Friends Among Wildflowers

By Laura Briggs

Lucy’s fondness for New Moon Farm continues to grow, along with the success of her picture books about its animals. With the special fair days reinstated for children to visit the llamas—and baby alpaca Newton showing surprising resilience despite his condition—Lucy finds herself looking to the future with ideas bigger than she ever before imagined.

But change is not as easy as making bold plans. There’s a pair of ‘rescue’ sheep in need of a home, and Lucy’s attempts to enfold them into the farm prove difficult, even with the help of vet Arthur Elliot. And then there’s the enthusiastic wish shared with her by Simon, the resilient, chronically-ill little boy, whose special bond with Llarry the llama brings a quandary Lucy is uncertain she can face.

Being brave isn’t Lucy’s strong point, but she’ll have to be if she wants to do bigger things in life. The question is, will these big plans bring the kind of change Lucy imagines for herself and for the future?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Laura Briggs
• Release date: Feb 20, 2024
• ISBN: 9798215888575

Laura Briggs

Laura Briggs is the author of several feel-good romance reads, including the UK best-seller 'A Wedding in Cornwall'. She has a fondness for vintage style dresses (especially ones with polka dots), and reads everything from Jane Austen to modern day mysteries. When she's not writing, she enjoys spending time with family and friends, caring for her pets, gardening, and seeing the occasional movie or play.

Book preview

Friends Among Wildflowers

By Laura Briggs

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2024 Laura Briggs

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Cover Image: Wild Flowers on New Moon Lane. Original art, Cartoon farm scene by Maciej Sojka, Cartoon Farm Characters (Part 2) by Jacklooser, Llama Alpaca. The klan card, by Yamalinaaa, Winter landscape with a house by Viktoriia Protsak, and Red farmhouse. Rural landscape with Barn house in rustic style on green field with cypresses, by Mspoint.Used with permission. http://www.dreamstime.com/

Title Page: Yorkshire Sheep. Original Art, Cartoon Farm Characters (Part 2) by Jacklooser Used with permission. http://www.dreamstime.com/

Table of Contents

Big Steps

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Blue Ribbons for Brilliance

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Practice and Pruning

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Lucy is Learning

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Big Steps

Chapter One

Newton the baby alpaca was doing well.

Lucy watched him as he wobbled in the corral, with his legs splayed at those odd angles from his bone condition. He was trying to get the baby llama Lillibet to play with him, bobbing his head like a dashboard toy. True to his mother Fiona in so many ways.

She offered the llamas and the donkey some bits of carrot through the gate. The last of her winter stores were getting to the point that they were better used as animal treats than for herself to eat, since the time to plant new ones was almost here.

Dimitri the donkey was the most enthusiastic recipient. Both Philomena the female llama and Fiona were more interested in some clover hay that Lucy had put in the hay rack this morning, where their babies were learning that dry grasses were as much fun to play with as to eat.

Llarry, however, sampled one, nibbling it interestedly. Like her, he preferred to watch and not get involved in the lighthearted scuffling between the new llama families. She gave him the rest of the carrots, slightly withered at their ends. She knew the animals were probably disappointed that the green tops had been distributed as snacks previously and were gone.

In her muddy chicken-print wellies, she walked back to the cottage, pausing to look at the mists on the mountains, and the bright green of the field across the lane on a cloudy morning, which was grey with rain. A few cows grazing, behind old fences of stone.

She shooed the geese away from the stoop, where they were looking for stray cranberries long dried from Christmas's garland. Inside, she slipped off her shoes, and made a cup of herbal tea before settling into the squishy red chair with her laptop.

Her ritual was the same almost every day, but a little variation on the routine kept life fresh. Like feeding the geese her toast crumbs as she watched the dawn appear slowly over the mountains; or waking extra early to finish tufting the cap on a needle felted titmouse. Finding the last of her wool had been used with that project, then spending an hour shopping online for new supplies.

She had learned to make different birds, and spotted toadstools in sets of three, along with foxes and hedgies, little llamas of varying patterns, and a rooster, which took three tries before he looked anything like the one scratching the ground in her back garden. She made a delicate spider with brown stripes, winding wool around slender wire legs. A web like a crocheted doily, from a pattern she worked back in Reading, when she first took up crochet and knitting from online tutorials.

Now she was making a bear. It had a very small face and snout. Its sleek coat was made from Llarry's wool, dyed with a black walnut paste she purchased online. For eyes, she planned to use tiny black beads. Joseph used to use them to make eyes for his animals.

The collection on the mantel was growing. Sometimes she gave them away, sometimes she stuck them between books on a shelf, or into corners of the Welsh cupboard with its plate display racks and shallow buffet ledge.

She was between work projects, presently, for her third children's book was being read by the editor at the publishing company. Until they asked her to begin making changes, she had nothing to do but wait. Sometimes it was a matter of weeks, sometimes a month, before they contacted her again. Sometimes it moved quickly afterwards, depending upon whether it was her words or her artwork which needed changing.

Between the two previous books published, sat a needle felted squirrel holding an acorn from the wood. His fluffy tail was made from Fiona's wool, dyed a light grey. The llama and alpaca wool was soft and light, almost hair-like. It was easy to fashion into sleek coats and feathery tufts.

Usually in the mornings, Lucy woke early, and brushed and braided her hair, cleaned her glasses, and took her meds for fatigue and for anxiety, if she thought she needed them, which was less frequently than in the past. She made a cup of tea and a slice of toast, and looked outside at the garden. She put on her wellies, and fed the animals, then worked in the garden if needed, or simply stood, hands in her pockets, if there was nothing to be done except look.

The morning air in her lungs was rejuvenating. Sometimes the dawn's light was clear and warm, like butter melting to gold; other times, there might be mist on the mountains, like this morning, or dew on the fields. She would think of the words that the mysterious Margot had written on a piece of paper, a poem about sunrise in the Yorkshire countryside. She shared in the same feeling, looking across her garden damp with dew on its grasses, with birds in the hedges and the bright-eyed hedgehog under a broken pot in the old compost heap, slipping off to nap after a night's forage.

Sometimes Dave the milkman drove up with the morning delivery, coming into view through the back garden wall's crumbly part. Lucy would wave.

Next on the routine's list, she typically checked her email. As usual, there were notices for products on sale, and from people pretending to be foreign princes who needed to transfer their funds to someone else's account in haste.

Pingtech, the game development corporation for whom she had worked until this past year, still sent regular updates on their work. For the past month, they had not renewed their invitation for her to develop another game. She had never quite decided if she was going to decline if they did. Maybe. Maybe not.

She liked creating games. Only she wasn't sure if she had time for doing it and for writing the books. The books were earning nearly as much as either Hedgeholes or Time Tumblers had earned, and that should be enough. Perhaps if she stopped some of her hobbies — no more knitting, no more making little animals of felted wool — and needed something to fill her time.

The latest email was nothing more than a notice about an online event for the debut of a much-anticipated new game, about fighting zombie vampires in a creepy Victorian cemetery. Lucy did not like online virtual meetings or Zoom parties; she avoided anything but chats where people used the old-fashioned pseudonyms and thumbnails of cats or cartoon characters.

The only other new email was the publisher's newsletter. It was about ways to promote your work online, by hosting 'live conversations' with people on Twitter.

Lucy deleted it.

~~~

The vet Arthur Elliot came periodically to check on Newton and sometimes to bring more bone-strengthening supplements to help. When Lucy saw his old brown car turning off the lane, she put aside her sketch notebook of drawings and ideas and put on her boots and coat.

He parked the car near Lucy's little one. As she walked by, Lucy saw a cage in the passenger seat, containing a large tortoise and part of a lettuce head.

The vet was looking over the corral fence at the little alpaca stumbling along behind its baby llama friend, attempting a gambol that resembled a rather messy flailing of limbs and head. He tipped over, and struggled up again, giving his head a little shake as if to say 'silly me.' He attempted another gambol, following Lillibet around the corral. He never seemed to grow tired of keeping up, Lucy noticed.

Doctor Elliot laughed.

He's not a shy little lad, he remarked. Like Fee. She's always the first one to show off for people.

He doesn't know when to stop sometimes, said Lucy. Lillibet gets tired of playing before he does, and tries to hide behind Philomena. He doesn't see the hint.

She smiled a tiny bit. Sometimes Fiona played with him instead, frisking around in a similar fashion. She tossed her silly mop head, then gave him a gentle bump that sent him toppling again. True to form, Newton flailed a bit, then found his way to his turned-out feet again like nothing happened.

Both Lucy and Arthur chuckled. They exchanged glances, and Lucy's smile grew a tiny bit bigger. This embarrassed her a little however, so she looked at the llamas again before she