The Sister Surprise by Abigail Mann (read full novel TXT) 📗

you’re going to go, go soon.’ He holds his hands up, his shoulders hunched aggressively. ‘Clock’s ticking.’

I nod, swinging my rucksack over my arm, and hover by the door. There was a time I was envious of those who walked out of Duncan’s office with new job titles and bylines. Now that it’s me, I don’t know how to feel. At this point, I can’t sit back and wait for someone else to decide for me.

‘Duncan?’

‘Hm?’ he grunts.

‘I’ll go. This is my story, isn’t it? I’ll figure out the right way to tell it.’

Chapter 8

‘I just don’t understand why you need to go up there. What are they expecting you to learn in Edinburgh that they can’t teach you down here?’

‘Well, it’s to see a different side of the magazine, I suppose. They’ve been encouraging more of us to go up to the Scotland office anyway. The desk cost is way cheaper. I think they’re trying to make it the bigger of the two UK headquarters. Something to do with Brexit. I don’t know the details,’ I garble across the kitchen table. Mum frowns as she snips thyme sprigs from the planter outside.

‘Ava, can you take these off me?’ I get up and walk to the open window, pulling my dressing grown tight around my chest. Mum reaches through and hands me a bunch of herbs, their smell woody and fresh. ‘Pop them in a glass of water, would you?’ I nod and turn the tap on. Mum disappears below the window frame. ‘It seems a bit last-minute. Are you sure they’re not exploiting you?’ she continues. ‘You’re with a union, aren’t you?’

Opening the fridge, I glance at the half-eaten mackerel that was there a few days ago. Tempted by the smell, Pickles winds around my legs, a globule of saliva dripping onto the kitchen tiles. ‘It’s a good thing, Mum. They don’t give these opportunities to everyone.’

Mum frowns and dips below the windowsill again. I close my eyes and breathe in slowly, partly from nerves, partly from the fish juice that has leaked on my hands.

‘Here you go, slugger,’ I say, scraping oily fish skin into Pickles’s bowl. He trots over, his deep purr a token of simple contentment. ‘How is it I’m envious of you right now?’

***

Duncan wants me on a train by next week so I’ve spent the last few days trawling the internet for accommodation. I was hoping to stay on the outskirts of Kilroch to keep a low profile, but with the North Sea on one side and a roughly stitched patchwork of fields on the other, there isn’t such a thing as a suburb. The two B&Bs I’ve called so far have already closed up for the winter, so I’ve turned to my last resort.

I found it on a volunteering forum, hidden on page five of Google under ‘Kilroch home stay’. Braehead Farm. And not a scrubby urban farm like you get in London featuring fat goats, a depressed donkey, and bags of pellets for toddlers to chuck at the animals. A proper, working farm with a muddy track, sun-strewn fields, and an assortment of disused machinery rusting in the driveway.

A farmer named Kian needs a volunteer to ‘help with the family’s rare breed pigs and chickens, as well as extraneous duties in exchange for free bed and board’. Although I’m dubious about how legitimate this is, the reference point I’ve latched onto is ‘no experience necessary’. The nearest I’ve come to animal husbandry involves pulling fledglings out of Pickles’s mouth back when he was fit enough to climb trees, so this suits me. With no phone number listed, I ping Kian an email. If Duncan wants me to get ‘stuck in and chase a story’, that’s exactly what I’ll do.

I lie back on my bed and click through photographs of the farm: a whitewashed house smothered in wisteria, set within patchy heathland. It looks idyllic.

‘Where is it you’re staying again, Ava?’ shouts Mum from across the landing. This is a trick question. She’s framing it as though I’ve told her already (which I can’t have done, as the only bed I’ve booked so far is a single berth on the Caledonian Sleeper train up to Inverness) so she must think I’m lying about something. Which I am. Sort of.

‘Not sure yet, someone is going to meet me at the station.’

I glance over the half-filled suitcase and sigh as Pickles climbs on top of a neatly rolled jumper. He paws it, his purr throaty and self-satisfied. I haven’t got a clue what to pack. I’ve tried checking the east Highlands forecast, but between October and December it’s like a weather tombola: rain, sleet, sun, or fog in any combination, sometimes multiple times a day.

As I attempt to manhandle my stiff, sun-bleached rain mac into its zip-up hood, my laptop pings with an alert. I stuff the mac into a trainer, open my email, and experience the now familiar pang of anxiety that comes with knowing I’ve pulled off a plan that part of me was hoping would fail.

Hey, Ava!

Thanks for responding to the volunteer call-out. I was starting to think I’d have to prepare the farm for winter on my own! We’ve got a spare room in the house that you’d be welcome to use. It’s an old building, but we’re well prepared for whatever Storm Sandra decides to fling our way when she lands next week. Bring thick socks and you won’t go too far wrong.

You didn’t mention whether you’d done any labouring or farmhand work before, but don’t worry because you can shadow me. I’m learning the ropes again myself after spending some time away, but I’ll explain all that when you get up here.

Hope the train journey isn’t too painful. The Caledonian Sleeper can be a wee bit temperamental, but as long as you hold on to the bed rails round the corners you shouldn’t fall out of your bunk. I’ll pick you up outside the station near the