Page 24 of One Week With You
I huffed, frustrated, and shoved my phone in my coat pocket. My reply would have to wait. Right now, I had supplies to buy. When I looked around to get my bearings, my eyes widened. Christmas had vomited everywhere. Tinsel ran along every shelf edge and counter. Strings of sparkly baubles hung from the ceiling, swaying gently in the fresh breeze I’d carried inside. Fairy lights twinkled and faded and flashed in different patterns all over the place.
A plump, middle-aged woman with greying curly hair and kind eyes gave me a cheery nod. “Hello, dear,” she said in a thick Scottish accent, zipping her lilac quilted body warmer all the way to her chin. “I’m Mrs Brown. How can I help?”
“Hi.” I smiled, grabbing a basket. “Do you have flour and vanilla essence? And chocolate chips?”
“Of course. Middle aisle, bottom shelf.”
I slowly made my way along each narrow aisle, throwing in whatever caught my eye. The cottage had a fully stocked pantry and I’d already purchased supplies, but sometimes a girl needed to make cookies. Maybe not the cute Christmas-shaped cookies I’d been making with my mum every Christmas Eve since I was old enough to hold a wooden spoon, but right now any cookie would do. I’d make them the size of my head, too. Maybe have them for dinner because why not?
“Are you the one staying up at Chestnut Cottage?” Mrs Brown asked, adding, “the old Scott place,” when I looked confused. I didn’t realise it had a name.
“Oh yeah, that’s me. My brother’s friend owns the place. Or his family do? I’m not sure.”
“His parents used to own it. Rafe bought it from them.”
My gaze flew up from the row of chocolate bars. “You know Rafe?”
Her pointed look saidpuh-lease. “Of course. You should’ve seen him stomping around here when it happened. That cottage has been in the Scott family for over one hundred years. He was furious they wanted to sell.”
Poor Rafe. God, his parents sucked. “I can imagine.”
“It all worked out though.”
Did it? I lifted my basket onto the counter and threw in a couple of sharing size chocolate bars. I’d be sharing those with myself later. Mrs Brown shook out a bag and started ringing up my items while I stared unseeing at the wall lined with cigarettes.
There was so much about Rafe I didn’t know, and despite everything, I still wanted to find out.
Would that feeling ever pass?
“Now, while you’re here, I think you should take a bag of gritting salt for the driveway,” Mrs Brown said. “There’s a snow storm headed our way.”
“There is?” I asked brightly, excited for the first time all week. The prospect of a real white Christmas made me want to jump with joy. “I’m not going anywhere so it’s fine.”
“Oh no, dear. You need to be prepared. We don’t want you stranded out there by yourself. You’ve seen what that road is like. I’ll give you our business card in case you need anything.”
“Thank you,” I said, tugging out my credit card to pay. “How long does the snow typically last this time of year?”
“Depends. Sometimes months.”
Wow. Okay. “You best give me some of that salt then.”
* * *
Chestnut Cottage was a fifteen-minute drive from the village and nestled against a backdrop of rolling green hills and distant snow-capped mountains. No other property in sight. I’d wanted peace and quiet and I was getting it.
My stomach lurched and tumbled but I dismissed it quickly. The time for regrets was gone.
I grabbed my shopping bags from the rental car and paused to take a deep breath, spluttering a cough at the itch in my throat. Even though it had been a week, I was still so unused to the bite of clean, fresh air.
I definitely wasn’t in London anymore.
The cottage loomed behind me, larger than I’d originally pictured. I wasn’t sure why. Rafe’s family were millionaires so naturally they wouldn’t own anything small. Probably didn’t know the meaning of the word. Even so, the wordcottagealways gave off a snug, cosy vibe in my imagination and this was anything but. The outside appeared stark against the hills, but when it snowed – fingers crossed – it would completely disappear into its surroundings, if not for the grey roof and royal blue front door. There was a matching garage set back to one side and a couple of shed-type buildings further back. I still needed to explore those later.
Some wooden outdoor furniture, in desperate need of sanding and a lick of paint, sat at the front, and I’d spent every day so far sitting there wrapped in a blanket, basking in the view of the loch further down the valley. The first day I’d cried, the kind of deep, wrenching sobs that made my sides ache and my face puffy for hours afterwards. But still, I persisted. Nature always had a way of reviving my mind like nothing else, and I needed all the help I could get if I wanted a plan formed by the time I returned to London.
All I’d managed so far was writing the word “PLAN” as a heading on the first page of a new notebook. Underlining it twice.
Dumping my shopping in the kitchen, I grabbed that notepad and spent the afternoon reworking my CV – twenty solid years of working since I was fifteen meant it took a while – and the only conclusion I made was that I wanted to stay in PR. But who would hire me now? Getting sacked from anywhere was never a good sign but getting sacked from NT Public Relations was the darkest mark of all.
