Page 42 of You Had Me At Pumpkin Patch

Rosie arrived back at her hut to find the door still open.

Maybe she had left it ajar when she’d rushed out to look for Steve, or maybe Zain had just barged in to nosy through the manuscript he’d seen her working on.

She had no idea what the truth was anymore, and she was past caring.

She was done with pinning her hopes and dreams on a fantasy.

How had she managed to kid herself that she’d found real love? Much like swoony heroes in romance novels, the man she thought she’d fallen for didn’t even exist. Their love had been scripted .

Had she somehow become her own ridiculous version of a hermit in a hut at Autumn Meadows? She’d been hiding from her long list of problems. For a time, being out here had felt special and magical, like something from a fairy story.

But people didn’t live in fairy tales.

How did she expect to live her life masquerading as a stranger called Rachel, pretending that someone had simply misremembered her name? She couldn’t keep dodging the truth and hoping her ludicrous lies didn’t come to light – or she’d be no better than Zain.

In fact, she couldn’t do any of this anymore.

She wasn’t a pumpkin farm retreat expert, or a wild swimmer, or even a writer who could come up with inspiration for her own stories without the clandestine interference of a chatbot.

Once again, she wasn’t playing the starring role in her own damned life.

She was the understudy. Rosie had let her wild writer imagination get carried away.

Worse still, Zain now knew everything. That she had a humiliating back catalogue of sham relationships, that she could barely write a love story without him as a muse, and that she’d been fooling Agnes all along because she was not the person who was meant to take this job.

How long would it be before he stormed to the farmhouse to tell their boss? He hadn’t blabbed about her being a rubbish swimmer, because he’d said grassing on people wasn’t his thing. But this was bigger. And she didn’t dare stick around to find out.

She rushed around the hut grabbing her things and stuffing them into her holdall, including the pages of her doomed manuscript. One day she’d find a shredder and gleefully annihilate it.

Rosie chose to ignore the gnawing guilt that tomorrow was the launch party and auction night. Zain and Agnes would just have to manage, like they’d always done. If Rosie was forced to spend any more time near Zain, or panicking about which of her secrets he might spill, she might explode.

All packed, she took one last glance around. There was a pull in her heart about missing her little writing nook and that typewriter. The peace, the lake, the fields...

That was probably nonsense too.

‘There are fields everywhere.’ She yanked the holdall strap further up her shoulder in case it was having weird ideas about jumping off her body and staying behind.

‘And I could buy my own typewriter.’ She shook her head.

Not that she’d be doing any more writing.

There’d been enough rejection for one lifetime.

She’d get a quiet job in a library, where she could enjoy other people’s books.

Rosie bowed out of the little wooden hut, which had never really been hers, and marched past the lake, keeping her head down in case its still waters tried to mesmerise her.

She ploughed onwards through the ever-greying semi-darkness, past Zain’s hut, through the wooden gate, and cut the quickest path through the pumpkin patches until she reached Agnes’s house.

Something made her stop for a moment, even though she couldn’t bear to look up.

Could she leave here without saying goodbye?

Without explaining herself? Was it time to be honest with Agnes that she hadn’t arrived here to have a job interview, but had been stranded and a bit desperate, and had allowed herself to settle into a life that had been meant for someone else?

That’s what any decent person would do. And Rosie knew she was a decent person, even if she’d lost sight of things in the confusing web of white lies and wonky truths.

But could she face that today? All parts of her felt like they’d been dragged backwards on a rollercoaster and thrust off into a broken heap.

And though her heart hurt to run off like this, she didn’t have the words to explain herself.

Maybe Zain would blurt out the truth for her anyway.

So her feet made the decision to keep on walking.

Clomp, clomp, her borrowed wellies striding towards the dirt path that was the long, winding exit from the farm.

The first place where she’d ever lain eyes on Zain, and if she had her way, the last time and place she would ever think of him. She was leaving this fantasy behind.

‘Rosie!’

The voice came from behind her, somewhere in the distance. She could tell it belonged to Agnes. Urgh. Had she seen her? Was it too late to scarper?

‘Rosie, please help. I don’t know what to do.’

Rosie stopped and took a deep breath. Agnes sounded like she was in trouble, and Rosie couldn’t bring herself to dash away and ignore a flustered plea. She would help the woman quickly and then get out of there. It was the least she could do.

As Rosie turned back towards the house, she saw Agnes flying towards her, stray animals skipping and flapping around her in an almighty commotion. Her eyes were full of panic.

‘It’s the house.’ Agnes jabbed a pointed finger towards it. ‘Part of the roof has fallen in. It’s devastation in there. Tiles and debris. And so much dust. What am I going to do? I’ve got all the animals out, but it isn’t safe to go back in there.’

Rosie looked upwards, straining her eyes to see in the semi-darkness. Wow, Agnes was right. It looked as if someone had swung a great wrecking ball at the top of Agnes’s house. Rosie’s stomach dropped.

‘Right. Erm, it’s OK,’ said Rosie, thinking on her feet. ‘You can stay in my hut tonight. It’s probably too late to find you anywhere, with the animals too.’

Agnes’s eyes darted to Rosie’s holdall, which was sliding from her shoulder under the weight. ‘Were you going somewhere?’

‘No.’ Well, that was a lie. ‘I mean, yes. I had a falling-out with Zain, and everything’s a mess, and...’

‘You were just going to leave me ?’ Agnes frowned and put her head to one side, her mouth open like Rosie had just declared her undying love and then dumped her for Julia Roberts.

Her dog Onions did the same, his furry little face even more heartbreaking than his owner’s. Damn, they were good.

‘You don’t need me,’ Rosie reassured her. ‘You’ll be fine.’

‘Fine?’ Agnes’s voice was almost a squawk. ‘Do I look like everything’s going to be hunky bloody dory? My house is falling down around my ears. I’ve got flocks of needy animals that won’t live on fresh air. I’m a poor, elderly, helpless lady. And you promised to help me. You were my last hope.’

Rosie sighed. Agnes was laying it on thick again, with the helpless old lady thing. Rosie was pretty sure nobody viewed the determined, slightly scary woman like that, even if she was well into pensionable age.

‘I need this new roof sooner than ever, Rosie. This big do and the auction tomorrow night can’t come fast enough.

It has to go smoothly and bring in some decent funds, otherwise where will we all live?

What will become of us?’ Agnes’s hand was clutching at her own heart now, and Rosie was sure at least three of the dogs were whimpering.

‘You’re the brains and the fighting spirit behind everything.

There isn’t a hope in hell of me being able to take over at such short notice.

And if you’re hoping to leave Zain in charge of hosting and schmoozing, then we might as well call in the bulldozers now. We’ll all be goners.’

Rosie let her holdall slip to the ground and screwed her eyes tight shut, because she couldn’t believe she was about to say this. Again.

‘Just one night. Or maybe two. And then I’m out of here. I mean it this time.’

Rosie could never live with her conscience if she didn’t see this auction night through and try her best to raise the money Agnes needed.

Rosie had to prove to herself that she could do this, and that the white lies she had told had been for the greater good.

And Zain had better keep his bloody mouth shut, because he’d told enough lies of his own.

‘Thank you, love,’ Agnes said earnestly. ‘And I’m sure you and Zain will make it up.’

Rosie’s eyes popped open. ‘That is not going to happen. If I’m going to stick around briefly to help with this, Zain whatever-his-name-is needs to stay out of my way.’

Agnes scratched his head. ‘I think he’s...’

‘And I do not want to talk about him.’ Rosie tugged her bag back onto her shoulder, hoping her tone was firm enough.

So it looked like Rosie would be spending the night avoiding her scoundrel of a neighbour whilst she topped and tailed in a small wooden hut, with an eccentric woman called Agnes. And approximately seventy billion cats, dogs, and for all Rosie knew, probably a flock of hens for good measure.

This surreal nightmare was getting worse by the moment. It couldn’t be over soon enough.