fiction

Black Hare Valley: Chapter Four “Willow Watches”

~ ChanAtkins ~ 2 Comments
Rough sketch of Willow – image is mine

© 2025 Chantelle Atkins. All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

NO AI TRAINING: Without in any way limiting the author’s [and publisher’s] exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

1

Willow Harrison knows exactly who the strange girl at the window is. In a small town like Black Hare Valley, any news is big news and her parents have told her all about Mark Aster returning to Black Hare Valley to reclaim the Hare and Hound pub after his father, Clive, passed away.

It was no secret that they never got along and that Clive Aster never forgave his only son for not marrying or reproducing. Who had the last laugh, Willow wonders now, staring at the girl’s moonbeam face. Mark Aster now has a wife, a step-daughter and a baby of his own on the way. Nice work, she concedes, and just look at that poor soul. Not a clue…

The girl seems frozen. Her face is a mask of panic, embarrassment and possibly hope. If she thinks Willow is going to move from her cosy spot behind the counter, she has another thing coming. Willow glares at her, wishing her away.

Suddenly, the girl turns, her attention averted by the clatter and chatter of two girls leaving Milly’s Café next door. Now Willow’s mood shifts. When she sees it’s the abhorrent Alexa Bradley and Bryony Duggan, she feels a surge of pity for the new girl. The inanely grinning, chubby-faced, mud-splattered new girl. A long sigh escapes her lips and she pushes back her hair before slinking out from behind the till and approaching the window in wonder.

It’s a bit like watching a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. The perfect teenage girls versus the inadequate and desperate to please new specimen, who Willow can tell from even such a brief view, is not the kind of girl Alexa and Bryony would give the time of day to in a million years.

She watches in absolute horror as the new girl offers them her hand to shake…

Oh God, no.

The perfect girls titter and giggle. They say something that causes the new girl’s smile to wither and fade. Then they skirt around her like they are avoiding dog shit on the pavement. Willow watches. The girl sags, then makes a snap decision to bundle hurriedly across the road and divert almost blindly down School Lane.

‘Where they will return to eat you alive…’ Willow murmurs to herself. ‘Leaving only bones,’ she adds as she turns away.

The door opens and the bell jingles and Willow half-expects the girl to be back, but no, it’s the vicar, Gregory Roberts.

Oh, Christ.

Won’t he ever give up?

‘Good afternoon, Miss Harrison!’ he declares in the same booming and authoritative voice he uses with his congregation at Saint Marks church.

‘Afternoon, Vicar,’ she returns evenly, her face expressionless.

‘Wet out there,’ he says rather pointlessly as he aims his folded umbrella at the floor and gives it a vigorous shake. Willow watches the rainwater spraying across the shop, peppering the books and gifts with droplets. ‘But don’t you worry, the May Queen will still be crowned!’ He flashes her a toothy smile. ‘It will just be inside a rather large tent.’

‘I wasn’t worried.’

He ignores the comment as he takes off his glasses to rub them dry on the inside of his coat. His red hair is thinning on top so he keeps it very short and neat. He is always clean shaven and is remarkably unwrinkled for a man of forty-eight. His skin has a loose, smooth quality to it. He is a portly man with a chin that blends into his neck and he is rarely seen without a sheen of perspiration on his smooth forehead.

‘What a shame you have to work!’ he goes on. ‘Mind you, I suspect it will be a smaller crowd than usual, what with the weather and everything. It really is blowing up a storm out there!’

‘Yes,’ Willow agrees, her voice soft as she glances at the window and the soaked town beyond it. ‘It is. How can I help you?’ She heads back to the counter, the new girl entirely forgotten.

Vicar Roberts looks around the gift shop and laughs out loud. Evidently, he has no idea how offensive he can be at times. Willow rolls her eyes, plonks herself down on the stool and picks up her book.

‘Oh no, no no,’ he says, not moving from the door. He rarely comes in any further, as if slightly afraid of the place. ‘I was just passing.’

Of course you were, she thinks.

‘Popping next door for a cream tea, actually,’ he goes on. ‘Plus I’m spreading the word about the marquees they’ve been erecting in the park. We don’t want people missing out on the celebrations just because of the rain. Oh, it was lovely this morning though!’ he tells her. ‘Isn’t it funny how it can change like that?’ He laughs as if it is all a great joke and Willow stares down at the pages of her book, wishing he would just leave. ‘Are your parents in? I was hoping to talk to them again about the neighbourhood watch committee.’

‘They’re a bit busy right now,’ Willow sighs, ‘but I’ll pass on the message.’

‘Oh. Okay. Right then.’ The vicar frowns and for a moment his lower lip protrudes like a sulky child. ‘And your mum is all right?’ he adds as an afterthought, although it can’t be, not really. He asks every time he comes in and Willows mother nearly always hides from him.

‘Yes, she’s fine.’ It’s always the same, Willow thinks in frustration, he just never gives up. He shifts slightly towards the door, umbrella in hand, but she can tell he hates to leave without getting what he wanted.

Go, please, just go.

‘Oh,’ he says then. ‘You will tell them about the marquees, won’t you? I really don’t want the weather putting people off. May Day is such an important event in the calendar.’

Willow releases the tiniest of sighs.

‘Oh, and you could pass on another message if you like.’

She raises her eyebrows and waits.

‘The new people arrived.’

‘Oh yeah.’ She looks back at her book. ‘I know.’

The vicar steps forward again. ‘Oh, you’ve seen them?’

‘Yeah, the girl was out there earlier.’

‘Oh, how lovely! I know the mayor was going to visit them and see if the mother would be interested in joining the committee. I do hope she was successful. Then of course for the girl there’s Sunday School, the Youth Choir…’

‘I’ll tell them,’ Willow cuts him off with a tight smile.

The vicar Roberts looks at her for a moment and Willow stares back at him. She keeps her expression as blank as possible. His smile is still there but its weaker now, his congregation cheer frozen. Willow waits.

He opens the door. ‘As you were.’

‘Goodbye, Vicar.’

He leaves. She watches him outside, putting the umbrella back up, flicking up the collar of his raincoat. He waits for a moment, as if gathering himself together. Then finally he strides away and out of sight.

‘Fuck you,’ Willow says, putting down her book. ‘Mum?’

‘Is he gone?’

‘He’s gone.’

Her mother’s pale face appears around the door to the stock room. She wears her dark hair long like her daughter’s and her slim frame is enveloped in a paint-splattered old shirt. She gently twists the ring through her nose and sighs wearily.

‘Well, thank goodness. D’you know, some things never change? I used to hide from him as a kid. Now all these years later I’m doing it again.’

Willow opens her mouth to ask what her mother means, but promptly changes her mind. She does not need to know. As much as she loves and appreciates her parents, Willow is not particularly interested in what they were like at her age, what they did, where they went. It might be the same town, she often wants to tell them, but it’s the 90s now, not the 60s. It’s different.

She checks her mother’s expression and demeanour though; she can’t not. Willow has learnt to spot the signs. Sometimes she thinks her mother’s depression is like a sleepless monster that lives inside of her. It claws her away from time to time, making her bleed. But she seems okay at the moment. So there is hope.

Her mother waves a hand at her. ‘Darling, you can go. I’ll take over. Not that we’ll get much custom in this weather.’

Willow does not need to be told twice. She grabs her own raincoat from the hook next to the door and zips it up over her black clothes.

‘I’m going to Paddy’s.’

‘Thought so.’

2

Willow slips out. The coast is clear. She can hear roars of laughter from the cafe as the vicar’s repertoire is eagerly received by Milly and all the other old women.

Willow crosses the road, holding onto her hood. The streets are deserted. As she cuts down School Lane, she sees someone up ahead. A bright blue anorak and duck yellow wellington boots. It’s the new girl. Willow slows, reluctant to bump into her. The rain is harder now but if she walks too fast she will easily catch up with the girl.

Part of her thinks, well, so what? Maybe I’ll say hi. Maybe I’ll tell her not to give a fuck about Alexa and Bryony. But part of her doesn’t want to be anywhere near this new girl. Her desperation was just too tragic. Willow is not good at sympathy and struggles with empathy too. She knows she won’t be any good for the new girl, so what would the point be?

She thinks about Paddy and their ongoing story and her mind is made up. The Tale of Dirty Feet and Esme is a story they have been writing together for almost a year now and the lure of another chapter is too important. The idea was born on a lazy July afternoon last summer when they were lying behind the old ruins that overlook Bob Rowan’s land. They were watching hares, she remembers, when fascinated and amused by their antics, they started to give them all names. Dirty Feet was the biggest boy and Esme was the smallest girl and together they got up to the most mischief. Before they knew it they had planned a story where the hares could talk and dream and plan just like humans.

Willow is normally a private writer. She doesn’t even hand her best work in at school. She thinks writing is a way to both make sense of life and endure it. In her darkest moments, she scrawls angry poems in notebooks she keeps stuffed under her mattress. In her darkest moments, Willow feels a bright hungry fear that she is turning into her mother.

Their story took them over last summer, Willow remembers now, with each of them injecting ideas and dreaming up adventures for the two hares. They had started to take turns to write it down and it had been a surprise to Willow to realise she could share both her writing and her ideas. It had never been just her story. It had always been Paddy’s too, and it still was. Paddy’s father had promised he would lend them his typewriter to type it up when it was finished. He would place it in the bookshop, he said, pride of place. The last time they’d worked on it, Paddy had been adamant he wanted to find a way to send the hares to space and Willow had hated the idea. It’s not a sci-fi story, she had insisted and he had winked at her.

The girl is suddenly moving faster. She’s almost running, which seems stranger. She goes out of sight, onto Black Hare Road. Maybe she’s really upset, Willow considers, picking her pace up a little. But if she is, why not just go home?

And if the girl is upset, so what? What can Willow do about it? Absolutely fuck all.

Unlike Jesse Archer, Willow has a healthy respect and even a grouchy sort of love for Black Hare Valley. It’s never quite turned on her the way it has Jesse. As she scuttles along its rain washed streets she feels a sense of it cleansing itself when it has to. She catches glimpses of the hills on either side of the valley – a vibration of their foreboding, patience and longevity fills the town and as always, she pictures Dirty Feet and Esme dancing across the hills.

Willow, along with Paddy, has mastered the art of courteous exploration – spending their childhoods playing in the woods, paddling in streams and rolling down hills. They’ve pretended to be kings and queens, cops and robbers, witches and dragons and everything else in between for years. They’ve even snuck into the Holloway, made dens in it, clambered up its earthy claggy walls and left their footprints in the clay and mud. The Holloway, of course, is where Dirty Feet and Esme live.

The town has been their playground and as Mayor Sumner likes to say so often, it really does have everything they need. Willow supposes it depends to some degree what you need, but her and Paddy have been well provided for: hours of dipping feet in dappled water, resting on smooth pebbles while frogspawn floats, dragonflies hover and newts bask in the sun; day long games in the woods, hiding from the world, just them and their make-believe worlds; weeks of tracking and recording the natural world as it is permitted to thrive boastfully in Black Hare Valley; promising themselves that they’ll be able to finally see a legendary black hare but feeling equally satisfied and entranced with the brown hares they glimpse from time to time.

Willow and Paddy have been watched and watched over by deer, foxes, badgers, rabbits, buzzards, sparrowhawks … And if she feels watched over by anyone its by Vicar Gregory Roberts – but that’s because he is one of those religious types who thinks it’s his life’s duty to convert everyone else.

3

Willow passes the school. The clouds are moving fast, swollen with black rain. It feels suddenly much later, almost evening. There’s a chill around her legs and a cold wind blasts around the corner, forcing her to recoil.

She bows her head and moves faster. She stops at Black Hare Road and scans the area. There is no sign of the new girl. Maybe she ducked into a shop to escape the downpour. Willow shrugs to herself. She crosses over, still checking around just in case.

The Hardware and Pets store is closed. The bookshop is open – maybe she went in there? She looks like the bookish type… Willow pulls open the door and goes insides, immediately soothed by the familiar and comforting smell of dusty warmth and the residue of hazy sunshine. The bookshop shields her from the brewing storm.

It’s like a separate entity frozen in time. The pace is lighter here, slower, calmer. In here, you lose time. She can see quietly bowed heads wandering in every aisle and she can hear the delicate rustle of old pages being turned. She focuses on the threadbare carpet and imagines Dirty Feet and Esme padding gently across it to hide behind bookshelves.

She drifts through, calmer now, inhaling the smell of a million stories. Paddy’s dad is at the counter, and looks up from a book to smile warmly at Willow. Paddy’s father looks exactly how she imagines Paddy will when he’s a man. Marvin Finnis is thin and tall and wears glasses like his son. He gives off a gentle, old-fashioned vibe, she thinks, in his knitted cardigans and soft corduroy trousers. She cannot imagine him in jeans and a t-shirt.

‘Oh Willow, go on through. They’re in the treehouse.’

‘They?’

So, the new girl did come in here then? Did Paddy see her, maybe? It would be just like him to spot a girl in distress and offer her shelter and comfort. Willow can see how that would have happened. She feels a stab of jealousy and hopes he is not telling the new girl about their story.

‘Yes, Jesse came in again.’

Willow’s mouth snaps shut. Her hands clench. She swallows and moves stiffly away.

‘Okay, thanks Mr Finnis.’

Fucking Jesse Archer! The absolute shit. Willow storms through to the conservatory, while the rain drums relentlessly on the thin glass and outside the sky is almost black. What the hell is the malignant creep playing at? Did he really feel so humiliated by that bloody stupid assembly that he’s still taking his rage out on Paddy, who, he obviously fails to realise, was equally as humiliated?

‘God’s sake,’ she huffs, yanking open the door. Jesse Archer is a manipulative, lying, thieving little shit. He’s taking the piss out of you; she has tried to warn Paddy over the last six weeks. She has warned him more than once that he cannot trust an Archer.

But he doesn’t seem to get it. His soft, sweet heart malleable like putty. His intention to see the same honesty and integrity in others as he strives for in himself. It’s partly his dad’s fault, she concedes, the man is obsessed with giving people second chances. He seems to think Jesse’s father Nick had a bad time as a kid and as a result has passed that on to his own son. Not entirely sure what he means, Willow also doesn’t care. In her opinion, having a shit dad is not an excuse to be shitty to everyone else.

Willow scurries through the rain to the treehouse. Lightning flashes across the sky and thunder cracks as she clings to the ladder and makes her way up. She clambers into the shelter and for a moment is lost for words. Just then another roll of thunder crashes above them and the four teenagers all cringe at the same time.

Willow eyes the new girl distrustfully but it does make sense that she ran in here to shelter from the rain and Paddy welcomed her into his treehouse, because that’s how he is.  Mr Finnis loves a stray and no doubt rounded her up and made sure Paddy looked after her.

It’s Jesse Archer that Willow really glares at. Why is he sat there like that, like he owns the place? It instantly enrages her. He walks around school and town like he owns the world; can’t they at least have one place that is sacred and safe? And why is he sat between Paddy and the new girl like he’s some kind of leader, just because he’s older and taller? Why were they having such an animated conversation without her? And why do Jesse’s eyes keep tracking to a spot in the pallet roof?

She scowls as Paddy helps her in. ‘This is my best friend, Willow,’ he tells the new girl.

New girl does that hand thing again – almost taking Willow’s eyes out. She jerks away from it, still scowling.

‘Jaime.’

‘Okay.’ Willow looks at Paddy. ‘What the hell, Paddy?’

He shrugs but he’s smiling. Of course, he’s happy to have these strange intruders in their treehouse, invading their hideout. He’s always enjoyed teasing Willow about how unsociable she is. She supposes he thinks this is funny.

‘Everything happened at once!’ he tells her.

Jaime lowers her hand, her bottom lip pulled in by her teeth. ‘I saw you in the gift shop.’

‘Yeah, I work there.’

‘Her parents own it,’ Paddy adds.

‘Oh cool!’ Jaime brightens again. She doesn’t seem to stay down for long… ‘It’s so cool that all our parents own businesses here!’

Willow frowns – is this kid simple? She really does look delighted with this pointless fact.

‘My mum is married to Mark and we’ve just taken over the Hare and Hound,’ she goes on, as if they didn’t all know that already. ‘And obviously Paddy lives above the bookshop. How cool is that? What about you, Jesse? Where do you live? What do your parents do?’

All eyes turn to Jesse and Willow smirks, enjoying his obvious discomfort.

‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘Tell her where you live, Jesse. Tell her about your parents.’

His jaw tightens and his expression sours under their persistent gaze. His arms are wrapped tightly around his wet jeans and Willow watches his fingers clasp together tightly, as if holding on.

‘Why all the questions?’ he mutters.

‘Here’s another one for you,’ says Willow. ‘Why are you even here and why won’t you leave Paddy alone and stop whatever this long-winded plot to humiliate him is?’

‘What?’ Jesse blinks at her.

‘You know what I’m talking about!’

‘No, I fucking don’t!’

‘Willow -’

‘No Paddy, I’m serious. Ever since that stupid assembly he keeps showing up here latching onto you. What for? He can’t really want to be friends. He’s up to something!’

‘Willow, come on…’ Paddy lays a hand on her arm but she shakes it off.

Her penetrating glare remains on Jesse. He tries to meet her gaze and hold it, but he can’t. His eyes are shooting all over the place. Guilty conscience, she thinks.

‘Maybe I do want to be friends…’ he says, his eyes meeting Paddy’s.

Paddy smiles while Willow growls.

‘You’re his fucking bully! Bully!’

‘Willow,’ Paddy tries again. ‘Seriously, you can’t be so cynical your whole life. He hasn’t done anything to me, I swear.’

Willow looks at Paddy in disgust. ‘Yeah, and you can’t be so trusting… I know he’s up to something. He’s always up to something!’

‘He just tried to blow up the school!’ Jaime pipes up excitedly.

They all look at her. Her blue eyes are wide, her small thin lips pulled into a huge smile. Willow can’t work her out. She looks like someone who just won the jackpot.

‘That’s what we were just talking about.’ Paddy turns to Willow. ‘See? Jesse tried to avenge us. Tried to get back at Bishop.’

Willow shakes her head; she can barely believe what she is hearing. ‘Are you actually serious?’

They all nod. Jaime is grinning like a loon, while Paddy’s eyebrows are arched as if suggesting this act of insanity proves his point somehow, and Jesse is just glaring back at her like; yeah, so what?

‘You tried to blow up our school? Are you fucking stupid?’ She holds up a hand. ‘No, don’t answer that. I know you are.’

‘The policeman caught him in the act,’ Jaime witters on. ‘I got photos and everything.’

Jesse looks away – his lips are moving but nothing is coming out.

Willow leans forward. ‘What do you mean, you got photos? Of what?’

Jaime looks hesitant but then unzips her anorak to reveal the camera. ‘I got this for my last birthday,’ she says. ‘Do you know anywhere I can develop the film?’

Willow throws up her hands aggressively. ‘Why are you wandering around taking goddamn photos of people? That’s not gonna make you any friends, you know!’

Jaime zips it back up. ‘I’m a reporter.’

‘She wants to be…’ Jesse murmurs.

‘She’s just curious,’ Paddy says, helping her out. ‘I think it’s an admirable quality.’

Willow elbows him. ‘You would.’

Jaime looks at her lap. ‘It’s my ambition, that’s all. I get a bit carried away sometimes.’ Her gaze shifts to Jesse, and Willow, watching, sees her eyes glaze over a little, her lower lip droop. Oh God, no. ‘I won’t do anything with them,’ she tells him quietly. ‘I promise.’

‘You’re not gonna blackmail him?’ Willow asks. ‘Well, that is disappointing.’

‘I’m not gonna do anything,’ Jaime says, her eyes still on Jesse, who is doing the shifty eye thing again, trying like hell not to make eye contact with any of them. What is he up to?

‘You’re not gonna write a story or anything?’ he finally asks, glancing just briefly at Jaime.

She beams back at him. ‘No! Of course not. Not now I’ve met you.’

‘You should probably give him the photos when you develop them,’ Paddy suggests, ever the voice of reason and fairness. ‘That’d be the right thing to do. He won’t want his dad seeing anything like that.’

‘My dad won’t care,’ Jesse snorts, his top lip raising.

Willow snorts back in agreement. ‘His dad is a bigger criminal than he is.’

‘But what about the policeman?’ Jaime looks bewildered, staring at them each in turn. ‘Won’t he tell someone? Won’t he tell your dad?’

Suddenly, all eyes are back on Jesse and Willow can tell that he hates it. He opens his mouth then thinks twice and closes it again. He shifts his backside and glances at the door. Willow can sense his desire to escape. More than anything right now she can feel how much he wants to just run. He gulps. His panic reeks. For the first time, Willow is genuinely curious about this boy. What is he so panicked about? What is he hiding?

‘Maybe he let you off with a warning?’ Jaime suggests for him. ‘Police can be like that sometimes. Like, maybe he wanted to give you a second chance.’

‘Yeah, right,’ Jesse sighs, eyes down. He pulls at a strip of rubber coming loose from the soles of his fake Nike trainers.

‘Well, what then?’ Willow demands. ‘Truth time. Who was it, Mayfield? I bet it was Mayfield.’ Jesse nods reluctantly, not meeting her eye. ‘What, he just catches you trying to burn down the school and lets you off with a warning? No way. I’m not buying that.’

‘Does seem kind of strange,’ admits Paddy.

‘Very strange,’ Willow goes on. ‘Tell us what you saw, Jaime. Did Mayfield even take Jesse home?’

‘I don’t know where he lives, but no. He just drove him here and let him out.’

‘He lives in the scuzzy flats on Taylor Drive,’ Willow says, not taking her eyes off Jesse. ‘So, what else?’

‘He was in handcuffs.’

Jesse’s face burns.

‘Handcuffs?’ Willow inhales, her eyes stern. ‘Well, well, well. You better start talking, Jesse Archer. What the hell is going on between you and Sergeant Mayfield?

Thanks for reading!

Please feel free to leave a comment letting me know what you thought of this latest chapter. Who is your favourite character so far? What are your thoughts on the town?

NOTE: Please remember this is NOT the finished version of Black Hare Valley Book 1. This book has not been to my editor yet or even my beta readers. There will be typos, grammatical mistakes, and sentences that need rewriting.

COMING NEXT THURSDAY: Chapter Five “Ralph – Monster Hunter”

Black Hare Valley: Chapter Three “Paddy’s Treehouse”

~ ChanAtkins ~ Leave a comment
photo is mine

© 2025 Chantelle Atkins. All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

NO AI TRAINING: Without in any way limiting the author’s [and publisher’s] exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

1.

The rain hammers against the roof of the treehouse. Paddy Finnis pulls his legs up and shuffles back until his spine meets the rough wooden wall. There is only one window, or rather, a gap in the wood big enough to be classed as a window. It once had a small sheet of see-through plastic nailed over it to protect the floor from the elements but it has long since torn and flown away. Now, a small puddle starts to form under the window and Paddy finds he only has limited space on either side of the window and door in which to keep dry.

No matter. The roof is solid and trustworthy. It will hold. The floor too is dependable. Paddy can still remember his father dutifully collecting piles of old wooden pallets all those years ago. The resulting treehouse was not quite the grand affair eight-year-old Paddy had envisioned but he had been happy and grateful just the same. Beyond the door, the rope ladder whips back and forth in the wind and he wonders if a storm is coming. He smiles to himself, imagining how that will affect the May Day celebrations that he won’t be going to, but he is sure the mayor will have a solution up her capable sleeve.

From his position, Paddy can see the thin stretch of garden which leads up to the conservatory. He can see his father’s rickety deckchairs and array of houseplants on the windowsills. He can just about see the blue wooden door that leads into the shop. To the right is a striped curtain and behind that, the narrow, dark stairs that lead up to the cluttered two bedroomed flat.

His eyes drift up to the windows – the long bay is his father’s room, on the opposite side is the lounge and to the left is the kitchen, both with views of Black Hare Road. Higher still, is Paddy’s room, the loft room, smaller, darker, colder but with a window on each side which gives him an almost aerial view of the whole town.

Both are perfect for stargazing and he moves his Meade LX200 telescope from one side to the other on a daily basis. Out in the treehouse he keeps his smaller Celestron Firstscope.

Paddy scowls at the weather. Yesterday had been so beautiful; one of those days when you feel good to be alive and grateful to live in such a beautiful place. But the weather in Black Hare Valley twists and turns like a restless soul and today the sky is a sulky grey and the clouds are black and billowing, throwing out rain as if in a temper. Paddy can hear cars splashing through puddles on the road and imagines folk dashing about under umbrellas. It is quite amusing however that the weather chose to be vile on May Day.

Paddy and his father had already opted to boycott what they consider to be an outdated tradition. His father refuses to bow down to the shop being closed for the day and they both think sitting a pretty young girl on a throne and pulling her through town is a bit old-fashioned, to say the least. Willow, of course, has far stronger things to say about the May Queen and Paddy hopes she turns up after working the morning shift in her parent’s gift shop. Paddy knows she detests the rain but she detests the May Queen tradition even more and he’ll enjoy hearing her rant about it.

He wants to do something in the meantime though – not just sit it out and wait for school to come crawling after him. He feels the first flutter of dread in his belly and resents it and the bullies that usually cause it; Steven, Dominic and Jesse. Thinking about Jesse, Paddy’s lower lip juts out as it tends to do when he is mulling something over.

There has been a change in Jesse Archer recently and at first, Paddy didn’t know whether to trust it or not. Willow doesn’t, that’s for sure. She still thinks his sudden and awkward attempts at friendship are part of a nasty plot; that he intends to make Paddy think they’re friends and then humiliate him at school. She could be right. She probably is right. Why would someone tough and cool like Jesse Archer ever want to be friends with someone like him?

As Mr Bishop had so unkindly pointed out on that hideous day six weeks ago, the two boys were polar opposites. Prey and predator, he had called them, right in front of an assembly of children. Paddy’s cheeks burn with shame at the memory and his small hands clench into fists on his lap.

The townsfolk always sing the praises of Mr Bishop but Paddy knows he is just another vile bully. Maybe the worst of them all. He sneers at children, looks down on them distastefully, wrinkles his nose at them as if they all give off an offensive smell. It was worse when I was at school, Paddy’s father likes to remind him, we were caned for giggling or not standing up straight enough! You kids don’t know how lucky you are.

Paddy is not sure about that but he rarely argues with his father, who has an eternal sleepiness about him that makes Paddy fear he is perpetually slipping away.

It hadn’t been Paddy’s fault that day, but it hadn’t exactly been Jesse’s either. That’s what Paddy can’t stop thinking about. If it is all a nasty plan to humiliate him, Paddy will be impressed because as Mr Bishop unhelpfully pointed out, Jesse Archer is not an obvious strategist or intellectual.

‘An animal,’ Mr Bishop had called him. ‘A predator of brute force hunting in a pack. Seeking out the physically weak and picking them off.’

Paddy shudders at the memory. It was actually Steven who had thrown the ball of wet tissues at his head but it was Jesse who had got the blame and wearily accepted it. But Mr Bishop was never one for missing an opportunity to teach. A kinder man may have sent both boys out of the hall or even to detention, but no, his eyes lighting up in glee, the headteacher had ordered Paddy and Jesse up onto the stage where he had been giving an assembly on his recent trip to Africa.

Mr Bishop went abroad twice a year and twice a year he gave endless and monotonous assemblies where the children were forced to endure slideshows in the name of education. He’d find a way to relate it to various topics they were studying but usually it was a tenuous link that none of them quite believed in.

On the screen behind them was a photograph of a lioness stalking a young, fragile gazelle. Mr Bishop kept a firm hand on each boy’s shoulder. He held assemblies alone – there were no other adults there to witness him describe Paddy as classic prey for bullies and brutes. Small, thin, weak, fragile, Paddy had felt his eyes burning into the floor as his head dropped lower and lower.

‘Probably born prematurely, poor eyesight. Quite probably uncoordinated and clumsy. Attracts the attention of the predator as an easy kill.’

Bishop had given Jesse’s shoulder a little shake. Paddy, risking a sideways glance, had seen the true fury on the other boy’s face. A knitted brow, flared nostrils, lips screwed up tight and pale as his body seemed to tremble with the effort to remain still under Bishop’s claw of a hand.

‘Predator. Survival of the fittest, you see. Taller, stronger, faster, braver. Brutish. Desperate to survive. Hunts in packs, exists in a hierarchal system. Must prove himself again and again.’

Paddy sits now staring at the puddle and still unable to quite believe the things Mr Bishop had said about them.

‘Of course, the gazelle has a choice. He can outwit the predator. Like Patrick Finnis here. A smart, quick, intellectual mind can sometimes outwit the plodding nature of a predator. But often not. It’s brute force and speed that wins.’

2

The stranger thing was the way Jesse Archer turned up at the bookshop the next day. Alone, not with his goons in tow. Paddy had been stacking books while his father answered a phone call behind the till.

Jesse Archer had slouched in, looked once at Paddy and then looked away. He had circled the shop twice – slowly, running his index finger along the spines of second hand books – pausing occasionally to pluck one out, read the back and slot it back in place.

Paddy had no idea what his game was. Stealing, probably, but he wasn’t in the mood for it. He sighed, put down the books and slipped through the maze of mismatched bookshelves to find Jesse in the far corner of the shop, perusing the books in the window display.

He looked over his shoulder at Paddy and said, ‘It’s trapped.’

‘What?’

On closer inspection, Paddy saw what Jesse was looking at. A Red Admiral butterfly was batting itself against the window in a frantic attempt to get out. Paddy put his hands in his pockets and came up bare.

‘Have you got a tissue or a handkerchief?’ he asked Jesse.

Jesse pulled a black and white bandanna out of his back pocket. Paddy recognised it – when they were a few years younger, Jesse and his gang had declared themselves outlaws. Cowboys. Jesse was at that point in his life totally in love with the fact his father had named his three sons after real life Wild West gunslingers.

He handed it to Paddy and Paddy leaned carefully over the books and used the cloth to gently scoop up the butterfly.

‘Out the back,’ he had said, thinking of the flowerbeds, and for some reason, Jesse Archer, notorious bully and good-for-nothing third son of drunken Nick Archer, followed him with a look of awe on his face.

Paddy walked to the back, through the dusty conservatory and out into the garden. The thin stretch was a colourful haven for pollinators – sunflowers, wildflowers, lavender, foxgloves, geraniums – the perfect place for a lonely butterfly.

He had crouched beside the lavender bush and unfolded the bandanna. Jesse had crouched too, and watched silently as the butterfly paused, flapped its wings twice then fluttered on to the bush.

‘Here.’ Paddy had returned the bandanna.

Jesse said, ‘Mr Bishop is a bastard. He’s wrong you know. He’s wrong about everything.’

It was the first time Paddy had considered that Jesse hadn’t just been angry up on that stage, but humiliated, just like him. It was the first time Paddy had considered that Jesse Archer had feelings of his own.

He’d nodded at the treehouse. ‘Want to come up?’

3

Now, Paddy hears a voice.

He scrambles forward and sticks out his head. His father is at the conservatory door, waving.

‘You’ve got a visitor!’

Paddy wonders if it’s Jesse. No, more likely it is Willow. He climbs down and dashes through the rain to follow his father through the shop. He looks around but can’t see Willow.

Instead, Jesse Archer is skulking in the shadows. He couldn’t look more suspicious if he tried. Paddy glances at his father who smiles and goes back to the book he is reading behind the counter.

Since the day with the butterfly, Jesse Archer has wandered in alone at least once a week and on a few occasions, he and Paddy have ended up back in the treehouse together.

Jesse never asks. He never says hello. He just wanders around the shop until Paddy intervenes. His father, ever the optimist, thinks it’s a good sign. He sees it as hopeful and has reminded Paddy to never judge a book by its cover, or by the gossip spread by townsfolk. In response, Paddy reminded his father about Jesse’s behaviour; his reputation for a troublemaker and a bully is well known.

‘He’s a nightmare at school,’ Paddy said. ‘He trips people up, he disrupts classes, he throws things at people. You don’t want to run into him.’

Paddy’s father had smiled gently before telling him that sometimes people just need a chance to do the right thing and that maybe Jesse has never been given that chance. He knows about Jesse – his family, his brothers, his background – and being the kind and gentle man he is, he feels for him. Mr Finnis think bad apples can turn good. Paddy is not yet convinced, but he is curious enough to give Jesse a chance. He hates to admit it even to himself, but he has been enjoying the boy’s company.

There is something there, he has found himself thinking, there is something about him.

And here he is again.

And this time, he walks right up to Paddy, hands in pockets, soaked through, no coat, blood on his neck.

‘I need to talk to you.’

Paddy nods and leads the way back to the treehouse. Just as Paddy is climbing up after him, Jesse holds up a hand.

‘Is there any chance of a drink? Or something to eat?’

Paddy pauses. Jesse has never asked for anything before. But he does look hungry. And weary. Like something heavy is pushing down on him relentlessly. Paddy’s father has told him more than once that Jesse does not have the best home life and this makes Paddy feel sorry for him.

‘Okay. Hang on.’

Paddy scuttles off to the kitchen, retrieves two slices of apple cake, a big bag of salt and vinegar crisps and two cans of 7-Up from the fridge.

Back in the treehouse, Jesse is sitting against the wall and glaring hard at an undefinable point in the roof – a gap between slats and spongey green moss. He looks angry as he raises a middle finger.

‘What’re you doing?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Here.’ Paddy clambers up and passes the cake and crisps over.

For a while they sit in silence. Jesse eats and drinks with his eyes fixed on the same spot. Paddy watches him silently, uneasily. He still can’t read the boy. He doesn’t understand him at all. He’s not sure he’s safe with this boy and he knows that Jesse has stolen books from them, just as his father knows.

‘It’s all right, Paddy,’ he’d said when Paddy had voiced his suspicions. ‘Maybe he’s reading them.’

Paddy hopes so.

‘More like burning them,’ Willow had snapped, churlishly.

But Paddy remembers the look of gentle wonder on Jesse’s face when the butterfly flew away. Paddy remembers that Jesse was side-tracked by its futile attempt to escape via a hard glass window. Paddy hopes that Jesse is not faking it when he asks to look through the telescope, and that he means it when he quietly declares that one day he is going to get out of this town and make something of himself.

‘What is it?’ he asks Jesse now.

The boy looks at him with sharp dark eyes. Paddy looks back and he does not see a brute or a hooligan now. He sees intensity – something fierce, inquisitive and acutely alive.

‘I tried to burn down the school.’

Paddy, visibly shocked, asks, ‘What? Why?’

‘Why’d you think? So we don’t have to go back there ever again.’

‘Oh.’ A few beats later… ‘Wow.’

Jesse looks away and shrugs. ‘Didn’t work.’

‘That’s probably a good thing.’

Jesse looks back at him and seems about to say something. But a metallic clattering sound outside halts him and they both turn suddenly and suspiciously towards the noise. Paddy stares at the end of the garden where the metal bins sit and the old gate doesn’t quite close properly.

‘There’s someone there,’ he says in surprise.

4

Jesse moves fast. Shoving the food from his lap, he shoots past Paddy and practically leaps to the ground before rushing over to the gate.

It’s raining harder now. Paddy almost slips on the rope ladder on his way down and when he lands, his other foot loses grip on wet grass and he goes down on his backside. He clambers quickly to his feet and rushes up behind Jesse who is towering aggressively over a short chubby girl in a bright blue anorak.

‘Who are you? What the hell are you doing spying on us?’

The girl just stares in horror. Her mouth an ‘o’ shape, her hands clutching the camera around her neck.

‘Were you spying on us?’ Paddy demands. He is sure he has never seen her before, which is a rare thing in such a small town.

Jesse pulls her inside the gate and she squeaks in fright.

‘Who the hell are you?’

Suddenly, there is a crack in the sky above them. Lightning forks without warning and is promptly followed by a deafening boom of thunder. The air hisses with electricity.

Paddy doesn’t think twice. He grabs Jesse’s hand and the girl’s and pulls them both towards the treehouse.

Jesse stands back, shaking now as heavy sheets of rain drum down on them, allowing the girl to scramble up first. He then gestures to Paddy, but it’s Paddy’s treehouse and he enjoys playing the host so he shakes his head and gives Jesse an urgent shove.

Jesse does not need to be asked twice. He hoists himself up after the girl and Paddy follows.

The three of them huddle together in the dry spot. The girl squeals when the sky booms again and Paddy puts out a hand to calm her.

‘It’s okay. Just thunder. I’m Paddy, by the way. I live here.’

‘Jaime,’ she replies, her voice a little high as her eyes shoot anxiously between him and Jesse. ‘And I wasn’t spying. Honest. Okay, I sort of was. But only because I’m a reporter you see, a journalist – okay, well not really, not yet, obviously, because I’m only fourteen right now but I want to be one day and so I’m sort of in training, you see? And anyway, sorry but I’m really not going to do anything with the photos anyway. I don’t even have a newspaper or anywhere to share them.’

She looks between their startled faces, smiling desperately, her shoulders bunched up to her neck.

‘You took photos?’ asks Paddy. ‘Of what?’

‘Who the hell are you?’ Jesse demands again, glowering at her.

‘Jaime Perry,’ she says again, a little exasperated now. ‘We just moved in yesterday. I’m new.’

To this, Jesse groans. ‘Jesus fucking Christ, are you fucking mad? Why would anyone want to move here?’

‘My mum,’ she frowns, looking at Paddy as if hoping he will help her. ‘She and my step-dad, Mark.’

‘Aster?’ Paddy helps her out and nods at Jesse as if to reassure him. ‘It’s okay, my dad told me Mark Aster is back in town to take over the Hare and Hound since his old man passed away. Remember? He got married. This must be his step-daughter.’

Both boys stare at Jaime, looking her up and down. Paddy sees a kindly face framed by wet blonde air. Her cheeks are as round as her bright blue eyes and her mouth is one big smile. She looks like the sort of person who smiles at everything and everyone.

‘Jaime,’ she says again, in case they have forgotten.

‘Still doesn’t explain the creeping around and taking photos,’ Jesse growls at her.

She seems to shrink, wrapping her arms around her knees. ‘I told you. I’m a reporter.’

‘You’re fourteen.’

‘Yes, I know, I said one day. I mean, one day I will be.’ She shrugs hopefully at Paddy. ‘I’m practicing. Don’t you guys practice what you want to be when you grow up?’

The boys swap a look. Paddy thinks about his treehouse and wonders if Jesse is thinking about crime. Yeah, they both practice.

‘Okay,’ he says to Jaime. ‘We get you.’

‘I don’t,’ Jesse disagrees and is still glaring at her. ‘I want to know what was so interesting about us.’

‘You,’ she corrects him and then blushes a fierce red. Paddy smiles, feeling sorry for her. Jesse just looks angrier.

‘What about me?’

‘I mean, I followed you here. I saw you get arrested at the school and I saw that policeman just drop you off here after so I was curious. I mean, you have to be curious if you want to be a journalist, so I went around the back to see what I could see. I was chasing a story.’

‘Not creepy at all…’ Jesse mutters.

Paddy is enthralled. ‘You didn’t say you got caught!’

Jesse shifts uneasily. ‘Course I did. Everything always goes fucking wrong.’

Paddy exhales slowly. He looks between Jesse and the new girl.

‘And what? Mayfield just let you go?’

‘No damage done.’ Jesse looks away. ‘Me and Mayfield have an understanding. I just came to tell you that I tried, that’s all.’

‘Jesse, you’re crazy! You didn’t have to try and burn down the school for me. Or you!’

‘Is that why you got arrested?’ Jaime is all ears and her eyes are wide, the storm forgotten as she stares greedily at Jesse.

He gives her a long, measured look. ‘Yeah.’

She slaps a hand over her mouth. ‘Oh my God. This is so exciting. I am so glad I moved here!’

Jesse examines her carefully before shifting his gaze to Paddy, his eyebrows raised.

‘She won’t be for long…’

Thanks for reading!

Please feel free to leave a comment letting me know what you thought of Chapter One – May Day. Please also let me know if you would prefer shorter chapters. They are quite long and I could split each in half. What do you think of the characters introduced so far??

NOTE: Please remember this is NOT the finished version of Black Hare Valley Book 1. This book has not been to my editor yet or even my beta readers. There will be typos, grammatical mistakes, and sentences that need rewriting.

COMING NEXT THURSDAY: Chapter Four “Willow Watches”

The Trees Want To Come In…

~ ChanAtkins ~ Leave a comment

Flash fiction

Originally published on Medium.

photo is mine

They didn’t used to be so close.

The trees.

Come with me, let me show you. Room to room. Window to window. Do you see? So close now, so close.

photo is mine

A long time ago I used to call it a wall of green. Back in the days when people were still a thing, and I’d do the gardening on sunny Sunday afternoons. Every now and then I’d stop and rest, rub the small of my back and grin at the trees.

‘Look at that wall of green,’ I’d say.

Because it was. Firs taller than the house, giant oaks, poplars, willows, sycamores and ash. So many trees. In the winter most of them shed their leaves and looked sorry for themselves. They looked barren and stark, nothing to offer but the impressive silhouettes they made against a silver moon.

But in the summer it was something… A wall of green I called it. From the huge trees lining the bridge across the road, to the endless rows of oaks, beech and hazel lined up along the lane, to the trees that edged our garden. Even the trees we added, the pear, and the apples, the plum, the cherry, the buddleia and the lilac, they grew so fast and were soon so tall they joined that great green wall.

And beyond that, sat us, surveying our huge green lawn, smiling smugly at the borders left to go wild, at the constant buzzing in the borage and the buddleia. Oh, we were smug, weren’t we? Thought we were doing our bit.

And oh, I did love those trees, that wall of green. We felt sheltered behind it, like nothing could ever touch us, like nothing could get through. And though a busy road ran past us, it didn’t feel like that in the garden, behind that ever growing wall of green.

We could hide there. Live there. Lie back on the grass and stare at the clouds. Listen to the robins and the blackbirds and the tits. Watch the crows see off the buzzards, and gasp in delight whenever a red kite hovered over us.

But things are different now. That life, that world, over. Only ourselves to blame, and all that. Of course. We always knew it was coming, always knew we were doomed. Why? Well, because people are mostly just awful that’s why.

Anyway. It doesn’t matter.

Things are different now, that’s all there is to say. That’s all I need to worry about. And the trees are closer. I know that. I feel it in my bones, in my blood. I suppose I could go out there with a tape measure, make an experiment out of it, prove myself wrong or right, but really, what would be the point?

I know.

photo is mine

The trees are closer now. They’ve crept in. Bit by bit. They’ve grown, multiplied, reached higher, spread wider. The green is startling, I can tell you that. It hurts my eyes. It makes my vision blur if I stare too hard. I start to get lost in all that green. I think about opening the door and letting it in. Or wandering out to join them. I think I can see faces in the trees — maybe people who felt that same longing, people who opened their doors.

They didn’t use to be this close, filling every single window. I can’t escape them now. Every window is covered. They stand like sentries, turning my home into a prison. And I am not free. I cannot simply leave.

Every window, I tell you, every single window. The green fills the space and there is no room for anything else. The green taps its fingers against the windows, asking to come in. The green scratches and scrapes, prods and pokes. The green is only pretending to be shy.

The green is terrible and beautiful and it is only what we deserve, after all, we slaughtered them, hacked off their limbs, uprooted them, burnt them. The green just wants to say hello. And oh, I am tempted to open the doors, open the windows. Let it touch me. Wander barefoot and mad into it’s inevitable embrace.

photo is mine

I tell myself to hold on. To wait. To try to live. I might be the only one left…

I tell myself to be brave, to try to survive.

I tell myself the green is patient and wise, but maybe it doesn’t mean to hurt me.

But I also tell myself that perhaps the green is the better option, the kinder end, because something darker and uglier and thicker and gnarlier roars and rumbles to life under the very house I stand in.

The roots are awake.

The roots are closer now.

The roots want to come in.

Thanks for reading! This was written in response to the prompt ‘from a window’ on The Wild Writers Club. Initially I wanted to take a photo from every window in my house showing the close trees, bushes and greenery and writing a non-fic piece about how much I love it. However, I started to get an idea for a creepy story instead so that’s what I went with…

Black Hare Valley: Chapter Two “The New Kid In Town”

~ ChanAtkins ~ Leave a comment
image is mine

© 2025 Chantelle Atkins. All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

NO AI TRAINING: Without in any way limiting the author’s [and publisher’s] exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

1

Jaime Perry’s first genuine introduction to Black Hare Valley is cold, wet and grey. The previous day a pleasant back-drop of blue skies and streaky white clouds had accompanied the cheery delivery of Jaime, her pregnant mother, Catherine, and her brand new step-father, Mark to the town.

Jaime, ever an optimist, is not discouraged to face different weather the next day. It’s one of the things Mark says he likes about her: her optimistic look-on-the-bright-side-of-life attitude. According to him, she will fit in well in Black Hare Valley. Having a father figure is still a novelty to Jaime, one she does not think she will ever tire of.

From the window of her bedroom above the Hare and Hound public house on the High Street, Jaime watches the heavy rain pummelling the thin glass of the window. She zips up her bright blue anorak, making sure her camera is lying snugly against her clothes where it won’t get wet. On her back she wears a slightly grubby pink backpack in which she has already stashed her reporter’s notebook, a packet of Wotsits, an apple, a handful of pens and a map of the town.

‘Oh, look at you!’ Mark comes into the room carrying yet another sagging cardboard box. She sees ‘Jaime’s bedroom’ written in black marker pen on the side and smiles at Mark gratefully.

‘Oh, thanks!’

Mark places it beside her bed and joins her at the window. ‘Not gonna let a bit of rain stop you then, eh?’

Jaime pulls up her hood. ‘Nope.’

‘Brilliant!’ He beams, as if she has made his day. ‘That’s the spirit. Just like me at your age; nothing could keep me indoors! I was always out there exploring in all weather.’

‘Do you think the rain will stop in time for the celebrations?’

Mark has already filled in her in on the town’s quaintly old-fashioned celebrations for May Day.

He tilts his head at the window. ‘Yeah, I think it will. It all kicks off at 3pm. You’ll be back by then, won’t you?’

‘Wouldn’t miss it for the world. So, where shall I start?’ Jaime asks, slipping her backpack from her arms. She unzips it and pulls out the map Mark gave her yesterday.

He frowns in concentration as he unfolds it and holds it out in front of him. Jaime runs her eyes over his kindly face and the way his brown curly hair lays in wiry waves against the collar of his blue and grey checked shirt. The shirt stretches over his slight beer belly, a gap between the shirt and his jeans revealing a white under t-shirt. He lifts one hand and strokes his curly beard – a thoughtful habit Jaime finds rather endearing. Her heart thuds with pride as she watches him.

In the year and a half that he and her mother have been together, Jaime has grown increasingly fond of Mark. She was there the day they met for the first time and she likes to think it will be a story she will retell in years to come. It’s certainly one she looks forward to telling her new brother or sister one day.

According to Mark it was instant love across the bar top. Catherine had gone into the popular high street bar to ask about a job they’d advertised. She had been nervous about it, Jaime remembers, clutching her daughter’s hand far too hard as she pushed open the door and strode up to the bar. Unfortunately, the position had already been filled and Jaime had watched her mother’s face fall in dismay. Since her father had left when she was a toddler it had always been just the two of them and times had often been tough.

Catherine hadn’t secured a job that day in their old town, but she had found herself an admirer, one who eventually managed to wrangle her telephone number out of her. The rest, as they say, was history, and now here they were, in Black Hare Valley. The beautiful, close-knit little town Mark grew up in.

‘Well, you’ll never do it all in one day but I’d say find the school so you’ll know your way in the morning.’ Mark jabs a fat thumb at the pub and then drags it along the High Street. ‘Past the library,’ he notes, giving her a wink. ‘We know you’ll want to check that out. Eugenie Spires has been running that place since I was a boy. She loves a bookworm! Then…’ He moves his thumb past a row of houses. ‘You see on your left here, you’ve got the nursery and the primary school, so cross over there and take the left onto School Lane. That’s how you get to the secondary.’

‘Oh okay, that’s simple enough. Is it a nice school? Nice teachers?’

‘You’ll love it,’ he enthuses. ‘You’re gonna fit right in, Jaime, I just know it. The headteacher, Mr Bishop, is tough but fair. And then, if you carry on up High Street, you’ve got the gift shop, café and post office. If you fancy getting a view of everything, you want to carry on past the vets and take the next right onto Walkers Road. See?’

Jaime leans over to watch Mark’s finger drag a route along a long stretch of road that loops around the back of the town.

‘Church,’ he points out. ‘Some flats. I’d avoid those people though. About the only ones that cause trouble around here. But keep going… and…’ His finger traces a route up into nowhere, ‘all that,’ he says, ‘is yours to roam. Fields for miles and miles. Pockets of woods to explore. Some old ruins. One of the hill forts is at the highest point but then eventually you’ll reach Rowan Farm. That’s private, obviously, which is a shame because the entrance to a Holloway is just below the hills there…’

‘What’s a Holloway?’ Jaime asks, already feeling the itch of curiosity, the desire to click her camera lens.

‘It’s just an old path trodden down over generations, but like I said, it’s Rowan’s property,’ Mark waves a hand to suggest it’s not worth pursuing, ‘but if you cut back down Rowan Lane here…’ His finger trails back towards town. ‘You’re back in town… a park there… The theatre there…. Then take Rowan Road back to the High Street via Lupin Lane and here we are.’ He jabs a triumphant thumb over her new home, the Hare and House Public House.

‘Thanks. I’ll do that then.’

Mark grins as he carefully refolds the map for her. ‘Well, that’ll be almost half the town explored anyway. This side. And up on those hills you’ll be able to see the whole place. Beautiful, it is.’

‘I can see why you wanted to come back,’ Jaime says as he packs the map back into her bag.

‘It’s even better in the sunshine,’ he says with a sigh, slipping his hands into his pockets. ‘You’ll settle in no bother. Lovely place for kids, this. The little lad’s gonna love it!’

‘Or the little lass!’ Jaime’s mum calls out from the stairs. Mark winks at Jaime and she winks back because they are both convinced the new baby will be a boy. ‘Mark, are you coming down? There’re some lads at the door wanting to know about opening times.’

‘Coming!’ he calls back. ‘No rest for the wicked. What, this place has been closed for all of two days? But these old-timers can‘t cope without it.’

He chuckles as he leaves the room and heads downstairs. Jaime follows, pausing on the stairs to lay a gentle, wondering hand on her mother’s swollen belly.

Catherine’s round open face provides a mirror to Jaime’s own. They have the same thin blonde hair, straight, neat and cut just above the shoulders to hang limply on either side of their inquisitive blue eyes. Like her daughter, Catherine is quick to smile and good at putting people at ease. Mark insists she will make a tremendous landlady.

She strokes Jaime’s hooded head. ‘Are you sure you don’t want to wait until the rain stops, sweetie?’

‘I’ll be okay.’ Jaime shrugs. ‘I’m in waterproofs, and school starts tomorrow so I won’t get another chance to explore.’

‘Okay, fair enough.’ Catherine sighs, smiling adoringly at her lovely daughter, so determined to put on a brave face and put the past behind her. ‘Well, don’t get lost.’

‘I’ve got the map Mark gave me.’

‘All right. But come back if the weather gets worse!’

‘I will.’

Her mum pinches her cheek. ‘Okay. Have fun.’

Jaime salutes – she intends to – and hurries downstairs. She peeks curiously into the bar area and can see Mark chatting to a cluster of old men who have stepped in out of the rain. They are all wearing dark macs and flat caps and the rain is dripping onto the maroon and gold carpet. One of them has what looks like a hairy whippet on a piece of old rope and it’s shivering between their legs, staring longingly at the fire.

‘If I let you in, they’ll all show up!’ Mark laughs. ‘And we’re not quite ready, that’s all it is, fellas. Deliveries will be arriving later and we can get all these barrels filled up for you!’

‘What about a tea or coffee?’ Jaime’s mother eases past her daughter to ask. ‘As neighbours, not customers? We can do that, can’t we Mark?’

There’s a cheer from the old men and a thankful grin from Mark. Jaime turns and goes out the back way. The pub kitchen is full of boxes to be unpacked and she’s not sure how many they can possibly open tomorrow with so much still to be done. She feels a twinge of guilt. Maybe she’s being selfish wanting to go off and explore. They could do with a hand here.

She pauses at the door, viewing the pub garden and trying to imagine it in better weather. It’s a long stretch of overgrown grass with faded picnic benches scattered haphazardly from one end to the other. At the far end is a swing set and plastic slide. A faint smile appears on her rain-splashed face as she pictures her baby brother (or sister) playing on them. She imagines herself pushing the swing or catching him (or her) as they come down the slide.

2

Jaime pulls the back door shut behind her and bumps straight into a fast-moving woman.

‘Oh!’ Jaime exclaims, stepping back and blinking up at the tall and imposing figure before her.

The woman is dressed in expensive looking Wellington boots of a rich red brown colour. Jodhpur trousers are tucked neatly inside the boots and a padded navy-blue jacket is buttoned up to her neck, where a blue and cream silk scarf is loosely wrapped. Jaime can see tiny pheasants on the material. Her eyes drift up to examine the long face with thin lips pulled into a blinding, white-toothed smile. The expression is one of instant curiosity – the surprisingly youthful grey eyes narrowed and intense. Her hair is silver, highlighted with ash blonde and worn in a severe twist at the back of her head. She holds a large black umbrella from which a steady cascade of rainwater is rolling off and onto Jaime.

She steps back again and the woman sticks out a hand inside a black leather glove.

‘You must be Jaime Perry,’ she states and her voice is loud, clear, calm and slow, giving the impression of someone who is used to being listened to and obeyed. She reminds Jaime a bit of her old headteacher – Mrs Bittern – the one who made so light of the bullying she had endured.

Jaime shakes the hand. ‘Yes. Hi.’

‘Margaret Sumner,’ the lady says, dropping her hand a little too quickly. Jaime frowns, knowing she has heard the name, panicking slightly that she should know who she is and ought to behave accordingly. ‘Mayor Margaret Sumner,’ the woman adds with a quick, small smile.

‘Nice to meet you,’ Jaime says with an audible sigh of relief. ‘Do you want to go in? I was just going out to explore.’

The mayor reaches for the door handle and places one boot on the step. Feeling crowded, Jaime moves around her and out into the rain.

‘Yes, dear,’ she replies. ‘You only arrived yesterday so you won’t have had a chance yet. I feel I ought to apologise for the weather.’

Jaime snorts a nervous laugh. There is something about this woman that makes her feel like she has done something wrong. ‘That’s okay, I don’t mind the rain.’

The mayor’s eyes track her up and down. ‘Yes, well, you’re certainly dressed for it. And it was absolutely glorious yesterday.’ She stares up at the dark clouds with a troubled expression. ‘It really can turn on a pin around here. You’ll get used to it, no doubt and don’t worry, May Day is going ahead as planned. I’ve just been overseeing the putting up of three very large marquees in the park!’

‘Oh, wow! That sounds great.’

‘Yes, I hope to see you all there later. There will be plenty of food and drink and I imagine it’ll be a good opportunity for you to meet people. Well, I’m going to go on in and introduce myself to your mother now. Of course, I’ve known Mark since he was a child.’

‘Did you grow up here too?’ Jaime asks out of politeness. Her mother has always told her that the best way to make conversation is to ask questions and encourage the other person to open up.

‘Oh yes, dear,’ Mayor Sumner says brightly. ‘My family have lived here for generations. In fact they founded Black Hare Valley, were the very first to settle here.’ She nods to the opposite side of town, to the towering stretch of green hillside Jaime can just see through the gathering mist. ‘I live up on Hill Fort Farm. That’s the highest point, you know.’

‘Oh.’ Jaime smiles.

Something flickers in the mayor’s eyes. They linger just a beat too long on Jaime’s – long enough for her cheeks to flush and her eyes to widen. Has she done, or said something wrong? The atmosphere feels icy…

‘Yes, I can see you all from up there. I can see everything. Now. Off you go. I’m going to tell your mother about our wonderful Neighbourhood Watch Committee.’

‘Okay. Nice to meet you, Mayor Sumner.’

Jaime watches, feeling a little unsettled, as the mayor opens the door without knocking and goes inside as if she owns the place.

Jaime spins away. ‘Okay then,’ she says to herself as she strides out of the gate and onto what must be the end of Lupin Lane. ‘Turn onto the High Street,’ she says and heads that way.

Jaime is smiling as she emerges but is forced to leap to the side as a huge brown truck powers down the High Street and through a puddle, spraying her with muddy water.

She shakes herself off. ‘Oh, damn.’

Jaime walks on, keeping close to the wall now, until she crosses the other end of Lupin Lane and finds the library. She stops at one of the windows and can’t resist peering inside. Mark was right about her being a bookworm. She feels excitement spreading through her at the size of the library, as she pictures how many books must reside behind its redbrick walls.

‘It’s huge…’ she says out loud, a bad habit born of years of loneliness. A passing man looks over his shoulder at her and her cheeks burn again.

3

Of course the library is closed for May Day. Jaime thinks it’s quite sweet, and just a tad old-fashioned how seriously they take the celebration. Her mother told her there would even be a procession along the high street – the May Queen sat on a throne and pulled along on a horse and cart, no less. Jaime thinks it’s adorable and wonders if the school would be interested in her writing about it. She’s hoping they have a school newspaper on the go and if they don’t, she hopes to suggest one.

She is grateful for May Day though. School being closed gives her a day to mentally prepare herself before she starts as the new girl tomorrow. My new life, she thinks and smiles again. A fresh start was what they all needed. Her mother had been right about that. A chance to start anew in a place where nobody knew her or the names she used to be known by.

Chubbs….Chubster…Chubba-wubba.

Sometimes Jaime can’t believe people have it in them to be so cruel. And now she hopes to put it all behind her. To start again. To have a second chance. She takes a deep breath and moves on. She’ll check out the library after school tomorrow. The thought excites her and she strolls on with a smile upon her face.

On the opposite side of the road she sees the nursery and primary school Mark mentioned. Walking on further reveals School Lane. No problem, she thinks, my school is down there. She stops for a moment and considers her options. She could cross over. The road doesn’t look too busy. It might be reassuring to wander past the school and suss out where the gates are, check out the size of it and so on. But, if she carries on, she can take the route that Mark advised.

She could have a peek at the gift shop and café and find Walkers Road. She stares up at the other ridge of the valley where the Rowan Farm must be. She feels the sudden urge to keep walking, to plough on up the hills, get that fantastic view Mark promised and maybe even keep going.

She turns in a circle and wonders how long it would take to walk around the entire town. She feels a pull – that thirst for knowledge her mum always jokes about – to see it all and know it all, to stand up there and spread her arms out as if wrapping them around her new home.

Decision made, Jaime continues to the gift shop. It’s an old-fashioned building with thick wooden beams and a thatched roof. It’s window curves outwards, small panes of glass divided up by green wooden frames. Windchimes tinkle. The window display reveals witches cauldrons, ornate candlesticks and leather bound books. The sign on the door says ‘open’. ‘Black Hare Gifts and Curios’ – Jaime mouths the words and thinks about going in. It looks dark, cosy, enticing. Candles flicker around a solitary till and she sees a face staring back at her.

Jaime pauses, unsure whether to wave or turn away, or go inside and say hi. She panics and does nothing, just stands and stares, all the time knowing how stupid and weird she must look. The face staring back is pale and almost hidden by two thick shafts of jet black hair and a heavy blunt fringe. The girl looks about her age and probably goes to the same school.

Oh God – why can’t she move? Smile? Wave? Do something?

4

Suddenly, a noise behind startles her. Snapped free from her trance, Jaime turns to see two teenage girls coming out of the café next door. Milly’s Café is a quaint white-washed building with a thatched roof identical to the gift shop’s. The windows are steamed up and a sea of chatter follows the girls outside as the door swings shut behind them.

Jaime experiences another awful panic-stricken moment where she is frozen to the spot. One of the girls is tall and rake thin. She has long blonde hair; the thick, luxurious type not the lank, dull kind like Jaime’s; she has almond shaped eyes a deep blue colour and her make-up is model flawless. She is wearing pink wellington boots and has a cream mackintosh tied at the waist. She looks Jaime up and down and giggles into her hand whilst turning slightly to address her shorter, more buxom friend.

‘Oh my god…’

Jaime follows their gaze and sees with dismay that her jeans and anorak are splattered with mud. Perhaps her face is too. It really was a huge puddle the truck roared through. The other girl has darker blonde hair and bright green eyes. Her complexion is clear, her skin like silk and her lips wide and full. She is several inches shorter than her friend with a curvy build contained under a black leather jacket she wears zipped up to her chin. She holds a huge black umbrella and stares at Jaime as if she has just landed from outer space. Her beautiful cherry red lips break into a wolfish, yet sultry smile.

Jaime acts without thinking, suddenly thrusting her wet hand at them as she straightens up like a solider on parade. The girls swap an incredulous look and burst into mutual laughter. Jaime’s nostrils flare and her lips tighten as she fights hard not to cry or panic. This isn’t the new start she had hoped for. This is all going wrong.

‘Jaime,’ she says, lowering her hand. ‘I just moved here.’

The girls swap another look. The tall one nudges the shorter one. ‘Ohhhh,’ she says. ‘That makes sense. Yeah, we heard about that. Don’t get too many new people about here. I’m Alexa.’ She nudges her friend again. ‘This is Bryony.’

Jaime feels a surge of hope. They’re talking to her. They’ve told her their names… She beams bravely.

‘Hi. So, do you go to…?’ She nods at the school across the road.

They both frown and Alexa says, ‘Yeah, obviously. It’s the only school in town.’

‘Your mum’s married Mark Aster,’ Bryony states, her green eyes narrowing.

Jaime nods, almost proudly. In truth, she is proud of Mark. He is a fantastic step-dad and she can’t wait to finally have a sibling.

‘Oh, yeah,’ says Alexa, turning to her friend with wide eyes. ‘God, yeah, he finally found someone to shack up with.’

‘Had to leave town for a few years to do it though!’ giggles Bryony.

‘Yeah well, he tried and failed with every woman here, right?’

‘Your mum?’

‘Yeah! Yours?’

‘Of course!’ Bryony makes a puking noise and quickly bores of Jaime. She rolls her eyes and flaps a dismissive hand in her direction. ‘I’m getting wet!’ she barks and quickly drags Alexa away.

Jaime turns, opening her mouth to say something, anything – but it’s already too late – they’re swishing past her and yet another umbrella shakes a cascade of rainwater onto her head.

A movement at the window catches her eyes and when she looks, the pale-faced girl stares back her, one eye visible through the curtain of hair. Jaime can’t deal with another rejection or more staring, giggling or eye-rolling at her expense, so she turns and hurries across the wet road, just knowing that she has to get away. Her planned route now forgotten, she finds herself plodding morosely along School Lane.

She can’t process the laughing or the belittling of Mark, not yet. It’s something that will come back to her tonight when she lies in bed, wide awake as her stomach churns with back-to-school dread.

For now, she splashes along, head down, cheeks burning. She tries to hold herself together. She tries to focus on the positives: the new baby; the new flat above the pub; her mum feeling happy and financially secure; Mark, being her friend and her father figure. She smiles. It’s okay. They were only two girls. She’s sure the rest of the children will be friendly. It will be okay.

And now she’s heading towards the school but she stops short when she spots a policeman crossing the school car park with a boy in handcuffs. It is the very last thing she expects to see but her instincts are cat-like, as she springs back and ducks behind the wall where she can peer out without being seen.

Her curiosity in overdrive, her eyes huge, her teeth biting at her lower lip, she does the first thing that comes into her head. She lifts her camera out from under her anorak and takes a snap.

The policeman is tall and broad, well-muscled and white-haired. He opens the door to a police car and pushes the boy into the passenger seat. Jaime holds her breath as her eyes devour the boy. He is perhaps a few years older than her, and tall. He’s wearing a rain spattered navy blue and black checked shirt and black jeans with rips at the knees. He has dark brown hair that is long and messy, curling in soft waves around his ears and neck, falling over his face when he leans forward. Jaime can’t see his face too clearly but still, she likes what she sees. She takes another photo before the policeman closes the door.

He gets in the other side and for a few minutes nothing happens. They must be talking. Jaime’s imagination and excitement are in overdrive. What did the boy do? Why is he in the school when it’s closed? Why has he been arrested? She wants to know. She needs to know.

Suddenly, the engine starts and the police car rolls slowly out of the school car park. Jaime starts walking fast, knowing that it will soon be out of sight and also knowing that she needs to keep it in her line of vision for as long as possible.

The car turns left. Jaime breaks into a run and tries to catch up. She finds herself on a road narrower than the High Street. Black Hare Road. She wonders if there is really such a thing as a black hare. She asked Mark about it when he first met her mother and he said it was a local legend, just a bit of fun.

At first she thinks the car is long gone but then she spots it parked outside a bookshop.

The Magic Of Books – Second Hand and Rare Books Bought and Sold. Maybe the boy lives there…

Jaime hovers at the roadside. She hides behind a parked white van and peers out. She looks through the lens of her camera and zooms in. All of a sudden she is right in the car with them – although they don’t know it and she can see the policeman taking off the boy’s handcuffs. Next, the boy digs into his pockets and hands over some small items she can’t quite make out.

What is going on here? Does the boy seem scared? His position is hunched, defensive, his expression tense. The policeman looks satisfied and amused as he receives the items and then something even stranger happens. The policeman gives something to the boy and the boy slips it inside his pocket.

What… the?

The boy gets quickly out of the car, moving as if he can’t get away soon enough, and the policeman drives away, still smiling to himself. Jaime snaps another shot, still unseen behind the van, as the rain-soaked dark-eyed boy walks stiffly and somewhat reluctantly into the bookshop.

Jaime cannot believe what she has just witnessed, but she zips the camera quickly back under the anorak and before she realises what she is doing, she’s crossing the road – the chase of a story burning her throat.

Thanks for reading!

Please feel free to leave a comment letting me know what you thought of Chapter One – May Day. Please also let me know if you would prefer shorter chapters. They are quite long and I could split each in half. What do you think of the characters introduced so far??

NOTE: Please remember this is NOT the finished version of Black Hare Valley Book 1. This book has not been to my editor yet or even my beta readers. There will be typos, grammatical mistakes, and sentences that need rewriting.

COMING NEXT THURSDAY: Chapter Three – Paddy’s Treehouse