WHO WHAT WHEN WHERE WHY (1)

 

Who’s in love?

What’s love got to do with it?

When I fall in love

Where is the love?

Why do fools fall in love?

Snippets of Downshire Life – Guilty Feelings

Highfinch, which nestled on the edge of the Pepperstock Hills, was where the Lily Green Hollows Golf Club separated the village from the Hamlet of Lily Green, and the combination of those two and Kingfisherbridge made up the parish of St Martins, and between Lily Green and the sleepy hamlet of Kingfisherbridge was where divorcee Karen Dillon lived with her daughter Melinda and brother Daniel Mason.

Daniel was a pig man and worked up at Orchard Farm in the wooded Pepperstock Hills and it was there, when he was walking in the hills that he met and fell in love with Meredith Upshaw from the neighbouring Russet Hill Egg Farm.

This made Karen immensely pleased and incredibly jealous in equal measure and that made her feel guilty because she loved her brother and really liked Meredith.

Of course she may have felt differently if she had known that things were about to change for her.

It happened when the Upshaw family threw a dinner party up at the farm to celebrate Meredith and Daniel’s engagement.

It was a big affair with more than twenty seated around a huge table beneath the canvas of a marquee in the meadow beside the orchard. 

Four generation of Upshaw’s were present and three on the Mason side.

Karen’s daughter Melinda was having a fun day, dividing her time between playing with her peers among the Upshaw’s and being spoilt rotten by her grandparents.

In fact everyone at the meal appeared to be enjoying themselves including Karen, although in her case she was merely putting on a brave face, and when they reached the teas and coffee stage of the proceedings, she slipped quietly out of the marquee for some respite from the jollity and then wandered into the fragrant orchard, and as soon as she was out of sight she leant against a tree and cried.

 

Karen may have slipped quietly away from the fun but her departure did not go entirely unnoticed, as Meredith’s cousin Tom saw her, and the reason for that was he had barely taken his eyes off her all day.

They had been introduced just after she and Melinda arrived and as   his daughter Cassie was of a similar age to hers they spent half an hour or so in conversation, and the only reason they stopped then was because they were instructed to take their seats, and the seating plan had them placed at opposite ends of the table.

When he saw her leave the marquee, and it was clear by the direction she took that she wasn’t off to use the facilities, he got up himself and headed in the same direction, and he emerged into the sunlight just in time to see her enter the orchard, so he followed.    

When he caught up with her she was leaning against a tree and as he closed the distance between them he noticed that her shoulders were shaking.

“Are you ok?” Tom asked

“No” she sobbed

“Why?” he asked “what’s wrong?”

“I’m a terrible person” she replied

“I find that hard to believe” Tom said brightly and put a hand on her shoulders and in response to his touch she leant into him.

“It’s true”

“You’d better explain then” he urged and tried to turn her to face him.

“No don’t look at me” she snapped

“Ok but you still need to explain”

“I love my brother, I really do and I’m so pleased that he and Meredith are going to get married, she is so lovely and they really are perfect together” she said

“But?” he asked

“I’m jealous” she admitted “I’m jealous of his happiness, God I’m so despicable”

“No you’re not” he said and tried to turn her again and this time she yielded and buried her face in his chest

“You just want to be happy too, that’s perfectly natural” he assured her

“It’s not natural to be jealous though is it?” she retorted 

“Did you ever wish that they weren’t so happy?” he asked

“No, not for a second” she snapped “They deserve to be happy”

“So why do you feel so guilty?” he asked

“I don’t know, but I still feel guilty” Karen said “I always feel guilty because of my jealous thoughts”,

“Well you’re not the only one who felt jealous today” he confessed

“There’s someone else?” she asked “Who?”

“Me”

“Why were you jealous?” she asked and lifted her face from his chest for the first time to look at him “Who were you jealous of?”

“The people sitting either side of you” he replied and she gasped

 

When Tom and Karen emerged from the orchard, all evidence of her tears had been wiped away, apart from a damp patch on the front of his shirt, and as they walked he was standing tall and she was smiling and they were holding hands.

As they neared the marquee they were greeted by their excited children, Melinda and Cassie, running in the opposite direction towards them.

When they got closer they stopped dead in their tracks when they saw the joined hands, then they looked at each other, giggled and ran away

“I think we can take that to mean we have their seal of approval” Tom said

“It would appear so” she agreed and kissed him.

 

Uncanny Love Tales – (042) Scratching an itch

 

Ben Williams and Peta Westphal were colleagues, but by no means friends, in fact they really didn’t like each other, so no one was more surprised than they were that they ended up in her Hotel room on the night of their company’s Summer Ball.

“So, that was surprising” Ben said as they lay in bed

“I can’t argue there” she agreed

“I didn’t even think we liked each other” Ben said

“We don’t, didn’t” she said and pulled a face

“Well we must like each other a bit” he suggested “On some level at least”

“Well, maybe not “like”” she said as they sat in bed drinking wine

“How does that work?” He asked

“Well it’s like this” she explained, “my work is my life, for now anyway, and I enjoy my own company, and I’m not really a sexual being”

“I can’t say I noticed that” he pointed out

“Well every now and then I get an itch that I need someone else to scratch” she confided

“And the rest of the time?” he asked

“The rest of the time I do my own scratching”

“That I’d like to see” he said, but she just gave him a look, then after another glass of wine she elaborated

“When I first met you, I knew instantly that you were a man who wouldn’t be looking for ties and I found that very attractive”

“I’m not sure if I should be flattered or not” He said

“Be honest isn’t that what she thought when you first met me?” Peta asked

“Pretty much” Ben replied after a moment’s thought

“Good because I’m not looking for a life partner, just a “friend” with benefits”

“Oh” he exclaimed and then Peta drained her wine glass and said

“Now I think I would like another go with your scratcher”

 

SETTING SAIL

 

Though you have been

A fair wind

Billowing my sails

My heart still craves

New shores

To beach my skiff upon

And it aches

For fresh new lands

Beneath my feet

So I must go

For you deserve better

And it would not

Be fair on you

If I were to settle

For my first port of call

CATCH OF THE DAY

With my fishing line of gold,

Hook, baited with pearls

I cast into the waters

As the ebb tide swirls

To catch myself one

Of the underwater girls

And land a pretty mermaid

With seaweed in her curls

Uncanny Love Tales – (041) Still waters run deep

The village of Brocklington was about six miles downstream of the River Deighton and was where Marian Yacoub was the post mistress.

She was a rather plain middle-aged woman just the wrong side of 40, who was quite small and slim, choosing to dress in all black, and was a very stern looking woman, who rarely smiled, with Short brown hair and wire rimmed spectacles over which she peers superciliously at all and sundry.

The general consensus in the village was that she was a dried up old spinster, but Pete Smith, landlord of the Mulberry Tree, knew that still waters ran deep and that there was more to the harsh faced Post Mistress than met the eye, because she was also his mistress.

He knew what lay beneath the drab exterior of her black attire, though everyone believed she wore thick black tights, he knew she only ever wore stockings, and her underwear, when she chose to wear any, was always black and always sexy.

Pete also knew you should never judge a book by its cover and if the poisonous clique in the village knew her as he did they would have known there was nothing cold, or dried up about her, but having said that he would not want any of them to share her bed, or her heart, as he did.

 

I HAD A VIVID DREAM

 

I had a vivid dream

And you were there

Lovely as the day we met.

I smelt your perfume

It was heavenly

A fragrance so evocative

I was intoxicated

It was blessed Euphoria.

I felt your caress

Tender like the first time

It was so real

My flesh tingled

The hairs on my neck stood up.

I kissed your lips

Like I did so many times

And my heart missed a beat

Just as it always did.

I would have stayed with you

Forever in your embrace

I wanted to stay

But I was dragged away

To awake in the real world

Where you no longer reside

And I was once again alone

But for a short time

I had you back

Even if it was just a dream

But what a special dream

A priceless dream

A dream, that if I could

I would dream again and again