“Someone ‘ere for you, lad.”
“Me?” I barely glanced up, too engrossed in a set of chairs that looked like they belonged in a Narnia film. “Not that bloke from the dairy is it?”
My dad glared. My sexuality had been embraced by the whole Manning clan with open arms, but shagging the milkman’s son hadn’t gone down well, especially when my dad had caught us in the barn in question.“Dear Lord, Jasper. There’s five bedrooms in the house. Have you no self-control?”I eyed the brandy Laura kept by the stove for cooking. Apparently not. “If it’s not Carl, who is it?”
“See for yourself,” my dad grumbled. “I’m having a brew.”
Sighing, I tore myself away from Kim’s mastery and drifted outside, my mind still on the barn. I had few friends in Porthkennack outside of the ones I’d borrowed from Gaz and Nicky, and part of me wondered if this was another of my father’s attempts to coerce me into taking home one of the farm’s stray cats—his lifelong mission.
Despite the fact that he’d been on my mind from the moment I’d met him, Kim was the last person I expected to see.
“Fuck. It’s you. What are you doing here?”
If Kim was offended by my greeting—or lack of—it didn’t show. He shrugged and turned away from the chicken run. “Foundme, didn’t you? Thought I’d return the favour.” He kept his gaze on the chickens. “And I came to talk to your kin about the barn. I’ve just had some old dinghies dumped at the shop. I was considering making them into a couple of kitchen-island-type things, if you think they’d be interested? They could use them for display . . . serving counters, whatever.”
The idea fit with the concept of bringing the outside in, but I couldn’t deny that it wasn’t what I’d hoped to hear from him. “You came to talk about the barn?”
Silence, then a wry grin warmed Kim’s face. “I came to talk about the barn in the hope that you’d be here. That cool?”
It was beyond cool. I nodded and inclined my head behind me. “Do you want to come in? My stepmum bakes, so there’s cake and shit.”
“Actually, I’d like to see the barn, if that’s okay? I rode my bike past this place every day of my childhood, but I’ve never passed your gates.”
A crude joke played on my tongue. I swallowed it and gestured forward. “Come on, then. I’ll show you around.”
I gave Kim the grand tour of Belly Acre Farm—the animals, the fruit tunnels, the barley fields. The salad crop seemed to fascinate him. He stooped and fingered the pale leaves of the young round lettuces. “These are so much better than mine. Even the ones the slugs didn’t get are crap.”
“My dad’s always had a way with greens. We lived off lettuce soup most summers to get rid of them.”
“Yeah? Sounds delicious.”
I pulled a face. “Not after six weeks of it, it wasn’t.”
Kim chuckled. “Think yourself lucky. My mum can’t cook for shit. I grew up on tinned ravioli and crumpets.”
“Are you close to your parents?”
Kim stood and stretched his spine. “Not really. They love me, they just don’t get me.”
“Outsider looking in?”
“Nah, it’s not that. It’s more they wish I was someone else . . . someone they understood.”
“Straight and sober?”
Kim grimaced. “Straight and man enough to handle a few pints.”
“Addiction doesn’t make you weak, Kim.”
“I know that now. Took a while, though.”
We started walking towards the barn. Our elbows bumped a few times and the urge to take his arm was strong. I didn’t, though, and it struck me as halfway to ridiculous that I’d had the patronising audacity to tell a recovering alcoholic what his addiction meant.Dickhead.“I’m sorry.”
Kim slanted a glance at me. “What for?”
“Anything. Everything. There’s bound to be something. I tend to speak—and act—before my tiny brain engages. I’m that bloke who’s forever cringing and apologising, you know?”
“I don’t know you yet, Jas. But I’d like to, and believe me, I haven’t ever known anyone perfect. Flaws make us human. Wonderfully human.”