Orla wasn’t stupid, she would work it out herself before too much longer. But he really needed a frank conversation with Delphine before he said or did anything. Finding out her exact situation had to be his priority.
‘I would say any day now,’ Jacques finished.
‘Great!’
‘But, I will need to speak to the vet in Grenoble. Take his advice on what to do, see if there is anything else we should be thinking of. Maybe he will come… if the weather stays consistent.’
‘And as soon as the baby is born, Erin and I can get out of here and back to the UK for Christmas.’
He swallowed, gripped the chickens a little more securely. She was thinking about leaving. Of course she was. She wasn’t even meant to be staying with him. He still didn’t know if Delphine’s windows were really being fixed. Saint-Chambéry seemed to be a whole web of white-lies right now.
‘Sorry,’ she apologised. ‘I didn’t mean for that to come out quite how it sounded. I’ve enjoyed my time here, of course, but my parents need me at home.’
‘It has got more serious, with your parents’ situation?’
‘I just think someone needs to guide them through a few things.’
‘And that is your job?’
‘I can’t exactly leave it to Erin.’
He nodded. ‘For me it was the same. With our parents. I was the older one. The one expected to understand the problems and explain them in simple terms to Tommy. It is a big responsibility.’
‘Yes,’ Orla agreed, nodding.
‘And you worry about Erin too. And this guy she is in a shituationship with.’
‘ Sit uationship,’ she said, putting down more feed. ‘Though perhaps your word is better. Yes, I worry about her too.’
‘A lot of worry for one person.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘But that’s what happens when you care about the people in your life.’
It resonated hard. He cared about Tommy. He cared about Delphine. He was beginning to care about Orla. And he had always been someone who had shut down those emotions because, in his line of work, that’s what you had to do. Katie hadn’t understood that. Had called him cold. Maybe that’s what he had needed her to see at the time.
‘You are a caring person,’ he told her.
‘Not as much as I was,’ she responded. ‘Because if you care too much, people take advantage.’
‘People have taken advantage of you?’
‘Yes,’ she answered with a sigh. ‘Because I let them.’
‘In your work?’
He watched her scatter the chicken feed and take a moment before she answered.
‘In my love life.’ She sighed and shook her head. ‘Love life. That’s a joke. No one actually has love in their life when they’re dating these days. It’s like that four-letter word really is a swear word after all.’
He wanted to say something heartening, something to dismiss her theory. Because how could someone who wrote so emotively about life feel so disheartened about connection? Except he usually had nothing to give in that arena. But he had given last night and both of them seemed to be ignoring that fact today. Perhaps he should be the one to address it now…
‘Orla, about last night. I?—’
‘You don’t need to say anything,’ she interrupted, moving on as more chickens congregated.
‘No?’
‘No, I mean, you telling me about your past and then talking about my writing, that really made me realise what’s important.’
‘And that is?’
‘Our sense of self,’ she answered. ‘Amid every situation we find ourselves in, the most important thing to remember is who is the story and who is the storyteller. I am a storyteller. A narrator for those who don’t have a voice.’ She sighed. ‘And you were a storyteller too. You went undercover and played a part so you could report back the stories.’
He shook his head, gathering the chickens closer. ‘I do not believe it is as straightforward as that.’
‘What do you mean?’ she asked as she crunched over the snow.
‘You cannot always be the narrator,’ Jacques told her. ‘Sometimes you will be the person who is creating the content.’
‘No, that’s just how it is for me,’ Orla said with a shrug. ‘I’m the person backstage making things run smoothly for the lead roles.’
‘But that means you are saying that you will never be the person who is the action.’
‘I’m just saying that, for the most part, I know that I’m meant to be the helper of others and that’s OK because I like that and I’m good at that. The minute I put the complete focus on me everything goes wrong.’
‘No,’ Jacques said, shaking his head and finding himself feeling angry. ‘That is not all you should be. That is not all that you are.’
He put down the chickens he was holding, ripped the feed away from her, sprinkled a whole heap on the path and watched as the chickens all ran to the spot and began feasting.
‘Maybe other people’s action is enough for me,’ Orla suggested. ‘When you’re in the spotlight you’re just setting yourself up for someone to tell you you have no right to be there.’
‘Someone has made you feel like that?’ he queried, getting angrier by the moment.
‘Someone made you feel like that too,’ she reminded him. ‘Maybe I should build myself a fortress in a forest and never come out.’
He grabbed her then, with a bit more force than he had intended, until her back was up against a fir tree. ‘Don’t you say that. You should never hide away. You are too beautiful, too clever, too charismatic to not be one of the biggest parts of this world. I can’t believe someone would dare to try to make you think otherwise.’
He was breathing hard now, exactly how he had been last night before they had kissed. And she was looking at him with those beautiful eyes. It would be so easy to get caught up in the moment. But it would just be a moment…
‘Orla,’ he said softly, stepping back from her.
‘Yes?’
‘Can I… take you out to dinner?’
He was holding his breath now, waiting for her reply.
‘Yes,’ she answered. ‘But… there is one condition.’
‘What?’
‘Can it be something we haven’t had to catch first?’
He smiled. ‘Agreed.’
‘And can I just check? Did you just call me charismatic? Because, if you did, I might want to add that to my résumé.’
‘If you carry on helping me with these chickens you might be able to add “farmer” too.’
She laughed. ‘Just so we’re clear, this is your story and I am merely the describer.’
‘We will work on that,’ he answered.
And as she picked up two chickens and the abandoned bag of feed, a warm feeling he hadn’t experienced for a long while grew strong in his gut. He had slowed things down for now, disconnected the immediate intensity, but only because everything was telling him that he wanted more than a moment with Orla Bradbee.