On my penultimate night, I’m sitting on the wooden bench outside my cabin with a beer and some bread and cheese, breathing in the view. The sky is strewn with candy-floss clouds, the sun like an orange being squeezed into the sea.
I’ve just finished writing Joel another postcard. There are several now in an envelope at Esther’s house—a time capsule of all my thoughts, my adventures. I’ve been passing them to her for safekeeping, in case anything should happen to me. Because if it does, I need to be sure Joel has a way back to my heart.
Postcard written, I capture the sunset on my phone and message it to Liam.Wish you were here?I add an emoji on purpose, because he always gets so grumpy about them.
Then, flip-flops on the boardwalk.
I turn to see Finn heading to his cabin. He raises a hand in greeting.
I smile and set down my beer. “Hi.”
Cautiously, he returns the smile. “You’re English?”
“Yep.”
“Ah. Sorry about my pidgin Latvian, then.”
I laugh. “Mine too.”
He exhales, looks up at the sky. “Nice night for it.”
“Beautiful.”
Just as I’m expecting him to move on, he lingers. “You staying long?”
“I leave the day after tomorrow.” I hesitate. “Would you like a beer?”
The smile reaches his eyes, and he walks over. “Love one. If I’m not disturbing you?”
“Not at all. Unless you had plans to...”
“I was pretty much going to do what you’re doing.” He laughs. “I’m a sucker for a sunset.”
I uncap a beer and hold it out to him.
He thanks me and sits down. Six-foot-plus, he’s blond and open-faced, with blue eyes that grip tight. He looks laid-back and beachy in shorts and flip-flops, a baseball cap.
I glance down at my beer and feel a twitch of anticipation, deep in my solar plexus.
“So...”
“... Callie.”
“Callie. I’m Finn.” We shake hands, his dwarfing mine. “Did you come here for the birds, or the solitude?”
“A little of both. I’m not really a birdwatcher. More of a bird... appreciator.”
He laughs. “Nicely put. So you’re here on holiday?”
“Yep. You?”
“Same.” Eyes sparking, he nods. “Nice T-shirt, by the way.”
The tractor T-shirt Joel gave me for Christmas, nearly three years ago now. Finally I’ve been able to wear it again, remember his smile with one of my own. I feel braver, somehow, when I think about him, these days.
My thoughts still drift to him a lot—to what he’s doing now, who he spends time with, the things he dreams about. To whether he’s got a job, or a love interest, or a different outlook on life since we split. But slowly, incrementally, the sharp edges of my memories are beginning to blunt. They wound me less, feel more like scratches now than stabs.
“Thanks,” I say to Finn. And then, so I don’t have to explain, “How long have you been here?”
