Seeing Stars (37 page)

‘Really?’ Lewis’s face was inscrutable. ‘That’s great news – Jem will be ecstatic.’

They slithered towards the main throng, everyone standing up now, almost visibly twitching with anticipation. Amber could
see the entire village gathered in the blackness and then some.

All except Zillah and Clancy.

Lucky so-and-sos, she thought. Bet they won’t need any celestial incantations to bring on the fireworks tonight.

The sky was still huge and clear, the stars a trillion twinkling sequins, the moon perfectly unshrouded by even the merest
wisp of cloud. There was still no breeze, no hint of any to come, nothing to relieve the thumping, sticky humidity. In fact,
no chance whatsoever, Amber thought, of Leo coming up with the goods.

They plucked a beaming Jem away from the Hayfields crowd, and each holding a hand, made sure he didn’t stumble.

‘What do we do now, then?’ Amber asked.

‘Skip,’ Lewis said, straight-faced.

‘What?’

‘We all hold hands and skip.’

‘You’re having a laugh.’ Amber frowned up at him. ‘Aren’t you?’

Jem shook his head, grinning hugely.

Amber exhaled, thankful that no one who knew her from her trance and house days in the northern nightclubs could see her now.
Skipping?
Holding hands and
skipping?

With a lot of scuffling, and swapping places, and several small arguments, the throng seemed to eventually organise themselves
into two huge circles, one inside the other. Somehow, in the organising, Jem was now between Lewis and Billy Grinley and Amber
found herself rather disconcertingly holding Dougie Patchcock’s hand on one side and Lewis’s on the other.

Sod’s law, she thought, that the first time they had any sort of physical contact it had to be in the company of about 8,000
other people and when she had exceedingly sweaty hands.

However, the tingle when his fingers laced with hers was well worth the wait.

They seemed almost ready to go, everyone practically quivering to let rip, when a small melee in the inner circle halted things.

Slo and Goff were rolling over and over on the ground, scuffling like badgers.

‘He was trying to mug me!’ Goff yelled indignantly, glaring malevolently with his one eye. ‘He had his hands in me pockets!’

Amber sucked her lips together to prevent the shriek of laughter escaping and didn’t dare look at Lewis. She could feel him
shaking.

Once Constance and Perpetua had broken up the fight and Slo and Goff, still glaring at one another were sulkily forced to
hold hands like sworn enemies at a children’s party, they were off.

The concentric circles skipped in opposite directions, faster and faster, like a manic game of The Farmer’s In His
Den. Amber’s feet seemed to have left the ground and as they ran and whooped and skipped, round and round, increasing in speed
until the faces were a blur.

She really hoped she wouldn’t be sick.

Just when she felt she really couldn’t keep up the pace any longer, and wondered how on earth old people like Gwyneth and
Ida managed to cope with the G-force, and if Jem’s pentangle would have her eye out, everyone started singing:

It would never make the charts, Amber thought dizzily, although it might go down a storm on Eurovision.

Then as quickly as the Fiddlestickers had started the mad skipping, they stopped.

Several people fell over. Amber, now suffering from a severe case of vertigo, staggered to a halt, pulling away from Dougie
Patchcock but still managing to hold Lewis’s hand.

‘Jesus …’ she muttered groggily as the village green continued to spin.

Jem grabbed her free hand to steady himself, gurgling happily.

‘He loves Leo’s night,’ Lewis said faintly, still swaying. ‘Loves the skipping and the singing. Although, personally, I’d
prefer to feel like this after thirteen pints of Hearty Hercules and a kebab … What?’ He looked down at Jem. ‘Oh, yeah. Nice.’

Billy Grinley was being discreetly sick on Perpetua’s sandals.

The Fiddlestickers, all tottering, slowly began to disperse towards The Weasel and Bucket. Right now, Amber thought, alcohol
was surely the last thing they needed. However, she was delighted to see that Gwyneth and Big Ida were amongst them, still
on their feet.

‘Is that it?’ She blinked at Lewis. ‘All over?’

‘Actually, I think it’s only just begun.’

She thought she’d misheard him. Her inner ears weren’t back on track. Surely he didn’t mean …? Hadn’t meant …? No, of course
not. Get a grip. Don’t fall for it. Don’t become a bedpost notch. Don’t become another Lewis Flanagan conquest. Fight it.
You’re friends – it’s better than nothing. Far better than the alternative.

Impatiently, Jem tugged on her hand and pointed at the sky.

‘What? Yep, the stars are fabulous.’ Amber pulled herself quickly together. ‘But Jem, sweetheart, much as I know this will
probably get me burned at the stake round here, I’m feeling very queasy and right now I’ve had just as much of stars as anyone
can take – so … bloody hell!’

The Fiddlestickers had all paused on their wobbling pubward journey. Everyone was looking upwards.

The sky was no longer blue velvet with a drift of diamonds: it was dark and angry, the moon being swallowed up by billows
of heavy, towering clouds. Black on black.

The willow trees started to shiver as a breeze rustled across the green. The temperature dropped a few degrees as the first
heavy raindrops fell.

Amber shook her head. ‘No way. Absolutely no way – oh, flipping heck!’

The skies literally opened. It was as if some giant hand had ripped the clouds apart.

The rain fell in a blinding torrent, bouncing from the parched ground, shuddering and thundering through the trees.

The Fiddlestickers screamed with delight, most running
towards the pub, a few simply standing, heads tipped back, allowing the downpour to sluice away the weeks of heat.

‘Come on,’ Lewis shouted, holding her hand more tightly. ‘We’ll shelter under the trees. No, trust me Jem – it won’t thunder
and lightning. At least not yet – the trees will be safe … Come on!’

They ran, the three of them, slipping and sliding across the now treacherous green, the rain drenching them in seconds, towards
the nearest of the willows.

Beneath the tree the noise was amazing: a roaring waterfall, gushing past them, drumming, pounding, as the rain dragged the
sweetest perfume from the baked earth.

Lewis, his hair plastered to his head, pulled Jem against the trunk, his arm round him. ‘OK mate?’

Jem, grinning delightedly, nodded, catching raindrops in his hands as they flowed from the tips of the branches.

‘And you?’ Lewis looked at Amber. ‘Are you all right?’

‘Me?’ She wiped the rain away from her face, and blinked drops from her eyes. There were mud splatters up her legs, her clothes
were saturated and her hair was in rat’s tails. She looked a wreck. ‘Do you know, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier in
my life.’

Shine on Harvest Moon

‘Shine on Harvest Moon …’

In the bar everyone took up the chorus even though it was only early evening, and although growing dark outside, the moon
was still nowhere to be seen.

September already, Amber thought, as she helped Mitzi with the final cling-filming in The Weasel and Bucket’s kitchen. Where
on earth had the time gone?

September – still warm, but fresher now since the welcome rain of the last month, with its brilliant blue and golden mornings
and hazy purple dusks. The trees just starting to change colour and the promise of darker nights and crackling fires and cosy
Christmas to come.

September – the end of her fourth month in Fiddlesticks and she couldn’t imagine ever living anywhere else.

Fiddlesticks, and the villagers, and, yes – the star ceremonies, she’d accept that now – had changed her life.

They’d changed her, too.

‘All done?’ Timmy popped his head round the door. ‘Enough to feed several armies?’

‘Absolutely,’ Mitzi nodded. ‘And all the proper stuff – nothing too OTT. All very suitable for tonight’s “all is safely gathered
in” motif. The best of Granny Westward’s harvest home recipes. Loads of banana and tomato –
although not together because I tried that and it looked like vomit – and pea and ginger, and carrot and grapes and olives,
and peaches and marrow and pomegranate and—’

Timmy held up his hands, laughing. ‘Stop right there. It sounds like something Fern concocts and calls a curry.’

‘Look at you,’ Mitzi grinned. ‘You only have to mention her name and you’re all gooey-eyed. Going well, is it?’

‘Blissfully,’ Timmy sighed ecstatically, drifting out again to serve yet another can’t-wait-a-minute-longer customer.

‘Right – that’s us done, love,’ Mitzi said, patting Amber’s hand. ‘You’ve been a godsend. Or maybe that should be a St Bedric-send?’

Amber laughed. ‘Crikey – that seems so long ago. But yes, maybe. I mean – this – all this, is what I asked him for with my
first very sceptical green-cheese wish.’

‘Mmmm, but don’t forget what I’ve always said about this practical magic stuff: you’ve got to know how to use it. True, some
of the manifestations are totally inexplicable, but I still maintain the magic – herbal or celestial – only gives you a shove
in the right direction. Yes, it makes things happen – I don’t doubt that for a minute. Not any more. But when it does, the
rest of it is up to you. And you –’ Mitzi smiled ‘– have used it wisely. Anyway, I’m off for a shower and a cuddle with Joel
– if I’m lucky and he’s not wrestling with a wisdom tooth – and we’ll no doubt see you later. I can’t wait for this Harvest
Moon festival. Having a real, live band will make it one the village’ll never forget.’

Amber sincerely hoped so.

The night was closing in as she left the pub, and she smiled proudly at the activity still taking place under massive arc
lights on the village green. It was as if the circus had come to town. The Fiddlesticks kiddies had never seen anything like
it, and were crowded round the huge festival-type stage, getting in the way of umpteen electricians and sound men and lighting
and special-effects experts who were all beavering away getting things spot on for the JB Roadshow.

Goff, Billy and Dougie, bristling with importance, were
checking off tick-lists with the police, a whole host of security and parking personnel had been recruited, and it looked,
Amber thought happily, exactly like a mini Glastonbury.

Only an hour or so to go until darkness proper fell; just enough time to get ready for the biggest party Fiddlesticks had
ever seen.

She felt a shiver of excitement. It was magic. Sheer magic.

In fact, since Leo’s Lightning, everything had seemed – well – bewitched.

Lewis and Clancy were getting on really, really well. They’d spent hours together, talking and explaining and catching up
and simply getting used to their new and unexpected relationship. So far, it seemed to have worked out better than either
of them could have hoped, although Lewis said he’d never be able to call him Dad. Clancy apparently hadn’t minded at all and
had promised never to call Lewis ‘me laddo’, or at least not in public.

Zillah, of course, was simply on cloud nine – Amber couldn’t remember ever seeing anyone quite so happy; Gwyneth and Big Ida
were merrily planning planting their autumn gardens, their winter keep-fit programme and their next animal-rescue sorties;
Fern and Timmy were so loved up it was becoming embarrassing – which only left Amber.

Well, she was enjoying the challenge of her college course, and the Hubble Bubble job was wonderful. So – everything in the
garden was rosy, wasn’t it?

Well, yes, almost.

There’d been no major Lewis-developments to report since the snuggling-up under the wet willows, although Amber thought they’d
become closer in a friendly way. There was no longer the remote disinterest in his eyes when he looked at her, and although
she ached to touch him, to hold him, to kiss him, she’d accepted that friendship was all she was going to get.

Ah, well.

*

It was, Zillah thought, sitting on Clancy’s guitar case, in the noisy, overheated, backstage bustle, exactly as if they’d
turned back time.

She’d met the other JB Roadshow members several times since her reunion with Clancy, of course, but she’d never heard them
play. Now, with Clancy, amongst all the paraphernalia, it was exactly as it had been all those years before with Solstice
Soul.

The laughter, the growing tension, the good-humoured jibes, the panicky loss of plectrums and drumsticks, the drinks and last-minute
cigarettes, and run-throughs of tunes they’d played a million times before.

‘Unbelievable out there.’ Tiff Clayton, his hair newly bleached for the occasion, beamed lecherously at her. He was like Billy
Grinley all over again only with a bit more showbizz pizzazz. ‘Full house. The whole green is packed as far as the eye can
see, and people have got candles and picnics and it’s mind-blowing.’

‘Pretty hot totty, too,’ Berry Knight, the lead guitarist grinned. ‘Just right for you, Tiff. There are at least three chicks
of pensionable age but still under eighty in the front row.’

Clancy bent down and kissed her. ‘OK? Not nervous?’

‘Of course I’m nervous’ She touched his cheek. ‘I was always nervous before a gig, wasn’t I? It’s no different now.’

‘Yes it is. Everything’s different now.’

She giggled. It was. Nothing would ever be the same again. And she loved it.

‘Right boys,’ Freddo strode into the mayhem, his hair flowing, his bling sparkling. ‘The crews are all up and running; sound,
lighting, special effects all A-OK. The security boys are happy and everyone’s ready for—’