weeds and wild flowers, with the shed at the bottom housing Sasha’s precious telescope, her most treasured possession.
By the time Sasha parked her dilapidated red Golf beside the green, it was twilight. The church’s ancient Saxon steeple jutted proudly over the village roof tops, a benevolent giant bathed in the blue light of evening. As Sasha got out of the car, a single note of the church bell marked the half hour. Summer smells of warm earth, freshly mown grass and honeysuckle hung heavy in the air. Sasha breathed them in, dizzy with happiness. Will loves me.
Before tonight, she’d been nervous about leaving him in October. Will had gone straight from school into his father’s estate agency business – I never fancied uni, Sash. I’m not the type. The idea of leaving him in Sussex, prey to all the St Agnes’s girls in the year below, filled Sasha with horror. Especially as Exeter was so terribly far away. But now that they were sleeping together – Goodbye, virginity! I won’t miss you – she felt blissfully secure in the relationship. She would read books on the subject and become a fabulous, inventive lover. Will, consumed with desire, would hurtle down the A303 every weekend, desperate to be with her. Afterwards they would lie awake at night, staring at the stars, talking about…Hmmm, the fantasy got a little vague at that point. But anyway, it would all be wonderful and perfect and…
‘Sasha! Where have you been? We’ve been trying your mobile all day. Dad was about to call the hospitals.’
Sue Miller, Sasha’s mother, was a plumper, shorter version of her daughter. Her once black hair was now heavily laced with grey, but her pale skin was still smooth. More worldly and sensible than Sasha (not that that was hard; the family poodle, Bijoux, had more common sense than Sasha), Sue had no idea how she and Don had produced such an intellectual powerhouse of a child. Don reckoned it was his genes. But then Don was out of his mind.
‘Sorry. I must have switched it off. Or something…’ Sasha rummaged absentmindedly in her handbag. Where was that phone? ‘Is it birthday-supper time? I’m starving.’
‘Not yet.’ Don Miller appeared in the hallway. He was holding a large envelope. ‘This arrived for you in the afternoon post, Sasha. I think you should open it now. Get it out of the way.’
Despite herself, Sasha’s heart lurched when she saw the Cambridge postmark.
‘St Michael’s.’
She already knew she hadn’t got in. But the weight of the envelope confirmed it. Everyone knew that if you were accepted, they sent you a fat package full of bumf about grants and accommodation and reading lists. This, quite clearly, was a single sheet of paper.
Sasha wandered through into the kitchen. Don started to follow her, but Sue held him back.
‘Leave it, love. Give her a minute. She doesn’t need an audience.’
In the kitchen, Sasha stood with her back to the Aga, turning the envelope over in her hands. Sensing her anxiety, Bijoux heaved his fat form out of the dog basket and sat loyally at her feet.
‘Thanks, boy.’ Why did the stupid rejection have to arrive today? She wanted to remember this as the day Will Temple made her a woman. Not the day that St Michael’s Stupid College rejected her because she didn’t know about globalization and her cardigan was buttoned up wrong.
Wrapping her anger around her like a cloak, Sasha tore open the letter.
On the other side of Frant village green, the Carmichael family was enjoying a summer barbecue with friends when they heard the scream.
‘What was that?’ Katie Carmichael put down her beer and moved towards the garden gate.
‘Nothing.’ Her dad, Bob, turned over the last batch of Wall’s pork sausages. ‘Just some kids playing silly buggers. Any chance of another jug of Pimm’s out here, Kelly? It’s thirsty work, you know, slaving over hot coals.’
But Bob Carmichael’s wife wasn’t listening. She was standing at an upstairs window, staring open mouthed at the spectacle unfolding before her.
‘Oh my God!’ Katie Carmichael had reached the gate. ‘It’s Mr Miller. He’s got no clothes on.’
‘You what? Don Miller?’
Bob Carmichael dropped his tongs. Half the village was outside now, pouring onto the green. Some of them were taking photographs. Most of them were laughing, or screaming, or both. Everyone knew Don Miller. He’d run the local post office for the last fifteen years, not to mention heading the Frant Neighbourhood Watch Committee.
Now it was Don that the neighbourhood had come to watch. Stark naked, whooping for joy, he tore round the cricket pitch screaming. ‘She did it! She bloody did it!’
‘He’s flipped his lid.’
‘I don’t believe it. Don Miller!’
‘That’s put me right off me sausages, that has.’
‘Where’s Sue?’
A few moments later Sue Miller’s solid, dumpy figure could be seen waddling towards the growing crowd of spectators, most of whom were now cheering loudly. The last time Don had felt compelled to take all his clothes off had been the night of his twenty-second birthday when England had beaten the All Blacks at Twickenham. It was a sight Sue would never forget, and one she’d hoped she’d never have to see again. Don, however, was clearly having the time of his life, playing to the crowd with a series of pirouettes and other improvised ballet moves. His plié left nothing to the imagination.
‘I’m sorry about this, everyone.’ Sue Miller smiled sheepishly. ‘I’m afraid Don’s gone rather off the deep end.’
‘No kidding!’ Bob Carmichael wiped away tears of laughter. ‘It’s his birthday, isn’t it? Is he drunk?’
‘Not yet, but he will be. We just heard.’ Sue’s smile turned into a grin. ‘Sasha got into Cambridge.’
Three hours later, Don Miller was in bed, snoring loudly. The combination of the excitement, Sue’s homemade chocolate fudge birthday cake and at least a bottle and a half of the best red wine the Abergavenny Arms had to offer had finished him off, poor man.
‘I knew you’d do it. I jush knew it!’ he told Sasha repeatedly as he staggered upstairs, leaning on her for support like an exhausted boxer. ‘You’re going to be the greatesht scientist this country’s ever prd’ced. My daughter. You’re gonna change the world. I knew it.’
‘D’you think he’ll be all right, Mum?’ Sasha closed the bedroom door.
‘Don’t worry about your father,’ said Sue. ‘It’s the rest of the village that’s going to need counselling. Post-traumatic shock, I think they call it. I’m used to seeing your father’s wedding tackle swinging in the wind, but poor Mrs Anderson. She looked like she was about to have an aneurism. I mean, she is ninety-two, the dear old stick.’
Sasha got ready for bed in a daze. She’d had a few drinks herself, but that wasn’t the reason. In the last few hours, her life had changed forever. She’d called Will to tell him the good news as soon as she got back from the pub.
‘Great, babe,’ he yelled over pounding music. Evidently the party at Chittenden was still in full swing. ‘Cambridge is miles nearer than Exeter.
