The Mysteries of Brambly Hollow

tea?” It was George, casting his shadow through the doorway for the second time that day. Meli nearly fell off her stool. An offer of a cup of tea, made voluntarily by any of the kids, was rarer than a set of hens teeth.
    “That’s nice of you. Yes please,” hiding her amazement, she turned back to her work. Intuitively she sensed that her son hadn’t moved. Glancing over her shoulder she saw that her suspicion was correct.
    “What?” she enquired, before asking. “Did you find your walkman in the end?”
    Shuffling forward on the soles of his trainers, he stopped just short of her, hands plunged into his pockets, his eyes two huge blue pools staring at her through an overhang of blond hair. “When will SS be back?”
    So that was it. Swallowing the troublesome memories and her white lies that shot up and clogged in her throat like a tangle of coarse woollen fibres, Meli hurriedly replied. “I don’t know. Probably not for a couple of months yet. Like I told you before, it takes time to raise a family,” she couldn’t quite meet his intense eyes.
    “I miss him.”
    “Yes, we all do.” When he remained unusually coy for a moment, Meli’s intuition warned her that she was being primed for something. She studied his expression, trying to get a hint.
    Sucking on his lower lip, he dipped his gaze for a fleeting moment before catching her in the full force of his dazzling blue headlights. “Can I have a pet?”
    “No.” The one word was ejected from her tongue with enough speed to break the sound barrier. Realising that George could quite rightly point out that she hadn’t given his request any consideration, she added. “We already have Quassi. He’s good company for you, especially now we can speak to him. We really don’t want any more pets. Sorry.”
    He pushed out his lower lip petulantly. “But I’d look after it, really, I would. It would only be something really small. You wouldn’t even know it was here,” he persisted, tearing his hands from his pockets and thrusting them down by his sides, fingers clenched passionately, echoing the same pledges spoken by children in households all over the world.
    Meli’s head was rocking back and forth. “No. No more pets.” Watching his lip quiver unhappily, she did feel a real heel. She vaguely recalled pleading with Amy for a pet, and her own heartfelt assurances that she would care for it. Eventually, along came a sweet little guinea pig she’d named Pepper. At first she did care for him devotedly. For all of about a month. After that Amy was lumbered. Meli wasn’t going to fall into the same trap. Was that wrong? She stiffened her shoulders resolutely; one pet for George would become one for David, and one for Cassie, and by her arithmetic, that made three. No way. Dismissively, she turned back to her work. Her cup of tea never did materialise. She wasn’t surprised.

    They were less than a week into the holidays when Meli felt the first tantrums brewing in her play pen, jointly attributed to her playmates: the boys, and her toys - internal and external events; in equal proportions. Although it was great having the kids home - somehow the knowledge that there were others around went some way to allay her anxiety about being alone - the twins were without doubt a constant nuisance. When they stayed in, not even thirty minutes would go by without one of them wanting something, and every where they went they left a trail of disaster. If only they were a couple of years older, she found herself wishing on more than one occasion, so they could have an allowance and keep themselves occupied, like their big sister, who, under their recent pact, had the decency to keep out from under her hair.
    And the external, irritating events? Well, they read like a travesty of village country life. An almost farcical and unbelievable catalogue of events guaranteed to reduce the most stout hearted to tears.
    On Monday, what passed as their front garden: a narrow flower bed with a scattering of marigolds and pansies, struggling to survive an ever growing crush of unrestrained weeds, was almost demolished, when several cows were forced onto the drive, when Elsa decided to motor up the track as the cows were coming down from milking. Then on Tuesday, the steak Meli had defrosted for dinner vanished. How could two bloody pieces of steak the size of dinner plates just vanish? Meli had looked accusingly at Quassi, but despite a thorough inspection of his oral