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‘Seren, I know you are cross with me—’
‘Cross is an understatement.’ She looked away. ‘OK, so I mightn’t have used up all my savings on that stupid van, but I have lost my job. And let’s don’t forget that if it wasn’t for Dippy, I wouldn’t be sitting here with my heart broken because I would never have met Daniel.’
Her father perched on the stool next to her and picked up a pair of pliers, turning them over in his hands, studying them. ‘Pretend for one minute that you’d never met Daniel, how do you think you’d feel about the van? Would you still feel like giving it up?’
Seren wrapped her hands around the hot mug, letting its warmth seep into her, and she took a sip. She might still be annoyed with her dad, but it was a reasonable question.
‘Possibly. I’m not sure. I might have felt a little more positive about it.’ She thought back to Sunday when she’d spent most of the day on the internet, searching for venues that might have a vacancy for a little travelling gift shop, before Daniel had dropped his bombshell and blown her heart apart. ‘I probably would continue with it,’ she admitted, reluctantly.
‘Like your aunt said, why don’t you give it a go for a few months? I know your heart’s not in it, but in time it might be, and it would be a shame to jack it in without giving it a fair crack of the whip. You were doing quite well, weren’t you?’
‘Better than I expected,’ she admitted grudgingly, deciding she might as well forgive her dad and have a proper conversation with him. After all, he’d only done what he thought was best for her, and he couldn’t have foreseen that it would cost her her job. Neither was it his fault that she’d had her heart broken.
‘So, you might make a go of it, if you tried?’ he persisted.
‘I might. I hadn’t thought much past Christmas.’
‘A travelling shop is for life, not just for Christmas,’ he’d joked, but she failed to crack a smile. ‘Sorry.’
‘It’s OK.’
He gestured to the mound of ivy. ‘Can I do anything to help?’
‘Not really. I can’t do much more as I’m nearly out of willow branches.’
Patrick rose and went over to a shelving unit, rooting around noisily. He returned to the workbench and set a handful of things down. ‘Are these any good?’
Seren saw three circular hoops that she remembered her mum using when she went through her cross-stitch embroidery phase. All of them had broken screws, but the lightweight wooden hoops themselves were still serviceable. Her dad had also found a couple of picture frames whose glass had long since been put in the bin.
‘Maybe,’ she said, her imagination firing, and she felt a tiny jolt of creativity surge through her. It didn’t dispel her misery, but it was welcome nevertheless, as a way to focus on something other than Daniel. ‘Thanks, Dad.’
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ he said, squeezing her shoulder. ‘It’s going to be OK, Seren, you’ll get through this.’
Seren wasn’t so sure. This was the first time she’d experienced the pain of a broken heart, and the way she felt right now, she didn’t intend to ever expose herself to the risk of it getting broken again.
Engrossed in weaving tufty branches of pine-scented fir around the smaller of the rectangular frames, she barely registered the sound of the shed door opening again.
Without looking up, she said, ‘Put it over there, Dad,’ assuming her father had brought her another hot drink to keep her going. She knew he was concerned about her because she’d been living on little more than tea and the occasional digestive biscuit, her appetite having given up the ghost for the time being, so he plied her with drinks on a regular basis, making sure she at least stayed hydrated.
‘Seren.’
The oh-so-familiar voice stopped her in her tracks, and she stiffened at the sound of it.
Slowly she put the frame down and turned around.
Daniel was standing uncertainly in the open doorway, letting the heat out and the cold late-afternoon air in.
‘Daniel.’ Her tone was expressionless, but her heart was beating uncomfortably fast and she felt she couldn’t catch her breath.
‘Can I speak to you?’
‘You’d better come in.’ She shivered, but it wasn’t just from the chill.
He sidled in, closing the door gently behind him, but made no move to come any nearer.
Seren wrapped her arms around her middle and waited for him to explain why he was there.
‘I came to…’ He stopped. ‘I wanted to…’ Another pause, followed by a small self-conscious laugh. ‘This isn’t easy.’
