It Started With A Tweet(71)

Lots of love,

Erica xx

P.S. Please, please, please send photos – of the scenery and Jack and Alexis too!!! Instagram has ruined my imagination :)

P.P.S. an official-looking letter came for you. Do you want me to forward it on to you?



I miss my bestie so much, but it sounds as if she’s moving on without me. If only I could get my life as sorted.

I’m about to reach into my pocket to pull out my pen and paper when I see Buster bounding up, and my heart starts to race as I see his owner coming into view. From my vantage point, he can’t see me tucked away here, and I feel a flutter in my belly as I spot a letter in his hands.

‘For me?’ I say as he goes to drop the letter into our box. He practically jumps a mile.

‘For God’s sake, woman, you scared the life out of me.’

‘Sorry, not sorry,’ I say grinning. That’s the best laugh I’ve had all day. ‘So can I read it?’

‘This?’ he says examining the letter, and I see a blush of red in his cheeks.

‘Uh-huh.’

‘Well, you’re here now, so I can actually talk to you,’ he says shoving it into his pocket.

‘Come on, what did it say?’ I say, wishing I’d waited until he’d deposited it in the box before scaring the crap out of him.

‘It didn’t really. Just the normal stuff. You know, Price is Right guff, talk about the weather: same old, same old.’

‘Right,’ I say, doing a slow nod. ‘And you walked all the way here just to post a letter about the weather.’

‘Well, I guess now we’ll never know, will we?’

He sits down on the wall beside me and brushes my leg with his, causing my cheeks to burn a little.

I’m tempted to reach into his trouser pocket to pull out the letter. I’m not too sure what stage it is in a friendship where you can stick your hand down someone’s trousers with the potential to accidentally grope them in the process, but I’m pretty sure we’re not there yet.

‘So what are you doing sitting here – apart from trying to scare the living daylights out of me?’

‘Oh, you know. Just thinking about things, and hoping you’d come by with a letter for me. I really do want to read it.’

‘Never going to happen,’ says Jack, shaking his head. ‘It’s bad enough that I know you actually read something I’ve written, let alone that I see you do it. No, I shall take this one with me to the grave. So, thinking more about what we were talking about yesterday?’

‘Uh-huh. More about what the hell I’m going to do with my life, and how I’ve made such a giant mess of it.’

‘You’ve got to stop thinking you’ve messed it up. You’re not on your deathbed, you know. Whatever happened was a small blip.’

‘My boss wouldn’t agree with that.’

‘Well, bosses can be idiots just like anyone else. You know, so many people would envy you at the moment. You’re free: no commitments, no strings. You could go wherever you wanted to go.’

I stare at Jack as he’s talking, knowing he’s right, knowing that I could go travelling or move to Land’s End, yet the only place I seem to want to go at the moment is right here.

It’s funny, as I’ve only been here for just over a week, and I know I don’t really know anything about him, but at the same time, I want to know everything.

‘I know you were saying it’s a bad thing that you have no attachments, but use your time wisely as I’m sure you won’t stay single forever.’

‘I should bloody hope not,’ I say, thinking that this pep talk is suddenly taking a depressing turn.

‘You do know I was trying to say the opposite of that; it came out all wrong. What I meant to say was, if I’d met you when I was living in London, I wouldn’t have been interested in a one-night stand.’

‘Oh great, so you wouldn’t have wanted to have sex with me – what’s wrong with me?’ I ask, turning and raising a provocative eyebrow.

Jack looks flustered and he’s scratching his head as if wondering how the conversation went so badly wrong.

‘I’m just messing with you. Thank you, that’s sweet to know,’ I say.

It wasn’t lost on me that he said if he’d met me in London, which is a nice way of saying nothing’s going to happen now.

‘You know, if I had my phone, I’d totally take a selfie,’ I say, looking behind me. ‘I mean, look at the sheep ready to photobomb us in the background. Talk about hashtag squad goals.’

‘Hashtag what goals? You do realise you talk a different language sometimes, don’t you?’

‘I’m sorry, Granddad, I forgot you’re not down with the cool kids.’

‘You know you’re over thirty, right? I’m pretty sure we’d tick the same boxes on most marketing surveys.’

I stare into Jack’s eyes, trying to get an idea of his age, but that damn beard is a real pain for guessing. I mean, is he mid-thirties, early forties? Who can tell with a disguise like that?

‘Go on, then, how old are you?’

‘How old do you think I am?’

‘Why do you answer every question with a question?’

‘Oh, sorry. Habit. I’m thirty-seven.’