Chapter 10
CARLY
‘What makes you the lucky one?’ Nicolas asks when I tell him I have to return to the bookstall, to restock before the author events end.
‘Lucky how?’ I ask, not entirely sure what he’s referring to.
‘To be Flynn’s chosen bookseller on this beautiful train? You must be lucky, or special, no?’ he says, following me back to the stand.
‘Then I must be lucky,’ I say, trying to make what’s left of the book selection look more than it is, not wanting to leave the stall unattended to grab some more. ‘My mum’s one of the authors on the train. We’re sort of a two-for-one package.’
‘Which author?’
‘Frances Henderson,’ I say, my inflection making it sound more like a question; Mum’s romance readership hardly targets young Frenchmen.
‘I know her work,’ he says, which surprises me even more than Flynn having known. ‘Do you like to read romance?’
‘Sometimes, but I read broadly.’ I shrug. ‘How about you?’
‘The same; I read a lot for work.’
‘What is it you do?’
‘I’m a journalist, mostly book reviews and author features,’ he explains.
‘Nice,’ I say, impressed, and the tiniest bit jealous.
‘It’s why I’m on the train; Flynn asked me to review the experience. We know each other from university days so it’s sort of a favour for him.’
‘That’s kind of you,’ I reply, thinking Jude would be pleased that I’m already hanging with someone firmly rooted in the world of books.
I want to ask a little about the paper he works for and his own reading tastes, but we’re distracted by Flynn coming through the carriage, head down, eyes on his phone.
‘Flynn,’ Nicolas calls, waving casually.
Flynn looks up, clocks me and Nicolas, and quickly shoves his phone in his back pocket.
‘Nicolas, good to see you,’ he says, oddly formally for friends, and shaking his hand.
‘Good to be here,’ says Nicolas, followed by a slightly uncomfortable second or two where the two stand together, Flynn’s stance strong and wide in his brogues, Nicolas loose and light in his black Converse boots.
I wonder about their time at university, thinking them an unlikely pairing.
I wonder if Flynn was the chilled version of himself that I met in the shop, or if he’s always had this harder, more business-like side.
‘Do you have everything you need?’ Flynn eventually asks me, his voice and gaze a smidge softer than earlier, for which I’m glad.
‘I’m a bit low on stock. Any chance you could grab me some more from the kitchen?’
He looks to Nicolas with an almost imperceptible narrowing of the eyes then back to me. ‘Sure,’ he agrees, and heads off.
With Flynn away, the observation carriage steadily begins to fill again with readers. The first to approach the stall are a couple of late twenty-somethings in baggy, loud clothing.
‘How are you enjoying the journey so far?’ Nicolas asks when they’re finished browsing the small selection of titles.
‘It’s great,’ says the woman with a grin, and I think I detect a New Zealand accent. ‘Joe and I have just been to the Levi Parker cookery demonstration. It was fantastic! The chilli prawns blew my socks off.’
‘Who needs lunch when you can fill up on barbecue bites,’ jokes Joe, with a Brummie twang.
We introduce ourselves and talk for a while about why they’re on the train – Daisy explaining that a wealthy aunt was meant to be on the trip but fell ill and gave her the tickets instead.
We chat until I see Flynn coming back without any books and a terse expression. He gestures for me to join him.
‘The books have had cooking oil spilt all over them. They’re ruined,’ he whispers.
‘You’re kidding?’ I ask, fully aware from the tension in his shoulders and the bloom on his brow that he isn’t.
He glances over my shoulder to where Nicolas is talking to Joe and Daisy, a growing group of readers gathering round the stall.
‘Give me a minute,’ I say, because despite his reserve, I want to help. The last thing Flynn needs is for a reviewer, friend or no friend, to get wind of the mishap, and the last thing Dad needs is for me to make Henderson Books look bad.
‘Nicolas,’ I say, gently touching his arm to segue into the conversation. ‘Maybe you could take Joe and Daisy to the bar, do a reader interview, get a little more of their story and experience so far?’
‘I’d love that!’ enthuses Daisy, pulling her thick curls into a scrunchy, and Joe agrees. Nicolas barely has time to respond before Daisy has threaded her arm through his and led both him and Joe out of the carriage.
‘Thank you,’ says Flynn, his shoulders relaxing a smidge after he’s assured the readers that more copies of books will be available soon.
It reminds me of a similar occasion when books didn’t arrive for an author event at the bookshop, and Dad and I had to placate customers with makeshift goodie bags.
‘No problem,’ I say, as Grant approaches, sashaying purposefully towards us in his tartan trousers.
‘Flynn,’ he says, his palms held out as if to stop an unrelenting force tearing towards him.
Flynn folds his arms as if to brace himself.
‘The oil didn’t just spill on the books, it’s also all over the cakes for the afternoon teas.’
‘Jesus, no books and no food,’ says Flynn. He squeezes the bridge of his nose.
‘It never rains but it pours,’ says Grant.
‘Tell me about it,’ he replies, his phone pinging several times in succession.
‘What’s the contingency plan?’ I ask, having learnt after the no-book mishap that every event needs a back-up plan.
‘There isn’t one,’ says Flynn, and I squint, certain I must have misheard him.
‘Has nothing like this happened in the past? You must have had books go missing or damaged, food go off or the wrong ingredients.’
‘Chefs always take care of the food, and I’ve never done a book event before.’
‘Um? Excuse me?’ I stammer, my mind leaps back to the bookshop and all his chat of Mum’s books, reader excitement, and book festival formats.
Suddenly any doubts I had seem vindicated; mentally I add dishonest to opportunist, and the sensitive guy I thought I met in Edinburgh fades further into the distance.
‘Let’s think,’ I say, parking my irritation. ‘It’s coming up to lunchtime so we can close the bookstall for a while.’
‘But after that we’ve got another round of talks with no books for sale,’ says Flynn.
It’s then that I remember Jude telling me about a hen do she’d been on last year.
The bride had fancied pizza on the train from Edinburgh to London, so Jude had figured out when the train was due to pull into the next station, ordered a pizza, and had the delivery guy come to the platform to hand it over.
‘What are our next stops?’ I ask Grant.
‘Newcastle in just over half an hour, Durham in under an hour, and York in around two hours’ time.’
‘Fine,’ I say, a plan shaping up in my head.
‘What are you thinking?’ Flynn asks, between firing off messages on his phone.
‘All three of those cities are university towns, they’re bound to have big bookshops. There must be a way to get more stock there.’
‘Let’s call them and find out, see if they can send what we need in taxis,’ says Flynn, as if reading my mind.
‘And what about the cakes?’ asks Grant.
‘Easy,’ I reply, thinking of a trip I took with my parents to York when I was a teenager. ‘There used to be a huge bakery there. We’ve got two hours. If they are still there, that would give them plenty of time to put boxes together and get them to the station.’
‘Fingers crossed. Let’s do it,’ says Flynn, and Grant pumps a fist.
‘Cool,’ I say, rapidly googling all the bookshops in the three cities and dividing them up amongst us to call. As I do that, Grant answers a call that’s come through on his walkie-talkie.
‘I hate to be the bearer of further bad news,’ he says, his face scrunched in concern. ‘But the driver’s just told me there are signal delays, meaning we might not arrive into London on time.’
‘Shit,’ says Flynn.
‘This is good news,’ I say, trying to remain upbeat. ‘This gives us more time to get the supplies we need.’
‘You don’t understand,’ he says, showing me his phone, lit up with messages. ‘I have to get to London on time, or else Christopher Rose is going to be left waiting, and everybody knows, Christopher Rose hates to wait.’