Chapter 6

On the Saturday afternoon I was waiting with my aunt for the arrival of our guests. When Aunt Isa had told me that she had invited them to stay overnight I had been flabbergasted. But she told me that once she had spoken to Joe and lunched with him she had felt surprisingly comfortable with him. This prompted her to think that she might as well do what she could to speed up the process and see whether or not Theresa was right. If we spent the weekend in the company of Joe and his daughter perhaps we would all have a better feeling as to whether or not this would fly.

When the car turned into our drive we were waiting to welcome them. Joe emerged from the driver's seat and my aunt went over and welcomed him with a hug and a peck on the cheek. I waited as a young girl emerged from the passenger side and stood nervously looking on. I took in a lovely looking young red headed girl who was still in the chrysalis stage of leaving childhood behind and emerging as a fully developed young woman. I moved swiftly to her side and said,

"My name is Peter. I take it you must be Katy?"

Her voice was barely audible as she said the she was, so I proffered my hand and she took it and we shook hands in introduction.

"I hope sometime during the day that we can have some time together so that you can tell me a bit about the school I will be going to when the new term starts," I said to her.

"My dad told me that you were going to be in the same year as me," she said and this time she was a bit more audible.

"Yes," I told her, "that is because I spent so much time in hospital after the car crash which killed my family and left me so badly injured that I missed so much my schooling. That won't make me stand out though, for I was the youngest in my class at my last school and now I will be the oldest, but not by very much."

Aunt Isa at this point called us into the house and Joe went to the boot and pulled out two small overnight cases.

"You can pick up Katy's case Peter and we will show them to their bedrooms Once they have settled in they can come down and we will have something to drink before starting preparations for the barbeque." My aunt said.

When they came back down stairs Aunt Isa asked what they would like to drink. Joe chose a coffee and Katy asked if she could have a fruit Juice. I said I would join Katy and have a fruit juice too. As Joe and my aunt sat talking as they drank their coffee, I asked Katy if she would like to come with me to our study and I would show her my computer and if she wanted we could play some games on it.

"Don't you go pressuring Katy into things she might not wasn't to do, Peter!" My aunt said.

"Katy won't need any pressure to get involved on the computer," Joe informed us. "I keep telling her she spends too much time on it at home."

"Just for variety then, she can tell me about my new school as we mess around on it." I said with a smile.

Rather reluctantly she followed me into the room that Aunt Isa and I used as a study. She tended to work of the desk top while I had a state of the art lap top. When Katy saw it here eyes lit up, it was a Sony with a large seventeen inch screen. She asked about its specifications and I told her it had a four gigabyte of memory and a two hundred and fifty gigabyte hard drive.

"I have one similar, but yours is more up to date," "She told me. "Mine has three gigabyte of memory, a one fifty gigabyte hard drive, and a fifteen inch wide screen."

Talking about computers seemed to break the ice with Katy and when I showed her Peter's collection of games I discovered that she had quite collection of her own and several of them, were duplicates of the ones I had in the study. In my other life I had never been much into games, as a computer to me was a working tool. After she had annihilated me a few times I held up my hand in surrender and made the excuse that in some areas the accident had left me with an impaired memory and it looked as if game playing was one of those areas.

"Besides which, I said to her, "I have not had much time for passive pursuits. I had to learn to walk again and I had to go through an intensive rehab programme to get my body back into the kind of shape it was in before the accident."

"That must have been hard," Katy said. "I don't know if I would have the will power needed to do that."

"When the chips are down and you don't have much choice it is amazing what you can find the strength to do" I said. "Rehab was not just hard, in the beginning it was very painful as a lot of my muscles seemed to have atrophied because of the months I had been in plaster"

"Gosh!" Katy said, "You must have been badly smashed up if you were in plaster for months."

"Over nine weeks," I said to her. "And that included a full body plaster which meant most of that time was spent flat on my back. In the beginning I felt it would have been easier to give up and die. But you seem to get strength from somewhere to carry on."

"Well you seem you seem to have recovered now. You look as if you might be pretty fit to me. She told me.

"Oh I am, believe me. I work out most days in the gym and I go to martial arts classes twice a week. The only time I feel relaxed is when I do my morning Tai Chi exercises and try to meditate for a while afterwards." I said with a laugh.

She looked at me and the shy expression was back on her face,

"I once saw a group of people demonstrate their Tai Chi exercises they looked so graceful I wished I could learn to do that. But I am not very good with people around me. I get all tongue tied and I am afraid to say anything."

I grinned, "You seem to be managing fine with me," I said. "I would never have guessed that you were as shy as that."

She looked surprised and then said, "I have, haven't I, but now you have pointed it out, I will probably get all withdrawn and silent again."

I smiled at her and took her two hands in mine and stared into her eyes.

No you won't," I told her. "Because I won't let you if I can help it. If your dad and my aunt get close, then we might be thrown together and besides I want you as a friend. I will need one if I am starting a new school where I don't know anybody"

"You might be better off not letting people know that you are friendly with me," she said, "I'm regarded as a bit of a freak and I get bullied quite a bit" she told me,

"Then," I said with a grin, "Perhaps you need a friend like me. Nobody will bully you if I am around."

"Oh Peter!" she said in alarm, "I would not want you to get into trouble because of me."

We were interrupted at this point because my aunt called to tell us it was time to get the barbeque started. I took Katy's hand and gave it a little squeeze.

"Don't you go worrying about that," I said as I led her through the house and into the garden.

Joe and I were tasked with preparing the barbeque for cooking while the girls ferried out the food.

"I saw you coming out hand in hand with my daughter," Joe said. "Does that mean you have been able to draw my shy girl out of her shell, Peter?" He asked.

"If you had not told me she was shy," I said with a grin, "I would never have known. Well that is not strictly true; she told me herself that she had difficulty talking to people. When I told her that it did not seem to apply when she was with me, she was surprised and admitted it was true. Anyway I told her I needed a friend as I would know nobody when we started school together."

"She needs a friend too Peter," He told me. "She is a very clever girl, but she gets picked on a lot at school. I have complained several times about this but despite their promises, nothing changes."

"She spoke to me about that," I said. "And I told her that she needed me as friend to prevent that happening for I am a martial arts exponent. If she sticks with me, I will take care of any bullying."

"Be careful Peter, we would not want you getting into any trouble over this." He stated.

"That is what Katy said," I grinned. "I suspect it will only take one demonstration of my skills to act as a deterrent to others and I will carefully pick the time and place."

He laughed and said, "I hope you are right for Katy could do with a bit of protection."

We had a nice meal and the weather stayed sunny and warm. My aunt and Joe seemed to be getting on fine. They had opened a bottle of wine during the barbeque and now as we relaxed in the living room my aunt opened another. As they sat and chatted I signalled to Katy that we should escape back to the study and to my surprise, she rose and followed me without hesitation. When we got to the study she burst into a fit of the giggles.