CHAPTER 19
Kim jerked at my words, turning her face to me with a look of obvious fear, shaded with guilt.

“What do you mean?”

“He looks really fit, that lad, doesn’t he?”

“Who?”

She obviously wanted to avoid the subject, and we were only a short walk from our kettle and mugs, so I decided to leave her dogs sleeping, whatever they were.

“Come on, girl. I can see the tent from here. Get in and get those boots off your feet and the rest of you around a cuppa”

I rose from my seat on the low ridge of rock facing the climbers’ playground and tugged Kim to her feet, eliciting a groan from her as she straightened.

“Oh my legs!”

I grinned at her.

“No false promises from me, love! You will ache tomorrow, so I suspect it will be an easy day for us. I’ll drop a hint to Pat, and if she fancies the hills, I’ll take you over to Anglesey. Do you mind filling the kettle when we get down, and I’ll get the stove sorted?”

Over the little ladder stile, Kim grunting at each step, and a slow trudge past the side of the farmhouse. As we approached the tents, I warned her not to pull her boots off until she had filled said kettle. I hauled one of the sleeping mats out of the tent, and after I had set the kettle on the heat, I helped her off with her boots as she flopped back onto her back, eyes closed, a sigh of relief bursting free.

“Debbie?”

“Yes, love?”

“I need some better tits. The amount of sweating I’ve done today, the rice will be bloody sprouting!”

“Was it a good day, then?”

She grinned, but it wasn’t entirely sincere, so I left her to her thoughts until she could be ready and able to talk. It didn’t take long.

“Debbie?”

“Yup?”

“There’s nobody about, is there? Safe to talk?2

“I believe so, love. What is it?”

“What you said. About me being straight, that is. It just seems odd to put it that way. Still getting used to being me, being sort of real. Dad caught me a couple of times… There was this lad, at school…”

“You don’t have to talk now, Kim love”

“I need to get it out, don’t I?”

“Was he a nice boy?”

“No. Not at all. But he was gorgeous, and… And a girl can look, can’t she? But Dad saw me looking a couple of times, and that scar, the one just below my left armpit, that’s where the buckle caught me when he went that bit further one day. Sorry if I was rude. I mean, if there’s anyone I can trust…”

The tears were back, welling up and rolling down each side of her face, so I found some tissues to wipe, which led to a hug, of course, and then Pat’s car was there, tyres crunching over the gravel. The kettle was bubbling away, so it was brave faces for both of us as Kim rolled onto her stomach to hide any traces of her distress.

Pat had two camping chairs with her (“Always come prepared since we met, Deb”), and I settled onto my usual convenient little rock once the tea was poured. Pat was utterly relaxed, eyes closed as she lay back in her chair, and sighing happily as she sipped her tea.

“What do you fancy for tonight, girls? I am too knackered to cook, so if you want, I can run you down to Capel and we can grab a meal in the Bryn. You up for another hill day tomorrow, Kim?”

“Um, maybe not, Pat, if you don’t mind”

That brought a yelp of laughter from the older woman.

“I should bloody well think not, girl! That was a really hard day for anyone, never mind a complete beginner! What do you fancy for tomorrow, then? Honestly?”

“Debbie said something about the island…”

“Birdwatching?”

“Yeah… Deb’s shown me a few things. Would be nice”

“Debbie?”

“Yes, Pat?”

“South Stack or Newborough?”

“You’d be driving, butt”

“Then it’s Newborough, after a stop at Llanfairbloodysilly, Malltraeth and South Stack. They’ve got a camera at Twr Elen now”

Kim perked up.

“A camera?”

“Nest camera. Peregrines”

“Oh wow!”

“Got your cossie?”

Crash and burn, yet again, and Pat noticed. Another sigh.

“There’s nobody close by, girls. I think it’s time for that talk we’ve been putting off. You OK with that. Debbie?”

She was right. I reached out for Kim’s hand in reassurance.

“If Kim is, Pat. Her story, her choice. Kim?”

“Yes?”

“I’m going to say a few things here, things about me. Some of them, Pat already knows. I don’t want to take away from your stuff; I just think if I set out my stall, it might make stuff easier for your bit. You OK with that?”

She nodded, and I dove in.

“Pat met me when I was with Mam and Dad. They were people who found me when I was living rough. NO! Shush; just listen for now”

Pat ‘s full attention was on me now, as well as Kim’s.

“Pat said it, when we first met. I didn’t look like my parents, and that’s because they were my Mam and Dad, not my mother and father. My father was fond of the belt. I ended up in a home, and it was a nasty one. Please, Pat. Not a word, just while I get this out. Some of the people who worked in that home moved on to another place, that hellhole in Carlisle. I escaped. Not soon enough, but not too late, if you see what I mean. That’s all I am going to say. What you choose to say is your choice, Kim, and I only said all that because I trust Pat, and I think she’s put a few things together already. Am I right, my friend?”

Pat nodded, then softened her face into the gentlest of smiles for Kim.

“I think I need to say a couple of things as well, Kim. No danger from me, OK? I’ve just noticed some things, and I understand, I think, what your worry is about swimming. I saw the marks around your shoulders when you were in the washroom yesterday, and I will leave it there. I also think… I think you’ve not really been yourself in public, not for long. If you want, we can find you a swimming costume in Bethesda; I know a shop. End of my probing, apart from one question. Debbie?”

“Yes?”

“We likely to get any official worries?”

“No. Kim is with me with local council approval, sort of. Got some tame coppers and the social services”

I looked back at my little girl.

“Better than that place I found you, aye?”

That brought a grin, finally, and Kim’s next question brought the reassurance I sought.

“How cold is the water, Pat?”

“Ummmmm… bracing is the word, I think”

The meal in the Bryn Tyrch was excellent, the clientele mixed and I was pleased to see several obvious locals at the bar rather than an exclusively foreign clientele. Pat was busy saying hello to several, including a man she explained was a local shepherd, a thin man in a woolly hat whose English consisted largely of odd sighs and sniffs, Pat explaining later that his English wasn’t that good. There were motorcyclists, NOT bikers, talking loudly about engine sizes and Powervalve Yamahas, climbers having their odd conversations consisting largely of arm-waving as they re-enacted the moves they had made on whatever silly bit of verticality they had been playing on, a few singletons, including a man with red hair in a ponytail who spent what seemed like the whole evening staring at his succession of pint glasses, and a familiar looking young man in a group of other lads and girls of around the same age. I whispered to Kim.

“Still as fanciable with all his clothes on, love?”

My worries were eased when she smiled, saying “Fuck, yeah!”

Thank god.

Another wonderful sunrise, another campers’ special breakfast (how much bacon had Pat loaded into her car?), and then off along the A5, Pat announcing at the Bethesda stop that our itinerary would be reversed. We found a one-piece costume in Kim’s size, as well as one for me, and then we barrelled along the main road to Holyhead and the cliffs of South Stack.

Three sorts of auk. Chough. Peregrines on their nest, visible by peeking over a low wall by Ellen’s Tower. Seals below the cliffs. All sorts of waders and ducks at Malltraeth. Orchids and a grasshopper warbler at Newborough. That incredible stretch of beach, Pat repeating her peak-naming for Kim before we all changed and took the plunge into the SODDING HELL IT’S FREEZING bracing waters, Kim’s breasts left on the beach wrapped in her clothes after yet another hug of reassurance from Pat.

A wonderful day.

We stopped in Bethesda on the way back, for something nice for our evening meal, which we shared around our tents, the shadow of Tryfan gradually moving over the campsite as we cooked, laughed and ate.

As the darkness set in, Kim and I retired to our tent, and as I settled into my bag, I heard her whisper.

“Could you hold me please, Debbie?”

I moved over so we could spoon.

“Thank you, Deb. You know so many good people. Makes me feel safer”

She paused, and I could feel tension in her shoulders.

“Debbie?”

“Yes, love?”

“Could you sing to me? Please?”