Page 84 of One Summer

‘I’m coming around to that idea,’ he says. ‘Living alone on an island seems to be cheering me up.’

‘Then I’ll leave you to it,’ I say. ‘Enjoy your solitude.’

*

It’s peaceful on the beach. The tide is full out, and even with all the holidaymakers dotted around the soft, dry sand, here at the water’s edge, there’s nobody except me. Ted is running into the baby waves and then running back out again before the water reaches his belly. He’s so joyful every time I bring him here that it makes me feel guilty to see him sitting in the house.

As the next wave comes in, I see something yellow swirling in the backwash. I bend down to get it and break into a grin. Just what Caleb told me I had to find.

A tiny piece of nautical-themed Lego… and not just any piece. This feels somehow significant. Here in the waves of Loor, I’ve found a lifejacket.

Sixty-Nine

Monks

I have Cedric on a blanket in the evening sunshine, when Caleb strolls over from his garden, hopping over the part of my garden that boasts a neatly trimmed privet hedge.

He nods a hello and picks up a paperback that I’ve been reading called Seven Enemies, and wrinkles his nose.

‘Why are you making that face?’ I enquire.

He reads the blurb. ‘It’s just sounds silly. The whole concept.’

‘It’s brilliant,’ I say. ‘Genre fiction keeps the lights on in publishing houses. Without it, there’d be no profit margin at all. It paid my rent for three years. Well, just about.’

‘You worked in publishing?’

I nod.

‘But now you’re a professional reptile-sitter.’

‘Don’t take that tone. Both careers have their challenges. Each has its fair share of snakes.’

‘I bet.’

‘Can I have my book back now, please?’

‘You’re really going to read that?’

‘If you ever pass it back,’ I say. ‘The theme speaks to me because, personally, I always have seven enemies.’

He raises a sceptical eyebrow.

‘It’s true,’ I say. ‘I have a mental list that I check in on regularly, to see if the order needs to be changed. In London, I can’t go to a new place without having a quick glance around to see if any of the seven are present. The first time in my life that I haven’t felt that way is on Loor.’

‘Hang on, I can hear my oven timer beeping,’ he says.

He’s wearing a stupid, unfathomable T-shirt today that says BUCKLAND MONACHORUM, and I know he wants me to ask him about it. As soon as he goes inside, I cave in and secretly google it, and find it’s a minuscule place in Devon and that monachorum means ‘of the monks’. As soon as I hear his door open again, I shut down the page and slide my phone in my pocket, so that he won’t have the satisfaction of knowing he’s raised my curiosity.

He comes back out holding a fork and a pasta bowl of something that smells completely delicious.

My stomach grumbles so loudly that he notices.

‘Haven’t eaten yet?’

‘I need to go shopping. All I’ve got left is a Pot Noodle and I can’t stand Pot Noodle. I’d rather eat Ted’s Pedigree Chum.’

‘I have food,’ he says. ‘If you’re hungry.’

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