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Leaning back, Joe shrugged out of his coat and laid it around her shoulders.
‘Thanks, but you have some too.’ Pulling the coat from her shoulders, she leaned against him and laid it over the both of them.
‘So, what’s next for you job wise? Are you going to come over to the dark side and give self-employment a go?’ Joe raised his eyebrows.
‘Maybe.’ She shrugged. She’d been thinking about it for a while now. Could she? ‘What would I do, though?’
‘What would you like to do?’ He held her hand under the coat.
‘I’d love to open my own craft shop one day. You know, make it a happy place to shop, the complete opposite to Mrs Hatton’s shop. I’d have a big table int he middle of the shop where people could sit and craft alongside each other. Id serve coffee and tea and invite crafters to come and do demonstrations and talks.’ She smiled. Maybe forgetting to post Mrs Hatton’s key through her letterbox had been the best thing that had happened to her in a while. Now she’d have to change her life’s direction. She’d have the chance to follow her dreams. She straightened her back and looked at Joe. ‘Could I set up a craft shop online? Begin my business that way?’
Joe grinned. ‘I don’t see why not. I think that’s a great idea.’
‘Yes, it would give me a chance to build a following, make some money, establish my business name and then when I can open up a shop I could carry on with the internet shopping side of the business to make enough money to live on whilst I’m establishing my brick shop. Do you think that could work?’
‘Absolutely. Anything you choose to do will work and I think starting a craft business online would be the perfect stepping-stone to opening your own brick shop.’ Holly’s enthusiasm had ignited the same in Joe.
She nodded. She could actually do this. She could. And once the online business was drawing in enough money, then she could make the leap to a proper shop, a shop in a little village somewhere, maybe. Perhaps even somewhere by the beach. She took in a deep breath, filling her lungs. Even from halfway up the hill, as far way away from the sea, the air felt cleaner, healthier, crisper. ‘Perhaps I can even think about selling my home.’ Her words were quiet, each syllable catching in her throat.
‘Only when or if you’re ready. You don’t need to if you don’t want to. You could build enough profit from your website to rent a shop somewhere.’
‘Yes, I could, couldn’t I?’ She could think about the house another time. She had enough to think about just now. ‘I’m glad Mrs Hatton has fired me. I mean, it’s scary, but it’s exciting too.’
‘To be honest, I’m surprised you stuck your job out so long.’ Joe chuckled. ‘I wouldn’t have worked with Mrs Hatton breathing down my neck if she’d paid me a hundred thousand pounds a week.’
‘Haha, well, I can assure you the pay was most definitely wasn’t that, anywhere close. Try subtracting numerous zeros from that figure.’ She shrugged. ‘It wasn’t so bad. She wasn’t there the majority of the time. She’d just leave me to it.’
‘And I can imagine what you did with all that free time between the smattering of customers.’ Joe held his hands out, mimicking holding a book and turning the pages.
‘Yep, you’re right. It was absolutely fab for zooming through my pile of books.’
‘Just think, if you’d stopped buying new books when you’d started working there, you might have just finished them all by now.’
‘I could never stop buying books.’ Holly held her hand against her chest in mock-shock. ‘It would be the same as you giving up coffee. Or more appropriately, air. It would be the same as you waking up one day and deciding you weren’t going to bother breathing air again.’
‘Fair enough.’ He squeezed her hand. ‘This is pretty perfect, dint it?’
‘What? Us or Penworth Bay?’
‘Both. All of it.’
She looked around the small private garden and smiled. ‘yes, it is. It feels a world away from real life. I almost feel as though I’ve walked right into a dream. I know how daft that sounds, but it’s lovely here. No hurrying down the street to avoid people you don’t want to run into, the beach on our doorstep, the sea air, the people. I don’t think I’ve met a grump customer yet.’
‘People you want to avoid, hey? They wouldn’t be anything to do with Mick by any chance?’
She shifted position and shrugged. ‘Yes. It’s just been freeing, not worrying about anything besides what’s down here.’
‘We could stay a little longer.’ Joe’s voice was soft, uncertain.
‘Down here?’ She frowned. Could they? She didn’t have a job to return to. She could set up her online business anywhere, and Joe could, and did, work from anywhere. ‘What about my parents’ house? And your house?’
Joe frowned. ‘You’ve not got a mortgage to pay and I can cover the outgoings on my flat for a while.’
‘So it would be like an extended holiday?’
Joe twisted around to face her. ‘An extended holiday. We could always extend a little more if we both loved it as much as we do now.’
Holly opened and closed her mouth. ‘You mean move down here?’
