Chapter 17

Heather opened the door just as I was about to knock on it. She'd given up on the tent after the twins had left, and returned to her normal room. I couldn't complain. I'd taken Sally up on the offer of a bedroom for the rest of the holiday myself, and was enjoying the comforts of modern life.

Heather looked great. A pale green sundress hung breezily on her, swirling with her movements. Her grin was infectious, as usual.

She looked back behind her to make sure no one was listening, then poked her head through the door. "Listen Paul, umm ... do you like tomatoes?"

"What? Yeah, sure. Why?"

"Well, it's ... Look, sorry, but I think I volunteered your help."

"Help? With what?"

"You better come take a look." She opened the door properly, and I followed her through. We walked down the hallway into the kitchen, and I stopped and stared. The table and bench were both stacked with wooden boxes of fresh red tomatoes, three crates deep in some cases. She looked at me, and grinned again. "Yeah. So, do you like them a lot?"

As usual, I couldn't resist. Dropping my camera bag in the corner, I walked up and lifted the nearest box. "What exactly," I asked as I turned to her with them, "are we doing?"

"Just ... tomato stuff. Sauce. Pulp. Soup, paste, probably porridge. But put that down over there," she finished, waving to the free space next to the sink.

"What, all of those?"

"Sort of. We're just helping Mum, though. You guys don't do this at your place?"

"My mother concentrates on not poisoning us each night. Tomato processing is probably beyond her."

"Grab one of those stools. I'll make coffee. We might need it. Sorry to change plans."

I sat as instructed, and let Heather work. "It's fine, really. But listen, did this suddenly happen? You woke up and the kitchen was all red like this?"

"Not exactly. I haven't been taking any notice, but apparently this is an exceptional tomato season."

"It is? Why's that?"

"Well, lots of rain earlier, and fine weather now, I'm told."

"We've certainly had the fine weather."

"Yeah. But spring was pretty wet."

"Okay."

"Yeah. So ... well, what usually happens is that one of Mum's uncles comes around and they do this stuff between the two of them, every year."

"So where's Uncle... ?"

"Dennis. Uncle Dennis. And he's going to be here tomorrow. Coffee. You want anything with it?"

"What, like a tomato?"

"Oh, don't do that. You'll be sick of the sight of those soon."

"I'm fine. So it's just today? What's the problem?"

"The problem is that Mum is far too friendly with one of the local growers..."

"Okay."

"And he dropped all these off this morning, and will be back tomorrow with some more, so we need room for them."

"Oh, I see. So we need to process this ton or so of tomatoes?"

"Yeah. " Heather waggled her finger at me. "Preserve, not process. We're going to preserve the tomatoes. In a few different ways."

"Preserve. Alright. Then what?"

"Ah. Come with me."

"Where are we going?"

"The laundry, of course."

Heather took my hand, and led me out of the room, still chattering. That was where this had got to. We'd spent the last two weeks being the best of friends. We'd told each other secrets, held each other's hands, kissed now and then.

We had spent literally days fiddling with cameras and recording the surrounding countryside. Heather had learnt all I knew about composition and aperture, exposure and depth of field.

We'd laughed. A lot. We'd cried a little as well, now and then.

We'd driven each other's cars. Heather had worn some of my shirts. We'd told silly jokes, taken long walks, watched movies, become vegetables sitting together in front of the TV.

I'd come to understand even more how funny, how clever, and how warm Heather was. She claimed to have come to know me better than she ever thought she could.

Mostly though, we had fun. Great friends, wonderful times, and a living, breathing sexual tension that would just not go away.

We both admitted frankly that we often left each other and went home to masturbate. We skinny-dipped. We discussed fantasies. We agreed that things should stay the way they were, and I for one was lying every time.

And now and then, when she touched me, it was all I could ever ask for. Like now, dragging me down the hallway to the laundry. I hoped we would never get there, because then Heather might drop my hand, and I didn't want her to.

The laundry wasn't what I expected. It was a large room with workbenches and shelves everywhere. The actual laundry equipment stood in one corner of the pale yellow room. The shelves were full. Over-full. Mostly with large glass jars full of different sorts of food.

At first glance most of them seemed to be red. Tomatoes in various disguises, I guessed. But there were also identifiable collections of fruit. Peaches and pears in tidy rows, along with some things that I couldn't quite categorise, but which must have been more obscure preserves.

Heather spoke while I stared. "Yeah, it's something of an obsession, I think. When we were younger we were pretty short of money, and Gran taught Mum to do this stuff. She's been working on perfecting it ever since. There's nothing quite like a jar of home-made spicy tomato soup in the middle of the winter though."

"It's impressive. So..." I looked at her. "Are you likely to inherit the obsession?"

She smiled, before kissing me on the cheek, and making me realise she was still holding my hand. "No, silly. I'm just going to visit and steal some of this every year."

"Good plan. Alright, thanks for showing me. Isn't the coffee getting cold?"

"Yeah. Hold on though, Paul." She turned me to face her, pulled my head down a little, glancing quickly at the doorway, and kissed me properly.

I completely forgot what was happening, and concentrated on returning the kiss. When she finally released me, I stood, my hands in hers, and stared at her. "What was that for?"

She didn't smile this time, but her eyes sparkled. "A test. Tell you later."

"Did ... did I pass?"

"Damn right. Kitchen, slave."

Heather's mother Sandra was in the kitchen when we returned. She insisted we finish our coffee, and thanked me very much for offering to help. I was fairly sure I hadn't, but it didn't matter. I was happy to hang out and do whatever Heather was doing.

At least for a start I was. It turned out to be hard work, cutting, blanching, peeling, boiling, straining. By the time we stopped for lunch I was exhausted, and just so hot.

Along with the tomatoes themselves, we had to do various things to sterilise the glass jars before we could fill them. Depending on the type and purpose, some were boiled themselves. Others were heated in the oven.

Sandra knew exactly what she was doing, and I just followed instructions, and helped wherever I could. Heather was working hard as well, aside from the time she took me down to the laundry room again to get some lids for the jars. As soon as we were out of sight she kissed me again.

I looked down at her. "You alright?"

"Yeah. I am. Very much so."

"What's going on?"

"Tell you later."

"Promise?"

"Cross my heart."

We stopped for lunch at some point, and elected to eat sandwiches outside, away from the heat. The grass was cool to sit on, and Sandra sat with us, chatting until the phone rang, when she ran off.

Heather was sitting next to me, and while she didn't drag me into a full embrace again, she was decidedly friendly, grabbing my hand and squeezing it. I didn't want to stop her, so said nothing.

Sandra was gone for a few minutes, and then came back outside, looking a little concerned. She spoke apologetically. "Listen, kids, could I leave things with you for a bit?"

"Mum!"

"It's Lucy, down the road. Her daughter is sick, and she needs to go out. She asked me if I could babysit for a little while."

Heather sounded more as though she was teasing than actually upset. "Mother, you know very well that I can babysit Miranda for you."

"Yeah, you can. You want to?"

"Yeah, why not? Mandy's..."

"Vomiting."

"Huh?"

"She's vomiting. Frequently. You still want the job?"

"God, no!"

"Thought not. So could you carry on with the soup until I get back?"

"You're trusting me with your preserves?"

"Hell, no." Sandra grinned. "I'm trusting him." She pointed at me.

"Me?"

"You."

I shook my head. "I don't know anything, Sandra."

"That's a good spot to start. You'll both be fine. Sorry."

Heather sighed, and smiled at her mother, and I was suddenly aware of how close the two of them were. They could almost read each others' thoughts. "Go, Mum. Go."

"I'll be back around three, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah. I want to talk to Paul anyway, and you just get in the way."

"I'll remember that next time you want some money."

"You'll owe us some money."

"I can't hear you."

Sandra walked off around the house and disappeared. Heather looked at me, and asked. "What?"

"You want to talk to me?"

"Yeah. But later."

"You sure are mysterious today."

"It's part of my charm."

"You have charm now?"

"Inside!"

"See, what you have is called leadership. Just remember who has been put in charge here."

"Yeah, right. Git!"

We worked. Heather really did know what to do, and I really did follow instructions. We'd been back in there for a while when she suddenly spoke. Hesitantly. "Paul?"

"Uh huh?" I was pouring hot red slop into jars I'd removed from the oven.

"Could you stop that for a second?"

"Hold on." I put the container back on the bench. "Yep?" I turned to face her, and noticed tears flowing down her face. "Oh, God, Heather, what's wrong?"

"Nothing. Really, nothing. It's just ... give me a hug?"

I took her into my arms, ignoring the heat. "What's going on?"

"It's just ... you know when I told you about Marcus... ?"

"I thought we weren't going to talk about that?" I still had her in my arms, and we were both speaking quietly.

"Yeah, I know. We weren't. But..." She reached up and kissed me lightly. "I needed to tell you."

"As nice as this is, you're not making a whole lot of sense, Heather."

"Yeah. You know I said the problem was that I couldn't trust anyone else enough?"

"Yeah, I remember."

"Yeah. Well, I realised something just before you got here this morning."

"What was that?"

"I realised ... I was wrong. I can trust someone. More than enough."

"Oh?" I held her tight, hopeful and terrified, all at once. "And ... who is that?"

"You, of course, you twit!"

"Me? Really?"

"Yeah. Of course. You think I had someone else stashed in the cupboard?"

"I hoped not, but you know what your family is like..."

"Yeah, alright. No, it's you. I ... I'm not sure how to say this."

"Just say it straight."

"I ... I love you, Paul."

"I love you too."

"You do?"

"Yeah. More all the time."

She reached up and kissed me properly. When she finally needed a break, Heather kept talking. "I think about you all the time. When I wake up. When we take photos. When ... well, when I touch myself. All I can think about is you."

"You know, you have a way with words, you know that?"

"Let me finish. I ... realised that I could let someone get that close, if that someone was you."

"How close?"

"That close."

"God." I pulled her close, squeezing her in my arms, and kissed her again.

That was when Sandra walked in, and smiled. "I might have known."

"What?" That was Heather, who hadn't seen her mother walk back in.

"I leave the house for a few minutes, and you start slacking around."

"We..." and Heather waggled her finger in that now familiar way, " ... were just having a rest."

"Right. And I'm going to be the next Prime Minister."

"Mother!"

"Yeah, yeah. Soup, right?"

Sandra said nothing else about it, and we couldn't continue the discussion. So we got back to work, pouring and boiling, sealing and stacking. But every time we got near each other, we'd make sure our hands brushed, and sparks would leap between them. Heather's smile would make me jump, and I would follow her delightful movements with my eyes.

After another hour or so, Sandra called a halt. It was just getting too hot in the kitchen, and we all needed a proper break, though I was in no hurry to get any further away from Heather.

Sandra sealed up the last of the current batches, declaring that there just might be sufficient space for the continuation for tomorrow, and assured us that we wouldn't be needed for that.

Heather and I quickly agreed that we should go out somewhere, and I picked up my camera bag, telling her that I'd better go take a quick shower beforehand, after all the hot work in the kitchen. Her look assured me she'd rather take that shower with me, but I ignored her for once, and turned to the door - just in time for Sandra to stop me with two large jars of soup from the morning. They had really just cooled enough to carry.

"Listen, Paul, thanks for your help. This was never your responsibility."

"Oh, no need. I wouldn't have missed this for the world."

"Really?"

"Really."

Sandra handed me the soup, and then pulled herself up to kiss me on the cheek, pausing just long enough to whisper in my ear. "Look after her, Paul. Please."

I stared for a while, mumbled something to Heather, and walked out the door. Did everyone understand what was going on except me?

Heather was waiting on the steps when I came back out of Sally's house. I sat beside her and put my arm around her waist. "You okay?"