‘You all right?’ asked Penny, appearing beside me and jogging on the spot, warming up.
‘Yes, just a bit knackered from juggling this and work. But I’m quite proud of myself. I told my boss no twice this week’—because that on-edge feeling had started to creep back—‘and they gave me the afternoon off for “community investment”, which was handy. I never realised this was going to involve so much.’
She studied my face thoughtfully before saying with a sympathetic smile, ‘I don’t know how you do it all.’
‘Some days, neither do I. Thank goodness for Hilda.’
‘Where is she this morning?’
‘You mean you haven’t seen her?’ I pointed across the park.
‘Yikes. How did I miss her?’
Hilda was sporting a brand-new running kit in honour of the event – apparently Poppy and Ava had helped her choose it online. I suspected Poppy hadn’t had that much to do with it; she had more taste than to choose the ultra-violet purple seventies-style tracksuit with its lime-green stripes down each arm and leg. It made the sunshine-yellow one look positively conservative.
‘Yoo-hoo!’ Hilda waved and we both laughed. Although not up to running the course, she, Bill, and Poppy were going to be our tail walkers today. Their job was bringing up the rear of the run to make sure that no one was left behind on the course. Poppy was desperate to have a go at the run while Ava was equally keen not to have to walk too far. This morning she was on a playdate with Janie’s youngest, for which I was quite grateful.
‘How are we doing?’ asked Ash, coming up behind me and dropping a kiss on the back of my neck. I turned, desperate to kiss him back and walk into his arms, but we were on duty. I missed him. But I knew how this worked. The job came first. I’d been like that once and I completely understood.
With a sudden flood of happiness, I just knew that for me, my job was no longer everything. I had a home, a ready-made family, and the parkrun, and it felt… enough. My life was full of things that I enjoyed and loved.
Ash might have only started his job in the last week but already our routine had changed. He’d had to put dog-care plans into place and Hilda, egged on by Poppy, had volunteered to collect Bill at two each day for a walk around the park before going to pick up Poppy and Ava from school on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays. On Mondays and Thursdays, Poppy would collect Bill from Ash’s ground-floor flat and take him straight out after school before bringing him back to our house. So Ash still called each day but it wasn’t the same. No run, no family dinner. He was in work mode, distracted and distant. Last night he’d been due to stay for dinner but had been late back from work and Poppy had begged for Bill to stay overnight and meet him here this morning.
‘We’re ready.’ I felt a fizz in the pit of my stomach as I grasped the loud-hailer. ‘This is it.’
With Ash following me, I walked over to the official start line and, as I began to move, the runners realised that this was it and began to make their way over.
Lifting the loud-hailer to my mouth, I scanned the faces in front of me. Ash gave me a big smile and a thumbs up. ‘Thanks everyone for coming for our trial run. I’ll keep it short and sweet today. If anything’s not clear or there are any problems or things you think need to be done, please come and see me or Ash or Charles at the end.’ I went on to describe the course, thank the volunteers, and tell everyone we were meeting afterwards at The Friendly Bean. ‘And finally, it’s really important at the finish to cross the line, stay in the funnel, and stay in your finishing position to receive your finishing token. If you don’t you’ll have Wendy to answer to.’ I pointed to her standing at the back of the crowd. ‘Don’t forget to get your tokens and barcodes scanned and make sure you return the tokens. That’s all folks. Good luck. Enjoy the run. On three. One. Two. Three. Go.’
At my words, the runners streamed away along the path, spreading out quickly. I could see Charles already working his way to the front, while Penny was running at a steady pace near the middle. I lifted my camera and snapped a few pictures, smiling so hard my face felt like it might split. This time next week, who knew how many runners we’d have. I crossed my fingers. Please let us have a good turnout. We’d worked so hard to get this far; I really wanted it to be a success.
Hilda clapped me on the arm. ‘We’ll be off then.’
I kissed Poppy on the cheek and ruffled Bill’s ears. ‘Enjoy the walk.’
With everything now done, loud-hailer hanging loosely in my hand, I walked the two hundred metres to the finish line, the sudden quiet ringing in my ears. Now all I had to do was wait – I glanced down at my watch – for approximately twenty minutes for the first runner to come back in.
At nineteen minutes past nine, there was a ripple of excitement as the first runner came into view, a young lad who seemed to be absolutely sprinting towards the finish line. The next runner was a good three hundred metres behind him and a hundred metres beyond him a third man. After that, the runners were more bunched together and all pushing hard for the line.
All the volunteers swung into action and everyone seemed to know exactly what they were doing. ‘Well done!’ I said, beaming at the first over the line, even though the poor guy was gasping like a landed salmon.
‘Well done, Claire, Ash, Hilda, Poppy,’ called Penny, waving goodbye as she and Charles headed out of the door of The Friendly Bean. They were the last to leave. With only twenty runners, the inputting of all the times had been relatively quick and easy and Elaine, Marsha, and Wendy were all finished by ten-thirty with test emails sent out to all our runners. Ash’s had pinged into his phone as we sat there.
‘Phew,’ I said, leaning back into my chair. ‘Aside from the tarpaulin, no glitches at all.’
‘We’re all set for next weekend,’ said Ash.
‘Let’s hope lots of people turn up.’ Hilda drained her coffee before adding briskly, ‘Now, some of us need to get back; I have a cake to bake. Claire has invited people for tea.’ She peered over the top of her coffee cup at me with schoolmistressy disapproval. I ignored her; she been quite exacting about ingredients when I’d gone to do the shopping. This Victoria sponge wasn’t going to be any old Victoria sponge. Apparently only Baxter’s raspberry jam would do.
‘Poor Farquhar. I was a terrible mother.’ Hilda paused as she sifted flour into a bowl. We’d been home for an hour, showered, changed, and the girls were outside primed and ready for the minute the invitation to come and lick the bowl was extended.
‘I’m sure you weren’t. You’ve given me tons of good advice.’ Out of the window I could see Poppy sitting on a blanket on the grass in the sunny garden with her faithful pal curled up next to her while Ava was administering to the patients of her make-believe hospital ward of soft toys tucked up in shoe boxes that she’d unearthed from my wardrobe, after clopping about in my heels for ten minutes. ‘Look at the pair of them; they’re both happy, thank goodness. I don’t think they’re missing Alice too much. Although I still worry about Poppy sometimes.’ I sighed. ‘I sent Alice another message this week. I don’t know what else to do. I can’t keep saying she’s stuck on a mountain for ever.’