‘Unless, of course, none of what he said was a lie. He is the loveliest man I’ve ever met, and once he got to know me he just realised that I’m a boring, pathetic person with a mountain of issues and he decided he doesn’t want to be friends with me after all.’
‘Okay, I’m not listening to this any more. This is getting so boring and pathetic that I’m wondering why I’ve bothered to be friends with you for so long. You met a man who seemed nice and then maybe revealed himself to be a jerk, boohoo. Or here’s a wild idea – perhaps he’s genuinely busy. Maybe September is the busy season for forest rangers. Either way, no big deal. Can we please talk about your party now?’
I knew Steph was teasing but she was also smart enough to know when I was sinking into pitiful wallowing.
Not that it stopped the wallowing altogether, of course. I still felt confused and hurt by Sam’s change in demeanour. I spent far too many hours wondering what would have happened if I’d gone ahead and kissed him. I might still be feeling lonely and rejected, but at least I’d have got to enjoy a kiss.
Early one mid-September morning, a week or so before the party, I decided that I couldn’t bear to lie there and wait for the birds to start cheeping for another miserable second. Getting up, I shrugged into leggings and a hoodie, put on my flip-flops and slipped outside, Nesbit padding behind me. There was a narrow streak of blue where the sky met the roofline of the cottages, the moon above it a mere sliver of silver. Icy dewdrops brushed against my feet, and as I breathed in the crisp air, it was ripe with the scent of autumn.
I was startled by a sudden cough, even though I’d come out here hoping to find him. Swivelling around, I saw Ebenezer crouched on a tiny stool, offering me a garden fork. Accepting it gratefully, I knelt down beside him and got to work.
‘Tomorrow, wear proper shoes,’ Ebenezer instructed when he finally rose from the stool with a wheeze.
Nodding, I went inside for a hot shower, a mug of tea and three hours of the best sleep I’d had in months.
After several days of party-induced panic, driven by relentless overthinking, I decided that the party was going to be a celebration of the completed Dream List – although apart from Steph, no one would know that’s what it was.
Initially, I wasn’t quite sure how that would translate into food and décor and entertainment, but on an extra-long walk in the opposite direction to Sam’s house, I decided it simply meant that instead of stressing out about everyone else, I was going to cram my party full of things that made me happy. Once I’d figured out what they were, of course.
The day before the big day, however, something even bigger happened. I came home from work to find a van outside New Cottage, and a man staggering under the weight of a giant cardboard box as he carried it up to the front door.
‘Do you need a hand?’ I asked.
The man dropped the box with a thud onto the pavement, revealing a pale face with startling blue eyes, floppy black hair and an overall air of dishevelment. He wasn’t exactly handsome… more like interesting. There was something about his face that made it hard not to stare.
‘It would appear so,’ he replied, with a sardonic twitch of one eyebrow.
‘I’m Ollie,’ I replied, realising that for all he knew I was a random woman who happened to be walking past. Not that he seemed fazed by that. ‘I live next door but one. In End Cottage.’
‘Ah, okay.’ The man nodded. ‘Leon.’
We spent half an hour hefting the remaining boxes and other items from the van into the cottage. At some point in the past few weeks the landlord had repainted the ugly beige walls in a crisp white and removed the disgusting lino, leaving freshly sanded floorboards. Instead of the scratched and stained furniture, there was a black leather sofa and a wall of metal bookcases. I couldn’t help bristling at the new kitchen appliances that Leanne would have found so helpful.
Leon was an English teacher; he’d started at the local secondary school earlier in the month, but had been in a short-term let until New Cottage became available. Slender and slouchy, wearing ripped black jeans and a wristful of beaded bracelets, his piercing gaze and slightly sarcastic manner made him seem like the kind of English teacher who had tatty notebooks full of bleak and complicated poetry, probably inspired by some doomed romance.
He was very laid-back about my random offer of help, but did offer to buy me a drink as a thank you. I didn’t think Leon would be someone I’d want to get involved with seriously. He was far too intense, and I couldn’t imagine laughing with him until my sides ached. He was, however, precisely the kind of man I’d had in mind when originally crafting the Dream List. My sixteen-year-old self would have found him intimidatingly sexy and mysterious.
My new neighbour might be the perfect person with which to dip my toe back into the dating waters.
‘Actually,’ I said, ‘I’m having a birthday party in our garden tomorrow evening…’
32
The morning of my thirtieth birthday, I indulged myself with a full two minutes of freaking out about the fact that I’d thought it would be a good idea to invite a load of people to my house all at the same time, followed by another five feeling weird and a bit forlorn about waking up alone with no one to say ‘happy birthday’, give me a hug or make me a cup of tea.
I then proceeded to spend a full hour celebrating waking up in my own house, eating exactly what I wanted for breakfast while wearing my most comfortable pyjamas and being able to please myself rather than putting all my energy into ensuring that my mother felt appropriately appreciated for all the (unasked for and unwanted) effort she’d have put into creating the kind of birthday that she would enjoy.
I remembered her offer to throw me the party off the Dream List – vodka jelly and Harry Potter – and I shuddered even as I breathed a sigh of delicious satisfaction that today was going to be just the way I wanted it.
And it was. I walked Nesbit to our favourite stream and back, and then helped Ebenezer hang fairy lights and weave ivy across the open-sided gazebo he’d spent the past few days constructing, as well as twining lights around tree trunks and in between branches. He’d also planted autumn flowers in various-sized pots and distributed them around the patio.