Page 13 of Love from Pretty Beach

I t hadn’t taken Darby long at all to conquer the video editing.

If she could do it, anyone could. Really, she’d just shoved a load of snippets of herself together into a twenty-minute draft video and left it at that.

In some of it, she’d left the camera rolling while she’d been chatting to both the wall and Lola about how it felt to be her age and on the cusp of a whole new existence.

There was some footage of her on the beach and some snippets of her attempt to make the bread when the smoke detector had gone off.

She laughed to herself as she watched it back; here she was, forty-one years old, talking to her rescue dog about making a YouTube video.

If that wasn't rock bottom, it was certainly within spitting distance of it. Despite that, she’d actually enjoyed putting the video together and had found it creative.

She’d added little tunes here and there and found a really good piece of music to use as her intro.

Before watching the videos on how to start a channel, she’d not even known that intros were a thing.

She’d not had a clue about any of it; accompanying audio, fading in and out, how to add text, but now she did.

The best part about working it all out was that it had felt good to exercise her brain. Nice to have something to think about and focus on. Not that it would ever see the light of day, but she was going to work out how to upload the thing and then let Penny see it for a laugh.

Downloading the video from the editing app, she then pressed it to upload the video to her newly created channel.

A grey button at the bottom in the middle signified where to upload it.

Tapping, it was ridiculously simple and before she knew it, the video was nearly there.

Private and not for public consumption, but most definitely online.

Clicking through the buttons, she agreed and checked the box that the video was not made for children, added something to the title just to learn how to do it and pressed to upload.

Going into the box where she was meant to put a description, she wrote the first thing that came into her head.

Hello, this is me, Darby. I like watching other women on YouTube, so here’s mine.

In this vlog, you will see me talking about how it feels not to have anything to lose, about trying to pull myself out of the doldrums. I do ramble on a bit.

It includes me walking my dog Lola in the beautiful little town of Pretty Beach, there’s a stroll up to the lighthouse (amazing views) and an exploding bag of flour as I made bread.

(I hope you like it, Penny, Darbs xxx). Oh yes, I forgot to say the name. Love from Pretty Beach.

Deciding that she would hold off on sending the link to Penny and see if she felt the same later that evening, she forgot about it as a phone call came in from work.

Right after that had finished, she took Lola out for a walk and mulling it over as she walked her down by the harbour, she realised how learning the video editing had been great.

So good to be learning something new. Maybe that was what had been missing in her life.

She would definitely have a look at some courses or doing something online.

Just as she was standing staring into the water in the harbour, as Lola was making a big old deal about a particularly interesting lamppost, Darby looked up to see the man from the lane standing on one of the boats.

Archie, boom shakka. There was that universe again doing its thing.

He caught her eye right away and smiled.

‘Any smoke detectors going off today?’

Darby laughed. ‘Oh, hi. Sorry, I didn’t see you there.’

‘You were away with the fairies.’

I’d like to be away with the fairies with you. Or be your actual fairy. That would be nice. ‘Ha.’

‘Lots on your mind?’

It couldn’t have been further from the truth. Right at that moment in time, Darbs had one thing and one thing only on her mind. She smiled and fibbed. ‘Busy, busy.’

‘Aren’t we all.’

‘How are you getting on with the property? I’ve been parking my car on the road. I hope that has helped.’ In actual fact, it had been irritating her that she’d had to park in the road. She wouldn’t be telling the god in front of her the truth.

‘Yes, the lads told me. Thanks for doing that.’

I wish I could do other things for you. Serve you in some way. ‘No worries.’

‘Beautiful day for it.’

‘Yes, I’m just walking the dog.’

‘I can see that.’

‘Your boat, is it?’

‘Actually, it’s not. I’m just checking up on it for a friend who’s on holiday.’

‘Right.’ Lola pulled the lead. ‘Well, nice to bump into you.’

‘Yep, cheerio. I’m Archie, by the way.’

Oh, I know that, alright. ‘Darby.’

‘Darby? That’s unusual.’

‘Yes.’

‘Short for?’

‘No, no. Not short for anything. Just Darby.’

‘Nice.’

As Darby walked away, she had to resist turning around to gawp.

He was mind-bogglingly handsome. She’d have him as a cameo in her videos or in her sandwich, absolutely.

Strolling away with Lola, she felt as if something was shifting.

Goodness knows what. For starters, he’d actually seen her.

She’d felt invisible for so long, so that in itself was a turn up for the books.

Frowning, she squeezed her eyes shut for a moment.

What was happening? Had the universe actually noticed her again?

Probably not, universe moments were for other people.

She was definitely out of the doldrums, though.

Darby Lovell felt brighter. The man may have helped with that.