Summer at Little Beach Street Bakery
Page 38

‘What are you looking at? Lots and lots of?’
Polly blinked.
‘I don’t know. Removal vans?’
‘Yes!’ said Huckle, who was also slightly drunk. ‘Don’t you see?’
‘We set up a removals business? Because I have to tell you, these guys seem pretty good.’
‘NO!’ roared Huckle, laughing. ‘Polly, I love you so much, stop being thick.’
‘I’m not being thick, you’re being NEEDLESSLY MYSTERIOUS.’
Both of them were laughing now, as Huckle shook his head.
‘Van!’
‘I don’t get it. Like the shoes?’
‘Like a BREAD VAN!’
Polly laughed. Then she stopped. Then she laughed again.
‘What do you mean, a bread van?’
‘Well, you know, like a pizza van. A van with an oven in it and they make pizza.’
‘Yes,’ said Polly.
‘Well, you could get one for bread. And drive it round Polbearne.’
Polly turned to face him. The water splashed in her face.
‘Not just like that.’
‘No, not just like that,’ said Huckle. ‘You’d need permits and stuff. But the council know you.’
‘The council hate me,’ said Polly. ‘We helped stop them getting that expensive bridge they wanted.’
‘Oh yes,’ said Huckle. ‘Okay, so we put a false moustache on you.’
‘But they won’t let me take a bread van into Polbearne.’
‘No,’ said Huckle. ‘But they might let you take one into the car park on the other side, where the fish man goes. So Polbearne people… They might have to cross the causeway to get to you.’ He blinked. ‘But you know, I have an idea they would. And the day trippers – they’d hit you first.’
‘I don’t want to work in a van,’ said Polly. ‘I want my lovely ovens and my lovely shop.’
‘You should have thought of that before Barfgate. And I tell you what, if you don’t have a plan soon, you might be sleeping in a van too.’
Polly sighed. ‘Where would we even get one? How would we pay for it?’
Huckle’s eyes strayed to where the charm bracelet had been, before she had taken it off and zipped it into her bag for safe keeping so she could go swimming.
‘No way,’ said Polly. ‘No way, that thing is mine.’
‘Not my one, doof,’ he said. ‘Reuben must have bought you the platinum one before all this shit went down.’
‘They won’t take it back, though,’ said Polly ‘It’s personalised and everything.’
‘They might melt it down for you.’
Polly shook her head.
‘I couldn’t do that.’
‘Mine’s the sentimental value one, you know?’
‘I do know.’
‘I mean, mine’s totally the best one.’
‘Now you’re sounding like Reuben.’
‘Well that’s useful,’ said Huck. ‘Because I am attempting some entrepreneurial brilliance. Is it working?’
Polly put her arms around his neck.
‘I wonder,’ she said. ‘I wonder if we could.’
Huckle kissed her full on the mouth.
‘We can do anything.’
‘Hey, you guys, stop with all the sexy stuff,’ came Reuben’s whining voice across the waves. ‘Honestly, you’re disgusting. And come and eat this pavlova, before they take the oven away.’
Chapter Eleven
Polly woke the next morning in one of Reuben’s sumptuous, ridiculous guest suites. It had a circular bed, and automatic curtains, which, drunk the night before – after they had finished eating on the beach, they had come in and watched Star Wars episode 3 one last time in the big cinema – she had insisted on opening and closing until Huckle begged for mercy. Neil was on the floor beside them, still sleeping soundly.
At first Polly wasn’t sure what had woken her, until she realised it was a removals man, carting off a sink from the capacious en suite. She blinked.
‘Actually,’ she said, ‘could you leave the loo for a bit?’
Huckle was still out for the count, gently snoring. Polly felt rather rough as she stumbled to the bathroom, but the view – the bathroom had a huge window over the bath, straight out to sea, nothing in your eyeline but sharp, sharp blue – woke her up.
‘I will MISS this place,’ she said, as Huckle started to stir. ‘I can’t believe some Russian guy is going to come here and ruin it.’
‘Ruin it how?’ said Huckle, groaning and running his fingers through his thick hair. ‘I don’t know how it could actually be more tacky.’
‘I am thinking, gold everywhere and more animal skins?’ said Polly.
‘Oh yes, that would do it,’ said Huckle. ‘You seem suspiciously perky for a morning after at Reuben’s.’
‘The swim helped,’ said Polly. ‘Oh, and also I slept through the film. He’s shown it about nine million times, and it’s been shit boring every single time. So actually I feel pretty good.’
Huckle smiled, and glanced at his watch.
‘I think he said something about his housekeeper going today.’
‘So sad,’ said Polly vehemently. She had always liked the idea of a housekeeper.
She took one last glance around at their stunning surroundings.
‘Shall we lock the door and bid it farewell?’ she grinned.
‘I believe under the circumstances that’s the respectful thing to do,’ said Huckle, rolling over in the bed.
Back in Mount Polbearne, having taken their leave of Reuben and Kerensa, bravely holding hands in what was left of their grand entrance hall, Polly and Huckle looked at the finances together, up in the sitting room.
Outside, it was a wild night. The grey clouds had come over and torn themselves up and now there was a storm brewing. Polly had, as she always did, gone down and forbidden the fishermen to go out in bad weather, and they had, as they always did, pretended to listen to her then turned around and gone anyway. Actually this was unfair: since the previous year, Archie had been much more conscientious and careful around weather forecasts and had occasionally held back the fleet. But he did not think this would be worse than a bit of wind and rain, and they were behind on their quotas, and so, with a weary look on his face, he cast off the lines and they chugged bravely into the hungry waves, Polly watching them go, anxious as ever.