Free The Stranger Next Door by Miranda Barnes

right way?'
    'Yes!' Tom screeched.
    'I know it's the right way,' Lisa announced firmly. 'I come down here every day to go to school. At least, I used to,' she qualified, 'before the fire.'
    'I don't know,' Daniel mused. 'Maybe you've been away too long. Maybe you've forgotten?'
    'Of course I haven't forgotten!'
    'Well, I shall have to trust you, Lisa. OK. You're the navigator.'
    'It's down there!' Tom yelled again, impatient to be included in any conversation going.
    Lisa just smiled now, satisfied. She knew Daniel was teasing.
    Anna smiled, too. They were all doing so well, the three of them.
    She sensed Daniel tighten up as they passed the first house. It was close to the road, not like the scattered houses they had passed on the hillside. An elderly man was working in the small front garden.
    'Hello, George!' Anna called.
    The gardener looked up and waved. 'How are you? Sorry to hear about your fire, pet.'
    'It could have been worse.'
    'Aye, well. You can generally say that about things.'
    'This is my next-door neighbour, by the way. Daniel Ferguson, from "Moorside".'
    'Oh? Daniel Ferguson, is it?'
    'It is.'
    The old man peered closely at Daniel. Anna held her breath until he smiled.
    'George Meredith. I've heard about you, lad. Good things. You're the one that saved all their lives, I hear. I'm very pleased to meet you.'
    The two of them shook hands. Daniel, embarrassed as he was, even managed to say a couple of words in return.
    'There now,' Anna whispered as they walked on. 'That wasn't so bad, was it?'
    'I don't know what you mean.'
    'No, of course you don't.'
    But he smiled. And then he grinned. Anna laughed.
    'You can get nearly everything here,' Anna said as she pushed open the door to the village shop.
    'Especially ice-cream,' Lisa announced. 'Not sweets, though, no,' she added hastily, catching her mother's eye. 'They're bad for you.'
    'Not in moderation,' Anna said primly. 'Only in excess.'
    'Sweets?' Tom queried. 'I like ….'
    'No, Tom!'
    'Hello, Anna!' Rhoda Cummings, the shopkeeper, called. 'Pippa tells me you've moved back up the hill?'
    'We have, yes. A long time ago. About two hours, it is now.'
    Rhoda laughed.
    'There are no secrets in this village,' Anna said for Daniel's benefit.
    'Good heavens, no!' Rhoda looked quite indignant.
    'Rhoda, this is Daniel Ferguson, our next-door neighbour. You probably won't have seen him before.'
    'No. heard about him, though. Hello, Daniel. You're very welcome here.'
    It's going to be all right, Anna thought with relief. Daniel hasn't turned and run. It's going to be all right.
    'I can't thank you enough,' he said on the way home.
    'For what? There's no need.'
    'I would never have got down here myself, on my own. But I'm glad we came. People in the village seem very friendly.'
    'Oh, they are.' She smiled and added, 'I hope you'll like it enough to want to stay.'
    He looked surprised for a moment. Then he smiled and nodded. 'So do I,' he said.

 
    Chapter Fifteen
     
    As the weeks passed, it became to be difficult to recall a time when Daniel did not live next door. Anna grew used to him being there, and was happy about it. It was good to have someone nearby with whom she could comment on the weather or share a joke. And she liked the way he worked so patiently in his garden, doing what he could, a bit at a time. She liked to see him growing stronger, too, day by day. She just liked him, she admitted to herself with a wry smile.
    The children liked him, too. They were in his garden now even more than in their own. They played again in The Secret Wood, and sometimes they kicked a ball around his lawn. She heard him shout at them in mock anger, and she heard their excited responses. She heard the laughter and happy voices, and was glad. To think, she thought with another wry smile, how at first they had thought a monster had come to live next door to them.
    Meanwhile, progress was being made on other fronts, too. Anna passed the theory test for her driving licence and