Page 8 of The Next Chapter

I dump a third bag of stuff by my suitcase.

It has my workout clothes in. Then I move to the top of the kitchen cupboards and start methodically filling the cool bag.

I can feel Seb’s eyes on me as I take it to the fridge, enjoying the blast of cold air as I pull out my probiotics.

Lola’s place looks pretty – read very – remote, and I don’t know how readily available they’ll be in the hotel shop – which I know she has because there is nothing I don’t know about the hotel Lola owns and runs.

I still just cannot picture Lola there. And that unsettles me, makes me think that I’m in for some sort of a surprise.

I hate surprises.

I’m the sort of person who reads the last page of a book before I start it, and I Google the endings to TV series before I watch them. That’s how much I dislike the unknown.

At least I know that how I’m acting is insane behaviour, that’s a really important point. It’s only really weird if you think you’re normal.

I already have my vitamins in the bag as I zip it up.

They’re the gummy ones because for about a year I’ve been feeding them to Seb on the down-low, pretending that they’re sweets.

I keep my back to him now so that he doesn’t cotton on to my devious but motivated out of concern for his B12 levels plan.

Finally, I double check my rucksack for my water bottle, suncream, sunglasses, purse and phone, and make us some drinks for the car. The only thing left to do is say goodbye to Elton.

‘Ready,’ I tell Seb.

‘Are you sure? We could dismantle the actual house and take that with us, if you like?’

I finally zip up my rucksack, giving Seb the finger as I do. It feels good.

Elton resists my attempts to give him a fond farewell in the hallway, leaving me with a shiny new scratch on my forearm for my efforts.

‘And you’ll remember his special food and his eyedrops?

They’re in the fridge.’ I harass the eighty-year-old Mr Cains on the street outside the house, handing over the key.

‘And if it gets over thirty-five degrees, move the window plants out of the sun or they’ll overheat. The thermometer’s by the back door.’

Mr Cains is dressed in a worn suit. He’s a retired accountant who discovered magic when his wife died.

This fact makes me feel a lot better about my own poor attempts to cope with my grief.

I know that Mr Cains is going to want me to pull the handkerchief out of his pocket before we leave, it’s something he got Dad to do all the time, too.

‘Don’t you worry about it, Lily. Me and Elton will have a whale of a time.’

It’s probably best not to reply that I don’t want Elton to have a whale of a time. I want him to have a nice, quiet, life-preserving time. But Seb is closing the boot of his car and declaring that we need to get going.

‘Okay, thank you,’ I tell Mr Cains. ‘I really appreciate it.’

‘You go and have a nice break, Lily. You deserve it. But before you go, would you like a hanky?’

I gasp in mock surprise as the handkerchief gets longer and longer.

‘Well, look at that!?’ I declare to Seb.

‘Fantastic, truly.’

I’m still pretend laughing as I climb into the passenger side door.

Finally, we’re ready. I’m going to see Lola.

Suddenly, I’m not laughing anymore.

‘Ginseng tea?’ I ask Seb, holding out the flask I’ve made for him. We’ve decided to take his car, because he refuses to be a passenger. Apparently, I drive too slow and this is already an eight-hour journey.

Yes, eight hours. And I get car sick. Because of course I do.

Plus, Seb’s car is some old red vintage thing with absolutely zero suspension. Like, zero.

His eyes dart to me.

‘Some what?’ he asks.

‘Ginseng tea,’ I tell him. ‘I thought you’d like to try it. It’s really nice.’

‘Nicotine suppressant, right?’

‘Well, er, n-not exactly,’ I stutter. He’s wearing a black T-shirt.

If he was a bit taller, he could be a model, all pale skin and high cheekbones.

Like a young Dracula. The roof is down on his car and his hair just lightly ruffles.

Mine loses the plot entirely and stands basically on end.

‘I just read that it can interfere with the dopamine receptors in your brain so I thought it might help and I had some in the cupboards already…’

Another look.

‘Okay, I ordered some especially on next-day delivery—’ I hold my hands up ‘—but it was no trouble and really, don’t you think it’s worth a try?’

‘Why do you have to be so fucking nice all of the time?’ he asks.

‘I’m not nice ,’ I tell him, even though his words are music to my ears. I work very hard at being nice. I help myself to a seaweed thin and a travel sickness tablet.

Seb just huffs out a laugh.

‘God, I really hope the person renting the other cottage is hot,’ he says.

‘I mean, that’s not really what this weekend is about.’ We’re having to shout over the wind from having the roof down.

‘Can we put the roof up?’ I ask.

‘Shush, stop ruining my fantasy. As if you couldn’t do with a little summer of romance. Guys really go for your whole Zooey Deschanel thing, and it might loosen you up a bit, a good orgasm.’

‘I’m loose!’ I protest, now definitely shouting. ‘I’m so loose.’ I realize I’m sat ramrod straight in my car seat while my neck fan buzzes. I concentrate on slouching and the pile of travel sickness bags on my lap slips. I slink down a little further. ‘And anyway, I only just broke up with Colin.’

‘It’s been nine months.’

‘What?’

‘NINE MONTHS.’

Seb relents and pulls over to put the roof up. Thank the lord.

‘That’s really quick to get over a break-up,’ I say as we set off again.‘I thought he was the one.’

Another huff. ‘He was too square. I still have nightmares about that time he showed me his Monzo account. All those fucking pots. Who saves a pound a week for “professional oven clean”.’

‘Er, I would do that, because I’m also square.’ Colin was actually perfect for me. We were on the same page about everything.

And anyway, people like me, we don’t end up with the sexy lumberjack types that Seb pines for.

We end up with people who are in possession of lifetime saving ISAs and favourite mugs.

We end up with a Colin. I’m not exactly sure what went wrong other than that I was too absorbed with grief for Dad to put any effort into a relationship.

But when I’m feeling better, I’ll be perfectly happy with Colin mark two.

‘Your squareness is a coping mechanism,’ Seb answers.

I stuff my mouth full of seaweed thins to stave off the sickness that’s hitting me before we’re even free of Manchester and also to avoid having to think too much about replying. It’s cloying, seaweed dust.

‘Hey, what happened with that woman you met at the pottery class last week? The one in her nineties. Is she going to go for a memoir?’

‘Nope.’ He pops the ‘p’. ‘Her granddaughter had the bright idea of just setting up an Instagram account and flooding it with pictures. That way it’ll be more “interactive and accessible” for them. Fucking social media. Instagram will be the end of us all.’

He grips the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turn white.

‘That’s the problem, isn’t it?’ he carries on, a conversation we’ve had a million times before.

‘Who needs us to memorialize their life when they’ve already photographed every last second as it is?

By the time all the socially awkward millennials start dying off, there’ll be nothing left to record, and we’ll be out of a business. ’

I let him rant, but the thing is, we do offer a service that social media can’t. Seb and I both have history degrees, and we pride ourselves on adding context to people’s life stories. Plus, you get an actual book, not a load of disjointed posts.

Seb’s great-granny was our first client and she’d lived this amazing life fleeing the Nazis and then fostering literally hundreds of children. If we hadn’t written it down, there’s every chance her story would have been lost at some point.

That’s how I know the business means so much to Seb.

And it’s why we can’t let it go under.

We need to convince Lola to let us write her memoirs, that’s all there is to it.

‘Wow, long drive,’ Seb says, in my opinion, stating the bleeding obvious.

No, that’s not fair. He’s done all the driving. It’s not like we could share it, what with my car sickness. The Skye Bridge connecting the island to mainland Scotland had been a particular low point. Like a rollercoaster if you ask me. And the bloody roof is down again.

I just hadn’t imagined that my grand reunion with Lola would involve quite so much vomit.

‘I know, I don’t think I realized that anywhere in the UK was so far away.’

Eight hours. Eight long hours since we set off.

My seaweed thins are long gone. And to think, when I’d found out that Lola lived in Scotland, I’d been surprised by her proximity.

But honestly, I could have flown to New York quicker.

Not that I’m a person who’s flying to New York on the regular. Or ever. But you get what I mean.

At least it’s been a beautiful drive. That does make a difference, vomiting by a stunning backdrop.

The satnav says that finally, finally, we’re fifteen minutes away.

I click my neck fan back in place, earning myself a side eye from Seb. But my nausea is returning, and for reasons unknown, I’m sweating an awful lot despite the car’s air-con.

I force myself to breathe in and out. To stop staring obsessively at the dot as it moves along the blue line. To take in the scenery.

Lola’s hotel is remote. I already know this from alllll of my Google Earth searches, but somehow being here, it feels even more secluded. Like we’re at the end of the earth almost. That’s how that author had described it at any rate.

That the Isle of Skye is like the edge of everything.

The single road we’re on weaves along the coastal road, as if there’s an invisible tether pulling me towards Lola and her hotel.