The Lighthouse at Porthglen Cliffs

Book Three – Love in Porthglen – Viola’s Story

A Sweet Romance

Tamsin Bracknell

THE LIGHTHOUSE AT PORTHGLEN CLIFFS: A SWEET ROMANCE

Copyright © 2022 TAMSIN BRACKNELL

All rights reserved. This work may not be copied, duplicated, transmitted, broadcast or otherwise distributed in part or in the whole without the written permission of the author.

The Lighthouse at Porthglen Cliffs is an original work of fiction that does not depict the actual names, circumstances, or events of individuals living or dead. Any similarity to such individuals or situations is entirely coincidental.

Published by April Showers Publishing

For everyone starting from scratch

Chapter One

A Change of Heart

Six Months Earlier

Dan and I had always been happy, at our core.

We weren’t jealous, we didn’t snipe at each other, we didn’t struggle to agree on anything.

He wasn’t just my husband, but my best friend.

And so, when he sat me down to talk, I had no idea what was coming.

“Viola, I know we’ve always had the same view of our future together,” he had said. “But I’ve had a change of heart.”

I chuckled at how serious his face was and rubbed an affectionate hand over his cheek.

“Whatever it is,” I smiled reassuringly. “We can get through it together. I love you.”

“I love you too,” he nodded, smiling but suppressing tears. “But I think this might change things.”

My mind was running away with itself thinking of all the awful things he might say next.

Terminal illness.

An affair.

Or that he simply didn’t love me anymore.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about this on my own,” Dan said, clearing his throat tensely. “And I decided – I want children. At least two children of my own.”

I blinked disbelievingly. Of all the things I thought he would say…

We had spoken at length when we’d gotten married about our future – houses, pets, kids.

We’d found a little cottage in the tiny coastal town of Porthglen, to be near my grandmother, and to find a calmer life than we’d had growing up in Manchester.

We’d gotten a puppy, Charlie - a Dalmatian - and a pond full of fish.

But kids, we had decided, were not on the cards for us.

As I looked back, I had been more set on the idea at first, and Dan had taken longer to think the matter over, but by the time we’d set a wedding date, I was certain he was on the same page as me.

No kids.

“Viola?” Dan’s voice was raspy, anxious. “Say something, please. I can’t bear not knowing what you’re thinking.”

“I don’t know what to say,” I replied. “I thought we had decided this years ago.”

“So did I,” Dan shrugged, tears rolling down his cheeks. I couldn’t stand it when he cried; it always made me cry too. But this time, I was too stunned. “Believe me, I really thought we were agreed.”

“Believe you…” I mirrored his phrasing. It sounded hollow now.

I couldn’t be angry at him – he hadn’t known all those years ago that he would change his mind.

And yet… I had known so confidently how I felt, why hadn’t he? What had changed?

“This is all my fault,” Dan said, breaking down and cradling his face in his hands. “I don’t know what to do…”

I instinctively shuffled across on the sofa to hug him.

Our embrace already felt different.

I turned, as I often did, to my grandmother.

She had moved to Porthglen a few years before me, and had been a big part of the reason I’d suggested the tiny village to Dan.

“Grams, what am I supposed to do now?” I asked her as we sat out on wicker furniture on the patio level of her beach view garden.

The sea was roaring with waist-high waves, the cliffs on either side of the bay the only break in the solid blue of the water.

It was peaceful here, wrapped in one of her crocheted blankets to keep the chilly spring air at bay, and yet I was inconsolable. I hadn’t stopped crying for days.

She handed me a mug of cocoa and took a seat next to me. She stared out at the sea for a moment, silent and pondering, as she often did.

“It seems to me, petal,” she cooed. “That you have two options, and neither of them are perfect, as few things in life are. First, you can have the life you want with Dan, but you’ll have to compromise and have children-”

“-Grams!” I couldn’t believe she saw having children as something one could compromise on.

“-Hear me out!” She quickly asserted. “The second option is to have the life you want without Dan, and without children. Both of these choices have flaws. You have to decide which life will make you happiest.”

“I can’t have children just to please Dan… can I?” I sniffled, the tears welling up anew.

“Times are different now, but… I did it,” Grams shrugged in the lop-sided way she always did when she was uncertain how I’d react. She eyed me closely.

“What?!” I stammered.

“Your grandfather wanted a boy and a girl,” Grams stated. “I wasn’t sure. I compromised, and I loved my children just as much as any mother when they came along.”

I had heard that argument a lot in the ten years or so that I’d been married – ‘it’s different with your own children’ or ‘I didn’t think I wanted children until I got pregnant’. As much as I protested, no one ever believed that I saw things differently.

“I know that you love Mum and uncle Graeme,” I said, careful of my words. “But didn’t you ever want something else? Didn’t you ever wonder what it would be like without them?”

To my surprise, she answered immediately, “Yes. I did. Like I said, it was a different time. I was married in 1955 to a wonderful man, and not having children just wasn’t the done thing. It was expected of me.”

I felt uncommunicably torn for her.

“I don’t regret my decision,” Grams said earnestly. “And I’m sure whichever path you choose, you won’t regret your choice either.”

Coming in October 2022

The Woodland at Porthglen Acres

Tamsin Bracknell

Book Four – Love in Porthglen – Lidia’s Story

Chapter Two

Hard Times

Six months later

The walk from my grandmother’s house – where I was now living - along the coastal path to Porthglen’s village pub, The Ancient Mariner, was one of the most stunning views in the village.

Craggy cliff-faces populated by seagulls and wildflowers, the gentle shushing of the tide, and our picturesque village ahead.

September was drawing to a close, and the path was scattered with the first autumn leaves, not quite orange yet, only tinted by a muted yellow at their centre, like the dab of a watercolour brush.

I pulled my cable-knit cardigan around me tighter as the pub came into view, wishing I’d brought a coat, and called Charlie to heel.

“Viola!” My friends greeted as I entered the pub. They were at the usual table – a window seat with an ancient booth of red faux-velvet, faded by age and many generations of backsides upon it.

“I’ve actually read the book this week!” Ruth laughed, holding it aloft like a trophy.

She was the centre of our little group, a few years older than the rest of us and the energy source of any room she was in.

“Well, this is a book club,” I countered with a wry grin. The running joke that no one but me read the books was only half-true, but it made us all laugh just the same. “Which you created, actually.”

“Yes, yes, I know! I just didn’t realise we’d be expected to read the books. I should have created a gin club,” Ruth dismissed playfully, before adding with her usual irreverence, “Anyway, it was a one star, as boring as paint drying!”

“How can Charles Dickens be boring?!” I said indignantly, taking a seat next to her on the booth and settling Charlie at my feet.

“It’s called Hard Times,” Hailey pointed out, gesturing with a chip as she leaned her elbows onto the table. “And I really did have a hard time reading it. The first chapter that I actually read, that is.”

She was the newest of the group, but she had gelled with us seamlessly.

“I watched the film,” Hazel offered, too engrossed in her Ploughman’s board to expand on her thoughts.

“I’m not sure ‘book club’ is an apt name for us anymore,” I sighed, a little disappointed that one of my favourite authors had landed so flatly amongst them. “Why don’t you guys choose the book next time?”

“Fifty Shades of Grey?” Ruth teased. “That wouldn’t really be fair – I’ve read that already.”

“Anything but that,” Hailey shook her head and decapitated the chip she’d been holding. “I don’t want René to think I want him to be like Christian Grey.”

Hailey had been dating her boss, head gardener at Porthglen Manor, for a few months now and we were all thrilled to see how happy they made each other.

Although I laughed along with the others – amused at the image of sarcastic but kind at heart René acting like a sadist – I hid a little pain. They had what I had once had, and the thought made me burst out the news that I hadn’t intended to share so soon.

“I have to tell you all something,” I said shakily, and seeing all of their worried faces look back at me, I knew I had to look just as awful as I felt. “Dan and I are officially divorced,” I finished.

“Oh, honey,” Hazel said gently, scootching her chair across the flagstone floor with an ugly screech to put her arm around my shoulders. “Here we are wittering on about books. How are you feeling?”

I tried to smile back at her. Hazel had been the first friend I’d made in Porthglen. She was kind and bubbly but always sharp - a shoulder to cry on and always honest.

Even so, it had taken me a long time to talk to any of them, Hazel included, about my separation from Dan after it first happened. For a while, Dan and I acted like nothing had changed. We stayed living together for a few weeks, but I spent more and more nights at my grandmother’s until eventually it was clear I had to make the move permanent.

That was when I finally told the girls.

They’d been shocked, naturally, as Dan and I had seemed to have the perfect relationship, but they supported my decision.

I didn’t want children, and he did. There wasn’t much more to it. The fact that we loved each other didn’t matter if we couldn’t map a future together.

“I’m… I feel awful,” I admitted, biting back a fresh wave of emotions but holding strong. “These past six months have been like an out of body experience.”

“Have you spoken to him since you got the official papers?” Hailey asked, pushing a lock of dark hair behind her ear. “Remembering my own divorce, it was helpful to have that final closure. Remind you of the reasons you’re splitting up.”

“No,” I realised. “I’ve been… avoiding him.”

“It’s understandable to feel too hurt to face him,” Hazel said.

“It’s not that,” I shrugged. “I… well, I still love him. I’m worried if I speak to him, I’ll feel worse. We’re divorced now, there’s no going back.”

“Still, it is just as likely to help as hurt,” Hailey offered.

“Maybe,” I agreed.

“And do you want to go back?” Ruth asked pointedly. “It’s okay if you do.”

“No, it’s not,” I laughed at my own contrariness. “We still want different things.”

“Of course,” Ruth nodded. “But that doesn’t stop you wanting him.”

“Ruth…” Hailey said quietly, noticing me starting to sob.

“No, she’s right,” I said gently, reaching across the table to grip Ruth’s hand. She had an uncanny way of always saying the right thing, however much you might not want to hear it. “I do still want to be with him, but I can’t.” I cleared my throat. “And that’s why I… um… I need to tell you something else… oh, this is hard.”

“What’s hard, love?” Ruth asked.

“I can’t stay here. I can’t keep living with my grandmother pining for Dan. I’m going back to Manchester,” I shuddered with tears.

“Viola, goodness…” Hazel said, her grip around my shoulders tightening tenderly. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” I nodded. “I just can’t imagine being happy here now, plus I’ve got family and school friends back home, so I won’t be totally alone. Mum’s still there, so I’ll be able to see her more often. The timing’s worked out pretty well – my cousin is going travelling for a year in a couple of months’ time, so her house will be empty. It’ll give me time to set up my dog-walking business up there and find my own place.”

They were all silent for a moment, their faces downturned sadly, before Ruth said, “I’m going to miss you so much.”

“How long?” Hailey asked. “We have a few more months with you?”

“Just under three months,” I nodded. “And I’ll miss all of you too.”

Chapter Three

Opportunity

“All of these dogs belong to the same person?” Laurie questioned as we headed up the cliff path, dragged by five dogs – a miniature poodle, a hairy mongrel of some sort, a Great Dane, a Border Collie and a leggy greyhound-type who tugged at the leash as if he wanted to dive off of the cliff edge after every autumn leaf we saw.

“She helps out at a rescue and ends up adopting every dog she fosters,” I explained.

“I don’t know how you do this,” Laurie protested, holding back the mongrel and Border Collie. “My arms are killing me.”

“I did say I could take all of them,” I laughed. “It is my job.”

“What sort of friend would I be if I let you take the brunt of it?” He retorted.

“If you were a true friend, you’d pick up after the Great Dane,” I teased, to a disgusted face from Laurie. “Now, come on – when are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

“It’s not much further,” he assured me. “Just at the top of this path.”

“You said that twenty minutes ago.”

“Trust me, it’s worth it,” he smiled, that warm, lip-curling smile of his that I knew all too well.

It meant he’d done something he wasn’t sure I’d approve of.

We’d been friends since I first moved to the village. He’d been one of my first ever clients. His work schedule – a chef with long hours - had made it a little difficult for him to keep up with daily walks. His dog Peanut had been put down at the old age of fourteen the previous year, but our friendship had grown well past our work relationship.

While the book club girls were my confidants, Laurie was my partner in crime, always taking me on some new adventure.

We finally reached the end of the steep incline, and the path levelled out across the grassy clifftop. The autumn sun seemed nearer, the sky an endless space above us.

“But there’s nothing up here,” I protested. “Just a few benches and the old lighthouse.”

“That’s it,” Laurie beamed. “Come see.”

We approached the lighthouse and stopped at the steps.

It was over a hundred feet tall, and although the orange stripe on its body must have once been bright enough to be seen for miles around, the paint was flaking off and years of dirt and weathering had faded it to a grimy off-brown.

“There!” Laurie said, his blonde curls whipping in the clifftop breeze.

“What am I looking at?” I asked with a shrug, trying to keep hold of the greyhound, who was straining towards a rabbit hole behind us.

“My next business,” Laurie said proudly, raising both hands to gesture to the lighthouse. “I just bought it.”

“Well, you do have a certain bedraggled look, but what credentials do you have to guide ships into harbour?” I mocked, receiving a grin back.

He’d been a constant source of fun since my divorce. He - unlike the book club, who although supportive, reminded me of my woes with every kind word – hadn’t treated me any differently since Dan told me he didn’t want kids. He’d only talked about it if I brought it up.

Our friendship had been a safe refuge for me, a place to go when the world felt too sad and suffocating.

“It’s going to be a café,” he explained. “I’ve been saving up to find the right location, and this place was so cheap.”

“I’m not surprised,” I said, nodding my head towards the leaking windows, peeling paint and ancient rusted pipes which outlined the side.

“I’ve got a business loan for all that,” he continued. “The whole place will be renovated.”

I nodded approvingly.

“I have to admit, Laurie, this is amazing!” I added. “How long have you been talking about opening your own place? This is the dream!”

“Thank you, I’m beyond excited,” he grinned, taking a step back and breathing out as he looked at the lighthouse. I started to get the sense there was something else he was holding back.

“Laurie?” I queried, joining him a step back and taking in the lighthouse again. “Something else you want to say?”

“Mm,” he nodded, knowing what I was getting at. “Well, the thing is Vee, I want to bring you in as my business partner.”

I couldn’t help but burst out laughing at what I initially thought was one of Laurie’s usual jokes. After a few moments, his fixed grin told me he wasn’t kidding.

“Laurie, I don’t know the first thing about running a café!” I shrugged. “You can’t be serious?”

“I’m deadly serious,” he nodded. “I want it to be a dog café.”

“What on earth is a dog café?”

“Street food, tapas, artisan cakes and coffee for the humans, dog-safe treats for their four-legged friends,” he continued. “Look, come and see the vision!”

He handed the two dog leads to me and fumbled with a set of keys for the front door to the lighthouse.

We stepped through to a run-down living room of sorts, a mouldy old sofa still sat in the centre.

“Imagine it nicely decorated,” he said, twirling around with arms wide, his eyes twinkling with the imagined scene. “Over here,” he headed to the back of the room, “Would be a counter for cakes and cookies, and directly next to it, the doggie equivalents.”

“You’re too crazy.”

“Just crazy enough!” He laughed, rushing to the other end. “Over here, a station to fill up water bowls. We could even have dog toys for sale, that the dogs could pick out themselves.”

“It’s like a cartoon!” I teased.

“And upstairs,” he said, stepping on the bottom step of the wooden spiral staircase. It crumbled under his weight, so he stepped back and opted for just pointing. “Upstairs can be a social area, sofas, beanbags, that sort of thing. We could have local charities bring dogs for adoption in. We could do puppy cuddle sessions. Just imagine it all, Vee!”

He was emphatic as he came back over to me and put a hand on my shoulder.

“Why me?”

“I need you,” he said simply. “I need your creativity, and the way you always put animals first. I need your canine cooking skills – I’ve seen those dog treats you handmake for Charlie.”

“Well…” I admitted. “I do that, that’s true.”

“This place – Peanut’s Place,” he said with a sad smile at the mention of his beloved pet. “Will be an ideal spot for dog walkers, hikers, tourists alike. The cliff is a common walking route, and this will become the favourite rest stop.”

“But the renovations…” I said. “It’s a big project.”

I hadn’t told Laurie about my plans to move back to Manchester. In just a few months, I’d be leaving here.

“The loan will pay for most of it, and you and I can do the rest,” he offered. “That is, if you want to.”

Of course I wanted to. This was huge.

But how could I say yes, knowing I’d be leaving?

I thought about telling him, but something stopped me.

“I wouldn’t be able to help with the day to day running – I’m not a barista or a chef,” I back-pedalled.

“Luckily for you, I have ten years in the restaurant industry, and a certificate from a barista course,” he teased. “Look, don’t worry - my sister’s going to be the boots on the ground, so to speak. The manager. Come on, I know you have your own dog-walking business, that is a priority. I just need your help to get the place off the ground.”

“I couldn’t contribute financially,” I said plainly, hoping he didn’t have his heart set on the idea quite yet. “All of my savings are tied up in the house with Dan, and who knows how long it will take to sell.”

“Don’t worry about the money,” Laurie assured me. “Just see this as an opportunity. A partnership.”

I wanted to do this. I could help my friend make an amazing business, a pillar of Porthglen’s community.

I just hoped Laurie would forgive me for leaving before it actually opened.

I looked around the damp, dilapidated room once more and sighed.

I got the feeling Laurie could get me to say yes to just about anything.

“I’m in.”

Chapter Four

Back to Square One

“I’ll pick you up after canoeing ends,” Grams said tenderly as she put the handbrake on and shifted her touch to my forearm. “Two hours, no more. Will that be enough time?”

“I can walk home, Grams. Please don’t worry about me,” I replied.

It didn’t matter that I was nearly thirty-five, she always insisted on driving me around town, unless she was out with one of her many clubs.

“Well, keep your mobile on,” she said. “And stay strong.”

I left the car and drew a ragged breath as Grams drove off.

I had decided to take Hailey’s advice.

Mill Grove, mine and Dan’s house, was directly ahead of me. There were still a few things to tie up, and although I could have done it all over text, or sent a friend round, Hailey was right. I needed to do this, no matter the pain it caused me. I needed a firm bookend to the marriage.

It was so surreal to see my own house with stranger’s eyes. Little things were out of place, signs of my absence.

The front garden which had once been my solace after a hard day was now overgrown, the front gate left open, which it never had been when I lived here. Amongst the weeds, was a ‘For Sale’ sign, a local estate agent smiling overzealously out at me.

Dan’s car was parked up on the verge instead of in the driveway.

The front door of the porch had a sticky paper residue on it, which had once been a sign reading, ‘A Spoiled Dalmatian Lives Here’.

I knocked tentatively and waited as Dan came to open the door.

“Hi,” he said, looking just as awkward as I felt.

He looked good – surprisingly so. His dark brown hair had been cut recently, shorter than his usual floppy ear-length style, and he was wearing a maroon jumper I’d never seen before.

“Hi.”

He looked away sheepishly and stepped aside for me to enter.

“There are only a few bits and pieces,” Dan explained as we walked into the living room. He handed me an envelope of cash – a couple of hundred. “I managed to sell that turquoise sofa. That’s your half.”

It had been our first ever purchase together, bought from a bespoke furniture maker in the next town over. For the ten years we’d lived at Mill Grove, it had been the centrepiece of the living room, and without it, the revealed laminate floor somehow looked colder.

“Thanks,” I nodded, attempting a smile. “Anything else?”

“A couple of books that I think are yours,” he said, turning and leading me through to the dining room. “How To Make Friends and Influence People?”

“Not mine,” I said, coming to stand next to the dining room table as we stared up at the bookcase. “I think your Aunt Lynda gave it to you for Christmas a few years ago.”

“Ah,” he nodded. “Well, Great Expectations, that’s definitely yours. You always liked Dickens.”

“That’s mine,” I agreed, taking the book from him.

There were odd moments like this with us now. We still knew everything about each other, over a decade of personal knowledge, foibles and hang-ups.

And yet him remembering my love of Dickens or me bringing a packet of mints in the back pocket of my jeans in case he wanted one were just trivia now.

What was really left between us when our shared future had been stripped away so suddenly?

“Do you want the wedding china?” He asked suddenly, moving through to the kitchen. “Or we could sell it. I don’t mind either way.”

Although neither of us had wanted to get it – it had been a gift his grandmother had insisted we’d use, although we never did – it still stung a little that he could talk about selling it so nonchalantly. Perhaps I should have been more prepared – after all, the sofa was just the beginning.

Soon, the house itself would be sold and gone.

“I don’t mind either,” I said quickly, not letting him see my confliction. I certainly didn’t want to take it back to my grandmother’s house, only to haul it up to Manchester in a few months’ time.

Dan - like Laurie, or anyone else in the village besides the book club and my grandmother – didn’t know I was leaving. He didn’t need to know.

“I, uh,” he said, one hand on the kettle as if he was about to offer to make me a cup of tea. “I should tell you something – we have a buyer for the house. They offered the asking price, so I accepted. I hope you don’t mind me speaking for both of us.”

“No, no, that’s… I don’t mind…” I stammered.

It had happened. I thought I had prepared myself, but my racing heartbeat indicated otherwise.

Dan met my gaze and came a little closer, one hand on the kitchen island.

“Do you remember when we tried to make our own pasta on here?” He asked with a small laugh. “And the dough got stuck over and over again?”

“We couldn’t breathe from laughing,” I nodded, a little smile pulling at my lips as my eyes involuntarily welled up, either from the shock of the house sale news or from the bittersweetness of the memory, I wasn’t sure. “And we never tried again.”

“You were always the better cook,” he grinned, the hand on the counter moving to my forearm.

I looked down at it. It felt good to have his touch on me again.

“Thank you,” I murmured, already knowing what I was about to do and already regretting it.

I pushed myself up onto the countertop of the kitchen island, keeping his hand on my forearm, and using my legs to pull him closer. He didn’t hesitate to meet me in a deep kiss, his other arm moving to my back and running up to my neck.

I held him close to me with my legs, letting his hands take my body weight as the kiss continued.

“I promise this wasn’t why I suggested you come over,” he breathed heavily as we broke apart.

“I know,” I smiled, tears falling freely down my face as I wrapped tighter around him and he carried me to the bedroom.

It wasn’t quite regret that I felt as I lay in my old bed staring up at the ceiling that afternoon. It was lighter.

My worry about seeing Dan again had been replaced by a steadfastness, just as pain-filled but easier to bear.

Hailey had been right. I needed to face my old life to be able to build a new one.

But she had also been wrong. This wasn’t closure, it had just reminded me of all the things I was giving up.

I still loved him and wanted to be with him.

“Hey,” Dan said, coming back from the ensuite bathroom in just his bathrobe. He ran a hand through his hair awkwardly. “That was… I don’t really know what to say now.”

“Me neither,” I chuckled. “Do you think… do you think we could do it again?”

I was hit by a wave of self-loathing. What was I doing?! I had spent all this time moving forward, just to go right back to square one.

“Now?” He laughed. “I’m not sure I could go again.”

“No, not now,” I shook my head, my cheeks flushing. “I didn’t mean that… I… don’t worry about it.”

“Oh,” he wiped a hand over his face. “I think we both acted quite impulsively. But nothing’s has changed. Has it?”

He looked at me hopefully, as if I might suddenly declare, ‘I’ve changed my mind! One afternoon in bed with you has made me want kids!’

I shook my head and he looked deflated. I couldn’t blame him for hoping.

After all, I was hoping for the opposite from him.

In the weeks after he had sat me down and told me, I had so desperately wished for him to change his mind.

I shuffled out from under the duvet to pull my dress back on.

“Would you, uh… would you like this too?” He asked, opening the bedside drawer as I rounded the bed.

He pulled out a photo album – our wedding album.

I blinked for a moment and took it.

Feeling conflicted, I found my remaining clothes and the items I was taking home with me.

Dan walked me to the door, and although we were both somewhat more hesitant than we had been in the kitchen, we kissed on the porch, before I turned and walked down the garden path.

What had I done?

Chapter Four

Stern Words

“Bloody hell, Viola,” Hazel blew out her breath, cupping a mug of hot chocolate I’d made her.

We were sat out on my grandmother’s back patio, wrapped in a blanket we were sharing, and taking in the sea view.

For the past half an hour I’d been recounting everything that had happened with Dan, not knowing how to feel about it.

“I know, it’s a lot,” I agreed, head in my hands. “I need to have some stern words with myself.”

“Be fair – this has all happened quite quickly,” Hazel reminded me. “Be a little bit more lenient with yourself.”

“But I’ve just opened up a whole can of worms. Even Dan said it – nothing has changed. I should be putting my energy into moving on, but there’s clearly still something between us. How can I just ignore that?”

“You can’t ignore it. But you need to decide what you want.”

I groaned, “I don’t know! I don’t know what I want. But I know for sure that I don’t want to hurt Dan.”

“Difficult,” Hazel agreed. “But remember you’ll be moving away soon. Perhaps that will give you the clean break you need.”

“I hope so,” I sighed. “I don’t know whether to stay away from Dan until then, or if it would be healthier to talk to him about all this.”

“I’d always opt for communicating personally,” Hazel mused, tapping her thumb ring against the outside of her mug in thought. “He might give you a different perspective on it, especially if he’s not in the same place you are.”

“That’s a good point,” I nodded. “Speaking of moving away… I have more news.”

“It’s been a big week for you – what’s the news?!” Hazel laughed.

“Laurie’s turning the old lighthouse into a café for people and dogs,” I explained watching her face go from confused to excited. “He’s asked me to be his business partner.”

“Gosh – are you going to do it? It sounds perfect for you but… you’re leaving!” Hazel pointed out.

“I know, but he only needs me to help him get it off the ground. I’ll be here for all the important bits, and I’ll get a little cheque in the post every month once it has opened.”

“And to think I thought I’d had a crazy week,” Hazel laughed.

“Work?”

“Someone came in with a traffic cone up his bottom,” she nodded. “Being a nurse is never boring.”

“Yuck.”

“Yeah.”

“What do you do when you see that guy walking around Porthglen?!” I asked, and Hazel nearly spit out her drink as she imagined the scenario.

“Try not to laugh while he avoids eye contact with me?”

“Was he drunk, at least?”

“I think so,” she nodded. “Most of the people we see on a Friday night are.”

“Who knew Porthglen had such a vibrant night life?” I shook my head in wonder. “You must see your patients around the village all the time?”

“Every day,” Hazel nodded. She paused and added hesitantly, “I thought I saw your grandmother today, actually.”

“At the pub, you mean?” I asked.

It wasn’t unusual to see my Grams at The Ancient Mariner for half a pint of lager with her friends. She was always off with one social group or another when she wasn’t painting, doing judo or playing poker.

I had to admit, it was a little depressing that my Grams had a more active social life than I did.

“No, at the hospital,” Hazel clarified, the revelation stopping me from taking another sip of my hot chocolate. “I was on early shift today and I saw her towards the end, so about 1pm?”

“Oh,” I said, trying not to immediately jump to conclusions.

That was not long after she’d left me with Dan.

“I’m sure it was just for a blood test – I was by the nurse’s station so lots of people go past there when they have a blood draw.”

“Still…” I exhaled. “She didn’t mention anything. She said she was going to watercolour class this morning, out for lunch at the pub and canoeing this afternoon.”

As I thought about it canoeing was the perfect cover for going to the hospital – the canoe club was far up the river Fowey, further than I would take any of my client’s dogs. I would never have known that she wasn’t where she said she was if Hazel hadn’t seen her.

Once Hazel had left, I found Grams in the living room, snuggled up with Charlie on the sofa, reading a book.

“Grams?” I asked tentatively, taking a seat on an armchair. “Can I talk to you?”

She sat up, placing a thumb in between the pages of the book and peering at me from over the top of her glasses, “Of course you can, petal. What’s wrong? Is it Dan?”

“No, not that,” I said gently. “It’s just… well, Hazel saw you at the hospital today. She said you walked past the nurse’s station near the entrance.”

“Ah,” Grams nodded, immediately settling back down against her cushions and opening the book back up, “Just a blood test, sweetie. When you get to my age, you need to get checked out a little more often.”

Whilst that would have usually assuaged my doubts, the fact that she had given me the cover story of the canoeing made me worry there was more to it.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I sighed. Charlie jumped off of the sofa and came to rest his head on my legs empathetically.

“Tell you what, petal?” Grams asked, engrossed in her book again.

“That you were going to the hospital. I could have gone with you,” I replied.

Grams had always avoided heavy topics.

She had first moved from Manchester to the Cornish coast when I was five, a year after my Grandpa’s death. Mum had always said it was for her ‘health’, although whether she meant mental or physical wasn’t clear.

As I grew older, I noticed Grams didn’t talk about her life before moving to Porthglen very often. It was compartmentalised.

I wanted to find out more, but it was never brought up, especially around the family. She was our fun-loving seaside grandmother, and we were never encouraged to see beyond that.

Grams laughed at my assertion and looked at me from behind the pages of her book with loving eyes, “I’m a big girl, Viola. I can go by myself.”

“But you don’t have to go by yourself,” I stressed. “Let me help you out.”

“Viola,” Grams said, her voice taking on a sterner tone. “I’m your grandmother, you’re my granddaughter. Not the other way around. I will ask you if I need help, but until I do, assume that I can manage my own affairs.”

She wasn’t going to tell me anything more, no matter how much I hinted. With a worried sigh, I headed to the kitchen to start cooking dinner for both of us.

Chapter Five

Opportunity

“Your floorplan doesn’t work,” I stated, staring at Laurie’s mock-up of the interior of Peanut’s Place. “I mean, the kitchen space and open area upstairs seem fine, but the seating is all wrong.”

“How so?” Laurie asked, coming to stand next to me.

He looked over my shoulder with the end of his pencil stuck into his mouth.

We were stood in the centre of the lighthouse, the scene around us a hubbub of movement and noise. Workmen were replacing the rotten window frames, taking up floorboards to lay wiring and re-plastering the walls ready for our paint colours.

Outside, more builders were loading up a skip with the old rusty pipes, and Laurie’s sister Keeley was signing a delivery order for a box of curtains.

“Well, you want people to bring their dogs, but there’s nowhere for the dogs to sit,” I explained, pointing to the design.

“You want dog-sized sofas?” Laurie teased. “Surely the dogs will sit on the floor?”

“I know you’re joking, but hear me out. They can sit on the floor,” I nodded. “But there needs to be enough space for that. The floor of a café is a hazardous place for a dog. People can trip over them, spill hot liquids, pull their chair back onto a paw – you get the idea. We need to make space under the tables or at the sides of the room for dog-safe areas.”

Laurie watched as I sketched over the top of his designs, leaving room for dog beds at the edges.

He smiled approvingly and tapped the drawing.

“See, this is why I need you! I couldn’t visualise it until you explained. Genius.”

I beamed.

Work had gone well so far. We were on budget, on time and the old, grimy lighthouse was fast transforming into the bare bones of a café.

Laurie had planned the menu, a marketing campaign including a few favours from friends of his in the restaurant industry, and I had assisted on everything dog-related, from keeping water dishes sanitary to suggesting a paw-washing station outside the front door.

We had even worked out a deal with the tiny pet shop in the village so that we could stock some of their toys.

“I think we’re done for today,” Laurie said with a grin. “Do you have some time?”

“I only had morning walks today,” I thought back. “And my Grams is out at one of her five hundred hobbies. Why?”

“Let’s go out,” Laurie suggested impishly.

“Aren’t we needed here?” I asked, looking around at the mess of building work.

“Keeley can handle it. There’s not much we can do until the crew are done with the repairs,” he shrugged. “Besides, it’s fun to goof off every now and then.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Seriously, where are we going?” I asked.

Laurie was driving, taking me out from Porthglen and towards the nearby town of Foweybridge, which was considerably bigger than our village, but a few miles inland.

“Now that you’ve said ‘seriously’, I’ll tell you,” he replied sarcastically, that lippy grin spread across his face again.

“Laurie! Just tell me!” I begged.

“Stop it,” he laughed. “We’re nearly there!”

We parked at the town square and walked through the high street towards the river, the focal point of the town.

As the path came out by the riverbank, I realised where we were walking.

Up ahead was Laurie’s workplace – the riverside restaurant Utopia.

“What are we doing here?” I chuckled. “You don’t want me to scrub dishes, do you? I promise I’ll stop teasing you so much!”

“No, no, nothing like that,” he smirked. “Just come inside.”

We entered through the staff door in the gardens, coming out into the usually bustling kitchen.

“Where is everyone?”  I asked.

“We’re closed today,” Laurie explained. “Staff training up in London.”

“Didn’t you have to go?”

Laurie turned the lights on, revealing ingredients laid out on the countertop.

“In a month’s time, I won’t work here anymore,” he shrugged. “No need to go and watch the same health and safety video I’ve seen two hundred times before.”

“The one you told me about – with the puppets?”

“The one with the puppets,” Laurie nodded, taking my hand and leading me forward. “Stop being so shy!”

“I feel like I shouldn’t be here!”

“You’re with me, you’re fine!” Laurie grinned. “Look.”

He gestured to the ingredients. Flour, sugar, butter, eggs, cocoa powder, cherries – the countertop was filled with delicious items.

“Black Forest Gateaux,” I breathed the words excitedly. “You remembered.”

“Of course,” he smiled.

A few years earlier we’d gone out with a group of friends for a Christmas meal. They’d run out of Christmas pudding – an unimaginable failure, as Laurie had put it – and instead offered us Black Forest Gateaux. Dan and a few of our friends had hated it, disappointed to miss out on the festive dessert.

It was the first time I’d had the gooey, chocolatey cake, and I instantly fell in love. By the end of the night – and a fair few glasses of prosecco later – I had eaten everyone else’s portions too.

“I don’t know how to make one!” I laughed.

“Me neither,” Laurie joked. “Where’s the instructions from the back of the packet?”

“Oh, ha-ha.”

“I’ll teach you. We’re going to serve it at the café,” he explained. “So, you’ll need to know how to make it.”

A shiver ran up my back.

“Really, I don’t think I’ll be around much to help you out with the cooking…” I tried to explain.

Why wasn’t I being honest with him?

It was somehow harder to tell him that I was leaving than it had been with my friends or Grams. Everything with him was… light. We had a laugh.

I didn’t want to see his face fall, all the fun taken out of our little adventure.

“I’m just joking, Vee,” he shook his head amusedly. “You don’t need to worry – I won’t make you do any cooking! Well, maybe just the dog treats.”

I should tell him, I thought. Just get it over with.

But just as I opened my mouth to try and find the words, he took my hands and my heart fluttered in a way it never had done with him before.

“We’ve got to wash our hands first,” he said, his thumbs tender on the backs of my hands. “Or I really will get in trouble with my boss.”

I couldn’t seem to form any words.

“Vee?” He asked. “You okay? Is it the cake – we don’t have to make it, I just thought it would be fun.”

“No, no, sorry… I’m just a little warm,” I said, pulling my hands out of his grip and taking my jumper off. I set it on an empty countertop and turned back to him. “I’m so surprised that you remember that night.”

“It was a pretty amazing night out,” Laurie said. “You were talking about that cake for weeks afterwards.”

“It was very good cake,” I agreed, coming back to stand at his side. “So, what’s first, captain?”

I tried to return to the banter we usually had.

“I like you calling me that. Perhaps I’ll get a badge so everyone calls me that,” Laurie teased. “First, cream the butter and sugar.”

I set to work with the stand mixer as Laurie relayed instructions. Soon we had a smooth, brown batter which smelt divine.

“Two separate tins,” he explained. “And we’ll bake them for half an hour.”

I again followed his instructions without any quibbling. If there was one thing Laurie knew how to do, it was cook.

“What are we going to do for half an hour?” I asked as I closed the oven door and joined Laurie on a row of stools.

“We’ll have to find something to talk about,” Laurie said, putting his arm around me.

There it was again – a jitter, deep in me.

What was that?

In all the years I’d known him, it had always been platonic. I’d been married, he’d had girlfriends, it had always been like that.

I shuffled out of his grip slightly, turning towards him.

“I don’t know…” I said, trying to hide my awkwardness. “What should we talk about?”

“All these years of friendship, and we can’t think of anything to say to each other?” He laughed, feigning an arrow to the heart. “I’m just quite glad to get you alone, honestly.”

Another jolt in my core.

“You… you are?” I struggled to keep my composure. What was happening to me?

“Yeah, I love my sister but seeing her every single day is reminding me why I was so glad to move out of mum and dad’s house,” he tittered. “Plus, with all those workmen around – me and you haven’t had a chance to have a quiet chat.”

His usual levity had faded. We rarely got into the serious stuff, but the mood was lower now, a contrast to our usual back and forths.

“What about?” I asked tentatively. He was holding my gaze, and I felt a strange compulsion to lean in for a kiss.

“Well, about you,” he said before I could. “How you’re doing. I don’t like to pry about your divorce, but you’ve not been yourself recently.”

I let my breath out.

He hadn’t really asked me about Dan, and I hadn’t really told him anything beyond the basics. My friendship with him was an escape from all of that heaviness.

“Things have been weird,” I said, not sure whether to tell him about my afternoon with Dan. “Our house sold.”

“Oh, wow, mate, that’s difficult,” he empathised. “So, you’re living with your Grams?”

Mate.

Whatever was going on with me, Laurie hadn’t noticed it. It was just a flutter, nothing more.

“Yeah, for now,” I nodded. “Actually, it’s a good thing in some ways – I could properly invest in Peanut’s Place once the sale goes through. Although I’m sad to not have my old life anymore, I’m trying to remember that it’s a new door opening.”

“Exactly,” he said, playing with the silver ring on his middle finger methodically. “And look at it this way – no more mortgage payments!”

“There is always a silver lining with you, isn’t there?” I said quietly.

“There always is,” he nodded earnestly. “Always.”

We left a pause, the happy silences that usually filled our time together. We were comfortable enough together that we could just sit and be.

“How much longer on these cakes?” I moaned after a few moments. “I’m so hungry.”

“Another… eighteen minutes,” he cackled. “Time goes slow when you’re waiting for cake, my friend.”

“I didn’t have any lunch,” I realised.

“If only we were in a kitchen full of food,” he shrugged with a mock sigh. I rolled my eyes.

“And what exactly would we cook?” I looked at the fresh fruit and vegetables in the racks above the countertops. “Grapefruits with a side of lemons?”

“Let’s whip up something,” Laurie grinned. “There’s always something delicious in the fridges here.”

He headed to the fridge and started pulling ingredients out.

“Oh, yeah - ‘whip up something’,” I scoffed. “Chef-speak for wizardry. Whenever I try to make up a recipe at home, it looks like a pile of worms compared to what you would make.”

“Practice makes perfect!” He declared cheerfully, coming back over to the stoves with a tower of ingredients which he held in place with his chin tucked on top.

“So, what’s on the menu?” I hovered by the stove, watching him lay everything out.

“Linguine alla limone,” he said, emphasising the Italian words with a careful accent as he took the lemons from the rack. “A classic, and very easy to make.”

“I sense there’s a story coming with this one,” I said, jumping up to sit on the work surface, eliciting a tut from Laurie as my backside became dusted with flour from the cake.

Laurie was more than a little passionate about his work. He had studied all over the world, travelling on a shoestring and washing dishes in local cafes to have enough to stay in hostels.

“When I was seventeen, I was staying on the coast of Sicily, and there was this little café on the seafront, Leggero’s. I washed dishes and cut vegetables and in return the owner let me sleep on his sofa in the tiny apartment above the café.” He heated up a pan and fried garlic along with lemon peels in olive oil. “He was very wary of me at first – wouldn’t let me cook a thing. A few months later, I seemed to have earned his trust a little more, and so we went to the market. They had lemons the size of a grapefruit, big, juicy and so tart.” He juiced the lemons into the pan and it drifted into a cloud of steam, sizzling furiously and smelling gorgeous. “After the café closed that evening, he made this dish in front of me.”

“And you got to try it?”

“Oh no, not that day,” Laurie said, his face the picture of concentration as he took a jug of cream and added it to the sauce along with chili flakes, chopped parsley and salt. “But eventually he let me cook for myself, and the first thing I made was that pasta dish. I proudly took my bowl to the chef-”

“-And he loved it!-”

“-No, actually he said it was the worst thing he’d ever tasted. I was only seventeen, remember,” he smirked, adding the now cooked pasta to the sauce. He stood back and with the gentlest motion of his tensed forearm, sent the sauce and pasta twisting into the air, and back down into the pan cleanly, combining them perfectly. “He told me my pasta was as overcooked as a wet fish, my sauce tasted like his nonna’s socks and – the ultimate crime to an Italian chef – I had burnt the garlic. But I didn’t give up.”

He took two bowls from the overhead shelves and twirled the linguine into them with a final twist of lemon and grating of parmesan on top.

“Here,” he said, taking a forkful and offering it up to my lips. “Close your eyes and imagine the Sicilian sea.”

I hesitated, blinking a few times, before submitting. I took the pasta into my mouth, the sharp lemon and creamy sauce hitting my tongue as I thought of the sea.

It was divine, the product of a skilled craftsman.

“No matter how hard I try,” I said as I finished the mouthful. “I can only picture the tide coming into Porthglen Bay.”

“It is very beautiful here,” Laurie smiled gently.

“That bit where the headland meets the forest, and the trees seem to be leaning in towards the sea, as if they want to be out there.” I gave a little laugh as I realised how silly I must sound. “Nothing compared to Sicily, I’m sure. You must miss travelling.”

“Not at all,” he said with a certainty that surprised me. He handed me the rest of my bowl of pasta, and joined me on the countertop with his own. “I learnt what I wanted to learn – namely, that I love food, and that I hate travelling.”

“Really?”

“I suppose I’m a homebody. I always wanted to plant roots here in Porthglen, near my sister and parents.”

“Mm, ‘settling down’,” I said, partly in jest of the phrase we heard a lot around the village, and from family members.

“Whatever that means,” Laurie said. “I think I have a different definition of it to other people.”

“How so?”

“Marriage and kids, that’s not for me,” he shrugged, and then with a sheepish look, “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No, no, I appreciate your honesty. I didn’t know that about you,” I admitted. “That was why me and Dan split up. He wanted kids, I didn’t.”

He’d had girlfriends, some serious, some not, but I figured it just hadn’t worked out. Now I was starting to wonder if he had been through what I had.

He nodded, “I did suspect that.”

“I wish I had suspected it,” I groaned, taking an even larger forkful of pasta.

“Did you always know you didn’t want kids?” He asked me quietly.

I thought for a moment, chewing my mouthful of pasta.

“Yes,” I finally said. “But I wasn’t always as certain as I am now, partly because everyone kept telling me I would change my mind. It’s hard to have much conviction about the future when your elders are telling you you’re wrong about it.”

“I know that feeling,” he snorted. “I’m waiting to hit the magical age where extended relatives stop mentioning my ‘bachelor lifestyle’. Although, I’d presume it is even worse for women.”

“‘Biological clock’ is a phrase I hear a lot’,” I nodded. “They mean well.”

“Possibly.” He agreed. He was silent for a few minutes as we continued eating out food. “Vee,” he said, getting softer. “For what it’s worth, I think you made the right choice ending your marriage.”

“Really?” I asked. I was still conflicted. Sleeping with Dan again had reopened a barely closed wound.

“Of course. I know you – you couldn’t compromise on that,” he said, a rare moment of directness compared to his usual levity. “You wouldn’t have been happy.”

We paused eating and met each other’s gaze again.

“Thank you for saying that,” I said slowly. “I really needed to hear that.”

“Well, good,” he smiled. “You’re going to get through it, mate.”

The timer rang for the cake, and neither of us moved.

He’d called me ‘mate’ again, and yet there was something in his posture that felt more tender than usual.

Or was I imagining it?

The timer started to beep more frantically.

“Laurie?”

“Yeah?”

We didn’t break our eye contact until I replied, “The timer!”

“Oh, right!” He laughed, coming back to himself.

He leapt from the bench and set to work, cooling, icing, and decorating it until the gateaux was complete. I watched him like I had front row seats to a magic show, marvelling at how naturally he carved the cake’s body and layered on the creams.

My heart glowed warm as I watched him, partly for his friendship, which was so vital to me, and partly from a kindling feeling of desire.

As much as I didn’t want to feel it, it was there now, bolder by the second.

I pushed it down. Things were complicated enough as they were.

“Done!” He stated, standing back from his creation.

“You really are a good friend,” I smirked, sliding off of the countertop and smoothing the flour off of my skirt as I stood next to him. “It looks magnificent.”

“You haven’t tasted it yet,” he reminded me with a wry smile. “Remember the Italian chef’s review – wet fish and nonna’s socks?”

“Yummy,” I grinned.

He cut into the cake, the firm layers of sponge melding with the soft cream and oozing cherries.

I took a plate from him and forked the first mouthful in. It was indulgent, a luxury.

“Wow,” I said, closing my eyes.

“Better than sex,” Laurie remarked, eating his own slice.

“Speak for yourself,” I replied, opening my eyes.

“Is it how you remembered?”

“Exactly how I remembered it. Maybe better,” I stroked his ego a little. “But I think more than that, it brings me back to that day. It was the company. You and Dan and all our friends. Laughter and easy conversation. I do miss that.”

“Laughter?”

“The group. Most of our friends have stayed with Dan,” I explained.

“Oh, wow,” Laurie shook his head. “I didn’t realise that.”

“It’s difficult when a couple splits up after a decade to know what to do. I don’t blame them, but it feels like I broke up the band.”

“Well, it wasn’t your fault.”

“And it wasn’t his,” I pointed out, shovelling more cake into my mouth. “But it is easier to support his dream of having a family than my dream of not having one. They mostly have kids of their own, I’m sure they were excited that he changed his mind.”

“That’s awful.”

“It’s human,” I shrugged.

The sound of key turning in the door to our left snapped our attention away from the conversation.

With a ‘shushing’ finger to his lips, Laurie grabbed the cake and gestured for me to follow him out of the staff entrance we’d come through, turning off the lights as we did.

Suppressing giggles like naughty school children, we crept back to his car, and once we were safely locked inside with the cake resting on my lap, we fell into fits of laughter.

“I thought you said everyone was at staff training!” I wheezed, my heart pounding from nearly being caught.

“That’s what I thought!” He shook his head, laughing too hard to start the car up. “Someone must have come back early!”

Chapter Six

Opportunity

After my great day with Laurie, and odd feelings surfacing that I couldn’t explain, I decided I had to see Dan again.

I had to tell him about my move, at the very least. I didn’t want to hurt him by moving forward with my life, and that was always going to be tricky.

I knew it was going to take a long time for me to truly feel like I wasn’t tied to him, and I was sure it would be the same for him.

Dan took me inside with a slightly puzzled look on his face.

“Tea?” He asked as we reached the kitchen.

“No, that’s okay,” I said. “I just wanted to… I just wanted to see if maybe…”

Why was it so hard to explain why I had come?

Why had I really come? Just to tell him I was moving home?

I didn’t want to get back to together with him, but I didn’t want to hurt him either. At what point was I stringing him along?

“Is this about the other day?” Dan said quickly, reading my conflicted look. “Because it was amazing, of course, but I saw it as more of a onetime thing.”

“Oh, yes, completely a onetime thing,” I clarified. “That’s not quite why-”

“-Good because, well, I have some news actually.”

It was only then that I noticed he was sweating, and he looked pale.

He gestured for me to take a seat at the kitchen island and then fiddled nervously with his fingers.

There was still a tan line where his wedding ring had once been.

“Okay,” I said, leaning on the kitchen island expectantly.

“I have, found someone else now,” Dan said quietly. “We’ve been seeing each other since you and I separated and, well…”

He produced a square piece of paper from his pocket. On the fuzzy greyscale image, was an ultrasound image.

A baby.

“What are you trying to tell me?” I said, my voice cracked and alien.

A baby?!

But…

He was silent as my eyes widened in shock.

“It’s… oh, this is your baby,” I sputtered, instantly standing up from the kitchen island. “Yours and… someone else’s…”

“Maria,” he interjected. “Mine and Maria’s.”

“Maria from your work?!” I coughed.

“Maria from work, yeah,” he said, fiddling guiltily with his hair.

“Were you… cheating on me with her?” I exploded, sad rage overtaking me.

I can’t believe it, I can’t believe it…

“No!” He quickly said, coming closer to me, but I instinctively back away from him. “No! We just started seeing each other after we separated, I swear. I wouldn’t do that to you, Vee.”

“Well, okay…” I shrugged, handing him back the ultrasound hurriedly and heading for the door.

I couldn’t deny it hurt. Even if he hadn’t cheated on me, our relationship of over a decade had only just ended. It still was a punch to the gut to know that he had no qualms about moving on so quickly.

A year ago, I thought we’d grow old together.

A year ago I thought that neither of us wanted to be a parent.

“Wait, Vee, let’s talk, I don’t want to end it like this,” he babbled, trying to stand in front of me to stop me leaving.

“Gosh, Dan, I really don’t know what to say to this. You’ve blindsided me a bit,” I tried to soften my tone, but I was hurting, and he could tell.

“You could say… congratulations?” He offered, seeming to immediately regret the words. “Ignore that, that’s… I just hope you can be happy for me, eventually.”

I nodded slowly, “Of course. But maybe not today.”

“I understand,” he said, thought his expression was heartbreakingly disappointed.

We hadn’t said we would stay in touch, or try to be friends, but I suppose it was implied with how amicable our break-up was, and how much love we still held for each other.

But as I looked at him, clasping the ultrasound and begging me for some odd approval of his actions, I started to realise that was wishful thinking.

There was too much and too little between us for us to ever piece together a healthy friendship.

“I’m going to go,” I said. “It’s been a long day.”

“Wait,” he stopped me again. “What did you come here for?”

“Huh?” I said, in a daze.

“You came here. You must have had a reason?”

“Oh…” I blinked away the shock for a second and straightened up. “I’m moving back to Manchester as soon as the house sale goes through.”

“Oh.” He withdrew, moving slightly out of my way, the action almost involuntary.

“Yeah.”

“Well, I wish you all the best,” he said, sincere but wavering. “Actually, this might help with that.”

He walked to the chest of drawers by the front door and retrieved a document.

“What is it?”

“The final sale of the house has gone through. I’m moving in with Maria in a week. The money will be in your account then.”

“Right,” I nodded, not sure what to say. It was a bumpy end to our marriage, and ending I had never expected. “Thank you for handling all of that.”

“No problem. I… I’d love to see you again before you go,” he said, trying to place a hand on my upper arm, but I moved away.

“I think it’s best if we don’t speak for a while,” I muttered, taking hold of the doorknob.

“What about your grandmother?” He asked.

“I’ll still come back to see her.”

“Then… there’s a chance this won’t be the last time I ever see you?” I asked hopefully, his voice cracking slightly.

I didn’t answer.

It didn’t matter.

We were over now.

There was that bittersweet closure Hailey had told me about.

Chapter Seven

Hike

“Thank you all for turning out for this proud Porthglen tradition,” our mayor, Tilly Queston, said, standing with two hiking poles propping up her ailing limbs as she stood on the cliffside path.

“I heard the poles are the only thing keeping her upright, like a waxwork figure,” Grams whispered to me from our position at the bottom of the hill, along with most of Porthglen.

“Shh, Grams, you can’t say things like that,” I murmured back reprimanding her comments.

“Well, it’s true, she’s far older than me,” Grams muttered back. “Some say she was on Noah’s ark.”

“Oh hush.” I couldn’t help but titter.

“She was one of the two llamas on board,” Grams added with raised eyebrows.

“As you all know, we are raising money for our wonderful local children’s hospital, the Queen Maud Wing at Foweybridge General Hospital.” Tilly swayed momentarily as she continued her speech, her daughter Liz coming to offer her a sip of tea, which immediately perked her up.

“That’s brandy,” Grams theorised. “Or sherry. She knocks back sherry at Christmas.”

“Grams!” I warned again, partly because I was noticeably giggling under my breath and other people in the crowd were turning to look at me.

“We will be walking 15 kilometres today in aid of our wonderful hospital, and I hope to see you all at the finishing line – The Ancient Mariner,” Tilly added.

“Told you – old lush!” Grams cackled, now audible to the people nearest to us, but thankfully not to Tilly.

“So, without further ado, on your marks, get set, go!” Tilly smiled, raising a hiking pole triumphantly as the crowd started their ascent up the cliffside.

“It used to be 25 kilometres,” Grams told me keenly as we battled the stone-strewn coastal path, Charlie running ahead eagerly. “But your generation couldn’t handle it.”

“I think it was because the elderly villagers kept having heart attacks on Fisherman’s Steep,” I retorted back, Grams giving me a knowing smile in return.

We had gotten sponsorship money from everyone in the village and given out far more than we’d raised ourselves. It was the most nonsensical way to raise money, but it was a popular annual tradition in Porthglen which was more about community than it was hiking or charity.

“You look knackered already,” Hazel caught up to us with her friends from the hospital. “Put your back into it Vee!”

“That’s that spirit, Hazel!” Grams laughed raucously, picking up her own pace.

“Steady, Grams, it’s not an easy climb,” I warned.

I was protective of her, and rightly so. She had no sense of danger, taking canoeing in her stride just as easily as horse riding, mountain biking and surfing. I wished I had her courage.

“Oh, stop it, Viola!” She dismissed me. “Worry about me when I’m dead!”

I rolled my eyes, but acquiesced to her wishes, staying silent as we moved with the group up to the clifftop.

The lighthouse came into view, still being worked on but in significantly better shape than it had been just a month ago when we’d started work on it.

My eyes searched for Laurie in the crowd.

He was up ahead with his sister, and another woman I didn’t recognise. He had his hand on her lower back as they took a steeper part of the path, and a pang of jealously hit me.

It’s a stupid crush, I told myself, the same thing I had been telling myself since our afternoon at the restaurant over a week earlier.

Just a crush, nothing more.

We had been friends for years, and so long as I didn’t mess that up, we’d be friends for many more years to come.

I was just feeling vulnerable and lonely, and the feeling would pass.

“Did you pack my raincoat?” Grams asked me as droplets of rain flurried towards us now that we were exposed to the elements at the top of the cliff.

“Will you ever remember your own raincoat?” I scolded her lovingly. “You’d forgot your head if it wasn’t screwed on.”

“It barely is,” she mused. “And don’t take that tone with me, I’m your grandmother!” She jested.

“Then act like it!” I shot back cheekily, eliciting a smile from her as I pulled the raincoat from my backpack and handed it to her. “What will you do once I’m back in Manchester?”

She tutted, pulling on her raincoat and fixing me with a glare, “I still don’t believe you’re actually going.”

“I am!”

“You’re not, love.”

“I am!” I crossed my arms indignantly. “I need a change of scenery, and once cousin Mai is out of her flat, I’ll be going back up there.”

“Your mother doesn’t think you’ll go through with it either,” Grams said, ignoring my reply.

“You’ve been talking about me?”

“Of course, we’re worried about you.”

“You don’t need to be! I just need to restart my life somewhere without the constant reminders of my marriage,” I said, gesturing my head to Dan, who near the front of the walking group, an arm lovingly draped over the shoulder of her colleague and soon-to-be mother of his child, Maria.

“Forgot that fool,” Grams shook her head. “You have so many other people here. Me, for one-”

“-I know,” I sighed. “But I need to go-”

“-And Hazel, and Ruth, and Hailey, and that fella with the curly hair you hang out with-”

“-Laurie-”

“-And all your dog walking clients you’ve spent so many years building a relationship with. You’ve lost some things, but not everything. I’d hate to see you make a move that you can’t come back from.”

I sighed.

I could never argue with her.

We trudged on through the increasing rain until the headland led us into the woodland at Porthglen Acres, a private farm which opened up its woodland for the charity walk every year.

It was one of my favourite places to come, a cosy hideaway with the ever-present lulling of the sea’s movement in the background.

We trod down piles of crunchy orange leaves as we walked, the forest becoming musical with our footfall. Charlie snatched at the fallen leaves as we made our way through the forest, and I called him off of a squirrel or two. He reluctantly returned to us, nuzzling Grams’ leg as we walked to ask for pets.

“You look damp.” Laurie approached us, offering sandwiches wrapped in cling film. “My famous Banh Mi.”

“Just what I need right now!” Grams moaned excitedly, taking the sandwich from him and tucking in.

“You’ll get a stitch!” I laughed, watching her tear into the bread like a wild bear. “Thanks, Laurie,” I added earnestly.

“I had to start handing them out otherwise my sister was threatening to eat them all,” he replied.

“Isn’t she sick of your food yet?” I countered.

“Not yet,” Laurie shrugged and added with an impish grin. “I might have to start making things I know she doesn’t like.”

“Tripe?” I suggested. “No one likes tripe.”

“I like tripe,” Grams shrugged.

“I do a great tripe fricassee,” Laurie mused, adding over the top emphasis to his description to make his point. “With pickled onions and a basil cream which really brings the umami notes to the surface.”

“You really can make any food sound delicious, can’t you?” I marvelled with an impressed smile.

“Anything except American cheese singles – you know the orange ones that come in plastic?” Laurie shuddered. “Not even an expert hand can save those monstrosities.”

“That doesn’t count as food,” I agreed.

“Well, I’ll let you get on,” Laurie smiled. “I need to get back to my friend anyway. See you at work tomorrow – I’ve got some menu graphic design templates to go through with you.”

“Great,” I said, smiling to hide a shiver of jealously running through me again as he jogged back towards the woman I had seen him with earlier.

Stop it!

Why was I even thinking like that?

“What’s that face?” Grams piped up, a sage expression tugging at her lips. “You like him, don’t you?”

“What?” I sputtered. “No, don’t be silly.”

“Viola Margaret Hennessey, you never could lie to me,” Grams laughed. “You like that man, the one you’re helping with his café.”

I groaned and begrudgingly replied, “It’s just a silly crush.”

“It doesn’t look that way to me,” she added with a knowing glance back over to him. “He was flirting with you.”

“That’s just how we talk to each other.” I played back the conversation in my head. Had he been flirting? We were so light-hearted in our usual interactions, how could I honestly say it was any different? “That’s just how he is with everyone.”

“Perhaps everyone he’s flirting with,” Grams said simply. “He’s never spoken to me like that before.”

“Well, you don’t really know him,” I hastily replied.

“I know his grandmother,” Grams shrugged. “And I’ve seen them together in The Ancient Mariner. He certainly doesn’t speak to her like that.”

“Well, maybe not, but that doesn’t mean-”

“-You never could see what was in front of your eyes, could you,” Grams laughed, starting to get a little out of breath as she tackled the sandwich, the increasing gradient out of the woodland and towards the waterfall, and the conversation.

We were silent for a moment.

Maybe she was right.

I had certainly felt something when we’d locked eyes at the restaurant.

Whether it was attraction of just the tenderness of two long time friends opening up, I couldn’t really be sure.

But I certainly felt something.

“Perhaps you’re right,” I thought aloud, continuing the hill as the waterfall came into view and some members of the group stopped to take photos. “Do you think I should say something to him? It’s not been long since I got my divorce through, I don’t know if it makes sense to start something with Laurie. Besides, I’m moving back to Manchester soon.”

Grams didn’t reply, and I turned to the side to realise she wasn’t next to me anymore.

I whipped around and saw her stopped a little way down the path, one hand still on the sandwich and the other at her clavicle, massaging it as she tried to catch her breath.

“Grams!” I said, the worry oozing from me more than I had meant it to. “Are you okay? Should we turn back?”

“No,” she wheezed. “Just a touch of hay fever.”

She was lying, and now I was worried.

I looked around for the book club girls, who were just a few groups back along the path.

“Hazel!” I called out, the shout barely leaving me before my Grams’ weight hit my arms and she collapsed against me. “Oh my gosh, Grams!”

Her eyes were open, though dazed, and her hands grasped my coat.

People around us jostled, and someone shouted for an ambulance as Hazel, Ruth and Hailey broke through the crowd, Hazel crouching down to take my Grams’ pulse.

Charlie wagged his tail and whined anxiously.

With a worried look at me, she gently said, “I’m calling an ambulance.”

Chapter Eight

Opportunity

Everything moved as a blur as I followed the EMTs out of the ambulance and listened to the doctors speaking in code as they rushed my grandmother through the hallways.

We reached double doors and a nurse stopped me, “We’ll call you when we know more, please wait here.”

I couldn’t help but choke down tears as Hazel, Ruth and Hailey arrived a few minutes later, each a comforting shoulder.

They asked what they could do, Hailey heading to the café for coffee and Ruth going to the vending machine for snacks.

Hazel stayed with me, telling me calmly that my Grams was strong.

But I couldn’t help but remember that she’d hidden her hospital visit from me.

I couldn’t help but wonder if there was something seriously wrong that she wasn’t telling me about.

“I’m going to go to the nurse’s station to see if I can find out more,” Hazel said gently. “My colleagues will tell me as soon as there is news, I’m sure.”

She left me alone in the waiting room, rubbing my thumbs together and hoping that I wouldn’t have to phone my mother tonight to tell her bad news.

Just as I was starting to spiral into worry, the double doors ahead of me opened.

But rather than a nurse, it was Laurie, his face a picture of concern.

“What do you need?” He asked, bending down in front of me. “Food, water? Is there anything I can do at all?”

I couldn’t answer, but in that moment, I was so glad of his presence that I knelt down on the floor with him and hugged him, sobbing into his chest.

With a firm grip around my back, he returned the embrace and whispered quietly into my ear, “It will be okay, don’t worry.”

We stayed like that for what felt like an eternity, cocooned and safe whilst feeling more unanchored than I ever had done before.

In reality, it was barely minutes before I released the hug, hearing the sound of the double doors flapping again.

We stood up as a nurse came over, her face expressionless.

“You can go in now,” she said, adding warningly. “She’s quite tired – be sure not to excite her.”

“Can you come with me?” I said to Laurie, barely audible. He nodded immediately, following me and the nurse through.

My Grams was propped up in a hospital bed, paler than usual, but with her usual fortitude shining through as she grumpily instructed an orderly, “I need more pillows!”

“Grams!” I gasped, rushing to her and taking her into a gentle hug. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, sweetpea,” she cooed, pulling back from the hug to look me in the eyes and take me hands. “I’m going to be fine, I promise.”

“Tell me what’s wrong,” I said. “What’s going on?”

She sighed and with reluctancy answered, “I didn’t want you to know. I have angina, it’s just a touch of it, the doctor said.”

“Angina! That’s a heart condition! Why didn’t you say anything?” I said.

“It hardly affects me at all,” she replied gently. “The doctor recommended a few diet changes, and I’ve been sticking to them. I just overdid it with the walk, that’s all.”

I nodded slowly, “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I thought it would be better if you didn’t know,” she shrugged.

I stared at her, perplexed by her answer.

We had lived together for months now, how had I not noticed anything.

“Why?” I pressed. “I could have taken care of you, helped you.”

“Well, that’s exactly it!” She laughed. “You already treat me like I’m made of glass. I like my life. I like taking risks and feeling free. I didn’t want to be put out to pasture just yet.”

“Oh, Grams, I wouldn’t put you out to pasture,” I sighed. “I just hate to see you struggle.”

“That’s old age, sweetie,” she shrugged. “Better to struggle doing something that you love than sit and stagnate doing something you hate. Your friend here knows all about that.”

She nodded to Laurie who looked at me sheepishly.

“Me?” He asked.

“Buying that crumbling old lighthouse and trying to make something of it,” she continued. “Not many people would have the guts to do that. But why rest on your laurels when you could be making every second a challenge? The reward is far more precious than the alternative.”

Laurie looked at my horrified face and had to give an agreeing shrug, “Your grandmother is right.”

“There you go,” Grams smiled. “Now, let me get some shut eye, and I’ll be ready to go home before you know it.”

The nurse ushered us out of her room, and I gawped at the closed door in disbelief.

“Will she really be okay?” I asked the nurse.

“Angina needs monitoring,” she replied. “Regular check-ups and a few lifestyle changes. But she should be perfectly fine so long as she knows her limits.”

I thanked her and she left us alone in the corridor, perching on hideous turquoise chairs.

“Are you doing okay?” Laurie asked quietly.

“It’s been a weird day,” I said, and correcting myself, added, “It’s been a weird year.”

“For what it’s worth, I think you’re amazing,” he said. “Fiercely strong. You’ll get through this just as you have everything else, I promise.”

We locked eyes again, and this time the pull was too much.

I leaned in, and connected my lips with his, gentle at first, and then stronger.

Before I could lean into it, I felt him pull away slightly, and then with more certainty.

He faced me, his expression confused and somewhat embarrassed.

“Viola, I…” he stood up. “I am really flattered, but… I don’t feel that way about you.”

My face burned red.

What had I done?!

“Oh,” I said, trying to save face with what was intended to be a casual tone but came out like a squeak. “Okay, I get it.”

“I’m so sorry,” he said, running his fingers through his curls so that they draped back against his forehead. “I just thought we were friends. I… would rather we stayed friends.”

The words hurt more than I expected them to. The rejection was salted with the strange knowledge that I had just altered our friendship forever, and the sinking feeling in my chest.

He didn’t like me back.

After all that had happened, I had messed up, and from the awkward look on his face, there was no way to go back.

Chapter Eight

Opportunity

Once Grams was settled back at home, I had more time to think about my actions.

I had made an already complicated situation even more tense. I had added a ruined friendship to my stellar record of a ruined marriage.

I was at an all-time low.

And yet, I had made a commitment to my friend, and so, despite feeling like running into the sea and swimming back to Manchester right that second, I turned up to the café a few days after my Grams’ illness.

Laurie was stood outside with the head contractor, Tim, and as he saw me, I watched the range of emotions colour his face; surprise, confusion, and finally discomfort.

As I approached, Tim was just finishing his sentence: “… so that’s all going to need replacing.”

“And how much more will that be?” Laurie said as I came into earshot.

“Another few thousand. But I can give you a discount seeing as you’ll also be paying for new wiring under the floorboards,” Tim shrugged.

Laurie’s face was pale.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

Tim turned to me and without the emotion Laurie was clearly going through, stated, “The wiring is ancient. Not up to code. We’re going to have to strip it all out and start over again. On top of that, we found mould in the loft space. The whole thing will need ripping up, the wood replacing, cleaning the walls, treating with anti-fungal chemicals and repainting.”

“Repainting?!”

“The mould has already come through the new paint,” he explained. “No point just painting over it again. All got to be redone unless you want your customers to come away with mould spores in their lungs. Health and safety might have some thoughts on that.”

“So, it’s going to be a lot more than planned?” I clarified, watching Laurie’s face carefully. I could see already that he didn’t have the money for this.

“That’s the long and the short of it,” Tim shrugged. “And we can’t start anymore work without some more money upfront. I’ll leave you to think it over – I need to get some more supplies.”

And with a simple nod he walked to his van, leaving Laurie and I speechless.

“Laurie? Are you okay?” I asked, coming nearer to him.

He was silent, staring off into the distance, like he was doing a long equation in his head.

I looked behind him. Everything we had achieved so far felt fruitless.

Laurie’s brand-new kitchen was sat out on the grass in front of the lighthouse, still in the polystyrene, waiting to be installed.

The stripe on the outside was half-painted with new vibrant orange, and partly left as if had been before, peeling and sad.

Somehow, seeing it only partially completed was sadder than seeing it before we had started work.

Laurie still hadn’t said anything, so I moved in front of him, hesitating to touch him before gingerly putting a supporting hand on his shoulder.

To my shock, he snapped out of his reverie and strode away from me, heading into the lighthouse.

I followed.

The inside was where we had made the most progress. We had found a beautiful wooden floor using local oak, which was now heaped up against the sides again so that Tim and his crew could get to the dodgy wiring.

The paintwork on the walls was scratched and marked from the boards leaning against it.

The only positive change was the staircase, which had been completely overhauled, no longer an ancient and broken mess.

Laurie took the stairs two at a time, and I followed, worried by his silence.

Once I reached the top, I found him looking out of the floor to ceiling windows of the lighthouse.

The old light still hung in a separate room above us, no longer functional but restored to be a beautiful decoration for the café.

The views from up here were incredible. We could see every inch of the coastline, miles beyond Porthglen. Each beach and clifftop was a different shade of shining hue as the sunlight hit it, speckling through the clouds into spotlights across the landscape.

“This has to be my new favourite spot,” I sighed, looking out. “The best view in the village.”

“Mm,” Laurie nodded, wiping a hand over his face tensely.

“Laurie?” I asked again, coming to stand next to him. “Talk to me?”

“Talk to you?!” He exploded, wheeling around to face me. I had never seen his face so full of rage and pain. “You have to be joking!”

“Wh… what?” I was too stunned to know how to react. It was so unlike him that I couldn’t form a thought.

“Why would I talk to you about any of this when I know that you’ve been lying to me?” He said, crossing his arms and pacing up and down the length of the attic room. “Did you not think it affected me that you were leaving?”

My breath caught in my chest.

“Laurie, I meant to tell you…”

“But you didn’t!” He seethed. “Instead, you kissed me! I’m beyond confused by you at the moment Viola. One minute I think we’re friends, then you kiss me, then I find out you’ve been keeping this from me. What am I supposed to think?”

I stammered.

He was right.

I had messed up our entire friendship.

“I’m sorry!” I cried. “Oh, everything’s such a mess.”

I broke down, sitting on a window seat.

“Yeah, it is,” Laurie said, quieter and calmer than he had been at first. “And honestly, I think it’s best if you just go.”

I looked up behind tears, “Go?”

“You’re leaving soon anyway, so it would be best if we didn’t continue this project together. I’ve got a lot to sort out.”

“But, Laurie, I want to be involved!” I stood up and closed the distance between us. “I thought you needed me.”

“Seems I don’t,” he snapped back. “I really needed a friend, Vee. I thought that’s what we were.”

“We are!”

“Then why didn’t you tell me the biggest thing happening in your life!” He roared. “Did you not think I would care that you were moving hundreds of miles away from here? Did you not think about the impact it would have on our friendship? Did you care?”

“That’s why I didn’t tell you!” I replied, tears streaming down my face. “It was too hard to tell you!”

“Well, you told plenty of other people,” he said with a little bit of spite. “I found out in the Post Office of all places. Your grandmother told Edna Liveston.”

“Ah,” I said, my cheeks glowing with mortification. What on earth had I been thinking, keeping this from him? “I’m so sorry, Laurie. But you have to believe me – I didn’t keep it from you because I didn’t care. I care about you more than anyone.”

“You have a funny way of showing it,” he said, the rage settling into frustration.

“I’ll go,” I said, respecting his wishes. I stopped short of the staircase and said quietly, “I leave in two weeks. Just after the café opens. If you’d like to see me before then, you know where to find me.”

I traipsed down the staircase and out of the lighthouse, forcing back the tears and finding my composure again.

As I headed back down towards the village, I saw Tim was still in his van, and an idea hit me.

“Tim?” I said, knocking on the window of his van. He startled and stopped scrolling through his phone. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

He opened the van door and regarded me with a perplexed look, “Yeah?”

“How much was the extra work you needed to do on the lighthouse?” I asked.

“Just under ten grand,” he shrugged. “It’s all very fixable, we just have to make sure it’s up to code. It’s the problem with them old places. Riddled with ancient wiring.”

“Here,” I said, digging into my bag and pulling out my chequebook. “The full ten grand. You can keep the extra for yourself so long as you don’t tell Laurie that I gave you the money.”

“Well, what am I supposed to tell him?” Tim laughed, taking the cheque and raising his eyebrows.

“Tell him that you’re willing to waive the extra cost, or that there was an anonymous benefactor, I don’t care,” I shrugged. “Just please, don’t tell him it was me?”

“Okay,” Tim nodded. “I don’t care who pays me. I won’t tell him.”

Chapter Nine

Opportunity

“I thought the author’s use of time as a metaphor was masterful,” Ruth was declaring as I entered the pub and found my seat with the book club ladies. “Viola – didn’t you think that?”

“Hm?” I replied, not fully listening.

“I read the book,” she said proudly. “We all did.”

Hailey and Hazel nodded enthusiastically.

“The Time Traveller’s Wife,” Hailey tapped her copy fondly. “It wasn’t bad.”

“It was pretty great!” Ruth said. “Much more interesting than Dickens. Sorry, Vee.”

The waitress came over with two plates of chips for the table and the discussion continued.

“Didn’t you think it was a bit creepy that she had known him since she was a little kid?” Hazel said, stuffing a few chips into her mouth and blowing out steam as they turned out to be hotter than she thought. Through pained gasps she added, “It was a bit wrong if you ask me.”

“I think it was fine because he met her as an adult first,” Ruth mused. “And then he time travelled back to her as a kid only after they had started dating.”

“That’s still really weird,” Hailey mused, taking a chip and splitting it in half to blow on it. “That means he was seeing the child version of her and then going back home and sleeping with her…”

“Well, when you put it like that!” Ruth laughed. “He couldn’t control where he time travelled to.”

“But he could control what he did while he was there! He didn’t have to talk to the child version of her,” Hazel pointed out.

“What do you think, Viola?” Ruth asked, pushing the plate of chips nearer to me to encourage me to take one. “Was he a creep or a victim of his own weird superpower?”

“What?” I asked, blinking at them. I had barely registered the discussion. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t read it.”

They all looked at me as if I’d said I had flown to the moon.

“What?!” Hailey said. “Are you okay?”

“You always read the books,” Hazel added. “Always. Even that week that you had tonsilitis, you listened to the audiobook while you had a cold flannel over your face.”

“Well, not this week,” I shrugged.

“I wish I hadn’t read the bloody thing now,” Ruth cackled. She gave me a concerned look and added, “What’s going on, Vee?”

I couldn’t hold it back anymore.

I broke down into tears, telling them everything from Dan to Laurie to my worries about my move and my grandmother.

“We really should have checked in on you again,” Hailey said. “You’ve had a lot to deal with. Have you talked to Laurie again?”

“No,” I sobbed. “He feels betrayed. I don’t blame him.”

“He overreacted,” Ruth said. “He’s stressed out, and he funnelled that into his hurt about you leaving. But, you should have told him.”

“Yeah,” I nodded. “I should have.”

“Enough beating yourself up,” Hazel said. “You need to think about what comes next. You kissed him – doesn’t that mean you have feelings for him?”

“I do,” I nodded. “But I care about him as a friend too. And he made it clear he’s not interested.”

“Perhaps he was just shocked,” Hailey offered.

“He was very clear,” I said. “I have to respect that.”

“So, what comes next?” Ruth said. “You’re just going to leave and sweep it all under the rug?”

“I suppose so,” I nodded. “I need a fresh start.”

Chapter Ten

Opportunity

“Is that the final box?” Grams said, looking around her living room at all my packed belongings. “You have a lot of stuff!”

She was looking better – the doctors had sent her home shortly after her episode, with a warning to take it easier. She was still canoeing, painting and hiking, but she took more rests, stuck to the recommended diet and remembered her pills wherever she went.

“There’s only six boxes,” I laughed. “Most of my old things went to the charity shop.”

“Well, either way, the house will feel empty once you’ve gone,” she said, coming over to clasp my hands in hers. She was holding back some tears, forcing a smile to cover them. “I will miss having you so nearby, my darling granddaughter.”

I hugged her, holding back tears of my own.

I only had a few days left before I was due to move into my cousin’s empty flat. Mum had arranged to drive down to pick me and my boxes up and drive me back to Manchester.

“It’s the opening of the lighthouse café today,” Grams said, moving into the kitchen to brew some tea. “Are you going?”

“No,” I answered quietly. I wanted to, more than anything. I had heard from Ruth just how spectacular it looked now that all the work was finished. Laurie had pulled everything off, just as I knew he could.

I had only complicated his life.

“Oh, honey,” Grams said, taking out two mugs for us. “I think that’s the wrong choice. You’ll regret it if you don’t go.”

“Laurie doesn’t want to see me,” I said quietly. “And I don’t want to ruin his triumph.”

“You won’t ruin anything,” she replied gently. “He may be upset with you, but he’s still your friend. He wants your support, if only as a gesture of good will. Join the village in congratulating him. Don’t leave Porthglen with that hanging over your head.”

The nervous butterflies swirling in my stomach as Charlie and I approached the lighthouse were relentless.

I had a Tupperware under my arm – my homemade dog treats, decorated with dog-friendly ingredients and ready for sale. It was the least I could do seeing as I would be leaving.

My mouth opened in awe as the café came into view.

There were cars parked all the way up the headland, and plenty of people on foot walking the same way as me.

The lighthouse itself was a bright beacon on the landscape again, the white stripes reflecting the sun and offsetting to golden orange stripe in the centre, where the sign Peanut’s Place hung with pride.

I dove through the crowd with Charlie as we got to the entrance. There was a queue out of the side door for takeaway coffees and food, and the interior was packed with people and their dogs on every floor.

There was a countertop full of cakes, and an empty space where the dog treats would have been.

“Viola!!” Ruth called to me. She was sat at a table with her boyfriend Fraser, a cup of coffee cradled in her hand and a half-eaten croissant in front of her.

“Hi guys,” I said, coming over.

“Isn’t it amazing?” Fraser marvelled. “Quite an act of determination to renovate this old place.”

“It really was,” I smiled. “Have you guys seen Laurie?”

“He’s in the kitchen, back there,” Ruth said, gesturing through the double doors at the back of the lighthouse.

I looked around.

It was laid out just as we had planned, with dog beds at the sides and enough seating for dozens of customers.

“Can you look after Charlie for a bit please?” I asked.

“Yeah, of course, love,” Ruth said.

I instructed Charlie to lay on the dog bed nearest to them.

With a strengthening breath, I found my way to the kitchen, smiling to Keeley who was at the till, juggling orders and takeaways deftly.

“Knock, knock?” I said gingerly as I approached the kitchen doors.

From the busy atmosphere of the café, I expected to find chaos.

In true Laurie style, everything was laid out neatly, on the countertops, a professional working space.

He had his back to me and didn’t seem to hear me.

I stood in the doorway and watched him for a few more moments as he moved swiftly from one station to the next, stirring sauces, boxing up cake slices and expertly chopping vegetables.

I couldn’t help but let a proud grin spread from ear to ear.

This was his dream.

Here was a man who had spent his entire life training to have his own place, and he’d done it.

I thought about announcing myself again, but I changed my mind.

I wasn’t going to ruin this day for him.

I placed the Tupperware container gently on the side and turned and walked back out through the café, saying goodbye to Ruth and Fraser as I picked up Charlie from the spot I had left him, beaming from ear to ear with pride for my friend, and fighting back tears of sadness for myself.

Chapter Ten

Opportunity

“I can’t believe this is the last time we’re going to see you before you go!” Hazel said, fighting back tears.

“I’ll be back soon!” I smiled, but deep down I was distraught at the thought of leaving them, of leaving Porthglen.

No matter how much I had told myself it was the right decision, it still felt big and scary.

We were sat in Ruth’s living room – modern art and uncomfortable sofas, but always full of laughter.

Each of us had a glass of prosecco, a toast to my new start.

“It feels like the time has flown by – it seems like just yesterday you were saying we had three months with you,” Hailey smiled. “Have you got your new place all set up?”

“My cousin left all of her furniture, so it’s all ready for me.” I pursed my lips. It was going to be a big change. “I’ve already got some interest for dog walking – my mum’s friends.”

“And Dan?” Hazel asked.

“That’s done,” I nodded.

It felt good to have put that to rest. He’d always have my affection, but we were done.

“I saw he’s moved out of Mill Grove,” Hailey said. “The new people have moved in.”

“He’s living with his new girlfriend,” I confirmed with a matter-of-fact nod. I couldn’t begrudge him any happiness. As shocked as I had been, he’d done me no wrong.

“Well, here’s to you, my darling friend,” Ruth said, raising her prosecco as the others copied. “To your new life. You truly deserve to be happy.”

“Viola – your mum’s here!” Grams shouted up the stairs.

I was sat on the bed in the spare bedroom of Grams’ house, my bedroom for the past six months.

I found my Grams downstairs, attempting to take one of my boxes out to the car. I chastised her and picked it up myself, warning her not to tackle any boxes on her own.

“My girl,” Mum said, taking the box from me and placing into the boot of her car before pulling me into a long hug. “Don’t get me wrong – I’m so happy you’ll be just round the corner from me, but… now is your last chance. You don’t have to leave.”

I bit my lip as we held the hug for a few more seconds.

I looked out at the view behind Grams’ house, the rolling waves as the pastel facades of the houses by the waterfront. I was born in Manchester, but Porthglen had felt more like home.

“Viola?” Grams’ voice behind us made us break apart the hug. “Look who’s here.”

I turned to see Laurie, Tupperware in hand.

“We’ll get the rest of the boxes,” Mum said, giving me a tender squeeze on the cheek.

Laurie and I stood in the street, neither speaking for a moment.

I shifted my weight awkwardly from foot to foot and finally said, “What are you doing here?”

I was surprised to see restrained tears forming in the corners of his eyes and he set his jaw and said, “I had to return your Tupperware.”

I puffed out a short laugh, and he reciprocated.

“What are you really doing here?” I pressed.

He looked different to usual, his face sunken and pale, his mouth drawn in, not curled into that all too familiar smile of adventure.

“I had to see you,” he said, a tear finally rolling down his cheek as he stepped towards you. “I couldn’t let you leave without speaking to you.”

“Ah,” I said. “Why?”

“Come on, Vee,” he said, coming nearer still. “I was an idiot to have a go at you. I know why you didn’t want to tell me you were leaving. I know why you kissed me. I lashed out because I was hurt that you were going not because you didn’t tell me, although that was difficult to swallow too.”

“I should have told you,” I said. “So, what are you saying?”

“I said that I only cared about you as a friend,” he replied, pushing the Tupperware box gently into my hands. “That was a lie.”

“It was?” I breathed.

“I heard you were leaving ages ago, Viola,” he laughed. “This village can’t keep a secret. Everyone knows. So, when you kissed me… I was upset.”

“Why?”

“Because I had hidden everything I felt!” He threw up his hands and turned on the spot, pacing back and forth in front of me. “And in that moment, you undid it all. It all rushed to the surface. And that hurt, because you weren’t going to stick around.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?!” I yelled, feeling just as exasperated by him as he was with me. “If I had known I might…”

“Might what? Not be leaving?” He shook his head. “I don’t want you to stay because of me. I saw what you went through with Dan. You deserve to start over.”

I had no idea what to say.

Of all the reasons in my head that I might want to stay, Laurie admitting that he felt the same way was not one of them. I had believed him when he had said he just wanted to be friends.

“I should let you get on,” Laurie said quietly. “Your mum has come a long way.”

He turned and started walking away, wiping a tear from his eye as he did.

“Wait!” I said. “Stop!” I caught up to him and grabbed him hand. “Why don’t you let me decide what I want, let me decide what is worth staying for?”

He looked down at me with relief, and I smiled back.

He pulled me into a kiss, wrapping his hands around the small of my back and lifting me up.

Our bodies melted towards each other, and my hands found my way up into his hair, thumbing the delicate blonde ringlets.

We had been friends.

We had been platonic.

But that had morphed now, seamlessly, naturally, into something more.

It wasn’t a hard choice to stay when I knew there was a future for me with Laurie, but really, it had just been the catalyst.

With or without a romantic tie, there was a future for me in Porthglen.

It was my home.

Also by this author

Snow at Shetland Lodge

Tamsin Bracknell

A Sweet Enemies to Lovers Romance

“I was wrong about you, Kieran,” I murmured.
His eyes opened fully, his face a picture of surprise. For a moment, I thought he was going to say something sarcastic, his lips parting with a smirk, but then he pursed them and sighed.
“I was wrong about you, too, Fern.”
After Fern catches her boyfriend in bed with her best friend, she heads on their couples' retreat to the Shetland Isles alone. There, she intends to spend New Year's Eve in their luxury cabin, with champagne, chocolates and creature comforts on demand.
After a long flight from London to Scotland she's cold, heartbroken and surrounded by loved up couples. Every activity seems to be designed for two, and she's quickly drained by the cutesy couples and the overly cheery staff.

When a dangerous snowstorm comes in, Fern finds herself caring for a tiny Shetland foal with the handsome but grouchy groundskeeper who seems to prefer animals to people.

Fans of Marian Keyes, Hannah Ellis and Emily Bell will love this cosy, warm new adult romance.

"I felt like I was snuggled up under a blanket with Fern in the Shetland Isles! Dazzling!" - Joanne

"The perfect escapism on a cold winter's evening!" - Lauren

About the Author

Tamsin Bracknell is romance writer from the UK. She lives in a cottage thirty minutes from London. She loves nothing more than getting cosy under a blanket on the couch with a hot cocoa (if there’s any room after her two cats have found their spots!)

You can find her on Instagram @tamsinbracknellauthor

About The Lighthouse at Porthglen Manor

Writing a story about a woman who wants to be childfree was something I always wanted to do, and it fitted Viola’s character perfectly. I wanted to show that she could be happy in love even without children, an idea our society still struggles with.

If you enjoyed this, please leave me a review on Goodreads or Amazon to help me out. Small authors like me really need the reader’s help to get their books out there.
The fourth book will be released in October 2022 so make sure to follow me or my publisher on social media for details!

Instagram:

@tamsinbracknellauthor

@aprilshowerspublishing

www.aprilshowerspublishing.com