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

on the other, demand for a phone mast isn’t particularly high on the telecom agenda. Still, I’ve got to find enough signal to send an email to Duncan, otherwise my next diary entry will be handwritten and sent via the ankle of a crow chucked into a southerly gust of wind.

Borrowed wellie boots on, I pull my sleeves down over my hands and march across the yard, clambering over a fence into the sheep field. The sight of another signal bar makes my stomach bubble with glee. A short way off, Miranda chews a hunk of grass in a grinding semi-circle. Another bar! I squeal. Miranda looks up and acknowledges me with a guttural bah. She blinks slowly and drops onto her front elbows, reducing the distance between her mouth and the ground. Do sheep have elbows? Or two sets of knees? If I get up high enough, I might be able to Google it. Kian said the signal can improve if the wind’s blowing in the right direction, but I’m not so sure. So far, I’ve found it impossible to detect sarcasm, humour, or straight neutrality in Kian because he delivers all three with the same intonation.

As I crest the hill, my clock flicks onto 10.32, but already the sun is dwindling as though it got up for work, looked outside, and decided it couldn’t be bothered with the rest of the day. I turn around, trying to find a sweet spot, and … yes! My phone pings. I send my diary entry out before looking at anything else from yesterday. A quick look on Instagram tells me that Rory is still racking up a huge gyoza dumpling debt, Max is yet to wear a shirt that doesn’t feature tropical palm trees, and Pickles has once again been featured on the page @FatCatsOfInstagram. His legacy continues, if not his low-cal dry food.

When an email comes through featuring the interlocked DNA icon of The Ancestry Project, I press it:

Would you like to change your privacy settings to start talking with your DNA matches?

I hover over the button. I could do it. Messaging Moira would mean that this whole charade of a ‘farming holiday’ is rendered unnecessary (that and the obvious fact that holidays shouldn’t involve labour, unless it’s the strain that comes from holding a chunky paperback aloft on a sun lounger), but something is holding me back.

How do you start a conversation like that? The only thing we have in common is a man who performed a handful of naked push-ups at some point in the Nineties and a bunch of other things left to chance. However you look at it, it’s still a risky way to announce yourself, especially when I’ve got no idea how Moira feels about having a sister. What if the circumstances were dodgy? Was our father married, with a family, or more children?

I lock my phone and slide it in my back pocket. Today’s egg delivery has come at the right time. I need to get off the farm. I need to start asking questions. I need to find a way around these sheep, who have blocked me in a semi-circle, eyes wild and yellow.

I half expect them to start clicking their feet, heads hung low in an ovine version of the opening scene in West Side Story, but as I head back down the hill, the herd follow me in Pied Piper fashion. I speed up, worried that they’ll headbutt me to the floor. Death by slow chewing is not the way I want to go.

By the time I get back to the kitchen, Kian is draining the last of his coffee, his eyes bloodshot and manic.

‘All right, let’s go.’ He unhooks a set of keys from a nail tacked into the wall, the wallpaper below stained tobacco yellow.

Outside, I squint as the sun cuts behind the house, glistening on the slick concrete forecourt. We load the Jeep with trays of eggs and a piece of machinery that looks like it’s been dredged from a river, yet Kian claims it just ‘needs a new bolt’ before it’s put back in the tractor. I strap them in, keen to avoid a scenario that involves a sharp corner and 150 crushed eggs. I walk around the passenger seat, but Kian’s already there. He tosses me the keys and they hit my left boob, which would have hurt if it weren’t for the three jumpers I’m wearing. I fumble and catch hold of a thistle-shaped key ring before they bounce to the floor.

‘You can drive, right?’

‘Well, I can drive, technically. I know recent events might suggest otherwise, but I have a license. Actually –’ I put on the facade of smugness ‘– I can drive a minibus up to a capacity of fifteen people. Not to brag.’

‘Great! You’ll be fine in this.’ Kian opens the door and settles into the passenger seat, one leg pulled up on his knee.

‘I don’t think you should trust me with this.’

‘Why?’

‘Because … I’ve not driven in Scotland before. With hills and sheep in the road and potentially mowing down Jacqui because I can’t find the brakes.’

‘If you mow down Jacqui, I’ll know it’s not an accident. You’ll be fine. Anyway, I’ve got to see John about this engine. If you deliver the eggs whilst I’m there, you can pick me up on the way back. Might be a good way to introduce yourself to people.’

I can feel my heart pulsing up into my throat. The beans on toast I had for lunch are threatening to make a reappearance. The alternative is that Jacqui has poisoned me with a lemon drizzle she left on the kitchen table. A possibility.

I shift the keys from one hand to another and bite the inside of my cheek.

‘All right. But if I take this one off the side of a cliff as well, don’t blame me.’

***

I look like an owl blinking over the steering wheel, elbows tucked in, eyes scanning the road for hazards that