TRISHA DAVID - Falling For Jack

Jack closed his eyes, defeated. He would have liked to yell at Bryony, but he had to admit this wasn’t her fault and he couldn’t yell at Maddy. He could still be annoyed.

‘Well, that’s the end of Jess sleeping on your bed tonight, young lady. She’ll smell almost as bad as Harry. We’ll bathe her in the morning.’

Maddy’s face fell, and Bryony had the sudden feeling that, for Maddy, maybe the colonies on bread and water were preferable to a night in bed without a dog.

‘Hey, you can bathe her tonight,’ she volunteered.

‘She takes hours to dry,’ Jack snapped.

‘So use a hairdryer.’

Maddy and Jack both stared at Bryony as if she were talking a foreign language.

‘A hairdryer?’ Bryony looked from one to the other and frowned. ‘You know—a neat little electric gadget that blows hot air on wet heads?’

Maddy looked doubtfully up at Jack. ‘I don’t think we have one of those—do we?’

‘We don’t.’

Bryony sighed.

Escape wasn’t easy.

‘Well, I have two,’ she confessed. ‘You’d better come in and we’ll bathe Jess here. But I get first go at the hot water.’

‘Two...?’

‘Two hairdryers.’

Jack stared. ‘Why on earth do you have two hairdryers?’

‘In case you haven’t noticed, I have rather an oversupply of hair.’ Bryony grinned. ‘I hold the hairdryers one on each side of my ears and my hair flies straight up like something out of Star Wars. It’s a great sensation, and a lot quicker than using one.’

Jack had a sudden mental image of Bryony—fresh out of the shower—naked and glowing, with a hairdryer in each hand, red hair flying upward. He felt dizzy.

‘I don’t know...’ His voice came from a long way away.

‘Oh, stop quibbling. My dog has made your dog smell, so I’ll fix it.’ Bryony leaped lightly up onto the truck tray, released the dogs from their cage, then jumped down again and grabbed Maddy by the hand.

‘Come on in,’ she said cordially. ‘If you give me ten minutes while I wash myself, then I’ll wash both dogs and send you home with a sweet-smelling Jess and a clear conscience. It’s the least I can do—and I always do the least I can do.’

She and Maddy marched forth, dogs following adoringly behind, and this time it was Jack who was left to follow, whether he liked it or not.

Bryony left the dogs outside and Jack and Maddy in her sitting room while she showered. By the time she emerged, Jack was starting to wonder just what sort of madhouse he’d got himself into.

Bryony’s cottage was like no other he’d ever seen. From the outside it was ordinary enough, though the two vast ceramic elephant legs—one on either side of the entrance—were a fair indication of what was to come.

And inside...

This lady was a chronic collector, a magpie, and what she collected was extraordinary. There were furnishings here from all over the world.

The furniture itself was huge—way too big for such a tiny cottage. The lounge sofa and chairs didn’t match. Each was vast and overstuffed and in a different colour of some sort of vivid silk. A riot of huge, squashy cushions tumbled over them and onto the floor. The floor itself had about ten rugs, layered one on top of the other. Each was in a different fabric or texture and the effect was one of some sort of crazy comfort cocoon.

And the paintings...

Weird, wonderful paintings—some of which were astounding, some just plain beautiful and a couple...well, if Jack had his choice he’d turn them to the wall while Maddy was in the room.

And there were things... Sculptures, some big, some small. An array of glasses on the sideboard, none of them matching but each one individual and wonderful. Small tables of exotic wood, with seashells and carvings and strange-looking seed pods...

Maddy wandered about the room, open-mouthed, and Jack sank into one of the vast chairs and just plain stared. This lady was a nut! A complete, utter nut! What sort of person put eight rugs on a floor hardly big enough to hold one?

They heard her in the shower next door, making enough noise to suggest there were a couple of whales in the bathroom. She dropped the soap and they heard her attempts to pick it up with astonishment. Maddy got the giggles.

‘Close your.ears, Maddy,’ Jack growled. ‘You’re not to learn those words.’

‘She doesn’t think we can hear.’

‘No.’

Maddy found this extremely satisfactory. She checked out each seat, chose the highest and clambered into it. Definitely into. You didn’t sit on any of Bryony’s furniture, you sank.

‘This is the best room...’ Maddy sighed. ‘You know you said we could decorate my room? I’d like my room just like this.’ She giggled. ‘Jack, take your hat off. See that horn? I think it’s a hatstand.’ She clambered off her seat, lifted Jack’s hat from his head and took it over to place it on what looked like some sort of bugle, stuck on a bamboo pole. Ridiculous!

But Maddy was grinning, and she’d removed Jack’s hat. For a child who only went near Jack when she had to, it was a beginning. Then Bryony burst back into the room, clad in jeans and an oversized white T-shirt that said ‘No Fear’ in huge red letters. Her amazing hair was turbaned up on her head in a white fluffy towel. She looked fresh and scrubbed and bare-toed—and absolutely gorgeous.

Jack blinked.

‘Your house is wonderful,’ Maddy told her before Bryony could speak. ‘Is the rest like this?’

‘Well, the rest is a bit crowded.’

‘You mean this isn’t?’ Jack stared around in incredulity and Bryony grinned.

‘I collect things. I have visions of one day living in a big house and needing all this. When I moved from New York I tried to sell a bit but selling things is okay in principle. It’s only when you pick up each thing and look at it and remember where you found it that it gets impossible. And storing... I know I should put some of these rugs into storage, but they’re sort of fun like this.’

‘You brought all this from America? It must have cost you a fortune.’

‘Mmm. But I couldn’t leave it behind.’ She grinned down at Maddy. Could I, now? Want to see my bed?’

‘Oh, yes...’ Maddy bounced across the room and grabbed Bryony’s hands. ‘Please...’

Bryony grinned at Jack. ‘You can see it, too, if you’re interested,’ she offered. ‘Otherwise, go grab a beer from the kitchen straight down the hall. I should have offered you one before I showered. I’m sorry. All I could think of was getting rid of my smell.’

Jack forgave her. Just like that. He got up in a daze and found himself not getting a beer but standing by Bryony’s bedroom door staring in amazement at the bed.

It was vast, king-sized or bigger, carved in some sort of deep red wood—mahogany or something similar—with huge posts at each corner and all hung with gold and purple drapes—like something out of a sultan’s palace.

‘It’s ridiculous.’ Bryony chuckled. ‘I’ll have to sell this. Roger says he won’t sleep in it in a fit and it’s hardly a guest bed.’

‘Roger?’ Jack was finding it hard to catch his breath.

‘My fiancé.’

A fiancé. Yeah, right. Jack managed to catch his breath on that one. For some reason, it made things seem more in control.

‘I’d like to sleep in it,’ Maddy announced, unaware that a spiral had just stopped mid-spin for Jack. ‘Very, very much.’

‘Well, if Jack says you can, then maybe one night you can spend the night with me and Harry.’

‘Harry sleeps here, too?’

‘Actually,’ Bryony admitted, ‘Harry and I swim in this bed. I told him he should really have been a giant wolfhound just to fill it up. We thought of letting out pillow space.’ She ruffled the little girl’s pigtails, and Maddy, who normally cringed when touched, wiggled her head as if she thoroughly enjoyed being ruffled. ‘Okay, miss. Let’s cope with these dogs. Harry first because he’s the worst. And then your Jess.’