She placed her hand on my shoulder and gave me a squeeze this time. “Totally. And I didn’t even officially friend you or like one of your posts!”
Her words, although said in an irreverent way, held more weight than I think she knew. Because when I thought about it, Samirah was the first friend that I’d made offline in years. We hadn’t agreed to be friends by clicking a button and sending thumbs ups and hearts each other’s way. It had just happened naturally, and it was real. More real than anything I’d had in years. Maybe ever.
I thought about my other so-called friends, who’d all abandoned me when I’d needed them most, ghosted me when I’d reached out . . . Real friends don’t do that. Only fake ones.
Fake friends and a fake life.
I was starting to think that, the longer I stayed here. Because when you do something real, like save a baby lamb, it puts things into perspective. It really highlights what’s real and what’s not. Real was over there in that pen, jumping about on its new legs with glee. Real was sitting next to me in this car, trusting me enough to tell me her deepest fears.
That was real.
The other stuff—@TheKyleWhite101, #powercouple, @FitspoFrankie—well, I was starting to think that wasn’t.
CHAPTER 67
We woke up together in Mark’s bed the next morning, and the next morning, and the morning after that, until a whole week of waking together had gone by. We would have breakfast together at the kitchen table, with Harun looking on, hoping to steal something off our plates when we weren’t looking. Turned out Mark was also a coffee connoisseur and each morning he would brew me a different blend. And after breakfast on most mornings, we grabbed a shower together and had hot, wet, sometimes very clumsy shower sex. And after that, Mark would drive me into town and drop me off at Samirah’s and he would go off to the store. And everything about that was perfect!
The pace of life here was slow and lazy and many days we would simply be off work for the whole afternoon and find ourselves with nothing to do but lie in bed, talking and reading and watching Mark’s favorite movies while I got a crash course in cinema and music. I watched and enjoyed movies that I never thought possible, even ones in black and white. We’d settled into this comfortable, effortless way of falling into bed at night, making love, waking up and then, after work, taking Harun on long walks through the desert followed by gin on the veranda, followed by talking late into the night and playing board games by candlelight when the electricity went out, which was pretty often. We even did quiz night and I officially joined Risky Quizzness. It was such fun. Turns out I have a serious gift for general knowledge, all that endless Googling and my need to know everything had finally come in handy! I was amazed by how much fun I was having without my phone and online life. I hadn’t thought about it once or craved it. For the first time in a long time, my life was balanced in a way it had never been balanced before. Work, friends, alone time, exercise.
Our routine began to feel so normal and natural. These weeks had completely changed my life, and I was really starting to feel a part of something. I’d also gone to book club, after being asked by Natasha for the hundredth time while doing my grocery shopping. I had gone back to meditation, and had a much more successful attempt at it; I’d popped round one afternoon to share a coffee with Logan at the hotel restaurant; and to top it all off I’d bought a box of dye and dyed my hair brown to match the roots that were showing. And what really surprised me was how much I loved it! I also found myself going for long jogs in the desert, exercising for no reason other than I enjoyed it. I hadn’t really enjoyed exercise in years, despite the fact I had been @FitspoFrankie. I exercised this time not to track it and log it and post about it, but for me, and me alone.
My days felt so full of stuff now. Real stuff. With real people. I’d even discovered my love of reading again. I hadn’t read in years. I had associated it with the lonely time, but now I was enjoying those moments alone where I could get lost in a book.
But the highlight of the week was definitely the rehearsal for the festival. And I must admit that, as much as I was rolling my eyes about this whole thing, I was actually enjoying it. There was this sense of community and camaraderie that I’d never experienced in real life before. And it was far better than anything I’d ever experienced online. Sure, the whole thing was completely ridiculous if you had to zoom out and look from the outside. A motley group of us walking down Main Street, trying to reenact scenes from this great trek that the Ackerman family had taken to get here. Ian and I were also getting along well, despite our shaky start. He’d spent extra time working with me, teaching me the moves I needed to perform when fighting off the jackal with a stick. I’d laughed the entire time he was teaching me, but laughed even more when Faizel let go of the sheep he was meant to be herding, who then made a bolt for it. He chased the thing down the main road for ages before finally catching up to it, drenched in sweat. But what was really nice about the rehearsals was that I was meeting people and was starting to feel at home in this small place. I was making connections here. Little dots in my life were being joined together to form a web of things that I hadn’t known I’d wanted, until now.
And at work I was learning so much from Samirah. It had been great, except for that day when a stray feral kitten had come in. It had been picked up on the side of the road and Samirah had spent an hour on the phone, calling people in town and asking them if anyone wanted a kitten, then she’d called the SPCA which was three hours away, but they were sadly full. She’d even contemplated keeping it herself, but couldn’t, what with her five dogs. I’d then offered to take it home, only to discover that Mark was deathly allergic to cats—red-faced, gasping-for-air allergic—and I’d had to run him to the town doctor for a shot of strong antihistamines. By the end of the day, after trying absolutely everything to home it, we were left with no other option. I’d cried the entire time. So had Samirah. And, when it was over, we’d sat on the veranda drinking tea and talking for hours about the sanctuary she wanted to start, so that kittens like this one could get a chance at life. I’d gone home that night and cried while Mark had held and comforted me.
And then, before I knew it, another week rolled past. Another week that Mark and I spent together, another week with Samirah, another week I’d spent submerging myself in the town and all its strange happenings. But this weekend was different. We couldn’t go fynbos picking and gin making, because on Sunday it was the festival. And today we had to go and try on our costumes.
CHAPTER 68
“Seriously, is this it?” I asked, looking at myself in the mirror. “This is it?” I turned around to get a better look at myself. My dress was long and heavy, hanging all the way to the ground. My feet were squeezed into pointy boots that were more uncomfortable than heels, and I was wearing a bonnet that, when I looked at it, I couldn’t help but say “Under his eye” in my head. I looked terrible. But Mark looked worse in that long jacket with the puffy shoulders that made him seem like he didn’t have a neck.
“What the hell?” I burst out laughing when I saw him. “We look terrible.”
Mark smiled at me. “Nah, I think you look sexy as hell.” I laughed as he walked over to me and laid a hand on my waist.
“Back off, I still need to pin her in.” Ian came over with a pin and pushed Mark away. “But before I pin you in, you need something else.”
“What?”
“Here.” He passed me a small cushion.
“What’s this for?”
“Margaret was pregnant.” He put a hand on his hip, holding the cushion out for me.
I laughed and shook my head. “No. I draw the line at that.”
“This is a true-to-life reenactment!” He sounded like he was getting worked up again. Truthfully, these last weeks spent with him, I was really starting to appreciate him. Sure, his obsession with this yearly reenactment was perhaps a bit much, but I guess it showed passion. He had a passion for his town and its history and heritage. So did everyone here. Everyone who lived in this town seemed to have a deep connection with it, and they wanted to celebrate that. So, bearing that in mind, I guessed I could shove a cushion down my dress.
“Fine,” I conceded. “But don’t make me look like I’m fat!”
“Honey, you could never look fat,” he said to me and I smiled to myself, because that just wasn’t true.
“Okay, wait here, I’m coming back with more pins,” Ian said, passing me the cushion.
I took it, maneuvered it to my stomach area and looked down. I hadn’t seen myself like that for years and a little feeling started nibbling at me.
