Pernille Hughes - Probably the Best Kiss in the World

“I am,” Jen insisted, keen to get back to the shoot and hopefully home to dry socks this side of darkness. Ava still wasn’t looking convinced, but a wail from inside the car distracted her.

“Leave Ferdinand alone, Beckham. He doesn’t want you filming down his pants. Rooney, sweetie, no Lego up nosey.” Turning back to Jen, she started to sit back down in the driving seat. “I’ve left some things on your desk, darling. Just a few bits I didn’t get to finish up. Perhaps you’ll handle them on Monday?” Ava always took the Monday after Glasto off to “reflect”. “Think of the quiet you’ll have, just you and Aiden, with me out and Zara still in the Seychelles. Heaven.” Jen chose not to flag Aiden the Intern’s mouth-breathing was plenty loud enough to be disturbing. She was more dreading what the “few bits” might be. Ava’s ability to deflect work was tantamount to a Teflon coating, and past experience said there’d be far more than a day’s work there. Moreover, Jen had never once been able to pass anything back to Ava on her return. The only upside was she’d know it was done properly and wouldn’t come back to bite her on the bum. It might take longer, but at least she was in control, and as far as Jen was concerned control was the only way to dodge life’s curveballs.

“We’ll be off then, darling,” Ava said, giving the ramblers a last look and slight shake of her head. “Enjoy your weekend.” Slamming the door, she wheel-spun away, leaving Jen mud-sprayed from head to toe and wondering if this was really what she’d studied all those years for.

Having smeared the slurry from her eyes Jen trudged over to the photographer and updated her shot-list with a sigh. She’d be a while yet, but it was almost the weekend and that meant time away from the inco pads and time with her real passion. She could tuck herself away in the safe confines of her outbuilding and concentrate on the thing that brought her joy.

Some women loved to bake, some to knit, Jen Attison loved to brew.

*

The opening expletive caused Jen to spill beer all over her hand. She mumbled one of her own under her breath. The following litany of filth carried across the small courtyard from the open kitchen door to the outbuilding. It wasn’t quite the sound of summer as she imagined it. Being a Friday night, the town was bouncing, the pubs and wine bars full with locals and the weekend tourists, all making the most of the balmy evening; sitting out where possible, or moving down onto the beach. The seasonal warmth brought the joy out in them, their chatter and laughter filling the air, the distant echo of fun snaking down the warren-like alleyways and over the garden walls of the houses in the old town. Jen could clearly hear it from the comfortable seclusion of her small stone outbuilding; the singing, the Oi, Oi ’s and the banter.

Jen looked at her phone. Eleven. She’d been expecting to pick Lydia up at midnight from the station. She had an alarm set. Yet here she was, spouting loud angry vocabulary that would make a fishwife blush and no doubt there would be more, so Jen braced herself.

“For fuck sake. Come out, you shitpin!” There was a silence from outside, as Jen waited, calmly finishing tapping the beer from the conditioning tank into the brown bottle she was holding. “Jen? Can you help me? Please?”

Jen sighed as she capped the bottle and placed it in line with the others she’d already filled since getting home. Slipping down from her stool, she looked out into the courtyard to see her sister, still swearing while crossly attempting to extract her ankle-strapped high heel from between two cobbles.

“ Easy , tiger. The kids next door don’t need to know those words,” Jen said, crossing the distance.

“Where do you think I learnt them?” They both knew this wasn’t true. Lydia had merrily collected a ripe vocabulary as a child when visiting Jen at uni, sponging up the vernacular of the rugby team who Jen had bizarrely acquired as a fan club. A secret home-brew kit in your fresher dorm room and indiscreet dorm mates will do that for a girl. Proud of the words they were teaching Lydia, the rugby lads had virtually made the thirteen-year-old their mascot. Nine years on, her word choices reminded Jen daily of that lost circle of friends.

A firm yank released the heel, allowing Lydia to teeter the rest of the way to the outbuilding where the comforting scent of malt, hops, yeast and beer enveloped them. The outbuilding wasn’t tiny, spanning the breadth of the rear-yard wall, but given all of Jen’s paraphernalia, it felt cosy and snug nonetheless. With the help of an old kitchen she’d salvaged off Freegle, and the addition of a small mash tun and two fermentation tanks which she’d bought from eBay and struggled to fetch home because large metal vats did not fit in a vintage Ford Capri, Jen had transformed the space into her own mini-micro-brewery.

“Why are you back so early? You said the midnight train. And why didn’t you call me to collect you?” As usual, Lydia’s refusal to stick to agreements irked her. But that was little sisters for you, a law unto themselves. Sometimes – most times – Jen suspected Lydia did it just to wind her up. Leaving the door open for some fresh air and pulling the hair-elastic off her wrist, Jen dragged her unruly hair up in a ponytail. Given the warmth out, the outbuilding could get pretty toasty and her hair was due a cut – as her Book IT app would remind her any day now; Jen always made her next appointment as she finished the last. Same with the dentist, waxer, window cleaner, optician, chimney sweep, boiler servicer and financial adviser. She was organised like that.

“I’m twenty-two Jen, I can get home by myself. You don’t need to collect me.” Lydia perched herself up on the worktop opposite Jen’s bottling. The two of them were clearly sisters; same heart-shaped face, brown eyes and chestnut hair, though Lydia wore hers shorter and had far fewer frown lines, while Jen was hoping their freckles disguised hers.

A battalion of capped bottles sat neatly on the counter top, products of a one-woman production line of Jen tapping the new IPA from the conditioner into the brown glass bottles and sealing the caps on with the new capper Lydia had bought her for Christmas. She’d worn out the one her dad had first taught her to use, in the days when she had to stand on a kitchen chair to help him with his home-brew. It now sat on her shelf next to his photo. She owed all of this to him. Her fine sense of smell had come from him, along with her taste for beer – she’d been sneaking sips since primary school. His hobby had grown to become hers, even after she’d left home for uni. By then the hobby had become a passion, as she experimented with recipes and flavours. Gradually, it had formed her career plan. The brewing industry was a siren’s call to her.

“We agreed I’d collect you,” Jen said, sitting down to start her labels. This batch was destined for the County Show. She generally sold her beers at a few farmers’ markets, the money coming in handy for restocking supplies and raw ingredients for the next brew, but the County Show was a bigger deal. She’d reserved a stall and was hoping to shift the mass of boxes currently stockpiled in their lounge, but more importantly there was the brewing competition to be won. The last two years’ first prize rosettes hung above her head on the shelf. Jen wasn’t a particularly competitive person, but admittedly she loved the validation the rosette gave her. She could brew, and brew well. She had an excellent understanding of flavours – this wasn’t vainglory, the judges had said so – and in lieu of not having the career she’d dreamed of, it was wildly pleasing to have her skills recognised.