Chapter 13
Churches had always been a bone of contention to Angelia.
She had always been spiritual but never religious.
She was uncomfortable with organised worship and a God who somehow – according to doctrine, at least – keeps tabs on people’s attendance at a purpose-built structure with fancy windows and opulent outfits.
She had felt out of place at every church wedding and christening she had ever attended.
Add to this the fact she was a singer in a rock band called Angel and the Fallen, which could potentially be seen as blasphemous, and she was grateful that she hadn’t burst into flames when she had crossed the threshold.
A group of people stood at the front of the church but had, thankfully, not noticed her entering. They were too deep in an intense conversation so she picked up Scrappy and slipped into a pew at the back where she would be hidden by a pillar if anyone were to look around in her direction.
A petite elderly woman with, bizarrely, purple hair was standing, arms folded across her chest and shaking her head.
‘So not only has Geraldine broken both her wrists falling off rollerblades – I mean what was she thinking at her age – but now you’re telling us Amelia has chicken pox?
’ she said with a huff. ‘All we need now is for one of those steroids to hit the earth and we’ve a complete set.
’ She harrumphed sulkily as Angelia stifled a giggle.
‘Come on, Granny, it’s not as bad as that,’ a blonde woman told her with a small laugh as she slipped an arm around the older lady’s shoulder. ‘And I think you mean asteroid.’
The purple-haired woman glared up at the blonde. ‘Aye, Arabella, that’s what a said.’ She then added, ‘We’ve lost our organist and our choir manager less than a month before the summer concert, so I’d say it’s pretty bloomin’ castratory.’
The woman named Arabella grimaced. ‘Catastrophic, Granny.’ And Angelia chuckled. She liked the purple-haired lady already.
‘Hi, can I help you?’
On hearing the soft familiar Scottish accent spoken by people from around the Edinburgh area, Angelia almost jumped out of her skin. She turned to see a very handsome, clean-cut man in a navy button-down shirt and jeans, looking down at her from beside the pew.
‘Oh, erm, no, I’m fine, thanks.’ She turned quickly in the opposite direction and glanced nervously over her shoulder towards the door, wondering who else was about to enter.
‘It’s okay, I told them you’d got in a car and left the island,’ he said with a smile.
Angelia’s face flushed with heat. ‘Oh… thanks. But… erm… Look, if you’re a reporter, too, I’m just not?—’
She made to stand up but he held up a halting hand and laughed.
‘Well, I’ve never been accused of that before but no, you’re safe.
I only report to him upstairs, not the world.
’ Her crumpled and confused expression and the way she glanced towards the ceiling looking for an upper floor must have been a huge giveaway.
He held out his hand, smiling. ‘Ferris Blaikie, curate extraordinaire,’ he said.
‘Oh!’ was all she could manage to say as she pointed to the ceiling, the fact he meant God dawning on her.
He reached out to stroke Scrappy’s head, and the little dog seemed to relish the attention. ‘Please, you’re welcome to stay as long as you like, Miss MacAuley.’
‘You do know who I am then?’
He grinned and nodded. ‘I certainly do. Ruby said you were buying the old antique shop across the way and that we might see you around the village a wee bit.’ He glanced around a little conspiratorially before whispering, ‘But I’m also partial to a bit of rock music too.’
He must have been in his early thirties, with neat brown hair and smiling eyes to match. He was tall, good-looking and broad shouldered and didn’t look how she expected a curate to look. Although what that was exactly, she wasn’t sure.
‘Are you allowed to listen to that sort of stuff?’ she asked in surprise.
He chuckled. ‘Yes, of course we are. It’s not the Dark Ages, you know. And to my knowledge you’re not a group of devil worshippers who bite the heads off animals.’
She felt a little foolish and her face warmed with the heat of embarrassment. ‘No, I suppose not. Well, thank you for hiding me, anyway,’ she said, smiling. ‘I appreciate it.’
‘No bother at all. I heard you were coming home to Skye for some peace and quiet and to escape all that stuff so…’
‘Right…’ she said.
‘Aye, I was saying to Ruby it seems the stars just love this wee village.’
Angelia nodded. ‘So it would appear.’ He turned to walk away. ‘So, you’re a curate? What does that mean? Are you a kind of trainee vicar?’
He smiled to reveal a row of slightly crooked but healthy-looking sparkling white teeth. They gave his face character, she thought, and then wondered why on earth she was giving him a dental assessment.
He grinned. ‘I suppose you could say that. I’m ordained but I’m working here to assist Father McAllen until I’m assigned my own parish.’
Angelia nodded. ‘Right, cool.’
‘Are you a churchgoer, Miss MacAuley?’ Ferris asked with a tilt of his head.
She cringed. ‘Please call me Angelia. And no, not really. I’m not exactly a religious type, to be honest. Sorry.’
He shook his head. ‘No apology needed. You’re welcome to stay until you’re comfortable to leave. But like I say, they’ve gone now.’ He paused and then slipped into the pew in front of her. ‘I’m intrigued as to why you chose this as your hiding place, though.’
Angelia felt that warmth in her face again. ‘In all honesty it was the first place I came across while I was running away from those paps. I tried the door, and it opened so… here I am.’ She held out her free hand to exaggerate her point.
He raised his eyebrows and nodded. ‘God does work in mysterious ways.’ And then added, ‘If you believe in that kind of stuff, of course.’
‘Which I don’t, I’m afraid,’ she replied.
‘Noted. And who’s this cute little chap?’ he asked, reaching out to stroke Scrappy again.
‘This is my best friend, Scrappy. He’s not a big talker but he’s quite the listener,’ she said with a grin. ‘You don’t look like a priest,’ she said without meaning to and clapped her hand over her mouth. ‘Ooh, sorry, I meant to just think that rather than say it aloud.’
He laughed. ‘Ah, well, you see, you came in before proper nightfall. At that point I grow a bushy beard and most of my hair falls out before thick-rimmed specs appear on my face and I start asking people for cups of tea.’
Angelia laughed along, wagging a finger. ‘Ah, that explains it. It’s the timing.’
‘Aye. It usually is. So—’ Before he could say anything further the chatter between the group at the front of the church became heated and loud.
‘I’m just saying there’s no point carrying on if we don’t have anyone to lead us,’ a woman aged around sixty, with badly dyed, very dark brown hair and wearing a flowery dress, said.
‘Well, you can away ’n boil yer heid, Gertrude McHugh,’ the purple-haired, rather feisty, woman told her, as the elderly men in the group stood by silently, seemingly a little gobsmacked.
‘Granny! That’s plenty!’ the blonde-haired woman – Arabella, was it? – said.
‘Sorry but she’s been a negative Nelly from day one.
Am I the only one who remembers the Christmas concert rehearsals?
It was all, “I don’t want to sing anything by Michael Bubbles, he’s no Frank Sinatra,”’ the purple-haired woman mimicked the McHugh woman.
‘And “Isla Guthrie, it’s round yon virgin, not Round John Bergin.” Honestly, you make one mistake,’ she chuntered and shook her head while patting her perfectly styled lavender hairdo.
‘That’s it! I’ve had enough. I’m going to go back to knitting club in Broadford,’ the McHugh woman said with a stamp of her foot.
She wagged an index finger in the face of Lavender Haze.
‘And for the record, Isla Guthrie, the lyrics in “Dancing Queen” aren’t anything to do with feeding beef on a tangerine, nor is there any ABBA lyric that says “take your teeth out, tell me what’s wrong.
”’ She grabbed her jacket. ‘I knew this was a waste of time, right from the get-go.’
‘Aye, well, you go and get gone then,’ the purple-haired granny said, and Angelia almost choked on a laugh that escaped.
‘Excuse me,’ Ferris, the curate, said as he stood.
‘I think they may be in need of a referee.’ He grimaced and turned to walk away but stopped.
‘Look, if you need to talk to someone while you’re here, I’m a great listener.
I’m not quite as cute as your current confidante, admittedly, but unlike him I’ve been known to give out some pretty sound advice too.
And I’m here most days.’ He smiled and then turned again to head hurriedly towards the chancel.
‘Ladies! Gentlemen! What seems to be the issue?’
Angelia watched as Ferris calmed the frayed tempers of those involved in the dispute.
When they had, not particularly quietly, explained their predicament, he said, ‘Well, I would be happy to play the music for you, temporarily, if that helps?’
As Ferris took a seat at the keyboard, which was situated off to the side, Angelia decided it was a good time to take her leave.
Ferris played the opening bars to Katrina and the Waves’ ‘Love Shine a Light’ and as she reached the door, Angelia glanced back over her shoulder to see the keyboard-playing, friendly, rather handsome, curate nodding along with the sheet music as the group of people rearranged themselves now their number had decreased by one.
* * *
As Ferris had said, the coast was most definitely clear so Angelia and Scrappy wandered over to the shop.
Once through the door, she flicked on the lights.
They would definitely be the first order of business, she decided as she squinted around the space in the meagre amount of illumination they offered, as the sun had begun its descent.
Now that she had recovered from the shock of the initial viewing of the place, and it had been cleaned up and cleared of the detritus, she felt better able to view it as a blank canvas, with an open mind.
It was going to take some serious work, but she could see someone really making a go of a business here.
She released Scrappy from his lead and the curious canine headed off, sniffing at every spot within his reach as he always did when they brought him.
As she stood in the same area she had only a couple of days earlier, armed on that occasion with a sweeping brush, she could now envisage racks of albums against the walls and in the centre.
She could imagine music playing over a fancy sound system that would obviously be needed for such an establishment, and she could visualise people queueing up at the old cash register to pay for their unique finds.
A smile spread across her face as she daydreamed about the place all decked out for Christmas too with fairy lights strewn from the ceiling and perhaps a tree in the corner with old CDs fashioned into ornaments.
Her heart skipped at the thought of creating something wonderfully different.
Something no one would expect from either her, or from the little coastal village of Glentorrin.
She understood what her mum and Fiona had said about making the place viable for a variety of business possibilities, but Meghan’s idea of a record shop just felt right.
It was exciting and, of course, appealed to her passion for music and record collecting.
All she had to do now was kit the place out and hope that someone would love her vision and Meghan’s idea.