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“Oh sh—” Ally’s voice dropped to a muffled whisper. “I have to go. The boss is coming, and like usual lately, he’s not too happy. I’ll swing by your house around eleven tomorrow and we’ll talk soiree details then.”
The line went dead, so Emilia headed back outside to finish her tea. Ally’s mention of Blaine’s recent prickliness mingled with Aggie’s advice about moving on from the past. The soiree would be one step closer to the future Emilia wanted. Another chance to make new connections. All she needed to do was stay brave and keep showing up.
Late afternoon came, and the light rain from that morning turned into heavier sheets of water over the darkened valley outside Emilia’s kitchen window. Since Blaine had stormed off before starting much work, she peeled potatoes at her dilapidated counter, two of her overhead cupboards a partially demolished mess.
Aside from that, her day had gone to plan, in that, there’d been no plan. No interruptions. Nowhere to go. No unforeseen dramas… Pure heaven, really.
The gloomy sky grew darker still and so did the light in her kitchen. She tore her gaze from her peeling knife and looked out through the window, to the misty landscape half-obscured in the torrential downpour. Since that day in Blaine’s driveway, when Anthony had changed the course of her life forever, she’d developed a terrible association with rainy weather and storms.
A clap of thunder roared over the valley. She jolted, dropping her knife to the counter and pressing her hands to her ears.
Breathe woman, it’s just noise and water.
Rain pinged like stray bullets against the cottage’s metal roof, the ruckus providing a chance for her to work on her vow of being brave. So in a moment of daring, she made her way out the back door and onto the landing.
The icy air nipped at her nostrils, the smell of wet earth and damp hay filtering through; the once bone-dry grass was no longer dry. More lightning fired across the plain, and she jumped, this time at the almighty crack of her gutter detaching from the edge of her roof.
A large chunk of metal hit the concrete edging, the boom ear-splitting; still, one end remained attached to the roof, threatening to pull the rest of the guttering down.
Clearly, she wasn’t the only one overwhelmed by rain.
Storm phobia aside, she had to act or the damage would get worse. What with her half-kitchen, the last thing she needed was to lose a section of her veranda too.
She bolted across her yard to the back garden shed, and her loose white shirt became sodden in seconds. The booming sounds continued, this time the thunder and not her gutter, and once more her nerves frazzled.
A rickety old ladder lay within the shed. She hooked it under her arm, pocketed a screwdriver, and then headed back into the pummeling rain.
Sharp chills penetrated her bones. She positioned the ladder against the roof’s edge and climbed up each rung, wanting this ordeal over as quickly as possible.
She’d never been the handy type, which made twisting at screws ever more terrifying atop the feeble ladder. The whole thing wobbled if she twisted too fast, and her hands turned numb from the cold. Her shivering made dismantling the gutter about as easy as performing brain surgery with a wet piece of dental floss.
The screws were stiff in their holdings, and she grunted at the effort of loosening the three that needed to come out. Every passing second added to her shivering and the anesthetized sensation in her fingers. Anyone would have struggled, but for a girl from the sunny West Coast, the frosty conditions took her breath away.
The last screw gave, and she fought back a joyful sob, the damaged section of gutter falling to the ground. Now all she had to do was climb down seven rungs and be free from this cold nightmare. All she wanted now was a warm bath and then to go to bed.
She took the first rung. The ladder wobbled again and breathing got harder. Why couldn’t she breathe? Despite the cold, she needed to stop and get her bearings. Because of the cold, stopping seemed like a terrible idea.
She gasped for another tight breath, her ribcage somehow way too small for the air she needed. She tried for another rung, her eyes fluttering momentarily closed.
Oh, God. I know what this is. Not now. Please, not now.
For some reason, she thought someone called her name, but she couldn’t be sure. Maybe she would be lucky. Maybe that someone would help. Dizziness had well-and-truly taken over, and nothing she did seemed enough.
She made for another useless attempt to breathe. The world around her tilted and muddled. Somehow, she’d have to make it inside the house, but not right now. Right now, she just wanted to sleep.
