Christmas at Lilac Cottage - Holly Martin Page 0,52

farce. She wanted to inspire Daisy to continue with her carving, show her that with hard work and commitment she could create beautiful sculptures that people would admire. Instead she had exposed her to the crazy world of fierce competition and showed her that, no matter how hard you worked, it came down to who you knew and whose back you had scratched. Was there any point entering the big competition at the ball in a week’s time if the winning vote had already been cast?

Penny dropped Josh off and she smiled when she saw him give Daisy a quick peck on the cheek to say congratulations. Daisy sat in silence with a huge smile on her face the rest of the way home.

They pulled up outside their house and Daisy practically bounced to the door, overflowing with excitement. Penny let them in through her front door and after Daisy had greeted Bernard with enough affection to last him a lifetime, she burst through the connecting door into her lounge.

‘I have had the best night ever,’ Daisy announced to her dad and Penny moved to the doorway to watch her. Henry was sitting on the sofa, reading a book, which he immediately put down to give his undivided attention to Daisy. He was wearing glasses and his feet were bare and there was something that made her stomach leap with affection for him at these small little attributes.

‘Dad, I came third. Admittedly it was only out of eight people, well six, but still I came third and Jackson Cartwright was a judge and he said he was so impressed by my sculpture and…’

‘Wait, you entered into the competition? I didn’t know you had been creating your own sculpture, why didn’t you tell me? I would have come.’

‘I didn’t think it was any good, it was my first attempt and… I don’t know, I didn’t want you to see me fail.’

‘I’ve told you before, you can only fail if you don’t have a go. I’m so proud of you for entering. I wish you would have told me.’

‘Sometimes you get a bit funny about my art.’

Henry looked shocked. ‘I’ve always supported your art. I’ve paid for courses, I’ve taken you to exhibitions, I’ve bought you art gear…’

‘But whenever I tell you I want to be an artist when I’m older, you always tell me not to neglect my other subjects.’

‘That has nothing to do with me not supporting your art and everything to do with you being a lazy sod when it comes to your homework.’ He put on a high-pitched girly voice. ‘Dad, I don’t need to do my maths homework because I’m going to be an artist when I’m older. Dad, I don’t need to do this history essay because I’m going to be an artist.’

Daisy giggled at the terrible impression.

‘You’re a clever girl, Daisy. You could be anything you want to be when you’re older, a doctor, scientist, astronaut. If you want to be an artist then I’ll be behind you one hundred percent, but that does not mean you get to take it easy in all your other subjects. In a few years’ time you might decide that you don’t want to be an artist any more, you might want to be a vet or a translator or prime minister. You can’t do those things without your GCSEs. You have six months until you finish school and you can study whatever course you want at college but you’re damned well going to work your arse off between now and then.’

Daisy smiled. ‘OK.’

‘And next time, tell me when you enter a competition and then I can cheer the loudest when you win, or boo really loudly at the winner if you lose.’

‘Penny won,’ Daisy said and Henry looked over at her.

‘You did, that’s fab. I wouldn’t have booed at you if I’d been there,’ Henry said and then to Daisy he whispered, loudly, ‘Well, maybe I’d boo quietly.’ Daisy and Penny laughed. ‘I don’t suppose there’s photos of these wonderful sculptures.’

‘I have photos on my phone,’ Daisy said, grabbing her phone and, pressing a few buttons, she passed it to Henry. ‘That’s mine.’

‘Wow, this is really great, and you did all this on your own?’

‘Penny did the chainsaw bit, she wouldn’t let me use that.’

‘Good job too, some of those tools look lethal.’ He flashed Penny a look of concern.

‘She’s very sensible when she uses the tools, and I’ve showed her the correct way to use them,’ Penny