The Forest of Adventures (#1 of The Knight Trilogy) Read Free Page B

coat had almost sent me half demented with the warm spiced
smell of his body and I was strangely grateful that the house was
filled with the rich smell of roast chicken in the hope that I
could now be free of it.
    Mum was sat huddled between her
desk and the wood burning stove and Sam was sat at the dining
table, several science textbooks sprawled out. He had his
headphones in and hadn’t noticed me come in. Standing outside of
the half open door and looking in at the peace and warmth of the
room, I felt a sudden wave of guilt which felt like a distressing
blend of love and claustrophobia all rolled into one.
    Mum stretched, removed her
glasses and stood up before making her way to the kitchen. As she
passed Sam, she placed a hand on his shoulder. It was the action of
a mother who loved her son dearly. One big happy family! Something about it all suddenly freaked me and I took a step back
knocking over Martha’s umbrella, sending it skittering to the floor
in a noisy commotion.
    “Mina, is that you? Run up and
wash your hands. I’m about to serve supper and don’t forget to feed
Dusty before we eat.”
    As if my guilt couldn’t get any
worse, I pushed my bedroom door open to find a small bunch of white
hyacinths lying on top of my pillow. A small card had been slotted
into the top of them on which Sam had written the simple, yet most
important of all words - I love you- in his spider like
handwriting . I lifted the flowers up to my nose, taking in
their pretty sweetness and immediately the events at the bookshop
came back to me.
    Sam was not usually so showy in
his feelings. He wasn’t given to corny clichés and often took the
piss out of the sort of grand gestures Matt made to Sara on an
almost daily basis. However, the simplicity of the flowers and the
inscription showed that Sam was aware that something was wrong and
he cared about it enough to put it right. I knew he deserved to be
loved and not hurt and I promised myself to put things right. But
even as I made the promise, I knew that it wasn’t one that I’d be
able to keep. Something had changed and it wasn’t going to change
back.
    I pulled on my deep emerald
jumper which was Sam’s favourite and looped my string of green
glass beads around my neck. Sam had bought them for me on my last
birthday. He said they matched the colour of my eyes and I loved
them, yet tonight when I looked at myself in the mirror they
reminded me of a beautiful noose.
    *
    Dinner was already on the table
by the time I arrived downstairs and Sam was lighting the candle
with a firelighter lit from the wood burner. With his spare hand he
made to reach out and take mine but stopped as if thinking better
of it. Instead he cracked an awkward smile before speaking,
    “Hello stranger. I’d started to
think about sending out a search party.” His voice was trying to
put on a comic edge but it was tense. I smiled and shrugged, unable
to give him either an unhurtful or rational explanation as to where
I’d been and he deserved better than a lie. “Thought maybe you had
been kidnapped by aliens or that you’d finally made good your
promise to run away with the circus.”
    I could barely meet his eyes,
thinking that there was nothing more genuinely painful then when
somebody you loved tried to hide their hurt and confusion with a
joke.
    I hoped a half truth would
satisfy him, “I went to the bookshop.” He nodded. I panicked,
“Thank you for the flowers Sam, they’re really lovely. Look I…” but
before I could finish, Mum busied into the room carrying the gravy
and interrupting my apology.
    Dinner was chatty, a result
maybe of all of us trying to hide the weird atmosphere. Mum fired
questions at Sam and me in quick succession and Sam, seemingly
satisfied that things were hopefully on their way back to normal,
was happy to indulge her.
    By nine o’clock, Mum had
already gone up to bed, book in one hand and a cup of hot chocolate
in the other and Sam was snuggled up on the sofa under