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‘Anyway, finish that one up. We’ve got quite a few more to get through.’
‘Yes sir,’ Sophia said, draining the cup.
Turns out, being a mocktail mixologist’s tasting assistant is one of the best jobs in the history of the world.
‘More cola.’
‘Needs to be a bit more… aggressive with the bitter flavor?’
‘Way too green.’
‘Who would have thought that you could swap out whiskey for barley tea?’
The two of them laughed and drank for what felt like hours.
Eventually, when Sophia had drunk more sweet juice than probably anyone ever had before, she said, ‘Daddy, didn’t you say that there weretwosurprises for me?’
‘I did. You’ve had enough to drink?’ he asked mischievously.
‘Yes!’ she said, batting at his arm gently.
‘Good. Then it’s time to work.’
To Sophia’s surprise, he pulled out a needle and thread from a pocket. ‘Time to teach me everything you know.’
CHAPTER 11
There’s almost no end to the repairs you can make to a vintage bear. You can clean and scrub for hours, replace whole patches of fur, replace all the stuffing. Sometimes, it can feel as though you’ve replaced the whole thing.
There had been plenty of times in Sophia’s short career as a stuffie restorer that she’d wondered whether she’d replacedtoo muchof the bear. It felt like she’d destroyed the old bear and built a whole brand-new soft toy.
Truth is though, somehow, the essence of the toy always remained. Whether it was the same eyes, or some of the old stitching, or a couple of chunks of the vintage stuffing, the old bear always remained. You couldn’t ever eradicate memory or soul.
‘This is way, way harder than it looks.’ Wolf said. He was struggling with the cleaning of a relatively simple toy. Sophia had given him one of her stuffies — one of her least valuable ones, of course — to work on. His was a little pig called Porker that had anextremelycurly tail.
‘You need to use a coarser brush,’ Sophia said.
‘Coarser? Won’t that hurt Porker’s skin?’
Sophia laughed. ‘He can take it. There’s years’ worth of grime in that guy. He was second-hand when I bought him, so I guess he’s third-hand now.’
She’d been so excited when Wolf had asked her to teach him what her job involved. It was such a pleasure to include someone in her world, and hugely gratifying to have Wolf tell her that it was a hard job that required serious skill.
‘I don’t want to ruin him,’ Wolf said. ‘I know how important stuffies are to Littles.’
‘It’s true,’ Sophia replied. ‘But don’t worry. You have my permission to make mistakes.’ She was busy working on a stuffed elephant from the Clever Monsters shipment that was truly ancient. The fur on this guy was almost entirely bald, and she could feel that super-firm stuffing that companies used to use inside their stuffies in the stone-age.
‘That elephant’s pretty amazing,’ Wolf said, eying the elephant. ‘Looks like he’s been through a lot.’
‘She, I think,’ Sophia said. She showed Wolf a tiny scrap of pink fabric tied to the elephant’s tail. ‘This used to be a pink ribbon, I’ll bet.’
‘I’ll bet you’re right,’ Wolf said. ‘Wonder what sort of life that elephant’s had. How many generations you think she’s been through?’
Sophia pondered for a moment. ‘This is a serious antique. Probably worth quite a lot. Age-wise… I dunno, could be a hundred years old, honestly.’
‘A hundred?’ Wolf’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. ‘That’s a piece of damn history.’
‘Yep.’ She said, trying not to let her anxiety bubble up like a geyser. ‘That’s why they’re paying me so much.’
