18
Holly
I close the education centre on Thursday after a fairly quiet day where the highlight was trying to work out why one of the little visitors was steadfast in his belief that he was going to be a golden retriever. I’d passed out the crayons and fun workbooks (made to look like schoolbooks from Tollbridge School of Sorcery and Enchantment, though kind of cheap) when he’d opened that sucker and set to, muttering “watch me be a golden retriever, a golden retriever.”
I’d had to bite the inside of my cheeks when he’d rushed at me twenty minutes later, just as I’d handed back the magic wand (a small tree branch) to a cute six-year-old girl, demanding I’d take a look.
“Miss Boo! (that’s my stage name, I guess) Miss Boo! Look, I’ve finished.” He’d tugged so hard on the ankle-length skirt that is part of my uniform, I thought he’d tear the velcro. Uniform. Yep. That wasn’t mentioned in the contract. No way I’m posting evidence of this on my Instagram account.
“Already?” I’d exclaimed theatrically (because drama major = old ham) as my eyes scanned the room for his parents.
“Yes! Already! My mummy says I’m a golden retriever.”
I’d pondered this for a beat before realising he meant overachiever.
Kids. They crack me up.
Loosening the Velcro on the waist of my skirt, I step out of it and hang it on the peg, swapping my prim high-necked blouse for a long cardigan. I usually wear a T-shirt, leggings, and boots under that get-up, but I do wonder what’ll happen when summer comes to Scotland. Will I still need the layers, or will I melt?
Maybe I can get a little weather advice from Cameron tomorrow when we hit the pub. As I grab my Kilblair Castle cotton tote, because this is no place to use my Prada, nervousness washes through my stomach. Not the anticipatory, exciting kind, and, to be honest, I just don’t get it. Why am I not more excited about it? He’s cute and kind, and he brings me flowers almost daily. From the garden, sure, but I’m not exactly high maintenance. Buy me a beer, tell me I’m cute. Slap my ass when we know each other a little better, and I’ll be a happy girl! I don’t need hundred-dollar bouquets, diamonds, or wooing. I just need you to like me. And for me to like you. And I do like him, but still, this feels . . .
I push the thoughts away because I’m going to the pub with him anyway. I’m gonna let him blow away those cobwebs! But not those cobwebs. I have no intention of sleeping with him. Not on a first date.
I’m such a hypocrite, I think critically, reaching for the door handle. It’s not like he-who-should-not-be-thought-of even went out on a date with me. We just had coffee and drinks. And amazing sex. My shoulders sag, my Kilblair Castle branded tote sliding from my shoulder down my arm. Unicorn sex, and boy, did I ride that man’s horn. It was the kind of sex I’d never had before, and wonder if I’ll be lucky enough to ever experience again.
I give myself an internal shake. No good comes from dwelling. Especially when you’re not in the privacy of your own bedroom. Pulling on the door, I step out and lock it behind me, then begin to hurry across the castle’s grassy courtyard. Today’s weather forecast? A light misting of rain, the kind that clings to eyelashes and glitters like tiny gemstones. The kind that turns hair frizzy and unruly, so it’s always best to be armed with an umbrella.
I’m heading for the kitchen to call in on my castle homies, but then I see I’ve left out the sandwich board I’d so artfully decorated, which reads:
Welcome to Miss Boo’s class
Come right in, but please note, unattended children will be given an energy drink and taught to curse during the first lesson.
You can bet I’d posted a photo of this to Instagram, along with one I’d snapped of the old stocks and another of the peacocks displaying their plumage. In fact, I’ve taken quite a lot of photos on my phone since I’d gotten here. The rain glistening in a spider web. Rainbows over the castle chimneys. The dark beauty of the nearby mountains. My sparkly sneakers reflected in a puddle. I’d used a filter for that one, given how they’ve become quite stained from stepping in a puddle or ten.
Kilblair Castle has offered me a wealth of images for an interesting social media, but I’ve found I just don’t post very often. I mean, that’s partly because my carrier’s signal up here is pretty much non-existent. When I’d asked Chrissy if she got 4G, she’d gotten red in the face and started to splutter. Turns out, she thought I’d said orgy. But at least there’s Wi-Fi. Sometimes. If I stand on one leg and hang my phone out of the window between the hours of three and four a.m. At least, that’s what it seems like. But it’s not just the lack of tech that keeps me from posting. I can’t explain it, but it’s almost like I want to keep this place to myself. I do share plenty with Kennedy, and I think she appreciates seeing where I am and what I’m doing. Though she has remarked several times about the lack of kilt-wearing Scottish men in them.
Seriously, I’ve yet to see one kilt-wearing man.
Maybe the whole thing is a myth.
Or just for TV.
Folding the sandwich board, I lug it back towards the door, which I unlock while balancing both board and umbrella. This job is about entertaining the kids, allowing them to experience a little of the magic from the movie. In the mornings, sessions centre around the castle and its history. There are outfits to dress up in, long dresses and capes, even fake suits of armour. Then, in the afternoon, we switch to “lessons” at Tollbridge School of Sorcery and Enchantment, where we might learn to “fly” a broomstick, though “first-year students” aren’t ever allowed to have their feet lift from the ground. Then we take part in a mad scientist–style experiment. We might turn ordinary raisins into magical dancing ones or concoct some witches brew slime. It’s a fun job, but it’s not day-care, and that’s what the sign is all about. The job is entertaining kids that come in accompanied by their parents.
I leave the sandwich board leaning against the wall, and I’m in the castle kitchen in minutes.
“Did you see him arrive?” Chrissy asks, her tone awed. “He came in one of them flashy STDs.”
“I don’t know who you’re talking about, but whoever he is, I’m not shaking his hand. Or anything else.” I drop my umbrella, more commonly known as a brolly hereabouts, into the brass stand, dropping my tote to a chair before flicking the switch on the kettle. I wonder if I can persuade Isla to get a machine. Maybe a Keurig?
“What did I say?” Chrissy’s ample form turns my way, bread knife in hand.
“You said Dylan Duffy arrived with chlamydia,” Mari mutters from the kitchen table, her eyes not lifting from her phone.
“I thought his wife was called Ivy?”
I begin to chuckle though stop abruptly when Chrissy points the knife my way. “She’s a nice girl, Ivy,” she says, her expression firm. “He’d better not be having no hochmagandy on the side. She’ll no’ stand for it!”
“Hochama what?” I ask incredulously. Sometimes, Scots really is another language.
“She means a side ho’.” Mari’s words sound a little sneery, but it’s hard to tell, given her eyes are still glued to her phone. Honestly, if I hadn’t worked alongside her these past few weeks, I might think that thing is attached to her hand. I mean, I like my phone, and I like the ’gram, but I’m not obsessed. Like some people. “And he he hasn’t,” she adds. “My auntie’s sister’s husband works for them over on their estate in Auchenkeld,” she decrees, her tone highly patronising. “They don’t live in America all the year-round. Anyway, he says they can’nae keep their hands off each other and that she’s expecting another bairn.”