Easter Egg Hun
“Hey, hun.”
I send a quelling look towards the annoyingly handsome man standing at the end of my garden path. Aaron Smith, the grinning idiot who dared speak those words to me slouches by my privet hedges with one hand on my green painted gate. Even the yellow daffodils seem pleased to see him and turn up their sunny faces to greet him.
“I am not your hun.”
White teeth flash in his tanned face as he grins at me. “Oh, but you are.”
I’m standing by the front door of my tiny cottage trying to ignore him as I watch the delivery man bring in another box from his van and set it down in my kitchen.
It’s Easter next weekend and the boxes contain chocolate eggs for the Easter Egg Hunt I’m running for the kids. The daffodils are out, the children of the village are playing on the climbing frames in the field, bunny rabbits frolic at the bottom of my garden and I’ve got a vast quantity of hot cross buns coming in a Tesco delivery next week just for me. I’m full of the joys of spring but for the bane of my life standing at the end of my path. We both know he won’t dare set foot on my property after last time when I was cleaning my windows and threw a wet sponge in his face. “Haven’t you got anything important to do?”
“Seeing you is always important. It’s the highlight of my day.”
I scoff at that and fold my arms. “Then your day must be mighty dull. Well, you’ve seen me so you can go now. Go on, go home to your bank vault and count your gold bars.”
“Can I take you out for a drink?”
“What did I say on the last ten occasions you asked me out? Nope.”
His chuckle annoys me. Nothing I say seems to put him off. I think Mum must have said something to him when she looked after my house for me last week because he now seems more determined than ever. It’s true it has been a while since my privet bush had a man explore it but that doesn’t mean I’m up for a thing with Aaron Smith. Hell no. He’s a rich banker and we all know what that rhymes with.
“Come on,” he coaxes. “Just one cup of coffee so I can show you what a nice guy I am.”
“You’re not. You’re annoying.”
“What if I told you that exchanging barbs with you these last six months has brought me out of my funk and made me want to start dating again?”
“I’m happy for you. Go find yourself a hot mama to work her way through your bank account.”
“I’ve already found her,” he says, looking at me.
“I don’t need or want your money.”
“I know.”
“I might be a lowly art teacher to you, earning a pittance, but I enjoy my job.”
“I know you do.”
“So, if you think I’m giving up my job to massage your feet and peel you grapes and tell you how wonderful you are, you’re out of luck.”
“I was thinking more that I would massage your feet and tell you how wonderful you are. The grapes we can share.”
I throw up my hands in exasperation. “Why are you standing there deploying your charm when everyone knows you usually savage people’s heads off like a pit bull for daring to wish you a good morning?”
“I had an epiphany. I realised when you threw that soggy sponge in my face that what you said was right. I’ve been wallowing in self-pity and taking it out on everyone else. And I’m sorry.”
I clutch the wall of my house like I’m about to fall over. “I think I need a lie down. Aaron Smith just apologised for being bad tempered.”
The smile stays. “I mean it. I took it out on you and that’s not fair. Forgive me?”
“I feel I need to contact the national media and inform them that the UK’s top hedge fund w—banker has found his heart.”
“You’re sexy when you hurl insults at me.”
I give him the middle finger but still he won’t go and just stands there laughing at me.
“See? That turns me on.”
“You’re warped.”
“Go on, insult me again. I can’t get enough.”
“You’re not one of those weirdos who likes to be whipped, are you?”
The delivery driver is agog. He’s so agog, his jaw is dragging along my gravel pathway.
Aaron opens the canvas tote bag he carries in his hand. “I bought a bottle of wine. We could share it tonight, if you want. You could come over and I could cook dinner to say thank you for helping me.”
“Trust me, I didn’t do it for you. I did it for myself and the long suffering people of this village.”
My mum drives past in her little yellow Citroen and toots her horn at us. I wave and so does Aaron. Oh, so he’s on waving terms with my mum now? So, what exactly went on last week?
“Are you and my mum having a mutual love in or what?”
He shrugs and turns back to me. “She invited me round last weekend for lunch.”
I gape at him. “In my house?”
“Yes. She wanted to talk about how we were going to make you fall in love with me.”
I fold my arms. “Yeah? And what was the plan?”
“The plan involved me learning to look out at the morning sun and smile, walk barefoot in the rain and dance under the stars—and stop biting everyone’s head off.”
“Good luck with that. Don’t they say absence makes the heart grow fonder? Tell you what, why don’t you emigrate to darkest Alaska?”
He chuckles and takes two steps up my path towards me. My eyes narrow and he takes two steps back again.
“Alaska, huh? Would you come with me? We could cuddle up during those long dark nights. I’d like to spend sixty days under a duvet with you.”
I roll my eyes. “Lame.”
How many more of these boxes are there? The delivery man brushes past Aaron to go back out to the van and then comes back with yet another box. This whole delivery seems to be taking a lot longer than I anticipated.
Aaron turns towards me, seemingly not caring that the delivery man is a party to our conversation. “I will admit I have been a bit of a thorn in your side these last few months.”
“A bit?”
He smiles and thrusts his hand in the pocket of his suit trousers. “But it’s been such fun winding you up.”
“Do you want another wet sponge in the face or what?”
His chuckle sounds again. “A sponge bath, Nurse Campion?”
“What do you think?”
“I’m free right now.”
“Don’t you have work to do saving the banks from earning too much money or whatever it is you do?”
“I’m a hedge fund manager.”
“Then shouldn’t you be in a city office pruning your hedges?”
“I’ve finished work for the day so I’m back home in the village this afternoon looking at your bushes instead.”
“I beg your pardon?”
He freezes for a second as he realises what he just said and then he bursts into laughter. “Sorry, that came out wrong.”
“You think?”
His face is a picture of merriment as he ruffles a hand over my privet. “I didn’t say ‘bush’, did I? I said bushes as in hedges as in these things here.”
Our eyes meet. “You are never going to see my bush.”
He grins in my face. “Never say never.”
The delivery driver looks at me and then his eyes slide down to my crotch. And he’s not getting a look either.
“Lana, can I get permission to come up to the house to talk to you rather than shouting at you so half the village can hear?”
“You stay right there.”
He sighs and scratches his forehead. “Fine. You want this conversation in public? That’s fine with me. I wasn’t asking to see your bush, was I? Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see your bush more than anything. It would make all my dreams come true but that’s not what I was—”
The delivery guy is halfway to the van and stares at Aaron as if to say, ‘Mate, shut up.’
He takes the advice and suddenly breaks off. “Do you know what? Forget it. I seem to be digging the hole deeper with every word that comes out of my mouth.”
“It seems to have taken you a remarkably long time to work that out.”
“Look, I know we didn’t get off to the best start when you pranged my car—”
“That was not my fault!”
“You caved in the rear bumper of my Ferrari with your Land Rover.”
I lift my chin. “It was an accident. My mum was supposed to be guiding me out of the driveway onto the main road but because she was checking her dating profile on her phone, she neglected to tell me there was some flash banker’s toy car sitting in the way.”
“Well, this flash banker rather likes his toy car, and it took him many years of busting his backside to be able to afford one. And then in comes crazy Lana Champion and decides to run it over with her mud splattered Land Rover.”
“I didn’t do it deliberately,” I retort, glaring at him. “And I told you a hundred times I would pay for the damage, but you wouldn’t let me.”
“Because I wanted a date instead,” he says softly and the delivery man gives him a look as if to say ‘Mate, are you sure?’
“Not happening.”
“Why not?”
“Because you might not have noticed but we exchange insults a hundred times a day!”
“I admit I took my wife’s death hard, and I pushed the world away for a time but I’m ready to start dating again and I think you’re the girl for me.”
“Woah, just put it all out there why don’t you?”
“I like you, Lana. A lot.”
The delivery driver—wait, I can’t keep calling him that. He must have a name. I look at his badge. His name is Will from Crawford’s Cash and Carry. Will stands before me with another box. “Where would you like me to put these, Madam?”
“In the kitchen.”
“The kitchen is full. Shall I put them in the hallway?”
I wave him inside, distracted by the fact that annoyingly attractive Aaron is asking me out again and that his blue eyes sparkle when he teases me. “Sure, yes, that’s fine. Thanks.”
The whole village knows the rich widower who lives in the converted white wooden windmill by the river was devastated when his wife died of cancer a couple of years ago. The day I pranged his pride and joy was the anniversary of her death so he was not in the best of moods. But I remember when our eyes met for the first time and the tug of attraction I’d felt for the reclusive guy at the end of the village who could barely look after himself. Shame that initial argument had set us off on six months of exchanging unpleasantries.
“You made me a homemade curry that night and brought it up to my house,” he reminds me.
I shrug. “You looked like you needed it. You were stick thin.”
“It was kind of you. I was grateful.”
“So that’s why you bit my head off, was it?”
He looks chastened. “It wasn’t a great time for me.”
“I know,” I say quietly.
“You’ve helped me, Lana. More than I can say. I’d still be in the depths of despair if it wasn’t for you.”
I airily wave my hand to dismiss it. “I just did what anyone would.”
He shakes his head. “No, it was more than that. You didn’t give up on me.”
“I was a nurse in a previous life. It’s hard for me not to care when people are struggling.”
“Bizarre as it sounds, you saved me. I needed the daily insult. I started looking forward to the moment you’d tell me you’d rather boil your head than go on a date with me.”
Will from the Cash and Carry stands before me and hands me the delivery note. “That’s all of them.”
“Thank you,” I say distractedly. I’m still thinking about the fact Aaron thinks I saved him.
“I’ll be off then,” Will says.
“Sure. Bye.”
The driver hesitates, his phone in his hand, looking at a map where he has to deliver next. “Give the guy a chance, okay?”
My eyes snap up from the delivery note to meet his kind set of brown eyes set in a wrinkled face. “Sorry?”
“Everyone round here knows he’s mad for you. What’s the harm in a cup of coffee?”
I look from him to Aaron who’s grinning from ear to ear. What’s with everyone? Do they all want me to date the hedge clippings manager?
Will nods farewell, then hurries down my garden path to his big box van and climbs in. This seems to give Aaron permission to set his bag down under my privet hedge and approach me, hands outstretched as if calming a wounded animal.
“See? Everyone knows I’m crazy about you.”
“Yeah? You’re trespassing, pal.”
“Sorry but I really don’t want to have this conversation with you where everyone can hear us.”
I grab my red and yellow golf umbrella from the stand by the front door and brandish it before me to keep him at a distance.
“Lana, I love you.”
I do a piggy snort of scornful laughter. “You do not.”
He’s smiling as he makes a grab for the brolly and takes it into one strong hand. Then he uses it to pull me towards him. “My attraction to you is off the charts.”
“Yeah, I can see that. My feelings about you are pretty epic too.”
That annoying but kind of cute chuckle rings out again. Mum drives back the other way and toots her horn again, this time quite enthusiastically. I think she’s just clocked me almost in Aaron Smith’s arms.
And I am, I’m standing in front of him, slightly breathless about what he’s going to do. The whole village is out on the playing field and about to witness me getting kissed for the first time in a hundred years. He puts a hand under my chin and lifts my face up to his like he’s about to kiss me. His face comes closer, his lips an inch away from mine and I close my eyes when he whispers, “Lana?”
“Hmm?” I say breathily with my eyes still closed and my lips parted ready to receive his kiss.
“I think you might have ordered too many Easter eggs,” he whispers.
My eyes fly open. “What?”
He smiles as he jerks his head towards my house. I turn and walk into my kitchen, and I’m shocked to see boxes everywhere—and I mean everywhere. They’re stacked on every worktop, on the floor, out into the tiny hall and into the lounge at the back. “I don’t understand,” I say, looking down unseeing at the delivery note. “I ordered a box of twelve eggs.”
He takes the note from my hand. “You ordered twelve hundred eggs.”
“What?” I demand and snatch the note back. There it is in black and white. “Shit, what on earth am I going to do with twelve hundred Easter eggs?”
“Get very fat?”
“I might have known you’d have some smart comment.” I put a hand to my head. “And this is your fault.”
“How is this my fault?”
“Because I placed that order on Friday when you showed up halfway through my art class with a bunch of roses like some bloody Romeo and all the schoolkids were staring at the mad man in the middle of the field with the sign saying: ‘I’m in love with Miss Champion.’ And I was so distracted I must have messed up the order. What am I going to do with twelve—?”
My sentence is cut off by his lips falling onto mine. He pushes me back into the kitchen and kicks the front door closed on our audience. Then he puts his strong arms around me and lifts me off the ground. My arms look themselves around his neck of their own accord.
“You were distracted by me bringing you roses?” he asks softly.
I shrug. “Yes…but it was mostly the sign.”
“Were you thinking about me all day the way I was thinking of you?”
“No but I wouldn’t tell you even if I was.”
“Liar,” he murmurs and kisses me again so hard I feel like I’m seeing stars. The earth spins and I don’t know if I’m still able to hang on. All I care about is being in this man’s arms.
“Aaron,” I whisper. “Do your rich banker friends like Easter Egg Hunts?”
“Their kids do. It’s for a good cause so I’ll make a few calls. We could raffle some off too. How do we get past all these boxes to your bedroom?”
“We don’t,” I grab him by the tie and lead him to the sitting room. I push him down onto the sofa. “Pretend like you’re a teenager again. That shouldn’t be too hard for you.”
“Ha, ha. You’re comedy gold. In that case, get your foil wrapping off right now, my little Easter egg and open wide up, I want to see the surprise inside.”
“Really? That was the worst sexy talk ever,” I say, giving him a look.
He starts chuckling. “I’ve broken through your crisp outer shell and now I want to taste your truffles.”
“Your puns are awful. I knew there was a reason I refused to date you.”
That just makes him worse. “Will you melt if I play with your fondant centre?”
I slap him on the backside. “Aaron, this Easter bunny is going to refuse to nibble your carrot or let you inside her burrow if you don’t shut up right now—”
And I shriek as he pulls me down on top of him and we’re both laughing as he puts his arms around me. Our eyes meet. “Yeah? Mean that, do you?”
“Nah, not really.”
“Good,” he whispers as he kisses me until my burrow is quivering and my little bunny ears have gone warm with happiness.
“Easter Egg Hun” by Cara Berry. © Copyright Cara Berry 25th March 2024. Not to be reproduced without my permission. By all means share on social media, and I would be grateful if you did but please respect my intellectual property—thank you!