Chapter 12 #2
The urgency in Addison’s voice was enough to make him sit up straight.
‘Watching what?’
‘The promo, of course. Bryce just saw it a moment ago. Turn on the telly—they’ll probably show it again in the next ad break.’
He fossicked in the deep cushions for the remote.
‘How bad? No sugar-coating it.’
Addison laughed. ‘Since when was sugar-coating part of my vocab? You look sweet, optimistic even. Much more genuine than the guy with the waxed chest and manicured moustache. Where do they even find these fellas?’
He knew exactly which farmer his sister was referring to.
Of the five contestants, Spencer was the oldest and had the most tenuous link to agriculture.
If there’d been a quiz about tractor brands, fertiliser or the correct technique for using fencing pliers, the other four farmers would have beaten him by a mile.
But he had felt like the most down to earth of them all.
‘I think you’re awesome for giving it a shot, even if you didn’t come home with the silverware. Are you sad you and Emily didn’t work out?’
‘Nope.’
‘You sure you’re not planning a stop in Loxton in the last week of the school holidays? You’d practically have to drive past her property to get to Ian’s hives at the nectarine orchard, right?’
‘Watching the TV promos will be enough of a reminder that we weren’t a perfect match.’
Addison signed off and despite his resolve not to worry about things he couldn’t change, Spencer’s hands were shaky as he watched the footage.
It wasn’t terrible, but it didn’t feel good either, seeing himself smile at Emily, hold the door open for her, accept a hug as a drone filmed them in all their 360-degree glory.
He thought of Clem again, and what she’d think when she saw the advertisements. It’d probably be easier for everyone if she took one look at the adverts and ran in the other direction, but the more he thought about that option, the less he liked it.
The paddock outside the cafe window had a glorious tinge of green, and as Clem brought in the washing later that week, she marvelled at the quick burst of growth from the sunflower seedlings.
The warm, rainy start to October had been great for the sunflowers, but not so much for the customers, or the endless loads of laundry at the tail end of the school holidays. Her clothes racks inside were groaning under the weight of previous loads.
She unpegged the linen dress she’d worn for the last play rehearsal, smiling as she remembered Spencer’s comment about the yellow chequered fabric bringing out the caramel in her brown hair.
That tiny compliment, which probably vanished from his memory the moment it left his lips, had been a guiding factor in last night’s online spending spree as she stocked up on expensive hiking gear to wear on the school camp.
I needed a new puffer jacket, and gold is perfect for visibility. Nothing’s going to happen anyway, she reminded herself. He’ll be working and I’ll be in peak parent supervisor mode. It’s far from a romantic getaway.
And yet … there was something that made Clem’s body tingle as she thought about the upcoming school camp. She and Spencer had been texting over the past few days, and there turned out to be an upside to the cafe being quiet: fewer people to witness his increasingly frequent visits.
‘Muuu-umm, is Isobel here yet?’ Harriet dashed around the corner and bounded over the washing basket like an Olympic hurdler, before jumping onto the bench and grabbing the Hills Hoist. Indi followed in her big sister’s footsteps.
‘That’s not a swing, or a flying fox, you terrors!
’ Clem tried to sound stern, but she remembered doing the same thing at that age, on the very same clothesline, in fact, when she’d visited her grandparents.
‘And Isobel will be here any minute. She’s picked up an extra babysitting job these school holidays, you’re not the only kids she minds. ’
‘But she says we’re the most fun,’ said Indi, squealing as Harriet tickled Indi’s underarms until both girls flopped onto the lawn in a heap of giggles.
‘And we feed her the yummiest food,’ Harriet added. ‘Maybe that’s why Selina’s so grouchy, because she doesn’t get to play games and eat morning tea like Isobel.’
‘Maybe,’ Clem said with a frown. So it wasn’t just her imagination. If even her girls had noticed that Selina still had her nose out of joint, several months into the job, then maybe she should check in, see if there was a way to make the workplace more appealing.
Isobel pulled into the driveway minutes later. The young woman rushed out, almost tripping over her backpack straps.
‘Sorry I’m late, Clem. The other mum was stuck behind a mob of cows after her shift, she felt terrible about putting your schedule out of whack.’
‘That’s fine,’ Clem said. ‘You’re only a little late.’ Isobel’s concern was in stark contrast to Selina’s, who had shown up twenty minutes late yesterday with no apology, and called in sick at the last minute the day before that.
‘I’m going to practise my pirate piece for you today, Isobel,’ Harriet said, dancing around the teenager.
‘I’m playing a young pirate in training, and Louisa says my character gets into all the scrapes and provides the laughs for most of the scenes.
We’re performing the first scene from the real script next week.
Do you think you’ll watch me at the play? ’
‘Wouldn’t miss it,’ Isobel said, taking the girls’ hands and leading them inside.
Clem had rostered Sebastian and Selina on for the day, plus Isobel to babysit, so she could make some headway on the coffee van and the mountain of paperwork she’d fallen behind on. She quickly got to work.
The first item on her agenda was working out the glitch with the new coffee machine. It had run smoothly in the morning at the market, but all afternoon the steam wand had been temperamental. Jean’s backup Nespresso milk frother had been a godsend.
But the stand-alone frothing gadget was an emergency fix, not a solution, and the minutes ticked by as Clem waited on hold to the coffee machine retailer.
‘Sorry, what was that?’ Clem squinted at the phone, trying to hear over the crackling phone connection. After half an hour of troubleshooting with a torch and some hard-to-follow suggestions, she still hadn’t cracked the issue.
Frustrated, she locked the van and headed for the cafe, where she settled into the office to work on her proposal for another school catering contract.
Several local schools renewed their canteen contracts at the end of each year, and while she hadn’t yet heard back about her first few pitches, she’d redrafted her business plan to ensure she could handle multiple school catering contracts and still turn a profit.
She knuckled in, determined to submit the latest proposal well ahead of schedule.
‘Having a win?’
She turned in her chair to find Sebastian in the office doorway, carefully balancing three plates. The sight of his cheeky grin, and the beautifully presented plates of fresh, seasonal and local produce, filled her with joy.
If the world stopped tomorrow, she could hold her head high knowing she’d championed local producers and gathered a team of passionate employees to serve up the finest food in the district, not to mention raised two feisty, gorgeous girls.
Was it greedy to ask for more?
‘Hard to say, but I’ve rejigged the templates for the catering quotes and tightened up the pricing, so I guess that’s winning.’
‘Hey!’ Sebastian flinched, cradling the plates like a protective parent as Selina rushed past. ‘Watch where you’re going.’
‘Sorry,’ called Selina over her shoulder, the pile of dishes she was carrying dripping a trail behind her.
Clem shot Sebastian an apologetic look.
‘I’m on it.’ She left her small office and grabbed a cloth from the cafe’s kitchen to clean up before anyone slipped.
She glanced around the cafe as she tidied.
Most of the customers were absorbed in their meals, or their conversation, but one man sitting close to the counter was tapping his loafers on the polished concrete and frowning at his watch.
She approached his table with her brightest smile. ‘Can I get you anything?’
He let out a sigh and made a show of rubbing his belly.
‘You could get me what I ordered. I can’t believe it’s that hard to make soft-boiled eggs with bacon and tomatoes.
Not beans, tomatoes. And not eggs hard-boiled within an inch of their life.
I want soft eggs with runny yolks. And certainly none of this fake bacon nonsense.
That girl’s brought two plates out and neither have been right.
Let’s hope the third time’s a charm. Not sure I’ll be coming back here again if I have to wait all bloody day for my breakfast.’
Clem was used to customers changing their minds, or misremembering what they’d ordered, but this sounded more like their error than his.
She smoothed things over as best she could, assuring him the meal was complimentary and apologising for the mix-up.
‘It’s not a mix up, it’s incompetence. That girl is off with the fairies. I see you had to mop up the tail end of my teapot from when she carted it out. Trust me, the poor man pays twice when cutting corners with cheap staff. It’s not worth it.’
Clem gritted her teeth and set down his order. She didn’t want to think about the above-award wages she was paying Selina, or the awkwardness she risked by firing her.
The arrival of her grandfather, Arthur, was a sight for sore eyes.
‘Aren’t you supposed to be finishing off your paperwork?’ Sebastian asked when he popped out from the kitchen.
‘I’ll get back to it in a moment,’ Clem told him with a wan smile, grabbing some menus and eyeing the empty chair beside her grandfather. If only she had a spare moment to sit and chat …
‘It’s bustling in here today,’ he said, unwrapping his scarf and removing his quilted vest. ‘You’re doing such a brilliant job, Clemmy, no wonder you look exhausted.’