CHAPTER 29
I have to admit that the rest of the session was more than a little anticlimactic after our lunacy. We got through the dances with minimal hiccups, and finally Di had us play some polkas for a while so those who still had the energy could burn it off.

Eventually, we wound down and Jerry came over with a tray of drinks. They didn’t touch the sides. I had been sipping bottled water throughout, but the pint was bliss. Kelly was one of the first to get to me as I slumped onto a plastic chair.

“How the hell do you do that, that squeaky jumpy bit?”

“Overblowing? It’s all a matter of getting the embouchure right, just at the right angle, and blowing a bit harder. Basically, a faster air stream at a different angle makes the air column vibrate at a different harmonic…your eyes are glazing over, Kelly”

“Yeah, right, that’s why I couldn’t really get that far with it. I am sticking to reeds and whistles. It’s like a fiddle and a mandolin, isn’t it? No frets to guide you, you have to be spot on”

“Yes, that’s why I like it, the subtlety, the control. If you start down that other road, you end up playing a banjo–oh, hello, Eric!”

“Bloody magic, mate! The two of you---insane. I was praying you wouldn’t fall over when you did that one-legged bit”

I laughed. “So was I, Eric. Oh, hiya Den, Kirsty!”

Dennis was dripping with sweat, and Kirsty was doing her best to distract every male in the area with nipples poking through her own damp top like Dennis-seeking missiles. I could understand her reaction, he was making me a bit unnecessary too. Kirsty was bouncing and as a result jiggling with excitement.

“Bugger me, Sarge, I would never have suspected you had that in you! That was fucking brilliant, and that tart with the red hair, fuck me!”

“The tart is called Steph, and is standing behind you”

“Shit…..”

She turned round and saw only Dennis and some random strangers.

“Sergeant Price, you are a sod! Never done this sort of thing before, I have got to do it again! Sweating like an otter’s pocket, I am.”

She indicated a group of coppers that I knew, mostly sweaty and clutching pints.

“We’re off round the Six Bells in a bit. You coming?”

Behind her, Den shook his head very, very slightly and mouthed ‘No’.

“Ruth, I would love to, but we have a dinner tonight round at Steph’s, just for the folk involved, and it would be rude, aye?”

“OK, Sarge! Laters!”

She moved off as Den smiled his thanks, and I watched them as they walked away, Ruth far enough away from Dennis to look almost innocent, but close enough to eviscerate any woman that approached him. I stretched on my seat, rolling my head to try and loosen some of the tension from nearly two hours of playing. I felt a pair of hands start to massage my neck: Ginny.

“That is lovely, Gin, lovely. You and Kate along for dinner?”

“Miss a free meal? Do I look stupid? No, leave that one!”

I leaned back into the embrace of a woman I was beginning to think of as a lifesaver, and she eased my tension till I was almost purring. Eric looked over, grinned and came close enough to whisper to me.

“Annie, I thought you were straight!”

“Well, when I find a man who can do this he’ll be a keeper”

Fuck, did I just say that out loud? Clearly I did, because Ginny was snorting. I actually felt the blush. Eric just grinned, the sod.

We were packed up soon enough, and a motley group of cyclists and vans headed off to Chez Woodruff where there was indeed a meal planned. Naomi had popped back partway through the dance to get the oven heating, and as we entered there was that absolutely gorgeous smell that only comes from roast lamb. Naomi had prepared a nut loaf sort of thing for Ginny, but the rest of us carnivores were salivating. It was only a few minutes before what needed unloading was off, and then Albert cracked a couple of bottles of fizzy wine.

“A toast before dinner, to music and life!”

We made quite a large group, even though Di had dragged Ben off to the pub instead, and Steph had set out two tables, the French windows open to the conservatory to keep us in touch. There were Jerry Summers and his wife Yvonne, Simon, the Woodruff horde, Albert and Naomi, the McDuffs, my girls and myself. And Eric. Even the banjo player got a feed, though of course he had played guitar, so he was almost a musician now. We were spread around to break up couples, and I ended up sandwiched between Big Bill and Eric. I sipped my glass of fizz and waited for the hubbub to die down a little, then tapped my glass with a spoon in the old signal for attention.

“I have an announcement, that most of you know already. I ask, for now, that it stays in this room”

“Rooms!” called out Ginny.

“Shut it or I’ll hide your knives. Now, it has taken me a long time to be able to face this squarely, but have good friends. Most of you know of my involvement with the poor girl who started this event off, but that is really just a very nasty coincidence. I am astonishingly lucky to have the friends I have, whom I now thank from the bottom of my heart. As I said, coincidences. Melanie, Steph there, Jerry…and me.”

Ginny was crying, and to my astonishment Eric and Big Bill both took my hands and squeezed.

“Yes, another one. I shall do the traditional thing. My name is Anne, Annie to my friends, and I do believe we are all friends here. I don’t know where I am going yet, I just know it’s away from where I’ve been. Cheers and iechyd da!”

The boys let go of my hands as I sat down, and I ducked my head to my wine glass to hide my shaking. Sal had a tear in her eye as well, I had noticed, but a smile on her lips. Big Bill laid an arm over my shoulders and squeezed me.

“Well done, friend. Don’t worry, courage is rewarded”

Eric echoed him from my other side. “You have more courage in you than anyone I have met, mate. No wonder you fell apart for a bit”

He slipped his arm below Bill’s and around my waist, and the two hugged me for a few seconds together. For once, not the first time, but the first in a long, long while, I felt almost feminine.

The subject was changed almost immediately, of course, and the discussion ranged far and wide, but always, always coming back to music, and mostly that day’s. The meal was superb, and we were on to the coffee, but I understood that the Woodruffs exuded music as others ate and breathed, and I had no issues there. I wondered about poor Eric, so asked him.

“Eric, do you want me to explain what some of the talk is about?”

“What do you mean, Annie?”

“Well, it’s about music, which is a bit of an unknown country for you…”

Ginny snorted, and Kate slapped her arm before passing her a tissue. Eric sighed.

“What is it about you and banjos?”

I grinned, toying with my coffee cup. “sTraditional, innit?”

“Annie, have you ever thought, as a classically trained guitarist who plays banjo because it is fun, that I might just find the constant put-downs upsetting?”

“Na, that would imply sensitivity and finer feelings, and you are a banjo player, so…..besides, I know you”

He grinned, and it was like sunlight. “Yeah, you do, and I can’t keep a straight face long enough, you cow. Seriously, what do you need from me? You have a lot of shit ahead”

“Eric, mate, I won’t know until I need it. Just be ready, is all I ask”

Big Bill was listening. “Ah, I always say ‘be excellent to one another’, it works for me. That’s what struck me about Steph when I met her, she cared about people, Geoff in particular, of course, but she did things for our family that can never be repaid, not in this cycle. Karma will do its thing, of course. I get the same feeling from you. I was talking to your colleague at the dance, Dennis is it? Pretending not to be with the girl with the huge chest?”

Shit. “Yes, Dennis. What did he have to say?”

Big Bill smiled, and several of the others leaned in. “He told me of a young boy, lost in a world he thought hated him, who did foul things just to be noticed, but who did them as a show and not out of malice, and he told me of a policewoman who saw, and understood, and cared, but still did their duty. Did it in a way to make a child feel human again. That is what speaks to me from your soul, Annie Price, true love for humanity, but with the realism that your vocation brings. Tell me…how many deaths?”

I started to shake at that, and Eric hugged me again. Bill sighed. “Too many, I see. Annie, you bear a weight on your soul that I can never truly understand, so look around you. These people are your world. They care. Whenever the souls you could not save call to you, remember the ones who care for you. Realise too, that the word ‘policewoman’ was Dennis’ choice. He told me he could see clearly what you are.”