Page 69 of Washed Up

‘What?’ said Bobby, turning to his father.

Brian calmly took a sip of coffee. ‘Oh, it was nothing. We just had a bit of trouble with the chapel. Dylan and Jake had to help me out from under a spot of rubble.’

‘A spot of rubble?’ said Frankie. ‘Dad, it was a whole entire statue.’

Bobby was frowning. ‘Are you okay? Did you get Dr Mac over?’

‘He came over, said he was fine,’ said Lily, waving a spatula covered in beans. ‘Just a scratch.’

‘He said we needed to watch for internal bleeding,’ said Frankie. ‘It wasn’t just a scratch, Mum. Why are you saying that?’

‘I didn’t want to worry your brother, that’s all,’ said her mum, teeth gritted.

Frankie resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

Lily presented Bobby with a plate piled high with a breakfast that, to her credit, looked more appetising than anyone had expected. Bobby nodded his appreciation and tucked straight in with gusto, forking an enormous sausage.

‘How considerate of you, Mother,’ said Frankie. ‘We wouldn’t want to worry Bobby now, would we? Anyway, he’s okay but we need to keep close eye on him for a few weeks.’

‘Who?’ said Bobby, grinning despite the mouthful of food. ‘Dad or Dylan?’

Their dad let out a little guffaw, then tucked into his own breakfast as it arrived.

By the time Frankie got hers, the eggs were cold and the bacon congealing but she ate it anyway.

‘Dylan has gone. That’s it, end of story,’ she said eventually.

She found herself kind of hoping they’d push the point more, ask more questions, but they’d all got bored of the conversation or distracted by messy fried eggs and that was the end of that.

Until Bobby polished off his plate and looked up at her. ‘Sally says that Jake’s into you,’ he said pointedly.

Her mum and dad both looked directly at Frankie, whose blush had returned with a vengeance.

‘He’s a lovely boy, that one. Lovely hands,’ Lily said, a little dreamily.

‘We all know you think so,’ said Frankie.

‘Well, he is,’ said her mother, a little defensively.

‘You could do a lot worse than Jake,’ said her dad, pointing his fork at her.

Frankie pushed back her chair. ‘Thanks, everyone. When I need love advice from you bunch of misfits, I’ll let you know. Bobby, I’m heading out to the cottages if you fancy coming to give me a hand.’

‘Can’t. Seeing Sally. But thanks,’ he said with a wry grin.

Frankie stared at him for a long moment. ‘Just don’t break her heart again, okay?’

‘I won’t,’ said Bobby, holding up his hands.

‘Remember, it’s not you that has to pick up the pieces,’ she said and turned to go.

‘Can you get me Dylan Wright’s autograph?’ was all he said in response.

‘Bugger off,’ said Frankie.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Because of her stupid brother and his stupid, apparently reasonably handsome face, Frankie had to wait until the evening to finally have a chance to speak to Sally alone. But she knew as soon as she saw her there was little point asking her anything other than about Bobby. Sally had already fallen and fallen hard. It was written all over her little elfin face. Poor Jake was clearly back off the menu.