CHAPTER 6
That day was one for bimbling. Sunscreen slathered, floaty dresses and floppy hats donned, or shorts and T-shirt in Lil’s case, and it was a slow amble past a wide variety of shops and tourist traps, with the occasional pause for ice cream, or a cold soft drink. We eventually emerged at the seafront, where all the usual sorts of souvenir cabins and eateries lined one side of a broad footpath, the other dropping onto a sort of beach.

CHAPTER 4
Lil sat in silence for a few seconds, staring at the mug of tea Alwen had just delivered. When she did speak, it was far more hesitant than I was used to hearing from her.

“What if… This is all sponging, stuff, yeah? If…”

She stopped once again, clearly seeking the right words before trying once again.

“If this is meant to be the start of proper things, proper COUPLE things, aye? How can I start on the basis of her paying for everything? And what if it doesn’t work out? How do I pay you all back?”

CHAPTER 3
I could hear the sirens now, taking the opportunity to slip a canula in as Tom played with the gas: why add more pain? I couldn’t get my head around the lack of blood flow from that leg, and wanted Naz more than a little out of it before I had a poke. If it was what I suspected, he could risk a toxic shock if and when the juices did start flowing.

Sirens; closer, thank fuck. I dropped a unit of morphine into the patient’s arm before nodding to Tom.

“Cavalry, I hope. I’ll hold off on back boards till we get their decision. On the other hand… Bryn?”

“Aye?”

“Could you tug out the back boards for us? You know where they are. I’m going to be very busy in a few”

We had a fortnight or so to get back into reality, of course, which meant some serious time at the State Government offices on St George’s, catching up with the usual suspects, and not just Bobby and Colleen. Our first few Proper Working days were nominally spent in a conference room with a group of around fifteen delegates from various ‘hubs’, which summed up what could be called Western Australia’s human geography. Like the rest of the country, people flocked to the bigger cities or the coast, and in most cases that added up to the same thing.

He knelt down so that his head was just about level with hers.

“I can be, if you’d like. What about your bear?”

LC shook her head.

“Kawan can’t be an uncle!”

They did indeed have some suitable cracks. Mostly a little wide for her palming jams, so it became FISTS for LC. The place was apparently an old water pumping station, tricked out in the old fashion to look like an extravagantly Gothic Castle, the huge chimneys embellished as ‘towers’. Apparently they run courses inside them for very long abseils; the sort of trick used by those nutters seen on the end of a rope window-cleaning on glass skyscrapers.

There was a great bouldering area on one floor, overhanging hugely in the centre over a serious crash mat, lead routes of a decent length with fixed ‘quick draws’ for those who wanted to lead rather than toprope, and those walls ranged from reasonably easy angles to overhanging. There was also a plethora of ground anchors. It would do me.

His voice shook just a little as he called out the directions, but we were soon at the pleasant little café, Clara standing on the footpath outside. I put a hand on the lad’s arm to keep him in his seat.

“She knows where to sit, son, and you’ve only just left her, so let’s get rolling before traffic time, okay?”

The Lily Ponds lifted my mood in their shaded tranquillity, despite a sort of one-person argument between my wife and herself over whether a rather out-of-place black swan could count as a UK tick on that list she denied keeping. Thankfully, and before she could come close to blows with herself, we were treated to the sight of a kingfisher flying out over the water, plunging, and then disappearing once more with a rather large fish, which reminded my stomach that it had actually been a rather long time since breakfast. Maz laughed, forgetting her swan-based dispute.

“Mike, darling, have we suddenly discovered a hitherto unknown large land predator, or was that your stomach?”

It was a much quieter evening, without the extra small persons, Paul and Paula collaborating with Maz to produce what she called a traditionally untraditional nasi goreng, and the ensuing conversation nearly broke me. I have no idea why, but as Maz prattled on about tradition preceding religion, and the central role pigs had always held in ‘Austronesian’ culture until the arrival of Islam. I had some very sharp memories of those first barbies together with Kul and Geeta, where she had avoided neither alcohol not pork.

I started to do a countback on my booze intake, and Sammy clearly noticed, laughing out loud.

“None of us bothered tonight, mate. Not asking for a go/no go tonight, just setting a seed. That’s your mate over there, I believe”

The last confused me, until I saw where he was looking, which was in the direction of a very lost-looking Neil. As I started to move, Maz tugged me gently back.

“The lad’s turn, darling. See?”

Ish was already there, hugging my, our friend while clearly struggling to explain why he had some young woman attached to one hand.

Change the subject, Rhodes.

“This is a nice place, Paula”

“It should be. Cost us an arm and a leg. Or rather, in my case, nearly an arm”

“Um… Lexie and I share a few friends. I think I know what you mean”

She nodded, her smile wistful.

“Yup. Just another thing I owe to Diane and the rest. Mo had a lot of assets, and they came my way”

“Mo?”

I was up very late on Tuesday morning, and in the end we were one of the last groups to leave, as I wanted to male sure my blood cells outnumbered the alcohol. I had switched to softer drinks after midnight, just to be sure, but I waited until noon and they were actually kicking us off the site. The traffic had dropped considerably by then, so we were soon out of Shrewsbury and on the A49 heading towards the Shropshire Hills. The day before had been, as the cliché goes, one to remember, but I suspected it might just have been erased from some people’s memories.

For some unknown reason, most people were up later for their breakfast the following morning. The exceptions, of course, were the four young people nesting in the Edifice, who were clearly audible, even through earplugs, from shortly after dawn. I popped my plugs out just in case we were to be visited by a lively LC, only to hear the typically calm voice of Jan as she corralled and fed the child pack. By the time I finally surfaced, they were gone, apparently delivered by Shan’s Mum Ginny to the children’s play area.

Priorities at that age are somewhat fickle.

It wasn’t far off the girl’s dream, I realised, as four of us in two couples joined another couple (ignoring the four kids) for a meal consisting of pie and mash in a cardboard box, which was actually tasty. Our son looked slightly woozy, in the happiest of ways, and both Blake and Di joined us in absolutely not teasing him. That restraint was clearly telling on Di, for she suddenly stood up and called out “OY!” to someone behind me, followed by “Just walk past and ignore me, why don’t you?”

“What bloody festival?”

“Shrewsbury folk festival. Bit of history there, to say the least. It’s where the Woodruffs met for starters, as well as where Annie and Eric got together. It was also the girls’ first trip away, as a couple, that is, and not with either set of parents. We thought it would, well; it’s not just a chance for you to get some relaxed time with both of them, but it also seemed like a proper present for Maz and the little one. They tell me it’s very good for kids, loads of activities just for them. The last weekend of the month, ah? Give my girl a chance to breathe. I’ll let you know who’s on, but not today. Enjoy the trip, love. We’ll be fine”

Our burst of laughter was interrupted by a call of “Budge over!” from Pen, as she and Keith appeared, each carrying a folded camping stool.

“If you lot are annexing our bunkhouse, me and Keefy will get a drink out of you, at least. You eaten?”

Maz grinned a welcome, her mood clearly on an upswing.

“Just ordered. Please tell me we’re not planning on hitting the chippy afterwards!”

I noticed a sharp look from Frank towards his wife, but she simply slipped an arm through his for a squeeze. Their business. That was when LC announced that she liked crunchy sausages, which drew Deb’s attention back to the rest of us.

“What are crunchy sausages, Carolyn?”

We ate breakfast as a family plus one (plus bear), and I noticed little nudges by Clara to Ish, with the occasional meaningful look towards Maz or myself. I waited until we had done the dishes and cleared everything away before dropping the hint.

“You want a word with me, son?”

He looked down at his feet for a few seconds, then nodded, so I led him outside into the slowly warming day.

“What is it, Ish?”

“Um, Clara, Dad. She says… Look, her staying with us was my idea, and it’s really nice, and… but she thinks you might see her as pushy, and she doesn’t want that. She wanted me to let you know that if it’s awkward, she can always go back with the others”

A rapid bit or negotiation followed, as Debbie clearly needed assurance her charge would be safe, and Neil was initially reluctant to move, as his little notebook was filling with e-mail addresses and names, but the promise of fresh victims finally settled the deal.

It had obviously been years since I had climbed on Milestone, but it had always been a favourite spot, right from my earliest puzzlement at how to use the unfriendly voids on Direct up to my realisation that the slab held enough holds in its ripples to make the climbing far more straightforward. As we uncoiled the ropes, Enfys was chuckling.

After a serious bit of hugging, or maybe strangling, by our girl, he passed her to her brother as Enfys set his lid onto a bunk. Settling himself onto a chair after doffing his jacket, he simply held out a hand as Alys placed a cup into it.

“How was the ride, Neil?”

“Not a bad one, mate, but I’m on the Beemer today, so took it a bit more gently. Club tonight?”

I soloed a couple of severe cracks, just to feel the joy of thuggery while sanctimoniously claiming it was purely to demonstrate how jamming worked, and then spotted the other three for some low level gymnastics. For Carolyn, that actually meant standing with my hands either side of her hips, while she told me her own hands were too small.

“That, my love, is why we have fists. Try it this way”

Neil directed us the next day, even though I knew the way, which allowed him to prattle on about the local sites and sights while I simply drove. For once, his chatter fitted the day for it worked like a cross between a sat nav and a tour guide. We heard all about how Cragside in Rothbury, powered by hydroelectricity. how the steam turbine was invented in Newcastle, which also had the world’s first electric public lighting, using the light bulb invented in Sunderland and copied by a man called Edison, and Neil was partway through a rather too detailed account of lawsuits and combined companies when he stopped dead.

“Sorry, all. I got talking, and then I remembered another place I want to see. It’s a little before the car park, Mike”

Once she had slaked her lust for her list tick, I whispered in her ear, “Something else for you round the corner, love”

Neil led the way again, back across the wall and then traversing the hillside towards the crags between the dark waters of the lough and the crags of the Whin Sill below the Wall, and Maz’ smile became a grin as I took her hand once again.

“When we went out to Statham’s that first time, and I asked what the rock was, and then said I was familiar with it?”

“That you’d climbed on it before? This is the place, isn’t it?”