off?’ Bartholomew can’t bear to look at him.
‘It’s due tomorrow. I’ve tracked my order on the Internet.’
‘People don’t take days off work to wait in for parcels. Why didn’t you just get it sent here?’
‘I was worried it would get lost in the system.’
‘What system? It’s you and me in a shed.’
‘And if I chanced it, it could be sent back to the depot, and I’d have to pick it up from there and that would be another day off.’
‘Well, not really.’ He can hear Ruby’s voice saying, ‘So how much time is it that Leonard’s had off this year? Fifty-two weeks?’ And him saying what he always said, ‘I don’t want to talk about it. I hate managing people.’
‘I don’t think you’re seeing things from my point of view,’ Leonard is saying.
‘That’s an understatement.’
‘This parcel’s really stressing me out. I’ve been tracking my order twice a day for two weeks. Tomorrow is D-day, the eagle is landing. I have to be there. For the trousers.’
‘Why don’t you shop on the high street, like normal people?’
‘Because Lands’ End does special wrinkle-resistant fabric. And I like the elasticated waist. Can I have the day off?’
‘I was hoping we could get these deliveries unpacked. There’s a hell of a backlog.’
‘I’m getting really stressed about the trousers.’
‘Oh d’you know what? Have the day.’
‘Appreciated.’
Bartholomew makes for the door, frowning. ‘God help us if they don’t fit,’ he says quietly.
*
A week later, Primrose is sitting on her high stool behind the till, one hand on her lower belly, filled with the new idea which is making her body tingle.
The midwife had told her it was only the size of a broad bean, but Primrose thinks of the baby as occupying her whole middle, and wonders, when she stoops to pick up a receipt off the floor, say, whether the baby is folded over. Or stooping too.
When she’d cycled in this morning, down the lane to Sinnington and then up the steep incline for the short stretch across the moor, she’d thought about her middle all the way. As if her middle were somehow a thing, brand new. Her legs were pumping on the pedals, her ears were rushing inside her hood and the wind on the moor was blowing hard into her face, but her whole mind was on her middle.
It seemed to Primrose that there were two of them cycling across the moor, two of them switching on the strip lights inside the Co-op. Two of them, together, pouring the change from little clear bags into separate compartments in the till. And so when she finally came to sit on the high stool behind the counter, she laid a hand on her little friend, who was her secret, and served a customer one-handed, half hoping the old lady might notice and ask her when it was due.
‘Primrose? Keeping you up are we?’ says Tracy in that hard voice of hers. ‘You can go on your break if you like.’
Primrose steps out into the bright autumn sunshine. Lipton High Street is peppered, as usual, with a handful of pensioners and a couple of young mothers with children in buggies. She walks past A Cut Above, where an elderly lady is sat under a plastic-domed heater; past the chemist, with its bottle-green gloss paintwork unchanged for decades; past the trays of warm sausage rolls in Greggs’ window. She turns down a side road towards Al’s Electrical shop.
A bell rings over the door as she inches into the shop’s dark, crammed interior. Bulging shelves reach to the ceiling, set with trays of rivets and tacks, and rolls of electrical flex hang from hooks in the rafters. Cable clips. Consumer units. Crimp lugs and heat tape.
‘Hello Prim,’ says Al from behind the counter. ‘Beautiful day out there. The trees are in great colour. I haven’t seen them that bright for years. Must be all the rain we’ve been having.’
‘I need another junction box,’ says Primrose.
‘Right you are. Which type?’
‘Thirty-amp. Three-terminal. In brown if you’ve
‘It’s due tomorrow. I’ve tracked my order on the Internet.’
‘People don’t take days off work to wait in for parcels. Why didn’t you just get it sent here?’
‘I was worried it would get lost in the system.’
‘What system? It’s you and me in a shed.’
‘And if I chanced it, it could be sent back to the depot, and I’d have to pick it up from there and that would be another day off.’
‘Well, not really.’ He can hear Ruby’s voice saying, ‘So how much time is it that Leonard’s had off this year? Fifty-two weeks?’ And him saying what he always said, ‘I don’t want to talk about it. I hate managing people.’
‘I don’t think you’re seeing things from my point of view,’ Leonard is saying.
‘That’s an understatement.’
‘This parcel’s really stressing me out. I’ve been tracking my order twice a day for two weeks. Tomorrow is D-day, the eagle is landing. I have to be there. For the trousers.’
‘Why don’t you shop on the high street, like normal people?’
‘Because Lands’ End does special wrinkle-resistant fabric. And I like the elasticated waist. Can I have the day off?’
‘I was hoping we could get these deliveries unpacked. There’s a hell of a backlog.’
‘I’m getting really stressed about the trousers.’
‘Oh d’you know what? Have the day.’
‘Appreciated.’
Bartholomew makes for the door, frowning. ‘God help us if they don’t fit,’ he says quietly.
*
A week later, Primrose is sitting on her high stool behind the till, one hand on her lower belly, filled with the new idea which is making her body tingle.
The midwife had told her it was only the size of a broad bean, but Primrose thinks of the baby as occupying her whole middle, and wonders, when she stoops to pick up a receipt off the floor, say, whether the baby is folded over. Or stooping too.
When she’d cycled in this morning, down the lane to Sinnington and then up the steep incline for the short stretch across the moor, she’d thought about her middle all the way. As if her middle were somehow a thing, brand new. Her legs were pumping on the pedals, her ears were rushing inside her hood and the wind on the moor was blowing hard into her face, but her whole mind was on her middle.
It seemed to Primrose that there were two of them cycling across the moor, two of them switching on the strip lights inside the Co-op. Two of them, together, pouring the change from little clear bags into separate compartments in the till. And so when she finally came to sit on the high stool behind the counter, she laid a hand on her little friend, who was her secret, and served a customer one-handed, half hoping the old lady might notice and ask her when it was due.
‘Primrose? Keeping you up are we?’ says Tracy in that hard voice of hers. ‘You can go on your break if you like.’
Primrose steps out into the bright autumn sunshine. Lipton High Street is peppered, as usual, with a handful of pensioners and a couple of young mothers with children in buggies. She walks past A Cut Above, where an elderly lady is sat under a plastic-domed heater; past the chemist, with its bottle-green gloss paintwork unchanged for decades; past the trays of warm sausage rolls in Greggs’ window. She turns down a side road towards Al’s Electrical shop.
A bell rings over the door as she inches into the shop’s dark, crammed interior. Bulging shelves reach to the ceiling, set with trays of rivets and tacks, and rolls of electrical flex hang from hooks in the rafters. Cable clips. Consumer units. Crimp lugs and heat tape.
‘Hello Prim,’ says Al from behind the counter. ‘Beautiful day out there. The trees are in great colour. I haven’t seen them that bright for years. Must be all the rain we’ve been having.’
‘I need another junction box,’ says Primrose.
‘Right you are. Which type?’
‘Thirty-amp. Three-terminal. In brown if you’ve
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