Page 38 of The Winter of Second Chances
‘You surf?’ asked Annie.
‘Kitesurfing, windsurfing, you name it,’ said Paul.
Annie got the impression Paul was trying to impress her. It was working.
‘Penny for them,’ said Paul.
Annie blinked and realised she’d wandered to the end of the gravel path that wound through the graveyard and was standing inside the wooden lychgate.
‘Sorry,’ said Annie. ‘I was lost in my thoughts.’
‘Anything I can help with?’ asked Paul.
‘I was thinking that you seem to have the work–life balance thing sorted,’ said Annie. ‘I’ve never been very good at balance. I’m on the lookout for tips.’
‘Well, you’re headed in the right direction,’ said Paul.
‘How can you tell?’
‘You’re here, aren’t you?’ said Paul. ‘You left behind something that wasn’t working and struck out on your own. You’re finding your balance.’
‘You make it sound like more of a determined effort than it was,’ said Annie.
‘Then what was it?’ asked Paul.
‘Running away,’ said Annie. ‘Spur of the moment.’
‘You need a perspective adjustment,’ said Paul. ‘Every action can be seen as either a positive or a negative. You need to retrain your mind so that your reactions to your actions are positively charged.’
‘Like,a smile is a frown turned upside down?’ asked Annie.
She smiled at Paul and he laughed back at her.
‘In its most basic terms, yes,’ said Paul.
‘Where do you learn this stuff?’ asked Annie. ‘Do you have a guru sitting cross-legged in your living room?’
‘I’ve read a lot of books and smoked a lot of weed,’ said Paul.
Annie tried not to let the shock show on her face. She’d never really got into the whole weed scene. She certainly hadn’t indulged since she’d had the twins. Well, that wasn’t strictly true: she’d smoked some once with Max after the twins’ fourth birthday party. It had been a disaster: she became paranoid and convinced herself that she was having a deep-vein thrombosis and was going to leave her children motherless and spent the next hour begging Max to let her call herself an ambulance. That had been her last foray into the murky world of drug use.
‘Should you be smoking weed and climbing ladders?’ Annie asked.
Paul laughed.
‘It’s strictly recreational,’ said Paul. ‘I like a smoke, the way you probably like a glass of wine. Contrary to popular belief, it doesn’t have to be the devil’s gateway to heroin.’
He was smiling wryly at her. Annie felt suddenly very uncool. She imagined her eighteen-year-old self, drawing a square in the air with her fingers and then pointing at Annie, a look of disappointment on her young face.
‘Oh God, no, of course not,’ said Annie. ‘I’ve smoked weed before. Loads of times.’
She had no idea why she’d said this. Paul was looking at her with an expression which exuded both amusement and pity, like one might give a chihuahua in a tutu. She inwardly slapped her forehead hard. Paul’s grin widened to a smirk.
‘Are laughing at me?’ she asked with mock chagrin.
‘I’m trying really hard not to,’ said Paul.
Annie gave him a playful nudge. It was all becoming rather flirty, she thought with no small pleasure.
