I climb out of the cab and stand for a moment, breathing in the fresh, salty air and watching clear green waves crash onto the white sand in the not-too-far distance. Suddenly I can’t wait to get in the water and wash off the dust and sweat from the day.
Behind me, I hear Ash arranging a return journey for nine o’clock in the morning. I feel a flurry of nerves at the thought of the driver not showing and stranding us here, but then I think, what’s the worst that could happen? If I miss my train, I’ll find another internet café and email Alison to let her know that I’m on a different one.
The sense of freedom I’d felt at letting my parents’ PA know that I was delayed by twenty-four hours was addictive. It’s so rare for me to choose to follow my heart, to do whatIwant to do rather than what’s expected of me. I could get used to this feeling.
Ash slings his rucksack over his shoulder and saunters over to me. He nods towards an outdoor shower near the wooden walkway. ‘En suite.’
I laugh and he smiles at me.
‘There are toilets there too.’ He points them out behind the café.
It’s almost six o’clock and the beach is emptying, but it still feels weird to be the only two fully dressed people walking out onto the sand. We head left, away from civilisation. On our right is the shoreline and on our other side are jagged cliffs the colour of peaches and cream.
‘Are you allowed to sleep on the beaches in Portugal?’ I ask Ash as we pass the last couple of people on this stretch of sand.
‘Um, it’s notstrictlylegal,’ he says.
‘What?!’
‘But I’ve had no trouble so far,’ he claims. ‘It’s not like we’re putting up tents or making a fire, and we’ll clean up after ourselves. It’ll be fine, I promise. We’re heading for those rocks.’ He lifts his chin to indicate a crop of boulders. ‘We need to stay away from the cliffs in case of rockfall, but we should be quite sheltered from the wind.’
‘What about high tide?’
‘The tide’s going out.’ He points at a line on the sand. ‘It won’t come back up past this line tonight – it’s a waxing crescent moon.’
‘What does that evenmean?’
He nods at the pale white C in the clear blue sky. ‘Yesterday that was a new moon – it rises and sets with the sun, so you don’t see it at all. When the earth, the moon and the sun line up like that, the pull of gravity is at its strongest, so the tides are more extreme. You get the same effect when it’s a full moon too, but for the next week or so, the tideline will continue to recede.’
‘I’m so clueless, it’s embarrassing. I used to think that theearth’s shadow caused the different phases of the moon. I still don’t really understand how it works.’
‘Do you want to know?’ he asks tentatively.
‘Sure.’
We’ve reached the rocky outcrop, so he drops his rucksack onto a boulder and gets down on his knees, drawing two circles a few inches apart in the sand to represent the earth and the sun. ‘Now imagine this is the moon.’ He draws a circle to the left of the earth, but a little higher. ‘Half of the moon is almost always lit by the sun.’ He draws a dotted line straight from the moon to the sun, then picks up a stone from the sand and moves it in a flat circle through the air. ‘As the moon orbits the earth, our perspective of it changes, so the only time we see the whole half that’s lit up is when it’s a full moon.’
He’s so cute right now.
‘I’d love to know more about the stars,’ I say with a smile.
‘How much time do you have?’ he asks with a grin, discarding the stone.
‘I’ve got all night.’ Did that sound flirty? ‘What about you?’ That definitely did.
‘I guess I’ve got all night too,’ he replies in a similar tone, his eyes glittering.
Heat flickers over my skin and the hairs on the back of my neck stand up as his gaze darkens. He makes a low noise at the back of his throat and tugs his eyes away as he gets to his feet. ‘I don’t know about you, but I’m up for a swim before dinner.’
I suspect it’s taken some effort to sound casual.
‘Definitely.’ I sure as hell need to cool down.
I face the other way while Ash gets changed into hisswimming trunks and then I spend the next twenty seconds half-heartedly hunting out my costume while watching him walk, half-naked, towards the water. I’m unbuttoning my dress when he dives straight into the waves, and when he surfaces and flicks his hair out of his eyes, I let out an audible sigh.
I need to get a grip.
‘What’s the water like?’ I shout as I drag my bikini bottom on under my dress.
