A Cottage by the Sea

  ‘Harry too.’

  Though most of what he cooks is generally burned to a crisp and inedible. Harry’s forte is enjoying food, not producing it.

  ‘Fancy chopping some onions for a barbecue sauce?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Ella and I make ourselves busy in the working end of the kitchen and soon the rich smell of cooking tomatoes fills the cottage. She adds some honey and Worcestershire sauce to the pan and already my mouth is watering. The windows are steaming up and the evening is drawing in.

  ‘I could really see myself being here in the winter with the wind battering on the door and a log fire roaring in the grate,’ I say.

  ‘It’s often like that in the summer,’ Ella confesses in a voice that’s too low for our menfolk to hear. ‘I’m just praying that it stays like this while you’re here and then we can all see it at its best.’

  ‘We did bring wet weather gear, as a precaution.’

  ‘Probably very wise,’ she concedes.

  While Ella removes chicken and sausages from the fridge, I make some garlic bread and wrap it in foil. Ella marinates the chicken in oil and herbs. Then we make a salad together, which Ella tosses in dressing. We cover it in clingfilm and slide it back into the fridge.

  ‘I cheated on the pud,’ she tells me. ‘When I was at the supermarket yesterday, I bought a tarte au citron.’

  ‘We’ll just call it a lemon pie and then everyone will think you’ve made it,’ I suggest.

  ‘Excellent plan. We can finish up those cupcakes too. Yum.’

  ‘Exactly how far is the supermarket?’

  ‘Bloody miles,’ she admits with a grimace. ‘You can’t forget a loaf here and pop out to Patel’s on the corner any time of the night or day. Living out here takes planning. And a big freezer. There’s three outhouses next to the cottage, one with a freezer. One of those giant American things that would take a lifetime’s supply of fish fingers. When I first come down here, it takes me a few days to get into the swing of it and then I’m OK. You just need a different mindset and a large dose of organisation.’ Ella glances at her watch. ‘God, I hope Flick rocks up on time. I don’t want to be giving her burnt offerings.’

  ‘How long do you reckon?’

  ‘Art needs to fire up the barbie now so that it’s ready in about an hour or so. If I can prise him away from his guitar and that wine bottle for a few minutes, I’ll get him on to the case.’

  I look over at Harry who, glass in hand, appears to be struggling to keep his eyes open.

  ‘Fancy a walk before dinner?’ I ask him. ‘Come and have a look at the beach before we start to lose the light. It’s very lovely out there. I can speak from experience.’

  He shrugs. I think he’d really like to say no, but I feel like digging my heels in. How can he be so uninterested in such fabulous surroundings and be happy to view everything through the bottom of a bottle?

  ‘Come on, sleepyhead.’ I tug at his hand.

  ‘I thought we were all waiting for Flick,’ he protests. ‘Won’t it be rude to be out when she gets here?’

  ‘You know Flick,’ I remind him. ‘She could be here in half an hour or she could turn up at midnight with a coach party in tow. I’m sure she won’t mind if we’ve gone to the beach. We won’t be long.’

  He still looks reluctant but I won’t be beaten.

  ‘Let’s get you some fresh air or you’ll be out for the count before nine.’

  Harry sighs and lets me drag him from the comfort of his armchair. ‘If we must.’

  Art raises a hand, seemingly ambivalent that he’s losing most of his audience. ‘Laters.’ He doesn’t yet know that Ella has plans for him.

  Harry puts on his jacket, which just doesn’t seem quite right for the beach, but I say nothing. It usually takes him a few days to get in the holiday mood. Hopefully, he’ll soon start to relax. I take a fleece from the coat rack in the porch by the door even though I don’t think I’ll need it.

  ‘Can I borrow this?’

  Ella nods, unable to talk due to a mouthful of stolen cheese.

  ‘We won’t be gone long.’

  I lead Harry down to the beach. He huffs and puffs as we clamber over the rocks. I feel limber and light compared to him. There’s not much left to walk on, now that the tide is in and all of the sand has gone. The sea shushes in and out on the shingle. Soon the entire beach will be under the sea, with the waves surrounding Cwtch Cottage on three sides.

  Giving up on the idea of walking, I find a nice smooth boulder instead. Sitting down, I pat a place next to me for Harry.

  ‘I could have sat down inside,’ he points out. ‘On a cushion.’

  ‘That’s not really the point, is it?’

  ‘Perhaps I could get a signal out here,’ he says and flicks out his mobile.

  I bite down my irritation. ‘Who do you need to call?’

  ‘No one,’ he says defensively. ‘It just feels weird being out of touch.’

  ‘Perhaps that’s no bad thing.’

  ‘Anything could be happening.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know. I like to keep up with Twitter. I haven’t tweeted since the service station. They’ll wonder where I’ve disappeared to.’

  ‘Do you actually know any of these people that you follow?’

  He looks perplexed.

  ‘Only on Twitter?’ I venture.

  ‘The boys are on there.’

  ‘So that’s two real people that you know.’ The two people who he’d never think to pick up a phone and call. They’re lovely men and I find it disappointing that he pays them so little attention. ‘Tweeting your sons every now and then is hardly the same thing as having a proper relationship with them.’

  ‘I beg to differ,’ he bristles. ‘This is the modern way. I wanted to tweet them that we’re away this week, in case they dropped in.’

  ‘I spoke to both Freddie and Oscar last night,’ I remind him. ‘They know we’re away. They’re both fine and they send their love.’

  He grunts at me. I have already told him all this.

  ‘I just don’t see the reason for all this “social networking”. It feels as if you’re hiding behind it. Can’t you be happy to have a conversation with me? Or would it make this a better experience’ – I jab a finger at the sea – ‘if you could tweet it to strangers?’

  ‘It’s not just Twitter,’ he grumbles. ‘Or the boys. It’s work too. What if they can’t contact me? I like to keep my finger on the pulse.’

  I don’t remind him that pensions don’t actually have a pulse. ‘I don’t think the big, bad world of high finance will grind to a halt if the office can’t phone you for a week.’

  ‘There’s no need to be scathing, Grace.’

  But I think there is. ‘We’re here on holiday, Harry. Let’s try to enjoy ourselves. Watch the sea, admire the setting sun.’

  He peers at the sun as if it is an alien thing. Then he stands on the rock and holds his phone aloft. ‘One bar,’ he says and there’s relief in his voice. ‘I think I’ve got one bar.’

  I gaze out to sea, but the calm I felt out here before is eluding me. How can Harry be so enthusiastic about talking to people he doesn’t know when he’s not enthusiastic at all about talking to the ones he purports to love? How can he be so keen to keep in touch with his office, when I can’t wait to get away from mine?

  While Harry climbs up the rocks, hopefully holding his phone aloft, I try to block out my annoyance and attempt to find a serene place inside me. I sit, letting the noise of the waves send me into a trance, and allow my mind to wander. How did I come to be living a life that I no longer feel should belong to me?

  I rack my brains for the millionth time, trying to figure out exactly why I’m working in a small accountancy firm, spending my days sorting out balance sheets and staff grievances. Of which there are many. They don’t like working late, they don’t like working early. They grumble that their access to the internet is restricted. They want the c
ompany to buy them iPads as their laptops are too heavy, too cumbersome, too last year. The office is too hot or it’s too cold. Some of them complain that the windows are open, some that they are closed. Some of them complain that the air-conditioning is too cold, others that it is not cold enough. None of them seems to possess layered clothing. They would like paid overtime and longer lunch hours. They want to finish early on Friday and, preferably, take the whole of Friday afternoon off in the summer months. In fact, they rarely seem to want to work at all.

  At the back of my mind, I wonder if they are all just terminally unsuited to accountancy. As am I.

  I wanted to be a ranger. Of what, I’m not sure. And that was my stumbling block. I had no firm plan, other than that I didn’t want to go to university or end up in an office. I thought that I’d like to work outside with nature, animals, the landscape. Perhaps in conservation. Digging out ponds. Repairing fences. Making bat boxes. My parents had other plans. Being outside in a vague capacity wasn’t a real job. Going to university and becoming an accountant was. So, in the absence of anyone to steer or help me formulate an alternative plan, I went along with theirs. I was a good daughter and I didn’t want to be a disappointment to them. To my parents’ delight, I emerged three years later with a respectable 2:1 in something I hadn’t the slightest interest in. I’ve been working in it ever since. Why? I can’t limp on, using the excuse that I’m well paid, for ever.

  I love nature, but when do I ever get to commune with it? I live in a flat in Muswell Hill, London, N10. Nothing wrong with it as such, but it’s not exactly the wide open plains of the Serengeti or the towering peaks of the Alps. The odd ragged squirrel graces our scrubby patch of garden. If I’m lucky Harry and I walk up to Alexandra Palace or take a turn round Kensington Gardens on a Sunday morning, once a week. If I go out running, I pound the pavements, breathe in fumes and worry about getting mugged.

  I look over at Harry, still trying to commune with Orange. He is not a nature type of bloke. On the beach in his smart jacket with his latest iPhone, he looks like a fish out of water. I give up waiting for him to come and sit on the rock with me in romantic and companionable silence and, instead, I get up and skim stones into the breaking waves. Harry steadfastly ignores the restless sea, the stunning sky, the plaintive calls of the seabirds that twist my heart, and yearns, instead, for Twitter.

  After a while I wander away from him and spend my time alone, climbing over the rocks, checking out what treasures the isolated pools have to offer. I pick up shells and smooth pebbles and secrete them in the pockets of the fleece. I turn my face to the sun and think that I have found paradise.

  My husband doesn’t notice that I’ve gone.

  Chapter Seven

  I wander back towards the cottage, leaving Harry to his mobile phone dilemma and fuming quietly inside.

  When I reach the little bay, there’s a man standing in the edge of the surf, shoes in hand, letting the waves swish over his toes.

  ‘Hi,’ he calls out as I head for the terrace.

  I stop and lift my hand to shade my eyes, trying to make out who it is in the blinding sunshine. He’s tall, athletic, but beyond that I can’t see very much at all.

  He turns his back on the waves and walks towards me. ‘The sea’s lovely,’ he says as he approaches. ‘Cold, though.’

  Then he’s right in front of me and I see him properly for the very first time. I look up at him and feel as if all the breath has been knocked out of my body. I’m sure that my world rocks ever so slightly on its axis.

  I stand and stare, when I know that it isn’t polite. But I can’t help myself. I’m quite simply mesmerised and I have no rational excuse for it. I’m losing myself in eyes that are the colour of dark chocolate. His face is kind, warm. The rays of the sun have flushed his cheeks and his mouth is full, luscious. His hair is brown, tousled by the breeze, and I have to stop my hands from reaching out to run my fingers through it. He’s wearing khaki combats and a white linen shirt that’s open and blowing in the wind. His chest is smooth, bronzed. I have never felt the urge to touch anything so much in my whole life and I’m not the sort of person who has previously had the urge to touch complete strangers. I ball my fingers into fists.

  ‘Sorry.’ His mouth turns up in a smile. ‘Did I make you jump, shouting out like that?’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘No. Of course not.’

  I don’t know quite what you’ve done to me, I think. But I know that for the first time in my life I feel all lit up inside and I can feel a burning in my veins that is, at the same time, both pleasant and painful.

  ‘Everything OK?’ He frowns in concern.

  ‘Yes. Yes. Quite all right,’ I gabble.

  What has happened here? I am sensible, level-headed Grace Taylor, not one moved to flights of fancy. But just look at me, I feel as if five thousand volts have shaken my body and I’m trembling like the proverbial leaf. My brain has been completely scrambled. I wonder if Cwtch Cottage is on an ancient ley line or something equally wacky.

  ‘This is a beautiful spot,’ he says, taking in the beach.

  ‘Yes.’

  But not as beautiful as this man standing before me. All the not inconsiderable delights of Cwtch Cottage and this idyllic setting have been swept from my mind.

  I scour my brain for something to say, otherwise he’ll think I’m an imbecile. And he’d be right. I could blame it on an excess of alcohol, except I’ve had one glass of plonk, a cup of tea and a cupcake. Perhaps there was a hallucinogenic drug in the cupcake. It would explain a lot.

  ‘Are you here on holiday?’ I manage to ask.

  ‘Yes. I am.’ The man holds out his hand. ‘I’m Noah,’ he says. ‘Noah Reeves.’

  I should take his hand, but I don’t know if I can trust myself. If his smile can turn my legs to water, what will happen if I actually touch him? I look down at his hand and he does too. The fingers are long and strong. I feel my mouth go dry as I take them in mine. When I touch his skin, it feels like the strangest thing I’ve ever touched and, yet, also the most familiar. My hand fits perfectly in his.

  We both laugh, uncertainly. Can Noah feel the powerful surge of electricity between us? Or is it just me going very slightly mad? Perhaps I’ve stayed out in the sun too long on the beach. His fingers tighten on mine and it feels so right.

  ‘You must be Grace,’ Noah says.

  That takes away my breath again. ‘I am Grace. How do you know?’

  ‘Flick has told me a lot about you.’

  That shocks me again. ‘Flick?’

  ‘Yes. I’m here with her for the week.’ He sounds flustered. ‘I needed to stretch my legs after the long journey. Thought I’d have a walk on the beach for ten minutes while she unpacked.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ Oh, Lord. This is Flick’s current man? Universe, you have got to be joking. ‘You’re with Flick?’

  ‘Yes.’ Now he seems embarrassed. ‘It’s nice to meet you.’

  ‘Nice to meet you too,’ I reciprocate, figuring that parroting is going to be easier than trying to formulate an original thought. ‘Flick has told me a lot about you.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No.’

  He grins at me, amused. ‘I guess we should get back to the others,’ he suggests. ‘I said that I wouldn’t be long.’

  ‘I should find my husband,’ I say, glancing back down the beach. ‘I wandered off.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ Noah says. ‘You’re married. I remember now. Harry?’

  ‘That’s right.’ The husband who had been completely blanked from my brain for a brief moment there, along with everything else.

  Noah lets go of my hand. He seems as reluctant as I do to break the contact. ‘I’m looking forward to getting to know you better, Grace.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say, breathlessly. ‘Me too.’

  ‘I’ll tell them that you’re coming. We should get that barbecue going.’

  ‘Yes.’

  He holds up a hand as he moves away from me and his
smile warms me more than the sun. I watch him climb effortlessly up the rocks and stroll into the cottage.

  So, Grace, what exactly happened there? Whatever it was, I somehow feel deep in my bones that my life is never going to be quite the same again.

  Chapter Eight

  When Harry and I return to Cwtch Cottage, the lights are on. I’d found him just where I left him, on the rocks, surgically attached to his mobile. Still grumpy.

  We walked back together in silence, which suited me as it gave me time to try to get my head round what had just happened with Noah. I still felt shaky inside.