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‘Come on, you’re in! Keep going! Keep moving!’ Emily was laughing as she encouraged her friend. ‘You’re doing brilliantly!’
‘I cannot believe… I… agreed to… this. What… was… I… thinking?’ Lou managed to say in between breaths.
‘Look at you! You’ll be swimming to Rum in no time!’ Emily nodded her head at the island beyond. ‘Let’s swim this way for a bit.’ She turned and swam parallel to the beach, leaving Lou on her inside. ‘How are you feeling now?’
‘Actually, I think I’m getting used to it. Still stupidly cold, though.’
‘I swear you will be buzzing after this.’
‘I’m just hoping I can feel my face after this,’ said Lou, managing a small laugh.
Ten minutes later, the two women sat on the beach, wrapped in towels. They had the rock-strewn beach almost to themselves – a couple of other swimmers in full wetsuits were still out in the water – and sat with a flask of hot, milky coffee between them. The sky above was the clearest blue, streaked with thin, wispy clouds. They watched the gannets plunge into the sea, quickly followed by guillemots darting in to see what they could find. A stiff breeze blew across the bay, making the fine hairs on their bare arms stand up on their salty skin. They both had their eyes closed, faces turned to the sun as it tried its best to warm them up a little more.
‘OK, I have to admit you were right. I really do feel amazing.’ Lou took a sip of her coffee. ‘Ooh, actually, I’ve just remembered.’ She reached round and pulled a small container from her bag. ‘Here, hold this.’ She passed her coffee cup to Emily to hold and opened it, showing Emily what was inside. ‘Fresh madeleines made this morning. I might have siphoned off a few.’
‘Those look amazing, thank you.’ Emily took one, feeling it was still warm. She held it up to her nose, inhaling the scent of warm cake. She took a bite and sighed. ‘Mmm, so good.’
‘Light as air, even though I say so myself,’ said Lou, laughing.
‘So,’ said Emily, through another mouthful of cake, ‘do you think you might hang around for a bit at Glengowan?’ Emily smiled as she said this. She’d worked at the hotel long enough to know that few managed to stick it out for longer than a year, two tops. Tucked away on the north coast of the island, the hotel was remote, even by Mull’s standards. And in the ten years she’d been working there, first as a sous-chef and now as head chef, she’d come to know within just a matter of days whether the newbies would last. She’d been hoping that Lou would stay, not least because she was a brilliant sous-chef but also really fun to be around.
As much as Emily loved her job, it could get lonely at times. Her hours were long, not to mention antisocial; trying to forge a normal social life on the island was tricky. She had a great team, but most were much younger than her, or older with families of their own. When she’d first arrived on the island, she had made an effort to meet people outside of the hotel, but given the physically demanding nature of the work, all she really wanted to do on her one night a week off was sit in silence in her cottage in the grounds of the estate with a book in front of the fire or binge-watch something on her laptop, preferably in bed. She’d joined a bridge club – it had been the only option for something that counted as a social life – but that had petered out after a while. As for meeting someone romantically, she’d given up on that idea years ago.
Emily’s few hours off during the day in between service were precious and she used the time to explore the island, usually by foot. Unless the rain was horizontal, she’d throw on her sturdy boots and walk. Sometimes she’d hear about a spot she didn’t know from a local and drive back down the single-track road to explore a new corner of the landscape. She had walked up mountains and along coastal paths down to deserted beaches, watched colonies of seals sunbathe on rocks and sea eagles circle the skies above her. The island was rugged and feral but breathtakingly beautiful at the same time. It ruled the people on it rather than the other way round and, in time, Emily had come to love it more than anywhere she’d ever lived. When she first came, she’d been running away from a life that hadn’t worked out as she’d hoped. But now, she felt as if perhaps this had always been the plan. She couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
Lou popped the last of her madeleine into her mouth. ‘I’m definitely here for a while, I think. I do love it, but I’m not sure how you’ve lasted so long. Don’t you ever want to go somewhere a little less cut off?’
Emily looked out to the sea again and took in a deep breath. To her, the view was still as magical as when she had first laid eyes on it. ‘That’s the thing. I’m not sure I can ever leave now.’ She reached into her bag and pulled out her watch, glancing at the time. ‘We’d better get back, it’s nearly eleven.’
‘OK, chef.’
‘You only have to call me that in the kitchen.’
‘I know. Habit.’ Lou shrugged.
As they drove up the long drive towards the castle on the hill, the sun now high in the sky, the sounds of Joan Baez’s ‘Diamonds and Rust’ drifted from the car radio. Emily’s hands gripped the wheel just a little bit tighter. How was it that a few bars from a song could take her back in a matter of seconds to a time she’d almost forgotten about? Almost.
* * *
Service that night had been straightforward, they were busy but not bursting, which was just how Emily liked it in the restaurant. It was the start of summer, not yet the school holidays, and the guests were a mixture of young couples having a few days away, older couples on week-long tours of the West Coast and a fair share of tourists from abroad. The last few years had been tough, but people seemed to be getting their confidence back when it came to travel and once they’d made it to the hotel, they were ready to have a good time.
Emily loved cooking at this time of year, with local langoustines and mussels all in abundant supply. One of her favourite dishes to cook – and eat – was a simply done piece of fish – whatever had been brought in that day – with brown butter and a bit of dulse, freshly cut off the rocks at low tide.
With service over and the kitchen cleared down, Emily did one last check of the rota for the following day before saying goodnight to her team and heading off back to her cottage. It was a short walk from the castle, down the drive and off to the left, and with the moon almost full, hanging in a cloudless sky, she didn’t need to use the torch of her phone as she sometimes did.
As she approached the front door of the cottage, she heard the familiar barking inside and, as she got closer, sniffing. She opened it to be met with the wet nose and wagging tail of her dog, Bertie. He was an old liver-and-white springer spaniel, bought not long after moving to the island from someone she’d got talking to in the pub she’d worked at in Tobermory. They, in turn, had introduced her to someone who worked at the castle, such was the way of the island.
When Emily had decided to move to be nearer to her new job, the formidable hotel owner, Margaret, had insisted Emily take the cottage in the grounds for a peppercorn rent. She too was a spaniel owner and Emily suspected it was Margaret’s soft spot for Bertie that had helped secure her living arrangements.
Margaret had been left the castle by her philandering husband – everyone knew about his affairs, including her, though she never let on and it was certainly never discussed in front of her – and after he died, she’d moved from the mainland to live in the castle, spending a large part of her fortune on restoring it to its former glory. She’d then turned it into one of the most successful hotels in the area, attracting the tourists with money to spend, hence the upmarket restaurant.
The hotel sat overlooking one of the most beautiful bays on the island, with a garden leading down to the cliff’s edge and, below that, a rocky beach at the bottom. The beach could be reached by steps but only at low tide, revealing a half-moon-shaped patch of sand, but the rocks made it too precarious to swim. Still, when low tide coincided with Emily’s downtime between shifts, she would walk down to the beach with Bertie, taking Margaret’s dogs with her as her boss was now unable to manage the steps.
At first, Emily had been terrified of Margaret. In fact, everyone who worked there was a little terrified of Margaret. She always wore a tweed skirt and jacket, her silver-grey hair immaculately styled in a bun. Along with her long, glossy red nails and trademark red lipstick, she was easily the most glamourous octogenarian on the island. Margaret ran a tight ship and didn’t suffer fools. But, over time, Emily realised that underneath Margaret’s very tough exterior was a woman who wanted the best out of the people who worked for her and, in return, wanted only the best for them. They’d had a few run-ins over the years, but their working relationship was based on respect and, for the most part, Emily loved it here.
As their friendship had grown over the years, Emily spent time with Margaret in her apartment in the castle, joining her for a dram every Sunday after service. They’d talk about the week they’d had, the week ahead, what food they could expect to get their hands on, who had booked to stay, how new recruits were doing. Very occasionally, Margaret would ask Emily about her personal life, specifically when she might go back to the mainland to visit her parents.
It was a sore point: Emily had left years before and rarely went home to visit. In Emily’s mind, there were too many reasons not to go back. Too many questions, for a start. Her parents were both now in their seventies and they’d never understood why their daughter had chosen not to marry, let alone didn’t have children. They were from a different generation, one where not doing either of those things just didn’t make sense. All their friends had children and now grandchildren, many of whom still lived close enough for them to see them often. On the rare occasions Emily did return home, it was never long before the conversation turned from asking Emily how she was to whether she’d met anyone yet. She found it exhausting.
