‘Here?’ His eyes are closed and raising an eyebrow takes a Herculean effort.
‘Yeah. Come on.’ I shift over to give him space and pat my lap. ‘Put your head down and get… well, comfy might be pushing it, but comfier than sitting upright.’
He laughs. ‘Nooo, I can’t. My hair still bleeds blue dye. You’ll get a stain on your Alice dress.’
‘I don’t mind.’ I reach over and let my fingers rub over the back of his hand where it’s resting on his lap. ‘Save yourself the energy of trying to protest and let me at least give you a pillow to lie on.’
He forces both eyes open and rolls his head along the wall to look at me again, and he goes to protest, but I give him such a stern look that he stops, sighs, and shifts around to lower himself down onto his side and rest his head on my thighs. Once I can reach the back of his neck, he lets me pull the hair up and lay the cool damp tea towel across his skin, and the online advice says I can cover him with something light, so I pull his jacket over and spread it out across his body. ‘This okay?’
He sounds like he doesn’t have the energy for more than a noise of consent.
‘Close your eyes. Doze off if you need to. I’m not going anywhere.’ I hold my hand against his forehead again, which still feels warm, and from there, it’s kind of natural to brush my fingers through his hair.
He makes a noise that’s a cross between a groan and a moan of pleasure. ‘That’s the nicest thing I’ve ever felt.’
There’s something so refreshing about how he says exactly what he feels. His body was stiff and tense, but the tension melts away as he relaxes, so I keep doing it. His blue hair has got a line of dark brown roots growing through now. It started off in hairsprayed spikes this morning, but has now deteriorated into a chaotic mess of spiky bits and mussed-up bits sticking out in every possible direction and then some extra directions for good measure, and I scrunch my fingers in it, stroking my fingertips along his scalp, brushing it back off his too-hot forehead, and he snuggles into the jacket and shifts around to get more comfortable, letting out that little noise of contentment again, and it makes something inside my heart turn to goo.
I don’t think Bram lets people take care of him. He keeps his Mad Hatter shield up all the time, and if anyone says something that might cut a bit too deep, he’ll say something silly or throw a handful of confetti or make a playing card appear out of thin air, anything not to let someone see they’ve hurt him, and this is a side that he hasn’t let anyone see for a very long time.
He’s half-asleep already. His breathing is shallow and his arm is stretched out, his fingers limp where his hand is resting on the floor, but he’s still shivery, and I continue playing with his hair, letting my fingers work through the remaining hairspray, stroking through the bright blue strands, and loving every little sigh of bliss and every time he turns into the touch, and the way relaxation seeps through his shoulders, the rest of his body sinking into the carpet too.
I didn’t realise how much I care about him. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be than right here, making sure he’s okay, or at the very least, that he’s not on his own if he isn’t. Even when he’s not fully awake, his stomach is making very angry noises, and I feel so horribly guilty because I’m responsible for this. My mind goes back to the other customers who ate that caramel cake too. I have no way of getting in contact with them to see if they’re currently feeling as bad as Bram is, but I suspect they probably are.
I’ve still got my phone in my pocket and without taking my fingers out of his hair, I scroll one-handedly through social media while he dozes, checking for mentions of Ever After Street, and refreshing the review site in case anyone has posted something about food poisoning.
This could be the end of everything. Guilt over not making sure, double-sure, that cake was cooked mixes with panic that my one mistake could finish The Wonderland Teapot when it’s barely started. I feel horrible that I might’ve caused other people illness, and as well as scrolling reviews, I read pages of info on how to ensure things are cooked properly and place an order for a food thermometer because I’m determined to ensure this doesn’t happen again.
I lose track of time. I know it’s passing because I can see the edge of a window in the main part of the staffroom and where it was daylight when I first came up here, darkness has long since fallen outside now. All that seems to matter is Bram’s head on my lap and the way his hair twirls around my fingers, and as much as I don’t want it to, that bottle of squirrel repellent keeps popping into my mind.
I’m at war with myself over it. Should I have confronted him straight away? Does it just tie in to that niggling worry that was already sitting in the pit of my stomach, the one that says if anyone could sabotage cakes without being noticed, it would be a magician. Or is it something completely innocent? Maybe he has squirrels nesting in the car or something… Maybe he had to repel a squirrel on the way out this morning and it was easier to shove the bottle into his bag than take it back to the house? Maybe he is followed by gangs of vengeful squirrels everywhere he goes and spray bottles of repellent are his only defence?
It’s certainly a possibility…
There’s no way he would’ve done this. Why would he, for a start? He has nothing to gain by sabotaging things here. If he wanted anything to go wrong with this place, he could’ve just left me serving supermarket-bought cakes and not tried so hard to help. Or he could’ve taken that information straight to his father and watched me be fired on the spot. He hasn’t. He’s gone out of his way to help me rediscover my love of baking. The man is letting me use his kitchen night after night. Why would he do that if he wanted this venture to fail?
‘What are you thinking about?’ Another hour or so has passed before his hoarse voice disrupts my spiralling thought pattern.
‘You’re awake?’ I whisper without knowing why I’m whispering. Neither of us left a light on earlier, and now the staffroom has fallen into darkness.
‘Not really. Somewhere in between.’ His voice sounds scratchy and thick with sleep. ‘With you doing that to my hair, I might be in heaven. Do you think they have stomach cramps in heaven?’
I burst out laughing so hard that it shakes him too, and then I scrunch my fingers in his hair by way of apology and tuck it back gently, enjoying the way his eyes slip closed again and he shifts to get more comfortable.
‘You didn’t answer my question,’ he murmurs after a few minutes.
It’s the perfect opportunity to bring up the squirrel repellent. I wasn’t going to, but he’s so relaxed that his body is practically a blue-haired puddle, and if there’s ever a moment to get the truth out of him, this is it.
The more I try to think of a way into the conversation, the harder it seems. ‘Do you have a lot of trouble with squirrels?’ I eventually blurt out. Great work, Cleo. Totally subtle. He’s going to know instantly that I’ve been through his bag.
‘Squirrels?’ He sounds thoroughly confused. ‘I thought I was awake, but this is clearly some bizarre fever dream. As random questions go, that really is quite random.’
I reply by raising an eyebrow. His eyes flick up to my face and then he sighs. ‘I can honestly say I’ve never had trouble with a squirrel in my life. Does that answer your very strange question?’
He doesn’t seem to have made any connection between my question and the bottle in his bag, and it’s not the right time to push it. ‘I guess so.’
‘Where did that come from?’ he asks after a while in silence.
‘I don’t know. Thinking about you, I guess, and Tabby, and the… gremlins.’
‘You think the gremlins are squirrels? Because I was thinking actual gremlins, you know, the “don’t get them wet, don’t feed them after midnight” type… Squirrels are clever, but I’m not sure they’ve got the dexterity or presence of mind to add salt to muffins or hot sauce to brownies…’
Does he really not get it? Is his mind so fevered that he hasn’t put two and two together as to why I’m asking about squirrels?
‘You never told me what she said when you confronted her…’ His leading tone suggests he’s waiting for me to fill in an answer.
‘She denied it,’ I say eventually. His eyes are still closed and my finger pads skim his forehead where I’m brushing his hair back, debating whether to tell him the rest or not. ‘She actually suggested it was you.’
His dark eyes fly open and his body stiffens. ‘Of course she did. And let me guess, you believed her.’
‘No. Of course I didn’t believe her.’ It’s a lie and we both know it. The bottle of squirrel repellent floats unbidden into my mind, but something doesn’t sit right about it, and I realise it hasn’t changed anything. I still don’t believe he could be responsible for the sabotage.
His head has shifted on my thigh and I can sense his eyes looking up at me, and it feels like he can read every thought, so I keep letting my fingers stroke through his hair.
‘I don’t think you’d be doing that if you did,’ he says eventually and then sighs too. ‘It wasn’t me, Cleo. Of course it wasn’t. And I’m not going to defend myself. I spend so much of my life defending my choices, and you make me feel like I don’t need to, and I’m not going to do it with you. You either believe me or you don’t. Either way is fine.’ He sounds beyond exhausted and weary, like he knew this was coming. ‘You know what they say – you can lead a horse to water but you can’t teach it to fish.’
‘Make it drink!’
‘Ah, no, but you can make it thirsty. If it needs to be led to water, it’s probably already a bit on the parched side.’ His face screws up like he’s given this some serious thought.
