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The family introductions continued: a drowsy-looking wife, three children with chocolate smudges around their mouths, two dogs and a rabbit in a hutch. The youngest child, a freckle-faced ginger, had insisted on showing me the rabbit, which cautiously hid in a pile of straw. I had sneezed several times.
Joseph handed me a bun. ‘And one granddad?’
I bit with gusto then licked the scalding juice from my finger before answering. ‘Mm, tastes good… It was his house, according to his son, and when his mother died, they moved in to help him, and opened the B&B for extra money. It’s a huge place with rooms in the attic for the kids. I felt a bit bad for running out the door. They seem like a nice family.’
We sat side-by-side on the picnic blanket in front of his tent. The site was surprisingly quiet.
‘Popular with hikers,’ Joseph said, noting my curiosity. ‘The ones closer to Scarborough cater for families.’
The campsite was amongst the moorland shrubbery, fringed by thickets of heather and gorse, and heavy with flies. He swatted one away.
He shifted to sit cross-legged. ‘Could do with rain. There’s a hosepipe ban down south.’
The ground around our feet was cracked open and rock-hard underneath.
‘Do you sleep on an airbed?’ I asked.
He squirted ketchup on his burger. ‘Oh yeah. I’m not one for scrimping on comforts.’
He still hadn’t shown me the interior of the tent.
A lengthy pause was necessary as we ate and avoided dripping fat onto the blanket. The breeze, which had kept us cool at Helmsley had dropped to nothing, and even up on the moors, the humidity drenched the air as if it had rained. I thought back to the conversation with Dad and his demands that I took Wellington boots. A parasol would have been more appropriate.
‘What’s the smile for?’ Joseph asked.
‘Oh, just a memory.’
‘A nice one?’
‘Yeah. Dad.’
‘Do you miss your family? Home?’
He offered me a box of tissues and I wiped my chin. ‘I’ve tried not to think about them too often. I am twenty-five.’
Saying my age, I couldn’t believe how quickly life had accelerated since leaving school. There had been a few years working in retail, plus weekend jobs. A legacy of hits and misses, including two weeks at a garden centre, which had been an undeniable disaster; what did I know about plants?
‘Tell me.’ He nudged my arm with his elbow.
So I told him my employment history, how I had gone from one job to another, never settling in or making lasting impressions on anyone. Craig had been one such failure, but I didn’t mention him to Joseph.
‘And now a hotel receptionist. Nothing to do with castles,’ he said.
‘No,’ I said, scrunching the tissue into a ball.
‘Sorry I can’t offer you an ice-cream. I do have a tin of fruit. Or an apple?’
‘An apple would be nice.’ I accepted the Granny Smith and bit into it. More juice dribbled down my chin. If he wanted a portrait of genteel manners, it wasn’t drawn on my face.
He handed me another tissue.
‘What about you?’ I asked.
‘I’m good.’
He thought I meant the apple. Should I push him, play a game of quid pro quo? Truth or dare? He seemed content to lie on his back and examine the mottled sky with its luminous evening clouds and hints of red. Tomorrow promised to be another scorching day of sunshine.
Without warning, he jumped up. ‘I know, coffee. You okay having coffee in the evening?’
