Chapter 49
Next morning, Aria stood a few feet away from the couple she was showing around a two-up-two-down, in case they were overcome by alcohol fumes.
She’d drunk and chatted long into the night with Sophie, crashing on her floor in the early hours.
Initially ignoring a message from Nic about a meal out, she’d answered him when his texts took on a worried tone as she hadn’t come home.
Telling him she was fine and staying with Sophie seemed to get him off her back.
As she wandered into town after the viewing, she decided a little spot of window shopping wouldn’t hurt.
Entering one independent store, she picked up a bottle of unique cologne and realised it was the scent she’d splashed on the other day.
So Nic did support local businesses, after all?
She put some of it onto her wrist and breathed it in, the dull ache in her stomach starting to feel like a void.
She headed to the supermarket to treat herself to an iced bun in the hope it would satisfy her in some way.
‘I’m surprised at the yellow stickers.’ A voice over her shoulder boomed around the store as the trainee manager scanned her shopping. ‘You’ve moved in with Nic Castle, haven’t you? I’d have thought his fridge would be full of champagne and caviar.’
Aria swung around to see Justin standing behind her with a bag of pine nuts in his hand. She put him right. ‘What Nic does with his money is up to him, but I can assure you he doesn’t spend it on caviar. Not all of us have pots of inherited caravan cash to throw away.’
Her ex-boyfriend sniffed. ‘They’re not caravans. They’re luxury mobile homes.’
‘Afraid you might be considered Lakeland trailer trash?’ She grabbed the buns and walked out, with Justin following close behind.
‘At least I’m not pimping Castle’s property for him.
’ She shifted uneasily on her feet before it struck her he was pointing at the estate agent’s shop.
‘I hear you are quite good at the sales stuff.’ His tone softened.
‘You showed a property to my cousin the other day and she’s put in an offer.
You’ll see her at the wedding, so let’s hope she doesn’t pull out. Did you get my invite?’
‘Thanks, but I’m busy that day,’ she mumbled as she turned to walk away.
He grabbed her hand. ‘Please can we put our doomed relationship behind us, Aria? I’m sorry for what I did.
I shouldn’t have asked you to marry me. It was a dick move.
I was just feeling so guilty for sleeping with Lu-Lu behind your back and wanted to prove I could commit to you properly by putting a ring on you.
Lu-Lu convinced me I was making a mistake, that she was more my cup of tea, and insisted I broke it off.
As I said at the time, it wasn’t personal. There was nothing wrong with you.’
Aria removed her hand from his as she attempted to process his speech. ‘So impersonal you couldn’t tell me face to face?’
‘The way it ended is something I now regret. Lu-Lu helped me compose it. I thought she’d add a feminine slant to soften the blow.’ Justin looked shifty. ‘But instead she only added the sad faces. In her defence, she’s always preferred emojis to actual words.’
‘That’s no defence! Are you telling me she helped you write the bloody text?’
Tiger barked as Aria raised her voice.
‘Not exactly! Look, Aria, I’m trying to have a moment here.
To get it all off my chest, you know?’ Aria’s disgusted expression didn’t discourage him from continuing.
‘I’m sorry that you caught us in bed together.
When you came charging over so distraught.
Lu-Lu likes to have sex every day. She also lets me do that thing you never, you know with her butt—’
‘Oh my God, too much information!!’ Aria screeched, knowing this intimate image of Lu-Lu would be scorched into her mind’s eye forever.
But Justin wasn’t done. ‘Fine, enough about us for now. This Castle bloke, have you set a date?’
‘Oh no, Justin. You don’t get to control the conversation. It’s my turn to tell you some truths. You were a two-timing, deceiving bastard, and a terrible lay. I can’t believe you had the audacity to re-use the invites I designed for our wedding! That’s so cheap.’
‘I had a copy on my laptop, and it seemed a shame to waste them. But I guess you might have wanted to use them as you are getting hitched too?’
She shook her head, unable to believe the stuff coming out of his mouth. ‘No Justin, we wouldn’t have recycled them like you recycled me.’
He pressed his fingers together, a praying hands emoji brought to life.
‘I hear what you are saying, Aria, and it’s totally justified.
I was a thoughtless son of a bitch, and I can see that now.
I’m really sorry. Can I try to make it up to you?
I could offer you a job? We need someone in sales who knows the area, and I know for a fact I’d pay you more than you are earning over there.
We could even throw in a caravan for you to live in if it all goes pear-shaped in the luxury lodge. ’
She bristled. ‘I have a job, Justin. And Nic and I are great.’
‘Fine, then. Well, enjoy your wedding planning and please do come to ours. I’ve invited you both. I’m just surprised he hasn’t bought your hut and knocked it down yet. He’s swiped everything else from under all our noses.’
As he sniped, she scrutinised the man standing before her in a back-to-front cap and branded sports vest that barely covered his chest. His babyish face still couldn’t produce decent stubble – it was patchy, at best. He’d never grown up.
Even if Nic hadn’t spun into her life like a lit-up Catherine wheel, Justin would never be her person.
He’d done her a favour by ending things.
It had been brutally final, but it was the right outcome.
‘I’d like to say it was nice to see you, Justin, but it wasn’t.
I suggest you stop letting Lu-Lu make your decisions, write your own texts and grow a pair of balls,’ she said, tugging on the dog’s lead and walking briskly away.
***
Aria sank into the back seat on the bus with some relief, picking up a text from Nic to say he’d gone to Brighton to see his mother and would take her out to dinner on his return.
Wondering if that had anything to do with their conversation about families and knotweed, she got off at her stop and plugged the code into the gate.
Turning right when the path split, she glanced down at her patch of beach and the land she’d worked so hard on.
‘Whaaat the…’
She ran forward, blinking in the sunshine, unable to believe her eyes.
In the place where the cabin had always stood, there was a pile of wood and rubble, pieces of furniture, and broken glass.
The entire hut had been demolished to a pulp.
Not even the once so sturdy sofa bed remained.
Along the line of the path stood a series of weary sunflowers, like useless sentry guards.
Even Tiger seemed to freeze when he saw the mash of rotten timber and glass that had once been their refuge.
A pitiful cry stuck in her throat as she picked her way along the path to where the simple veranda used to be.
In a frenzy, she began kicking at the earth, as though she could dig it up.
Tiger joined in, clawing at the ground. Despite the sunshine, she felt cold.
Then her whole body started to shake, breaths coming in gasps.
Holding her chest, she tried and failed to calm herself down.
Her legs took her on autopilot to Nic’s front door, where she banged hard with her fists and rang the bell multiple times.
When no one answered, she leaned against the porch railing, still struggling to breathe.
All she could think of was her dad painting the door, collecting seeds from the flowers to replant, and building the compost toilet.
That self-serving wrecking ball of a man had ripped apart one of her last connections with Eddie.
But no, that kind of guy didn’t get his own hands dirty – he’d have paid someone else to destroy her property.
She ran down to the beach to see if anyone was still around.
When she drew a blank, she collapsed on the pebbles and cried.
For her dad, for herself and for the simple home she hadn’t realised how much she’d loved until she’d lost it.