The Long Morning

The bank job had been handed out before breakfast, and the fluff who had it had said yes in the way you say yes when everybody is looking.

By mid-morning word had got round to Bravo — through Hushy, then Chatty, then Pinky, gathering speed.

"I'll take it," said Bravo.

"You don't have to," said Pinky.

"I know."

The bank was worse than it looked. Wet, steep, all loose stuff underfoot, with nettles doing well at the bottom. Bravo stood at the top of it and felt the whole thing arrive: the drop, the slipperiness, a clear picture of going down it much faster than planned.

And this is the point where Bravo, historically, says easy! and goes.

Bravo did not say easy.

"I'm scared of this bit," said Bravo, out loud, to nobody in particular.

Shivvy, who had come along to point out where the black bits were, went very still. "You are?"

"Feel it in my feet," said Bravo. "Right, then." One breath in. One small step, sideways, onto the part that looked solid.

It was solid. So was the next one.

Four lanterns came up out of the nettles, one at a time, passed hand to hand.

And at the top, Shivvy — who had walked down three steps of it without noticing, following — said, "I didn't know you got scared."

"Everybody knows now," said Bravo. "That's the improvement."

Buddy knows everyone's name, which sounds like a small thing until there are fifty-five of you and somebody has to sort out who is going where.

"Right," said Buddy. "Bridge to orchard. Two of you. Off you go."

It went well for about ten minutes. Then it did the thing it always does: the pairs formed up fast at the front, and at the back, slowly, there were the ones left standing.

Peeky, looking at the ground. And a little further off, Lonny, looking hard at a fence post, pretending very carefully not to be waiting.

Buddy has seen this exact shape in a yard a hundred times. The worst part is not being last. The worst part is the counting — standing there while everyone works out that you are what is left over.

So Buddy did not announce anything. Buddy just walked over, before the numbers got that far.

"Peeky. You and Lonny have got the orchard stretch. It's the long one. I gave it to you two because it needs somebody who'll actually count the hooks instead of guessing."

That was true, as it happens. It was also not the reason.

Lonny said, "Oh — with me?" and Peeky said nothing at all but went slightly less small.

They went off up the lane together, and by the bend they were talking, and by the orchard they were laughing at something, and neither of them ever knew they had been rescued.

Buddy went back to the list. Friends stick together. Somebody has to arrange it so they can.

The trouble with the path was that nobody could see all of it at once.

You could stand at the gate and see the gate end. You could stand at the orchard and see the orchard. Nobody, not even Zippy, who had run the whole thing, could hold the shape of it in one go — and so fluffs kept doing the same stretch twice and missing the one in between.

"Let's make something," said Doodle, and went and got the big roll of paper.

Doodle drew it on the floor of the barn, on her knees, with everyone tripping over her. The gate. The three steps. The lane. The bridge, with a proper drawing of the bridge. The orchard as a row of small green blobs. The long bend. Winky's house at the end, with a lantern over the door already drawn in, because Snoozy had been very clear about that.

Then every hook, as a dot. It took ages. There were a great many dots.

Muddle came in with wet knees and an armful of ditch-lanterns and stopped dead. "Oh," said Muddle. "Oh. It's all in one piece."

Humdy, who had been bored since about nine o'clock, immediately wanted to colour in a dot every time a hook got filled, and was given the job, and was not bored again all day.

By eleven the map was pinned on the barn door and fluffs were coming in to look at it the way you look at a window.

Doodle sat back on her heels with paper all over her and said, happily, "Right. Who wants the pens?"

The hinges had been in a damp box all season, and damp is a thing hinges remember.

"Grrr," said Fizzy, to hinge number four. "Why won't it work?"

Fizzy had a system. Fizzy always has a system: hold the lantern, thumb on the pin, push, twist. It had worked nineteen times, if you counted the ones that worked eventually, which Fizzy did.

Hinge number four did not care about the system. Fizzy pushed harder. The pin went sideways. Fizzy pushed harder than that, and something in the frame made a small unhappy noise, and the fizzing went right up to the top of Fizzy's head, the way it does, all at once, like a bottle shaken.

Huffy, who was sitting on the wall cutting rope into short lengths and being cross about it, said, without looking up: "You're going to break it."

"I am FIXING it."

"You're fixing it very hard," said Huffy.

Which is an annoying thing to hear and an even more annoying thing to be right about.

So Fizzy put the lantern down. Shook both paws out, right down to the tips. Stopped. Waited. Counted the hinges still to go, which was four, which was not actually very many.

Then picked it up again and did it slowly.

It went on the first go.

"Huh," said Fizzy.

Zippy came past at speed, shouting something about the path being longer than everyone thinks, and Fizzy — who an hour ago would have shouted back over the top — said, "Say that again. Slower."

Handy had done eight jobs before the sun was properly up.

That is not a boast. Handy simply sees them: the hook swinging loose on its nail, the bucket with the handle going, the gate that will jam later if nobody lifts it now. Handy sees who needs help before they have worked out how to ask, and then Handy's paws are already moving.

By mid-morning Handy had rehung eleven hooks along the lane, carried the glass up from the shed twice, and fixed the bucket.

By mid-morning Handy's arms had also started doing the shaky thing.

"Handy!" somebody called from the yard. "Could you just —"

And Handy opened their mouth to say how can I help, because that is what comes out, it comes out on its own, it does not even wait to be sent.

Lovey got there first.

"Handy's having a sit down," said Lovey, cheerfully, to the yard. "Handy told me so."

"I didn't," said Handy.

"No," agreed Lovey. "But you'd tell me to, if my arms were doing that. Wouldn't you."

Handy looked at their arms. Then Handy did the thing that is supposed to come after helping, and hardly ever does: checked in. How are you, Handy? Honestly? Worn thin, thank you, and it is not yet eleven o'clock.

So Handy sat on the step with a cup of something, for eleven whole minutes, and let the ninth job go to somebody else. It got done. Slightly worse. It got done.

And Handy was still standing at sundown, which was the entire point.

"That rope's no good," said Huffy.

Everybody carried on. Somebody was singing. The rope in question was already looped through nine lantern handles at once, so the whole lot could go down the lane in one swinging bundle, which is a much better system than walking nine times.

"I said," said Huffy, louder, "that rope is no good."

The singing stopped.

"Huffy," somebody said, in the voice fluffs use when they think you are spoiling something. "Not today. Please."

And there it was: the puff. Up it came, hot and fast, right behind Huffy's eyes, because Huffy had not said it to spoil anything. Huffy had said it because there was a place near the middle where the rope had gone soft and hairy and pale, and anyone in the yard could have seen it if anyone had looked.

So Huffy breathed in big, and blew out like a dragon, and squeezed both paws, and counted to ten. It took the whole ten.

Then Huffy walked over, picked up the rope, and held out the frayed part without saying anything at all.

Fizzy came and looked. Then Winky. Then everybody, which is how it goes.

"Oh," said Winky.

"Nine lanterns," said Huffy. "Over the bridge. Onto the stones."

Nobody apologised, because nobody ever quite does. Somebody said "well spotted" in a small voice and went back to work, and the singing started again.

Huffy sat down on the wall feeling exactly as cross as before and entirely certain it had been worth it.

Then Huffy cut the rope into short lengths, three lanterns to a length, so that if one went, only three went.

"I'm SO huffy," Huffy told the wall.

The wall did not argue.

Lonny had been standing at the edge of the yard since eight o'clock.

Not doing nothing. Lonny was being available. There is a way of standing that says I am here, and I would love to be asked, and I will not survive asking, and Lonny had it down to an art.

The thing Lonny believed, and had believed for a long time, was this: the fluffs who get picked are the ones somebody wants. If nobody comes over, that is the answer, and it is politer not to make anyone say it out loud.

Pinky came over eventually, the way Pinky does — already talking, already carrying something, already halfway into asking Lonny to help with the glass.

And Lonny heard the words come out of their own mouth: "No."

Which was not at all what Lonny meant.

"I mean — I've been standing here all morning trying to say a thing and you keep getting there first." Lonny's ears had gone a colour. "Can I do the orchard hooks? For you. Not with you. For you."

There was a pause about a thousand years long.

"Yes please," said Pinky. "Thank you, Lonny."

That was the whole thing. Lonny went up the lane with a job under one arm and a feeling like being three inches off the ground, and met Peeky at the bend, and they counted forty hooks between them instead of guessing.

Somewhere around hook twenty-nine, Lonny thought: nobody was ever going to come over and ask. Not because they didn't want me. Because they were all busy, and I looked fine.

"Want to be friends?" Lonny said to Peeky, who had not said anything for ten minutes.

"We already are," said Peeky. "You asked me at hook four."

Muddle had been sent for wicks.

Muddle had also been sent for oil, and asked about the glass, and told something about the bridge, and by the time Muddle left the yard there were six jobs in Muddle's head and they were all shouting.

"Too... many... things," said Muddle, to the lane.

So Muddle did the thing Tidy had said at the gatepost: pick the smallest, do just that. Wicks. One word. Muddle held on to it like a handle and set off.

And went the wrong way.

It is easy to do when you are holding on to one word: your feet go where they like. Muddle got halfway down a slope that was not the way to anywhere before noticing that the shed had failed to appear, which is not what sheds do.

Muddle stopped at the bottom of the bank, in the nettles, thoroughly lost.

And there, tipped on its side in the wet with the lid off and half its contents spilled into the ditch, was a wooden box.

Muddle looked at it for a while. Then Muddle counted what was in the ditch, which took some time, and was twenty-two.

Getting back up the bank with an armful of lanterns took three trips and cost Muddle both knees. At the top, Puzzly was coming the other way with a bucket and a puzzled expression.

"Why have you got those?"

"Because I went the wrong way," said Muddle, "to the shed."

"That's not an answer."

"It is today," said Muddle.

By the middle of the morning, Pinky had the whole land organised.

It had happened the way it always happens. Somebody said, "Who's doing the wicks?" and looked at Pinky. Somebody else said, "Who knows where the spare glass is?" and looked at Pinky. And Pinky, who cannot help it, said yes, and yes, and of course, and made a list, and the list got longer, and Pinky's own name was written at the bottom of it four separate times.

Wicks. Glass. Oil. The hooks past the orchard, because nobody had claimed those.

"You matter, and so do I," Pinky said, quietly, to a bucket. It is a good line. It is easier to say than to do.

Lonny had been hovering at the edge of the yard for a while. Lonny does that — stands just close enough to be asked, and never quite asks.

Pinky went over, because Pinky always goes over. "Lonny! Come and help me with —"

"No," said Lonny.

Pinky stopped.

"I mean —" Lonny went red to the ears. "I don't mean no. I mean I've been standing here all morning trying to say a thing and you keep getting there first." Lonny took a breath. "Can I do the orchard hooks? For you. Not with you. For you."

"Oh," said Pinky. "That's kind, but honestly it's quicker if I —"

And then Pinky heard it. The sound of it. It's quicker if I.

Handy, going past with an armful of rope, said, without stopping, "Pinky. Let them."

So Pinky crossed both arms over her chest and tapped, slowly. Left. Right. Left. Right. And under the tapping was a thing Pinky does not say out loud very often, which is that being the one who helps is also a way of never being the one who needs anything.

"Yes," said Pinky. "Yes please. The orchard hooks. Thank you, Lonny."

Lonny went off up the lane at a sort of skip, carrying a job, looking about four inches taller.

And Pinky sat down on an upturned bucket, in the middle of the busiest morning of the year, and did absolutely nothing for a count of ten, and found that the land did not fall over.

Tidy was explaining the plan at the gatepost, in order, with pictures.

It was a good plan. Squirmy could see that it was a good plan. Squirmy could also feel both feet doing a small independent dance, and a sort of fizz travelling up from the ankles, and a powerful need to be anywhere doing anything.

"First this," Tidy was saying, "then that."

Squirmy made it to then that.

"Sorry," said Squirmy, already moving. "Sorry. Back in a minute."

Ten big jumps at the end of the lane. Ten proper ones, arms and all. Then Squirmy came back and managed another whole minute of the briefing, which is not nothing.

Zenny, sitting perfectly still at the edge of it all, watched this happen twice and then said, quietly: "Squirmy. What's the job at the far end?"

"Carrying. All the way past the orchard and back. Loads of it. Miles."

"Mm," said Zenny, and went back to being still, having said the entire thing without saying any of it.

Squirmy thought about that for approximately one second and then went and took the far-end carrying job off a fluff who had been dreading it, and did it twice over before lunch, at a run, singing.

Everyone said afterwards that the far end went up faster than anyone expected.

Squirmy never did find out what was on the fourth picture of Tidy's plan.

Tidy likes a morning with a shape in it. First this, then that.

This morning had no shape at all. Nobody had ever done this before. There was no last time we welcomed the chief home with fifty-five lanterns to look back at, no list from last year, nothing.

Tidy stood in the middle of the yard holding a pencil and feeling the floor tilt very gently.

"Too many things," said Muddle, arriving at speed. "Wicks and glass and oil and the bridge and the hooks and who's doing the bank and what time does the sun even go down —"

"Stop," said Tidy. "Say the smallest one."

Muddle stopped. "...Wicks."

"Good. That's the top of the plan."

And there it was: the way in. Tidy found a flat board and began to draw the day in pictures, the way Tidy draws every day. A sun coming up. A bucket. A lantern with a wick in it. A lantern with a flame. A sun going down.

Wobbly came and read it over Tidy's shoulder, and said, "But what if the wicks run out?"

"Then we're on the second picture instead of the third," said Tidy, "and I draw a new one."

Tidy heard the words come out and was rather surprised by them.

By the time the board was pinned to the gatepost, there were nine pictures on it, in order, with the hanging done from the far end back towards Winky's house — because if you start at home you end up in the dark furthest from your bed, and Tidy had thought about that, and nobody else had.

Fluffs kept coming past to look at it all morning. Nobody had to ask what was next.

There was a hole in the bank, half behind a root, and Wondy saw it at once.

"Ooh," said Wondy. "What's that?"

Everything in Wondy wanted to go in. That is not an exaggeration; it is a description. Wondy's feet had already turned. Wondy's head was already inside, in the interesting dark, finding out.

And then Wondy did the hard thing, which is the same hard thing every time: stopped. Looked. Listened.

Looking: the hole went further back than a rabbit needs. Listening: something in there was dripping.

Newby arrived, and did not like the look of it. "We should get somebody."

"We should find out first," said Wondy.

"Those are different things," said Newby.

They were both right, which is the tiresome thing about Newby. So Wondy asked instead of climbing — lay down flat at the mouth of the hole and called, "Hello? Is anything in there?" and waited, and heard nothing but the drip.

Then Puzzly came and asked the question neither of them had: "Dripping what?"

Oil. It was oil. The can had gone over the edge with everything else that morning, wedged itself under the root, and had been quietly emptying into the bank for four hours.

They got it out with a stick and Newby's scarf. There was about a third left, which was a third more than anybody in the yard thought they had.

"If you'd gone in head first," Newby said, "you'd have put your paw straight through it."

"Ooh," said Wondy, thoughtfully. "Yes."