Chapter Three #2
I try to calm myself down a bit. After all, I should not get ahead of myself. He could well be dating someone else. Or maybe even married? A few of my friends have started getting married now so it’s not out of the question.
‘Party starts now, Jennifer,’ I overhear one of the women in the row behind me saying cheerily. ‘Your divorce has come through, we’re on our way Down Under, and it is my mission to find you a multitude of single men to flirt with for the entire trip.’
I hear Jennifer, who must be the one wearing the sash, cackling.
Ooh, maybe Hamish could even be divorced, I think wistfully before thoroughly telling myself off.
Don’t be ridiculous, Nina!
Whatever his situation, it will be so good to catch up after all these years.
Annoyingly, Hamish has been taken further back into the plane and I can’t see him anymore.
I take one last glance over the back of my seat, at a flash of baggy jeans and a loose-fitting shirt disappearing off into the distance.
He’s still dressing like a surfer, just like he used to, I think happily to myself.
The plane starts to taxi, its engines roaring as it begins to pick up pace on the runway.
I glance out of the window and watch the tarmac rumbling past, body tilting back as we head up into the sky.
It’s a bright and balmy September day in London, the city growing smaller before we break through the clouds, into the blue skies above.
With thirteen full hours still to go, I decide not to pick up my new book just yet. I’m not a lunatic, I will not be raw-dogging this flight, but I should try to pace myself in terms of entertainment. Besides, what better entertainment than drifting back to my happy place? Memories of the past.
Penny says I do this a lot and she’s not wrong.
If I’m trying to get to sleep but my mind is racing, I’ll pick a memory of one of my dates with Hamish and walk through it, bit by bit. I find it calming, soothing, and it helps me to drift off.
I still can’t believe he is on this flight. Anticipation builds in my stomach and I close my eyes, deciding to head all the way back to our meet-cute for today’s daydream.
There’d been a sense of possibility in the air when I got back to Cornwall after graduating from university.
I knew where I wanted to be (London) and what I wanted to do (event planning) but I also needed to build up some money before making the big move.
So, while I applied for jobs, I moved back in with Mum and took a job at a coffee shop in Newquay for one last summer at home.
What a summer it turned out to be.
I remember the day I met Hamish so clearly.
The weather hadn’t been great, which meant the café was absolutely packed with holidaymakers retreating from the drizzly beach.
I didn’t get a break all day and by the time we waved goodbye to the final stragglers and hung the closed sign on the door, I was starving.
On my way home, I decided that I couldn’t possibly make the ten-minute walk back to Mum’s without some dry-roasted peanuts to take the edge off my hunger, so I popped into the corner shop.
I’d got my earphones in as I made a beeline for the shop’s dwindling nut supplies, humming along to some NSYNC as I reached out to grab the last packet at the exact same time as somebody else did.
I remember pausing, looking over at this person about to steal my nuts.
A beautiful, blond Adonis.
We got a lot of cute surfers in Newquay, especially over the summer months, so it’s not like I wasn’t used to seeing them popping up all over the place. But there was something about this guy. A mischievous look in his eyes. A ten-out-of-ten smile.
We stared at each other for a couple of seconds.
‘Looks like we have a problem here,’ he said brightly.
‘Yes, it looks like you’re trying to steal my nuts,’ I replied, pulling out my earphones and letting them dangle around my neck.
He looked like he was weighing this up before he said: ‘Only one packet left. We could share?’
‘And how do you propose that would work?’
‘How about this. I buy the nuts, then we take them down to the beach and share the packet?’
‘Slight problem,’ I said. ‘The rain?’
‘Didn’t you notice? The sun’s come out. It’s beautiful now.’
One glance out of the corner shop’s front window told me he was right, and it took me milliseconds to decide that this was a great idea.
So what if he was a stranger? There was something about him that made me think I’d be foolish to pass up on this offer.
Besides, I was single and had no plans that night. Why not?
He introduced himself as Hamish.
‘Down for the summer,’ I said.
‘Is it that obvious?’
‘Well, your Scottish accent was my first clue,’ I laughed. ‘I’m Nina. Back for the summer. I grew up here.’
‘Then it sounds like we got our timing just right. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Nina.’ The way he said my name did tingly things to my spine.
I squeeze my eyes tighter still, the roar of the engine settling into background noise as the memories of our first date fill my senses.
I can hear the cry of the seagulls as Hamish and I made our way down to the seafront armed with snacks.
I can smell the salt in the air, feel the breeze whipping up against my skin.
The sound of the Atlantic Ocean racing up to the shore, shimmering in the sunlight.
But most of all I can feel the excitement deep in the pit of my belly, the certainty that even though we didn’t know each other yet, this man, for sure, held endless and thrilling opportunities.
Hamish did not disappoint. He had me in stitches from the minute we sat down on the sand, telling me stories about his mad Scottish relatives.
We couldn’t have had a more different upbringing, what with Hamish coming from a long line of aristocrats and being farmed off to boarding school the minute he was old enough.
His tales about black-tie Christmases and weekends in the South of France were so far removed from anything I’d experienced, and I remember feeling so surprised that I actually liked this man who’d grown up with unimaginable privilege.
He was engaging, commanding, inquisitive.
As we sat there munching on nuts, he asked me questions about my childhood, genuinely interested when I told him about the small flat I shared with my mum, how she worked all hours as a nurse to keep a roof over our heads. How I’d never known my dad.
‘So, yeah, no bow ties at Christmas for us,’ I said with a wry smile as I came to a close. ‘Mum would save up for all of our favourite foods, so for us Christmas lunch meant mac and cheese followed by a Terry’s chocolate orange.’
‘Now that sounds ideal,’ he said, lit up by the sunset.
I remember looking out to sea as great swathes of purple and orange bloomed across the sky.
It remains the most stunning sunset I have ever seen, and I grew up on the coast seeing some pretty epic ones.
I turned back to look at Hamish, still smiling roguishly at me, and not once did it feel strange that we’d literally just met in a corner shop and were now having an intimate date on the beach.
It just felt right. The perfect first date.
‘Moss, why are you making weird noises?’
I snap my eyes open to find Callum, of all people, staring at me in concern.
‘Just … thinking about work?’
Callum presses his lips together in disbelief.
‘You had your eyes shut, a huge smile on your face and you were sighing,’ he points out.
This man really is a fly in my Chablis, I decide, noticing that the plane radar screen in front of me says we now have …
oh wow, still thirteen hours to go. Did time stand still while I was having that daydream?
I look at Callum looking at me. And for reasons totally and utterly unknown to me, I decide that I’m going to engage him in conversation.
Take Kat’s advice and open up a channel of communication.
Maybe it’s an altitude thing and I’ve gone clinically insane at thirty-five thousand feet?
Or maybe it’s just that there’s no one else to talk to and I am a chatter.
‘Do you believe in meet-cutes, Callum?’
‘Meat queues?’ His brows furrow above his glasses. ‘I mean, it’s only polite to queue if it’s busy at the butchers, no?’
I sigh loudly. Clearly there is not one solitary romance bone in this man’s body.
‘Meet-cute,’ I repeat with extra enunciation this time.
Callum looks even more confused.
‘It’s the charming first encounter between two people who are basically destined to fall in love,’ I explain.
Callum takes his glasses off and pinches the tip of his nose.
‘You must have had one,’ I insist. ‘Cast your mind back to past relationships. On second thoughts, maybe charming first encounters aren’t your thing. Your poor unsuspecting victims probably didn’t see you coming.’
‘Are you referring to my former partners as poor unsuspecting victims, Moss?’
I press on. ‘Like, how did you meet your current girlfriend?’
‘I’m not dating anyone,’ he says.
‘Last girlfriend?’
‘Old friends.’
‘The one before that?’
‘Friend of a friend.’
I exhale in frustration. ‘Okay, so no meet-cutes for you. Let me tell you about my meet-cutes.’
‘Must you?’
‘Oh come on. It’s a long flight and maybe this will be a way for us to collaborate or whatever Kat said.’
Callum looks unconvinced, but if I don’t get this Hamish story out soon I will explode, and as much as it pains me to say please to Callum, the odds are stacked.
‘Goodness, Moss. If we must,’ he says, motioning for me to continue.
At this point the seatbelt sign finally pings off and people around us start standing up and stretching their legs.
‘I’m listening,’ he adds, also taking the opportunity to stand up and pull his jumper off. In doing so, Callum reveals more than a glimpse of toned torso.
One of the divorce party, sitting immediately to our rear, starts to cheer.
‘Are you here to take all your clothes off?’ another asks. ‘Because if so, I’m going to need to video this.’
I can’t help but giggle as a very flustered Callum motions towards his seat. ‘No, no,’ he says, holding his hands up. ‘I’m, er, sitting back down now.’
‘Shame,’ says the woman behind me.
‘Boo!’
‘Get your pecs out for the girls,’ heckles another.
The look on Callum’s face. I’m shuddering with laughter as he hurriedly sits back down, shrinking into his seat as much as his height will allow. I pop my head over my seat, looking back to the row of women, two immediately behind us, another four in the middle aisle.
‘Good news,’ I tell them with a twinkle in my eye. ‘He’s single.’
‘Delicious,’ says divorcee Jennifer. ‘Tell me, how does he feel about cougars?’
‘Very positive,’ I confirm.
‘Unbelievable,’ Callum tuts as I turn to face him. He’s scowling at me, pulling a baseball cap down low over his face. ‘I’ll have my revenge, Moss, just you wait.’