sorry. I didn’t mean to make you jump. I was following someone …’
The woman gave her an old-fashioned look. Rumbled, she thought.
‘I thought they might be going to the same class. What classes are up here? IT?’ she ventured. It was most likely that Jack was running a course rather than attending one.
‘Oh, no classes on this floor, it’s all local meeting groups. What class are you here for?’
Bugger, thought Beth. ‘Wood-turning.’
The woman looked taken aback. ‘Then you need to be in the workroom outside. Come with me.’
‘Don’t I need to sign in or something?’ Beth strained a last look up the corridor as the woman put out an arm to guide her back downstairs. She gave in as her shoulders sagged and she trudged after the woman, leaving a trail of drips off her coat as she went.
The workroom was very tidy with a series of low benches on one side of the room and six workstations on the other side. Each station had a wall of tools all very neatly hung up. Two men were already seated at the front bench so she went to the one behind and sat down. They stopped talking as she approached and smiled kindly at her. Beth was introducing herself as someone marched into the room, creating a draught. The larger-than-life figure put her in mind of a ginger and slightly less hairy version of Hagrid from Harry Potter. He marched to the front of the class and clapped his hands astonishingly loudly. Beth instantly wanted to clap her hands together to see if she could get the volume anywhere near close. She sat on them instead to stop herself.
‘Hello, hello, welcome, welcome. New recruits and old favourites,’ he bellowed as he waved to two more men entering the room behind her. He was a bear of a man with a voice to match. Despite his size and volume Beth found she quickly warmed to Tollek, who explained that he was originally from Norway but had fallen in love at university in Bath and had stayed, despite having his heart broken. Beth found herself doing a head tilt at the romantic story and then, noticing that nobody else looked remotely interested, she sat up a bit straighter.
As she had suspected she was the only woman in the group with five men. Her bench partner was a homemade-jumper-wearing fifty-something called Ray who made lots of notes. The first half of the lesson whizzed by as Tollek provided a brief history of the craft of wood-turning and explained his own qualifications, which included coming from a long line of woodcraft devotees in Norway. He also ran through the course syllabus and placed a lot of importance on health and safety and the rules of the workroom. Beth eyed the machinery with longing. She really wanted to have a go.
‘Enough of me. Let’s have a break for coffee and a bit of socializing and then we will acquaint ourselves with the lathe,’ said Tollek with another handclap, which Beth was sure had set off a mild case of tinnitus. Ray scuttled round the bench to join the other men and Beth found herself following behind all the way to the refectory like a lost sheep.
She was rummaging in her purse for change when she heard Jack’s voice and forced herself to remain still and with her head down. She slowly turned to watch him leaving the break area with a young man. They stopped to chat outside the gents’ toilets and when the young man went into the toilets Jack walked away towards the stairs.
Beth pulled a receipt from her purse and prepared herself. As the young man came out she pounced.
‘Hi, sorry. The man you were with dropped something.’ She waved the receipt in front of him vaguely and he was momentarily distracted like a cat with a feather. ‘Which class is he in?’ She was desperately keen to know what Jack was doing here. It was none of her business but simple curiosity was getting the better of her.
The man reached out his hand. ‘I’ll give it to him if you like?’
That was the obvious thing to offer, she really hadn’t thought this through.
‘Oh, okay,’ she handed over the receipt. ‘Is it good? The class or meeting you’re going to, because I wondered if I might switch.’
He was frowning deeply now as he shoved the receipt into his pocket. ‘Sorry, it’s not a course. Look, I’d better go or I’ll be late.’
‘Oh, of course, yes. Enjoy yourself,’ said Beth, feeling like a total idiot. Was he shaking his head as he went up the stairs? She wouldn’t have blamed him. She sloped back into the break area, got herself a tea from the machine and went to read the noticeboard. There was a brochure of all the courses and she sprang on it, took it to a nearby table and started to look through it. Each course also had details of the room and floor it was on. The men from her course got up and left. She checked her watch: time to go back. A woman was wiping down the tables and Beth sidled back in.
‘Excuse me. Do you know which groups are meeting on the first floor tonight?’ It was a long shot.
‘Er, Tuesday, is it?’ said the woman and Beth nodded. ‘Knit and natter – actually no, that’s moved to a Thursday. Adult dyslexia support and domestic violence support,’ she said and then carried on wiping.
Beth knew she was frowning. Either Jack was dyslexic or there was something very sinister going on that he was attending a domestic violence support group. Beth wandered back to her class and sat at her bench and tried hard to listen to Tollek but her mind was distracted by what she’d just discovered and the uneasy feeling that was breeding in her gut.
After a lengthy discussion about tools and sharpening and a quick refresh of the health and safety they all moved over to the machine side of the room. Tollek ran them through the basic principles of the lathe, put on a safety mask and did a demonstration. Beth forgot about Jack for a while, watching Tollek intently as he rounded off a piece of wood. The machine had a low purr as Tollek expertly ran the chisel across its surface. Wood shavings curled away from the wood and filled the air with a fresh scent. She watched him cut in to make a specific groove and demonstrate the importance of keeping tools sharp. She was fascinated.
When the students had a go themselves Beth had to stop herself from running to a lathe in her excitement. Tollek came to each of them in turn and checked that their piece of wood was secure and got them started. Beth knew she was grinning as she rested her chisel on the tool rest and felt it make contact with the wood and change the tone of the machine’s purr.
‘Stay firm and smooth with your actions,’ said Tollek. ‘Good start, Beth.’
As she worked the wood her mind drifted back to Jack. Her curiosity was piqued and she wanted to find out more. He was either attending the dyslexic group or the domestic violence support group; she really hoped it was the former even though she hadn’t spotted any signs that had led her to think he might be dyslexic. But just because she hadn’t noticed anything that didn’t mean he wasn’t. Yes, it had to be that. Her foot slipped off the motor pedal and the lathe ground to a halt. She’d lost concentration.
Tollek was soon at her side and got her started again and this time she stared hard at the wood to maintain focus. A few seconds later her mind had wandered off again. If it was the domestic violence group why was he there? Was he scouting for his next victim? She felt a shudder go through her and immediately banished the thought. Surely nobody would be that twisted and surely not Jack, although she knew too well that just because someone was pretty did not mean they were good. Perhaps the support group was for reformed abusers? she thought. But if it was, that was an odd thing to need support for, wasn’t it?
Tollek suggested that they stop working and inspect their handiwork. She was so pleased she almost gave herself a clap.
