Eleanor woke up with a start. It took her a moment to work out where she was, until the peace and quiet reminded her that she was back home in The Forge.
The tranquillity of Cranley village was always a shock after the noise of central London, where there were loud neighbours, packed pavements and people shouting into their mobiles wherever she turned.
With relief, she sank back against the soft pillow. She closed her eyes, intending to drift back to sleep when she heard the hee-haw of the donkey.
With a groan, she dragged herself out of bed and walked over to the window. Her bedroom overlooked the back garden, where she could see her mum shuffling slowly around the makeshift animal pens.
Eleanor quickly got dressed and headed downstairs, feeling irritated that she hadn’t had time to straighten her hair or put on her make-up yet. In any case, her mother was the only person to have ever seen her without make-up on. But she still hated the feeling of not looking her best.
‘Mum!’ she said, heading straight outside. ‘You should leave that to me.’
Her mum had been struggling to undo a large bale of hay that had appeared from goodness knows where.
‘Morning, love,’ said her mum, sinking down gratefully onto a nearby low wall, which looked as if it could crumble at any moment. ‘It’s fine. It just takes me a bit longer at the minute.’
‘Tell me what to do,’ said Eleanor.
‘Daisy needs her breakfast,’ she answered. ‘You just need to scatter some of the hay around for her.’
Eleanor inwardly rolled her eyes. By naming the donkey Daisy, her mother appeared to have bonded with the animal. She sighed. The donkey was quite sweet in a chunky pony kind of way. But the garden was far too tiny for any kind of animal that size.
‘She needs her water filling up as well.’ Her mum pointed to an old tin bath which appeared to be the new watering hole in the garden.
Whilst her mum went inside and put the kettle on, Eleanor gave the donkey her breakfast.
She stretched her back as she straightened up, watching as the last petals of apple blossom drifted down in the gentle breeze onto the lawn. Or rather, the lack of it. The donkey and the goat had seen off any grass that might have been growing.
‘Buttercup will need milking if you can manage it,’ shouted her mum from the kitchen.
Eleanor spun around in shock. ‘What? I’m not milking a goat!’
‘Please, love.’
‘Jeez.’ Eleanor turned to look at the white goat who was chewing on some hay. ‘What do you do with the milk?’
‘Drink it, of course.’
Eleanor blanched. ‘Shouldn’t it be, I don’t know, pasteurised or something? Boiled so that it’s safe?’
Her mother stood by the back door and shook her head. ‘No. It’s absolutely fine.’
A little wooden stool was produced, which Eleanor recognised as one of her childhood ones. How times had changed, she thought, sitting down and placing a bucket under the goat’s teats.
‘Sorry about this,’ she muttered, glancing at her newly manicured nails and wondering whether it was too late to put on a pair of gloves. But then again, what was the point when her eczema had become so bad that it was now at the base of nearly every finger on both hands.
Buttercup seemed quite happy to be milked. Which was more than could be said than Eleanor’s point of view of the whole situation.
It took until late morning to sort out all the animals, by which time Eleanor was finally able to head back upstairs and put on her make-up and do her hair properly.
She had fed the donkey and goat, picking up a large bale of hay and getting a prickly rash down her arms in thanks. She had milked the goat and didn’t really want to repeat that experience too often. She had also fed the kittens and stopped a few escaping or getting trampled under the donkey’s hooves. She had chucked some pellets on the floor for the chickens whilst dodging their sharp beaks in order to pick out their freshly laid eggs. The tortoise had had its morning greens. The cockatoo had had its tray cleaned out whilst it had flown around the lounge and nearly out the back door. The battle to get it back in its cage had taken almost an hour. Finally the dogs had needed feeding and walking.
Now she stared at herself in the mirror in dismay, realising she was going to have to get changed into her second outfit of the day already. She was covered in fur, drool and other indistinguishable stains that she didn’t want to think about. All in all, she felt a mess and looked it as well, which made her even more irritable. The fact that her mum was so grateful for her help with the animals made Eleanor feel a hundred times worse.
She just wished she didn’t have to lie to her, that she could find a real job that would make her mum proud. But there were still no emails regarding any jobs. Instead her phone was full of messages from both Annie and Megan, giddily excited to see her. They had agreed to meet up at Willow Tree Hall that afternoon so that Annie could show Eleanor around her new home before going out to the pub for a much overdue drink to celebrate her friend’s engagement.
Eleanor changed out of her dirty clothes and stared around the room as she sank onto the bed. The whole room was unchanged from her teenage years. Apart from the Spice Girls posters that had been ripped down at some point, of course. There were various dust-covered stuffed toys dotted around the bed. A few abandoned novels. And the cup awarded at the annual village summer fete for best collage, which she had made from dried petals. Sitting there, she felt trapped in a time machine. All the hopes and dreams that had led to nothing were now gathering dust around her too.
But she knew she had to force herself to carry on. The hope that any story about pop stars hanging around Willow Tree Hall might just be enough to get her job back. After all, they weren’t just her own dreams and aspirations. They belonged to her mum as well.
And Eleanor couldn’t let her down after everything they had been through.