Chapter 19
19
‘You have got to be kidding me.’
‘Nope, you said I could do with you what I wanted.’
‘Yeah, but that didn’t include this.’
‘Ah, you promised, Dennie. Remember, Dennie is a fun-loving guy! You’re not going to let me down after all this, are you? You’re not going to back down?’
‘I most certainly am not. I’m no quitter!’
‘Glad to hear it. Right, come and take this from me then and let’s go.’
I laughed as Dennis tried to mount my brother’s bike. It was a similar size to mine, so I knew he’d be fine on it. I could feel his fresh minty breath on my face as I helped him fasten the helmet under his chin. Embarrassed by our closeness, I moved as fast as I could to get away from him and how warm he was making me feel.
‘Right, come on then. You ready?’
‘Yep, let’s go!’
When I glanced back at him, wobbling from side to side, he looked like a little boy learning to ride for the very first time.
‘Christ, I haven’t ridden a bike for literally years.’
‘You’ll be fine,’ I shouted over my shoulder. ‘It’s, literally, like riding a bike.’
‘Oh, you’re so funny. Whoa!’ He wobbled and leaned the bike on one side, balancing it with his foot which was closest to the floor. ‘Right, I’m ready, just go and I’ll follow you.’
I started to pedal and we just did a little gentle ride round the harbour wall to get him used to it. I kept turning to look back, and he looked more confident every time. Trust me to pick someone who’s naturally good at everything he does. Now there’s a thought.
Back to earth, Nancy .
I could, however, immediately tell that Dennis was definitely not one to give up. He was someone who would persevere until he mastered something and it wasn’t long before he was riding beside me and chatting comfortably about the things he was seeing around the bay. Before long, I had stopped at the top of the cliff waiting for him to catch me up. He wasn’t that far behind me but it gave me time to catch my own breath. I was trying to prove a point that I was happy to do this all the time.
‘Wow. This is kind of amazing,’ Dennis said when he’d caught me up. ‘Thanks, Nancy.’
‘Told you it’d be something you’d enjoy. It’s fun, isn’t it?’
‘It is, although if you’d asked me to come on a bike ride with you, I probably wouldn’t have agreed.’
‘That’s why I didn’t tell you.’
‘You know me so well already.’
I smiled at him, thinking about how my mum said he’d be full of layers. I hardly knew Dennis but it was kind of fun learning about what made him tick. We were such different characters that I knew we wouldn’t always see eye to eye on everything but we could definitely teach each other things that we might need to learn, even if those were things like having fun.
‘The bay looks stunning from up here. And I’m blooming roasting.’ He took his helmet off and hung it over the handlebars and pulled at the bottom of his Tommy Hilfiger hoody to drag it over his head. Unfortunately for him – but fortunately for me – he also pulled at the bottom of his T-shirt and gave me a glimpse of a rather defined stomach. I had to tear my eyes away but not until he’d noticed my raised eyebrows.
He patted himself.
‘Been working on getting my six-pack back after Nan told me I was looking a bit porky. Been back in the gym before work, and if I get time at night, I try to get a run in too.’
‘Do you like exercise?’
‘Not really. It’s just a necessity, isn’t it?’
‘I’m not one for the gym to be honest. It’s all a bit boring and repetitive.’
‘It is but that’s kind of the point.’
‘I’d rather be on my bike,’ I said. ‘I love taking in the countryside, noticing things about the place I’ve lived in all my life that most people don’t see when they’re driving.’
‘Funnily enough that’s what I was just thinking. I’ve always driven down to Nan’s and parked up at the harbour side outside her house. So it’s only been when I’ve been out walking with Gladys that I’ve seen more than ever before – and I’ve been coming here for years to visit Nan.’
‘It’s strange that we’ve never really bumped into each other before really.’
‘Well, to be truthful, I don’t normally get that involved in the village life. Since I’ve been working, I’ve not been to stay with Nan for much longer than a weekend at a time. I’ve always been too busy to stay for longer. But it’s actually really rather lovely. I’m loving it more by the day.’
I turned to him and found he was staring at me. I didn’t want to presume anything here, but it felt like we really had a connection again. I had felt it when I first met him, on that day when we collided and it wasn’t until he started dishing out the advice to me that I started to feel differently. Maybe it was because I felt like he was criticising me when all he was trying to do was help. There was a bit of me now thinking that it was just a communication issue. Like in most cases in life.
We locked eyes.
‘Maybe you’ll come and stay again.’
‘Maybe I will.’
We both grinned at each other like lunatics.
‘Come on, slowcoach. Race you to the next stop.’
As we cycled around the wide coastal path side by side, we settled into a more relaxed pace and I pointed out some landmarks to him as we travelled. Finally, we reached a bench and we stopped. My bike, with its basket on the front, might look like the bike of a little old lady, but it was actually incredibly practical and Dennis was impressed when I handed him a bottle of water and started to unpack a picnic blanket and some food packages.
‘Wouldn’t it have been easier to pack them in plastic bags?’ he asked, looking at the wraps I’d used.
‘Easier, yes maybe. But environmentally friendly, no. I try where possible to limit the amount of plastic I use. These are made of beeswax. You can swill them and use them time and time again. Much better for the world.’
‘Oh yes, I suppose it is. I’m so much better informed now, Nancy. I did some reading last night about how we can all do our bit. There are lots of things that I think I could do and I wondered if you’d mind me running the ideas by you.’
He was now talking my kind of language and once on this topic, I could go on for hours.
‘Just stop me when I’m boring you,’ I said as I passed him a packet of sandwiches.
He unwrapped them and grinned. ‘Have you made me chicken and stuffing sandwiches? These are my favourite.’
‘I know they are. Mum said that your nan is always talking about you and your favourite.’
‘Oh my God! Chicken crisps too! You are spoiling me.’
‘Yep, that made me laugh because I thought that I was the only person in the world that loved chicken crisps. But now there’s two of us.’
‘We’re clearly made for each other.’
I turned my head but he was looking down at his sandwiches and I wondered if I’d imagined what he’d.
He started to tell me about his ideas to be more sustainable.
‘Maybe I’ll buy myself a bike and stop using my car so much.’
‘That seems like a waste of money if you’re not stopping long.’
‘Well, maybe there might be a reason to come back a bit more often.’
This time, it was my turn to look down at my sandwich. Did he mean me? Was I reading this the right way?
I looked up and our eyes locked again. This kept happening. It was almost like he had a magnet that was pulling my eyes towards him. Much as I liked him, the emotions that he had stirred up within me were ones that I was feeling uncomfortable with. I was quite happy on my own, in my own little world. Love brings complications with it. I saw that every day when I looked at my brother and his relationship with his girlfriend. She was demanding and high maintenance and he spent his life doing things he didn’t want to do, just to make her happy. That wasn’t the sort of relationship I wanted. I wanted the dream that my parents had. Years of being with someone who loved you for being you. I knew deep down that my brother wasn’t the best role model, but it was the only one I had apart from Mum and Dad. Dan’s was the one that I knew wasn’t right. But when I questioned him about it, he always said that that was just the way love was and that it was better to be with someone who loved you, like she loved him, than being on your own. He was happy to make all the compromises.
Their relationship had put me off and was one of the main reasons why I wasn’t looking for anyone in my life. I was busy enough – with my beach angel work, my bookshop, and the other stuff that I did in the community. I didn’t really have the time or energy for anyone in my life. And certainly didn’t have the time or energy for anyone who didn’t even live here. A holiday romance was not my thing at all. Even if he was a Gozzer lookalike.
My mood was pensive when I packed the food back into the pannier. We were just about to ride off when I peeked over at Dennis. He was gazing out to sea and the gentle wind was blowing his normally gelled-back hair, and it almost looked fluffy after he’d been wearing a helmet for the last two hours. Some women were lucky that their hair fell into gorgeous natural waves when they shook their head out of a hat. Sadly, I was not one of them. I was more the type whose hair was stuck to their head, and looked hot and sweaty, so it was a good job I wasn’t trying to impress anyone.
I got my phone out of my cross-body bag and took an inconspicuous shot of Dennis. His eyes were closed and he was letting the wind wrap itself around him. I’d never seen him look so relaxed and happy. The next time he told me he didn’t know how to have fun, I would remind him of this moment.
As he came back to reality, I turned away, pretending that I hadn’t been staring at him for the last minute or so.
When we arrived back at our house, where he insisted he should return the bike, he offered to take the helmet home to clean it. ‘I’m sure your brother doesn’t want my sweat inside the next time he wants to wear this.’
‘It’s fine, honestly. He won’t mind at all. We’re used to having sweaty helmets in our house!’
The smirk on his face was enough to make me blush and I looked away, removing my own helmet and trying to fluff up my hair which I’m sure was plastered to my head and sticking up in all the wrong places.
‘Well, you still look gorgeous to me, Nancy.’
I giggled in response, thinking he was taking the mickey out of me, but when I looked over at him, he looked deadly serious. I couldn’t work him out at all.
‘I really have had fun today,’ he continued. ‘Thank you for showing me what I could be doing with my life instead of working all the time. You’ve really opened my eyes, you know. There’s a whole new world outside.’
‘You’re welcome, Dennis.’
‘Dennie. I think I’ll definitely be Dennie from now on in Driftwood Bay. He feels more at home here than he’s ever felt in his life before. And he has you to thank for that.’
‘Well, that’s what friends do for each other, right?’
‘Yeah, that’s what friends do.’
To my sheer surprise, he handed me back my brother’s helmet then leaned across and kissed me on the cheek.
As he walked away and I touched the place where his gentle lips had brushed against my skin, I shivered. That did not feel like something a friend would do.
Before I went to bed that night, I flicked through the photos I’d snapped along the way today. The autumn heathers that gave purple colour to the lush green landscape. The birds that were circling around us. The views across the bay. My finger stopped at the picture I’d taken of Dennie and I lingered, drinking in all of his features – the way his eyebrows were in perfect symmetry with each other, the way his nose ever so slightly turned up at the end, at the little dimple in his chin that was so tiny it was hardly noticeable and the freckle on the brow of his nose. The thoughts that were going through my mind right then were not thoughts of things that friends should be doing with each other. I had a feeling that I might be in a little bit of trouble.