ALANA'S MISTAKE ✔

Chapter 18

Alana stood in her drawing class, unable to focus her attention on the naked woman who sat in the middle of the room, draped in blue crushed velvet material. She was supposed to be creating a pencil rendition of this lady's curves and try as she might to capture the shades cast across her shoulders and chest it was simply impossible.

She could not get her mind off the letter Elias sent to her yesterday, the slice of anxiety that had been served up to her in a bright red envelope. As soon as she'd finished reading she had taken it to the bathroom and ripped it into a thousand tiny pieces then thrown it in the bin, checking to see that none of the black, scrawled words were decipherable.

But the memory of it lingered like the ache of an injured body part. Those drawings, intermingled among the writing, excruciatingly detailed and somehow, so dark. He had painstakingly drawn every feather on the wings of that angel. She cringed inside to think how long it must have taken him and she could see him in her mind's eye, bent over the page, his hair falling over his eyes, carefully drawing, drawing, drawing.

He had talked about love in that letter. Love? He didn't even know her. One night and he thinks it could be love? She felt like it wasn't her, it could not possibly be her, that he loved. It must be an idea of her, she thought, an idea projected onto her. But not who she actually was. It couldn't be. It made her wonder what could have led him to this point, how could he have such an unreal perspective on what was actually happening?

Why, why, why had he mentioned Snow? She kept trying to reassure herself that it was a passing comment, one of the strange ways he expresses himself. She always worried about Snow, it was her job as a mother, to keep her safe. Noah always said she worried too much. She also kept trying to tell herself that he would give up on her soon, but a sinking feeling in her stomach kept whispering to her otherwise.

The rest of her classmates stood at their easels, staring at the naked woman who sat so still you could hardly see if she was still breathing, before turning back to work on their drawings. The sun was cascading through the huge windows, making the shadows fall longer and sharper. Alana looked at her own drawing which consisted of the side of the woman's face, her neck and half her shoulder. It wasn't like Alana to be distracted - usually she would be absorbed in every angle and curve of the woman's body, representing what she saw in her own unique way on the page.

By the time the minutes of drawing class had ticked by and she had finished only a very basic figure outline, she packed up her bag and sloped out of the classroom without saying a word to anyone. She walked home, underneath the dappled shade of the trees, eventually arriving in front of her house.

As she approached the driveway she saw Snow there, dressed in her school uniform - black blazer with a cherry-red rim around the sleeves and along the collar, a white blouse, white socks up to her knees below a pleated grey skirt. Her hair was bunched into curly pigtails, her face squinting against the sunlight.

'Mummy! Mummy!' she called.

Alana's heart stood still in her chest.

'What's wrong?' she cried, running down the driveway, arms outstretched towards her daughter.

'Nothing's wrong, Mummy! We've got something to show you!'

Snow looked puzzled.

'I'm ok. Look.'

Alana breathed a heavy sigh of relief and held her chest for a few seconds in an effort to calm her heart. Snow took her mother's hand and pulled her along the driveway, towards the camper van which was parked where it always was, under the shade of a massive oak tree in the garden.

Suddenly Noah popped out from under the van, on his little board with wheels on it, the one he used whenever he was fixing engines. He had his blue overalls on and he grinned at Alana as she stood there.

'Got a surprise for you,' he said, wiping his tool with a greasy rag.

Alana's art bag was heavy on her shoulder, full of pencils and supplies, so she dropped it onto the ground, letting it lie on the lawn. Snow pulled her over to the back end of the camper van, then once Noah was stood behind them, she flung open the doors.

'Ta da!' said Snow. 'We made you a picnic..'

In front of them, inside the van, was the tiny camper table complete with a flowery table cloth, sandwiches, a pot of tea, cakes and even little pots of yoghurt for each of them. Alana broke out into a smile.

'It's gorgeous!'

Snow beamed and dragged her inside, explaining that this would be their dinner tonight and that mummy didn't need to cook, and that they did it so she could get used to the camper van, so she would be prepared for their trip to all the beaches in summer.

The three of them sat there, nibbling on the food, laughing and joking. Both Noah and Snow were at pains to describe to her in as much detail as they could how great the camper van was and why it was the best way in the world to travel and how they didn't need hotels, they just needed these four wheels.

Snow kept telling her all about the beaches and what they could do there together, as if Alana needed any more convincing. In truth, her only wish was that summer would hurry up and arrive sooner.