Chapter 20
A couple of mornings later, I get the sense that something’s happening when I serve tea to more people before ten o’clock than I usually see in an entire day, and fend off multiple enquiries about booking a table for the next quiz night.
I tell myself that the foreboding sense of unease is for nothing, and it’ll just be because of Lettie telling everyone who goes into the village shop, as she said she would.
‘Excuse me, are you the lady from the video?’ A woman in her thirties has come up to the window and ordered tea and a slice of cherry Bakewell cake, but instead of looking like she’s going on a walk, she’s got a selfie stick, a portable ring light and such heavy make-up that she looks like she’s going to a photoshoot.
‘Video?’ I pause with the kettle mid-pour halfway to her cup.
‘The Marzipan Campervan quiz night! My mum shared it on Facebook, and seeing as I only live two hours away, I simply had to come and see for myself! Can you do the “Hello, Dolly!” thing for my Instagram channel?’
‘What?’ I ask. It’s one word that encompasses many questions. What video? What ‘Hello, Dolly’ thing? What Instagram channel?
‘Oh, never mind, we’ll just get a selfie! Smile!’
Before I realise what’s happening, she’s posed in front of the van and snapped a photo with her selfie stick with my confused face peering out of the window behind her.
‘Ta! This cake had better be good, all my followers are dying to know if it’s as amazing as it looks!’
I feel like I’ve woken up in a different reality. ‘Did you say you’ve driven for two hours just to come here?’
‘Of course! Everyone’s talking about this place! It’s soooo cute!’
‘Thank you… I think.’ I force a smile and finish making her tea and cutting her an extra-large slice of cake, lest any Instagram followers think badly of me, and she wanders off to sit at a table, extracts her phone from the selfie stick, and pushes the cake around her plate to arrange it in the most photogenic way.
The whole encounter weighs on me uneasily. Why on earth is anybody’s mum sharing something about me on Facebook? I know Lettie was wandering around with a camera, but she said it was just a few photos and clips for their 225 subscribers. Mums sharing and Instagram followers seems bigger than that.
I intend to have a look online, but the morning ends up being too busy to take a breath.
Never mind googling Thimblenouth’s social media, I’m trying to make a batch of Melting Moments with one hand while serving customers with the other, and there really does seem to be an influx of visitors who are not walkers at all, but are coming solely to visit here.
Reece comes down from the pub to help when he spots how busy things are, but the cakes are gone and the next batch isn’t out of the oven yet, and I’m getting so concerned about the chatter I overhear that I close the serving hatch for a desperately needed break.
I sit down while Reece clears tables and turns customers away.
Six weeks ago, I would never have dreamed of being busy enough to turn customers away, but this is more than that.
People are cooing over the van and taking photos of it.
Reece has chased away a young couple posing in front of it.
Photos like that end up on the internet, and photos of this van on the internet would be a very bad thing.
I’ve barely used my new phone, but while I wait for the oven timer to ding, I find the browser and do a search for ‘Marzipan Campervan quiz night’, expecting to be directed to Lettie’s post on the village’s social media account.
I’m definitely not expecting the barrage of results that fill my phone screen.
Headlines. There are headlines. I stare at the phone in horror.
Beloved pub quiz night saved!
The pub quiz with a difference!
Yorkshire’s most charming pub quiz!
Hello, Dolly!
I click on them, but my mind is whirring too fast to read the words.
The screen blurs in front of my eyes as I scroll through pages of write-ups about the quiz night, and more specifically, about me.
Every single article has photos of me, or the campervan, or both.
There’s an entire article about my arrival here, the campervan and the café, and how none of the locals know where I came from, but they think I was sent to restore the heart to their village.
Another article recounts the story of the heartless second-home buyer determined to rid the village of their humble pub quiz and how I’m leading the fight against it.
This is a calamity.
I trace it backwards. The articles reference a video on YouTube, and I think of Lettie’s clips again. I knew they were filming bits and pieces on the night, but I didn’t think they’d be shared beyond their 225 followers.
I find the village social media pages, which are awash with photos and clips from Friday’s quiz night.
Likes, loves and comments. So many comments.
I scroll through but my hands are shaking too much to hold the phone steady and I end up accidentally ‘liking’ comments that say things like ‘So glad to see you guys back at it!’ and ‘I knew something so wholesome wouldn’t stay gone forever! Long live The Agatha Quizties!’
Every post links to a longer YouTube video, which has short clips of the best moments recorded from the night, and a full livestream which was broadcast on the night is still available to watch, and it’s all hosted on Thimblenouth’s own channel that has… definitely not 225 followers.
The thumbnail picture of the video is a still of me leaning out of the campervan window when Lettie had called over, ‘Say hello, Dolly!’
‘Hello, Dolly!’ I’d obliged, because it’s a joke I’ve heard many times after so many years of sharing a name with the famous Barbra Streisand film. And now it’s the main photo that’s plastered across the internet.
‘Did you know they were filming?’ I stumble out of the campervan in a daze and look around for Reece, who’s bringing empty cups back to the serving hatch.
‘Yeah, I said it was okay. It was me the camera was on the most so they wanted my permission to livestream it. They said their subscribers liked to play along at home.’
‘And you let them?’
‘Yeah, of course. Why not? I didn’t think it would do any harm. They only have 225 followers. I have more followers than that and I haven’t posted on social media in about fifteen years. I thought it would be good publicity for the Marzipan Campervan if any of the followers were local.’
‘There’s something they missed when telling us about those 225 followers – three zeros.’ I push the phone at him. ‘It’s 225,000 followers, Reece! At least, it was. It’s shot up to over 300,000 now! Some of these clips have got nearly half a million views!’
‘Oh, sweet niblets, that’s brilliant!’ He instantly realises I don’t mean it in a good way and tries to backpedal. ‘I didn’t mean it like that. I meant… wow. I had no idea that so many people would be interested in what we did the other night. That’s… um…’
‘There’s a photo of me in my stolen campervan advertising it!’
He grimaces, but he’s trying not to show his excitement. He’s front-and-centre of that video, and there are hundreds of comments saying what a good host he is, and as he scrolls down them, there’s a smile twitching on his lips that he tries to hide.
And I feel a bit guilty. In any other circumstances, this would be an amazing thing.
The kind of attention that could make or break a new business like the Marzipan Campervan, but these are not normal circumstances, and this is the kind of attention that gets you found by people who are looking for you.
Reece deserves comments saying how wonderful he is.
He deserves people from far and wide tuning in and enjoying his masterful handling of quiz night.
The village ladies have earned their thousands of followers.
I’ve never before met anyone who’s made me feel as welcome as Lettie, Madge and Wilma have made me feel here.
They deserve their big comeback livestream.
They deserve to enjoy their pub quizzes as much as they used to and to share that with as many people as they want.
But the one thing I needed was to stay anonymous.
Anxiety floods my entire body in a wave and coldness settles in my stomach like I’ve swallowed an ice cube whole, and I can’t get my words out properly. ‘I need some air.’
‘You’re outside. It doesn’t get any airier than that!’ Instead of laughing, Reece pulls a chair over, pushes me to sit down on it, and crouches in front of me.
‘Jared’s going to see these articles,’ I say after a few deep breaths. ‘It’s going to lead him right to my door. This was supposed to be somewhere I’d never be found, and somehow, we’ve made enough of an impact that half the internet is talking about us.’
‘Breathe.’ Reece’s hands cover my knees and he waits until I look him in the eyes and push out a long breath, trying to calm my racing thoughts.
‘Let’s think rationally. I know it feels like a lot of people, but that’s not half the internet.
It’s a very small fraction of a few people who might read one article or watch one clip and then never think about us again.
Does Jared have any specific interest in pub quizzes? ’
I shake my head.
‘Then it’s highly unlikely that he’s going to be browsing videos of Yorkshire pub quiz nights. It’s a small thing that appeals to a niche group of people and it doesn’t sound like Jared would be one of them.’
‘But when something gets a lot of attention like this, it pops up everywhere. We’ve all seen a quirky local news story one day and by the next day, it’s been reported on by every major outlet and is all over everywhere.’
‘Usually by an algorithm that recommends content based on what you’ve already read.’ He holds my gaze with that familiar twinkle in his eyes, and I can feel his words starting to penetrate my panic.