Read Online Summertime by Raffaella Barker - Free Book Online Page B

cobwebs on the ceiling, which I too prefer not to notice, and laughs at something David has said, before barraging him with questions.
    â€˜Have you met Tarzan yet? Are there any monkeys in this film? How big are they? What are theirnames? Do they sleep in the caravans with all the crew? Has Tarzan got a bow and arrow? How many snakes have you seen? Can you send us something dangerous, like a scorpion or some snake’s spit or something?’
    Even though it is ten o’clock at night and Felix should be in bed, I let him talk on, trying not to think about the telephone bill, but about Felix, and how he misses David. This leads to a brief soul-search and the conclusion that I have got it all wrong, and should never have got involved with anyone, no matter how melting his voice or smiling his eyes, unless he could guarantee lifelong commitment to the whole family. Felix passes the telephone, saying, ‘Mum, please can you try to sort out the email so I can send messages and stuff to David? It’s really important. I need to show him the Necromancer stuff on the internet, and I want to download it on to an email. Isn’t it time I was in bed, anyway?’
    Am constantly bemused by the weird ways of children, and suddenly long for a cosy chat with David about all their activities today instead of the stilted conversation which follows.
    I begin: ‘How are you?’
    â€˜I’m fine, thanks, what have you been up to today?’
    â€˜Oh, nothing really, just getting on. What about you?’
    â€˜Well we’re on set, and I’ve been trying to work out a way to get the bridge connected to the tree house, and none of the carpenters speak English. There was a huge storm here last night, and the electrics have been off all morning. They’ve only just got them back on. But I want to know about home.’ He sighs, and pauses, then says, ‘I miss you all so badly. Tell me what everyone’s doing. Is Giles playing any cricket before he goes back to school? How’s the flooded garden? How are the dogs? Have you set up your email yet?’
    I begin to relax, and I stop hunching at my desk and move over to sit by the fire, thawed now into talking to him again.
    â€˜Not exactly, but everyone’s fine, and missing you. The Beauty told her nursery school teacher that—’ There is a click, and the line dies.
    â€˜Hello, hello. David, can you hear me?’ I slam the receiver down. ‘Bloody, sodding bastard phone. It does this every time I speak to him. God, it’s primitive.’
    Redouble attempts with the computer and the helpline, and am rewarded at midnight, with the ping of an email arriving for me. So thrilling. Excitement is undiminished by it being from Angel.com to welcome me as a new member, and not something more glamorous. After gazing at their message, andcommitting it to memory, I decide it is best to stop until tomorrow. Can scarcely summon the energy to crawl up to bed after this computer marathon, and cannot face getting it wrong again.
    April 16th
    Constant rain for the past week means that I need never have bothered pumping out the knot garden. It is back to its incarnation as a lake, and even has frogspawn lying like a pillow of tiny glass beads at one end. Should I keep trying to dry it out, or should I accept defeat and make it into a proper lake, or rather pond, and become a water gardener? Am gazing into the murky swamp, pondering this issue before collecting The Beauty from a morning with my mother, when Desmond and his marquee people arrive to check the space. I had been expecting a team of efficient country types with measuring tapes and theodolites and so forth, but instead Bass (as in bass guitar, he informs me) and his girlfriend Siren surge up the drive in an orange camper van with purple curtains and flames painted behind all four wheels. Despite the inclement weather, which has caused me to put on an old boiler suit of David’s and