The Little Village Christmas. Sue Moorcroft
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Peeping back was a pair of round black button eyes topping a hooked beak that looked way too big for the little plate-flat face and ball-of-fluff body. One wing hung badly, like an empty sleeve.
The beak opened and emitted a surprisingly loud HEHHHH, like gas leaking under pressure.
Delighted, she laughed. ‘You are so gorgeous.’ Extending a cautious finger, she touched the off-white fluff of Barney’s chest. ‘As soft as down.’
‘I suppose it is down. He’s a bit young for feathers.’ Ben was still occupied with whatever he’d taken from the tall white fridge. ‘Look away if raw stuff upsets you. He eats mice and chicks. I buy them frozen from a pet food supplier.’
‘I’m a country girl. I know animals have to eat and that they eat each other.’
Ben returned to kneel beside her, in his hand the red lid of a sandwich box covered in chopped meat. Delicately manipulating a pair of tweezers he lifted Barney out, and touched a tiny piece to Barney’s beak. Barney, with a bob of his head, grabbed it quick and scoffed it down with much chomping of his beak.
‘Cute!’ The slightly acrid smell of Barney warred in Alexia’s nostrils with the much nicer man-and-whisky smell of Ben as he patiently fed the youngster. Barney bobbed energetically and made little breathy noises that sounded to Alexia as if he were trying to squawk with a sore throat.
Ben murmured soothingly as Barney’s supper vanished, addressing him solemnly as ‘little guy’. Alexia watched, fascinated by the contrast of Ben’s strong tanned hands and the tiny ball of fuzz snatching at every morsel of food that came his way.
Finally, Ben put down the now-empty lid and pulled a towel from a drawer. He spread it over Alexia’s lap where she sat cross-legged on the floor. ‘Now, little guy, you look after our guest for a few minutes while I do your housework.’ Gently, he scooped up the baby bird and transferred him to the hands Alexia instinctively cupped to receive him. ‘Put your hands low on the towel. Relax your fingers and let him putter about.’
Alexia marvelled at the almost weightless warmth in her hands. ‘Barney Owl, you’re so soft and cuddly.’
Barney breathed hehhh companionably and peeped all about the kitchen, head twitching this way and that as his gaze fixed on each new thing, one stumpy wing waving. Alexia breathed a sad sigh over the other, broken, wing, but then if Barney hadn’t been injured she would never have known him, never felt his tiny talons scraping across her skin under his dandelion-clock fuzz.
Filling a bucket with water, Ben removed a soiled towel from Barney’s tub to drop in it then retired to the sink to scrub his hands. He returned to carefully relieve Alexia of the near nothingness of the young owl’s weight, their fingers touching as Barney made it from one to another. Then Ben sat beside her on the floor and set Barney on the flagstones to stretch his legs and explore. Alexia giggled as Barney pecked at drawer handles or paddled his feet on the floor as if finding it odd beneath his feet. ‘He’s so cute!’
At length, Ben took the towel that had been draped over Alexia’s knees to line the tub before collecting Barney up. ‘Bedtime, Barney. Maybe Alexia will come back and see you another day.’
‘I’d love to.’ Alexia rose reluctantly. While Ben slid the tub back in place with Barney in it she glanced around the kitchen, noting the natural oak cupboards and drawers, the plain worktops. ‘Did you really fit this kitchen? It has a charming lack of artifice.’
He shrugged. ‘I’m not the kind for fads or frills.’
‘So I see.’ Everywhere were unfussy lines, no pictures and no ornaments. She wandered back into the equally sparse sitting room. All the shape and movement in the room came from the minimal furnishings and the unevenness of the walls – warm but making ‘plain’ an art form.
Following her in, Ben stopped in front of the stove and fed another log into the flames, though the room felt warm compared to Alexia’s recent perch on the kitchen floor. ‘Do you want to see the upstairs?’ His back remained to her but his voice held an undercurrent that made Alexia’s heart trip on its next beat.
Did ‘seeing the upstairs’ mean simply viewing what he’d done with the upper storey? Or something more to do with his hesitant move on her, the interest in his eyes whenever he looked her way?
She was quite confident that if she responded, ‘I think I’d better go home,’ he’d just nod and walk her back to the village.
But being with him was like being in the thrall of an absorbing film: not knowing what would happen next and gripped by the urge to find out. She decided on a neutral reply. ‘That would be interesting.’
Ben turned away from the fire with a smile of what might have been relief. Flipping the light switch at the foot of the stairs, he stood back to allow her ahead of him. The practical, mushroom-coloured stair carpet looked new and, remembering that she’d spent the evening disturbing dust and spiders, Alexia kicked off her trainers before treading up the stairs.
At the top, she halted as she found herself on a postage stamp of a landing under a slanting ceiling. The uncurtained window framed a rectangle of black night. ‘Bijou,’ she observed. A door to her left was closed, then the landing simply opened out into a bedroom. Much of that bedroom was taken up by a double bed. Two small windows in the wall beyond it rose either side of a stone fireplace laid with newspaper and kindling.
As Ben reached the landing too she could feel his warmth crossing the few inches of air between them. He cleared his throat. ‘At least the bed’s made. Kind of.’
Alexia glanced at the forest green quilt dragged untidily up to a heap of pillows and had no idea what to do next. It felt equally wrong to barge through the closed door or lead the way into Ben’s bedroom. There was no room to stand back and let him go first yet if she suggested they go straight back downstairs he’d probably think she was feeling worried or threatened.
She wasn’t … she was feeling warm and swimmy. And it was more to do with his presence behind her than whisky or beer.
From his stillness she suspected he was processing similar ‘what now?’ thoughts. The silence grew until Ben broke it with a sigh. ‘I think in the old days I used to plan some kind of lead-in. That saying about buying dinner first can’t have come from nowhere.’
Though reassured to realise that he seemed to be feeling all the uncertainty she was, he sounded so disgusted with himself that Alexia felt laughter brewing. She turned, meaning to make a joking remark, but he seemed to move at the same time and her forehead clonked his chin, making his teeth click audibly together. ‘Ouch, sorry!’ She clutched her forehead, which felt as if it bore the imprint of his jaw. His look of ludicrous dismay released her laughter into the air. ‘I’m no more prepared than you. I’m so dirty.’
Laughter sprang into his eyes and she began a mortified backtracking. ‘I meant dusty, dusty from the wrecking party and I must smell of sausages and—’ She clutched her forehead harder than ever. ‘And I can’t believe how much I just over-shared.’
Slowly, he reached out and opened the door that had been closed. He pulled a cord and light sprang out to greet them. ‘Help yourself.’
Alexia gazed into the room in wonder. It was as if Ben had made up for the unfussiness of the rest of the house with a bathroom of floor-to-ceiling opulence. A blindingly white corner spa bath and one of those shower cubicles with jets from all angles gleamed invitingly between walls and floors of polished tiles.
‘Ooh.’ She stepped into the room, forgetting their mutual embarrassment. A small sigh of longing escaped her. ‘How gorgeous. It makes me want to wallow in the bath.’
His expression focused now, rather than mortified, he stooped to push down the plug and pull up the lever on the shiny chrome tap. The room began to echo with the thunder of water. A dollop of bath foam from a tall green bottle soon added a froth of luxurious light-reflecting bubbles.
Alexia gazed at the steaming water then back at Ben.