Page 28 of A Scottish Lighthouse Escape

Chapter Eleven

Christmas.

A word that used to fill Joe and me with sparks of anticipation. It was descending on me now like a black fog.

It was growing ever closer, taunting me, reminding me of the wonderful Christmases Joe and me had had. Or at least, I had thought they were wonderful. How many times did Joe make up an excuse and slip away to see Greta over those festive seasons? Where was he, when he was claiming he had another post-work Christmas drinks do to attend?

Christmas was five weeks away now, and I was already sick of the sight of festive selection boxes, chocolate figures of Santa, snowmen and reindeer, not to mention the sparkly greeting cards.

At the entrance to the local garden centre, miniature Christmas trees and festive wreaths glowed everywhere.

I adjusted my moss green crocheted hat and clamped it down tighter over my curls. Even the weather seemed to be hinting at the festivities to come. Doughy clouds sailed overhead, with the water in the bay laced with white horses as it struck the pelt of sand.

I blinked furiously as pictures of Joe and me decorating our six-footer silver Christmas tree last year exploded in my mind. Him kissing me under the mistletoe; both of us savouring hot chocolate in Hyde Park and sharing a bag of roasted chestnuts; our breath colliding and mingling in the frosty air as we did our Christmas shopping, arms draped around each other. Did he repeat everything with Greta? A Christmas replay of all things romantic? When he was kissing me, did he taste her too and vice versa?

I tried not to dwell on how I would always insist on wrapping rose-gold fairy lights along our apartment balcony and station another decorated tree out there too.

Inside our apartment, the air would be filled with the scent of cranberry and cinnamon potpourri, and pictures were draped in more lights and garlands of holly and ivy. I didn’t think you could go over the top at the most magical time of the year and Joe was every bit as crazy about Christmas as I was.

I tried not to register the empty feeling tripping through me, as I saw myself and Bronte stumbling out of the apartment and me slamming the car door shut, me imagining Joe’s face in the rearview mirror.

I gripped Bronte’s lead tighter in my right hand.

I’d stashed a couple of reuseable carrier bags in my shoulder bag. I wanted to get some air and decided to walk to the supermarket, rather than jump in the car.

No corner shop for me today. I didn’t want a repeat performance with Rhea Stafford. Hopefully, no more nosey parkers would leap out and interrogate me. I know people meant well and only wanted to pass on their condolences about Joe, but all the kind sentiments in the world wouldn’t wipe out how I was feeling and what he’d done.

* * *

At the supermarket I secured Bronte’s lead around the nearby railings, grabbed a basket and dropped my chin into my scarf, just in case.

As I stepped inside, a display of Christmas selection boxes caught my attention. I glowered at the reindeer glitter design. Jesus, I was turning into Scrooge.

Gathering my resolve, I proceeded to scoot up and down the aisle locating bananas, bagels, more milk, pasta and assorted vegetables.

My lip curled up when I saw mince pies and Christmas puddings for sale.

There were a few other customers around, but it wasn’t busy. Relief swam through me.

I surmised that nine o’clock on a Tuesday morning in November, wasn’t the most popular time to conduct your weekly grocery shop. Perhaps a lot of people had ventured into the bigger towns to start their Christmas shopping. I groaned inwardly at the thought of it.

I hurried up another aisle under the strip lighting, reaching for a bar of 90% dark chocolate. On the shelf below, was Joe’s favourite – Oreo. A pang of something hit me in the chest.

I pulled my eyes back up to the fluorescent ceiling. Was this what my life was going to be like from now on? Feeling like I was taking part in an episode of Supermarket Sweep every time I needed to restock my fridge? Stay cooped up in my grandparent’s cottage for the foreseeable? Hiding from people? Trying to avoid awkward situations and probing questions? Worried that I’d dissolve into a torrent of tears, if anyone so much as asked if I was okay?

I glanced back at the bar of Oreo chocolate he loved.

I had to accept that there were going to be reminders of him and of what I thought we had, lurking around every corner. I would just have to learn to deal with them. A song we both liked or a film we snuggled up to watch together. Someone with hair similar to his, running in the park.

And that was precisely why I’d fled from London and dashed up here to Rowan Bay. It was so I could try to give myself time to heal in private and learn somehow to deal with the pain and the deception. It wasn’t going to be a quick fix. At the moment, it felt like I was going to be fumbling through this airless, dark torture forever.

With my basket brimming with food items, I rounded the bottom of the next aisle to the pet section and picked up a new, squeaky apple toy for Bronte. Joe hadn’t been keen on getting a dog to begin with. He insisted he wouldn’t have time to devote to them and that it wouldn’t be fair.

But that all changed the day I brought her into the apartment three years ago. She was a squirming, licking bundle of ten-week-old fluff and I’d fallen in love with her the moment I set eyes on her at the breeder’s house in Camden. She’d wiggled over to me, licked my hand and then sat down behind my boot, as if to say, ‘When are you taking me home then?!’

As soon as Joe clapped eyes on her, she wrapped herself around his heart and decided she loved us both unconditionally.

I plopped the latex toy into my basket, dropped my head and started to make my way towards the tills. That was until I barrelled into a tall, broad figure. ‘Oh, sorry!’