‘Also not. My parents are great, but …’
‘Mine too,’ I say. ‘My mother is the village telegraph. If we had a massive nationwide power outage, and all other forms of communication were down, Little Mickton would be absolutely fine. She’d make sure the lines of communication were kept open somehow.’
‘My mum’s a bit like that too,’ he says. ‘Although she isn’t as terrifyingly efficient as yours, by the sound of it. Her saving grace is that she’s easily distracted. She has lots of mad enthusiasms, but they don’t last terribly long before she’s on to the next thing. So, if she doesn’t get to pass on a piece of news at once, there’s a good chance she’ll forget it.’
‘This is our stop,’ I say.
He drops my hand and picks up my backpack. ‘What have you got in here – rocks? We aren’t going to a rock-throwing contest, are we?’
‘Not today,’ I say. ‘But I’ll bear it in mind for another time.’
‘Rock climbing?’ he says.
‘How many rocks do you think I have in here?’
He shrugs. ‘Rock climbing for beginners, or for those who don’t like heights.’
The bus stops and the driver opens the doors.
‘You have a very odd impression of me,’ I say, jumping out into the snow.
I lead the way down the high street and turn into a small shopping arcade. ‘Here it is.’
He peers at the shop front. ‘Paint Your World’?
‘That’s right. They opened over the summer, and I’ve been dying to come here. But it felt weird to come by myself.’
He follows me inside. ‘I don’t see why. If you want to do something, there’s no reason not to do it.’
‘Is that the Alex Fielding philosophy of life?’ I ask.
‘Not always, but it seems a pretty good one.’
A boy who doesn’t look a day over fourteen comes over to greet us. ‘Good afternoon. Welcome toPaint Your World.’
He leads us towards a nearby table. ‘Do you know the rules?’
‘Perhaps you’d better explain them,’ I say, not wanting to interfere with his evident desire to show off his knowledge of his job.
He points to the rows of shelves. ‘You each choose one of those clay figures and paint them any way you like. The paints are here on the table. When you finish, bring them to me. I’ll glaze them and put them into the kiln to fire. You can pick them up two days from now.’
‘It seems to me that you have an unfair advantage,’ Alex tells me.
‘Meaning?’
He gestures to the pots of paint. ‘Meaning that you can draw, and I can’t.’
‘There’s no drawing involved,’ I say. ‘And I’ve seen you with a paintbrush. You’re pretty good.’
‘That was because you put me on river and grass duty. You didn’t trust me to do any of the detailed stuff.’
‘Not true,’ I say. ‘You were too chicken to try.’
‘I didn’t want to spoil the beautiful picture.’
I smile. ‘You’re the only one who has to live with this one. What are you going to paint?’
He considers the rows of figures. ‘I think I’ll paint this little guy.’