Page 34 of Fixing a Broken Heart at the Highland Repair Shop

‘Salopettes?’ said Ally. ‘Really?’

‘Yep, trust me, you’ll need ’em.’

Murray had been more animated than he’d been in a long time since his sister’s announcement on Friday that she’d accepted the Zurich job.

He’d not disappointed, proclaiming, ‘We need to get you to a mall!’ So that’s where they were now, on a sunny Monday morning, looking for Alpine sportswear, apparently.

She hadn’t had a moment to think about Jamie and what happened at the bothy since she set foot in the mill house just before tea time on Friday and told everyone her news.

Her mum and dad had insisted on popping Prosecco and ordering Chinese food from the takeaway in Stranruthie, and they’d chattered and fussed all evening and in her dazed state she’d let them.

Then she’d helped at the repair shop all of Saturday and she’d spent Sunday composing her resignation letter for work, and sorting out her Swiss visa, buying insurance and returning her signed contract, all with Murray’s help.

The world around her had changed unrecognisably in the space of a few days. And now, according to her brother who, ‘knows about these things, trust me,’ she needed a whole new wardrobe too.

‘No, none of these are any good. Let’s try another place. You have to be Zurich-ready!’ he was telling her now, hustling her out of the store as if he didn’t have all day to shop. ‘Besides, you won’t be able to afford a thing in the stores there. Not on a temp’s wages.’

Murray was determined to help her, and part of her was grateful. She hadn’t a clue what kind of thing she needed for twelve whole months of living in another country. He didn’t have to be quite so brisk though.

As soon as they’d arrived at the mall, they’d stopped for coffee in one of the big chains, and she’d watched as her brother downed a cortado standing at the counter, right in the face of a totally bemused barista.

He’d tapped the cup down like it was a tequila-drinking competition. ‘Ahh! Real coffee! I’ve missed this.’

‘Has it been that bad, drinking instant at home?’ Ally had said, thanking the barista for her caramel iced latte and dragging him out of the café.

So far, he’d made her look at merino base layers, ‘ essential for winter’ and ‘decent boots, none of your misshapen thrifted stuff.’ He’d thrashed through the rails, dismissing garment after garment, pulling out white and beige things in linen and cotton.

‘Think layers, lots of layers, but smart casual, leaning towards the smart end of the scale.’

She’d let him bundle her into changing rooms with armfuls of clothes and waited for his infrequent nod of approval when she came out to show him.

She used to love shopping with her brother, years ago, but she didn’t remember him being this manic.

‘The men will all be in sports jackets, of course, and shirts and sometimes ties,’ he continued in his whirlwind way as they went into another store she wasn’t sure she could afford to even look in.

‘You can’t have them showing you up, so try these.

’ He’d bundled dresses and jackets upon her, and shoved her into another changing room.

When she looked in the mirror under the harsh lights, she barely recognised herself.

She rejected all the long black tubular dresses that somehow made her look both gothically terrifying and frumpy, probably not what the designer was going for, and told Murray she’d borrow her mum’s green suit jacket for her trip, it had been good enough for her interviews, making him gape in exaggerated horror.

Murray dragged her into the sunglasses store next door, telling her not to ‘even look at the prices because you will need a good pair. Just be sure not to leave them by someone’s bedside or…’ and he’d tailed off, remembering something unsettling.

‘What bags were you thinking of taking?’ he wanted to know as he shovelled a bacon double cheeseburger into his mouth in the fast-food lunch place. ‘God, they don’t make dirty plastic burgers like these in Switzerland, honestly! Eat up.’

Ally only picked at her fries. She hadn’t had much of an appetite since coming back down to ground level on Friday. Her brother had forbidden her usual ketchup and ordered mayonnaise, telling her she’d better get used to it.

Ally informed him she’d planned on carrying her stuff in ‘a book tote or something’ and he’d dropped his hands, burger and all, in heavy disappointment onto the plastic table.

‘All right,’ she groaned with an eye roll. ‘What kind of bag are you talking about?’

After he’d gulped his way through a McFlurry, he trailed her around a painfully expensive shop which claimed to sell handbags but had only about eight of them on the starkly bare shelves.

‘This one?’ he tried, examining a mulberry-coloured thing with short, hooped straps and a tiny flap on the front with a big gold catch.

‘Mind you, if you are planning on shopping for luxury goods while you’re away, you can’t do any better than a trip to St Gallen, lovely little stores, all the designers and… ’

‘There’s no price tag on this,’ she said, interrupting his weird travel blogger monologuing.

Who was he trying to kid? This was Murray McIntyre, the boy who’d devoured Heat magazine for celebrity gossip and made her go with him to see Harry Styles in Glasgow, where they’d worn matching outfits and they’d both screamed themselves hoarse when he sang ‘Kiwi’ as an encore.

He might try to hide his insecurities under this pretentious act, but he was still her twin brother and he couldn’t bluff his way out of telling her what the hell was wrong.

Having had enough, she snatched the – admittedly very nice – bag from him, dumping it back on the shelf and, even though he was mortified, hauled him from the store under the cool glare of the shop assistant.

‘That’s it!’ she snapped, when they hit the bright lights of the concourse. ‘What is up with you?’

‘I’m totally fine.’ He leaned back on the glass barrier with a crooked arm, glancing down at the shoppers and fountains on the floor below.

He tried crossing a sockless ankle but failed entirely to pull off the pose of ‘unbothered and fabulous’, appearing only slightly daft and utterly transparent to the person who knew him best in all the world.

‘Is it because I’ve accepted the job? I did say if it made you upset in any way, I wouldn’t touch it.’

‘I know, and I told you not to be stupid. Of course I’m not upset about that. I promise.’

‘You’ve been acting strange ever since you got back, and I just cannot with you right now.

I need Murray, not this bougie international playboy thing you’ve got going on.

’ She held up the fancy shopping bags he’d forced upon her – all lovely stuff, but she’d have been happy travelling in her old faves from the charity shop.

His face fell. Good. She was getting through to him in his delusion.

She aimed her last shot. ‘A playboy who’s been sleeping all day and prowling between the fridge and the telly all night, and who’s putting away mall snacks like they’re about to be banned! Just, stop. Breathe. Tell me what’s wrong. Please.’

His expression cycled through affronted, then irritated, before landing on defeated.

‘Tell me.’

With a heavy sigh he mentioned in a sorry voice that he’d spotted a Krispy Kreme on the way in and she should probably follow him.

Back in their mum’s car in the multi-storey and with an hour left on their ticket, having returned all the unnecessary clothes he’d charged to a shiny gold credit card for her, they lifted the lid on the original glazed dozen.

‘Thing is,’ he told her between chews, fully dropping any charade of being dignified at this point. ‘There’s some stuff you should know, about Switzerland. My life there… it’s not quite as high-flying as you’ve probably imagined.’

‘What are you telling me?’ she said gently, biting her own donut, her legs curled beneath her on the driver’s seat. ‘Your luxury life in Switzerland has been a big swizz?’

‘Well…’

‘Oh my God, it has?’

‘It’s true I had an apartment and everything. That came with the contract.’

‘Right?’ She waited.

‘Only, I shared that flat with three other guys and, I don’t know if you’ve flat shared with a bunch of straight Dutch and German environmental engineers before, but there was a lot of bro behaviour.

Crunches on the living room carpet, that sort of thing?

Squats and hundred litre bottles of water downed all day long, and so much sliced cheese for breakfast and 6a.m. before half marathons and, oh my God, the sports kit tossed everywhere! ’

Ally was beginning to see his problem. ‘Bro overdose?’

‘It was too much! I just wanted to crash in front of Love is Blind and eat my snacks in peace.’

‘Okay, so what happened?’

‘Well, I got friendly with someone.’

‘Andreas?’ Ally said matter of factly. ‘I know. He was the one ringing me looking for you, remember?’

‘Well, he asked me to move in with him and of course I jumped at the chance. He has a seriously nice apartment.’

‘The one you sent us photos of? Pretending it was yours?’

He hid his shame in another bite of donut. ‘We should have bought some tea to go with these. They’re so sweet.’

‘Can we stay on topic, please?’

He threw his sister a look like a man who knew he was beaten. ‘Okay, okay! We were together for a while and things were great. Better than great. But he didn’t want anyone in the office to know about us, and I respected that, you know? Workplace romances aren’t good for his reputation.’

‘He wanted to keep you a secret?’ she said, trying to keep the dryness from her voice.