‘Hit it.’ We need something to lighten us up.
This week has been all right, considering.
Considering what his sister-in-law and mother-in-law think of me...
Charlie and I have done our best to put brave faces on it. I’m only here for one more week and then my tenants are out of my flat and I can move back home. I’ve done more than enough research to be getting on with the Cornwall scenes – now it’s just Thailand I need to worry about.
My flights are booked, my accommodation is sorted (free –yes!) and I’ve even managed to confirm that Isak does still do rock-climbing sessions for the resort. I was excited when that email came in.
Somehow or other I’ll get the truth out of him. I’m still trying to understand Nicki and where her head was at when she wrote this book.
It’s been hard keeping Isak out of my conversations with Charlie, but I don’t want to distress him unnecessarily. He did contact Nicki’s dad on my behalf a couple of days ago and Alain said he would be happy to meet up with me for a coffee sometime. He won’t be able to spare much more time than that, from what I’ve heard, but, if nothing else, the experience will help bring Nicki’s diaries to life, and that, in itself, will be fascinating.
I don’t know how it happens, becauseDeadpoolis absolutely frigging hilarious, but somehow or other I manage to fall asleep on the sofa. When I come to, the room is dark and I have a pillow under my head. The cosy blanket Charlie gave me earlier is still wrapped around me. I squint at the time on the DVD player’s digital clock.Two thirty-five!I’m not going back to the campsite now. I close my eyes again and try to get back to sleep.
In the morning, the smell of bacon and cinnamon rouses me from sleep. It’s just after eight o’clock.
‘Hey!’ Charlie exclaims when I appear in the kitchen. He’s frying up pancakes in one pan and bacon in another. ‘Did you sleep well?’
‘I did. Thanks for letting me stay.’
‘I didn’t have a choice: you were out like a light.’
Smiling, I walk over to where April is standing in front of the sofa, jiggling along to the radio. ‘Good morning, baby.’ She beams up at me.
‘MMMBop’ by Hanson comes on as I scoop her up. She leans her whole body over to her left and then all the way over to her right, back and forth like a cartoon jumping jack in slow motion.
I laugh and dance around the kitchen with her, singing along to the occasional lyric. When the chorus kicks in, I slide across the floor with her in my socks, but Charlie beats us to our destination, turning the radio up to full volume. We sing along at the tops of our voices before cracking up laughing.
I feel as if I have a balloon inside me and someone is filling it with happy gas. It is the best possible start to the weekend.
Next weekend I’ll be back in London. My balloon pops at the thought.
Chapter 36
On Thursday, my last day in Cornwall, we skip work so that Charlie can take April and me back to Lansallos in search of sea glass. He offered to show me another cove, but I wanted to see this beach one more time. While he climbs up onto the rocks to take a closer look at the shimmering colours that I saw the first time we came here, April and I walk barefoot along the shore, getting our toes wet in the cold, clear, light-blue water. I clutch her hands, even though she’s growing steadier on her feet every day. The truth is, I just don’t want to let her go.
That evening, Pat and Adam join us for one last pizza night.
‘Good luck with the rest of your writing,’ Pat says to me kindly, when we’re saying our goodbyes. She’s dropping Adam back to Bude on her way home.
‘Thank you,’ I reply sincerely.
‘I can’t wait to read it.’ She smiles warmly and gives me a hug. When she withdraws, I turn to Adam.
‘Bridget,’ he says fondly, opening his arms wide. I grin and step forward and he proceeds to squash the breath out of me.
‘Argh!’ I gasp, but he just squeezes me tighter and rocks me back and forth for a while before letting me go.
‘How was that?’ he asks meaningfully as I overegg my efforts to reclaim oxygen into my lungs.
‘I’m not sure what you want me to say.’ I regard him warily.
He leans forward and whispers into my ear, ‘Was it better than sex?’
I burst out laughing and give his shoulder a shove. He’s referring to the night we went out in Padstow when I said I missed hugs more than sex. He was unimpressed at the time.
‘What did you say to her?’ Pat asks her younger son impudently.
