Friday August 8th 2025 #2
The tourists dutifully unzipped their bum bags and produced fifty-pence pieces.
Had they been forewarned about this? I wasn’t getting an Apple Pay vibe from Rog and was starting to sweat.
Would I be kicked off the island because I didn’t have a fifty-pence coin?
What was a rattle, and was it going to be as unpleasant as it sounded?
“Don’t worry, this is Charlie, the new shop manager,” Red said, clocking my stricken expression. “She’s good for it.”
Rog eyed me with interest.
“Ooh. Welcome to Ormer,” he said. “Hope you like cows.”
I blinked. Why did that sound vaguely threatening?
“Hop on, then, here we go,” he said.
Red began to usher the obedient tourists onto the trailer. I saw now that it was in fact some sort of transportation system—Rog was fixing it up to one of the ancient tractors, and the tourists were settling themselves into the rudimentary seats along the trailer’s sides.
I joined them, and after a moment we started making our way up the wide rocky track cut into the hill. The trailer did indeed rattle. A lot. Clinging to the side, I was struck once again by a wave of panic. Was this life now? Dirt roads, decrepit tractors, ominous-sounding cows?
I gripped my seat, then lunged to catch my handbag as it went sliding out of my lap.
Rog was driving the tractor as though it was a sports car, one palm flat on the steering wheel as he dragged us around a bend.
A large cart horse plodded by, pulling a carriage containing two of the workers from the harbor.
They barely blinked as they passed through the cloud of dust kicked up by Rog’s tractor.
Had to shade my eyes with my hand when we reached the top of the hill. The track opened out to reveal a stunning sea view. The water of the Channel was dreamily blue, and the island’s greenery tumbled away from us toward the cliffs, a scramble of wildflowers and bracken.
The panic quieted. Who wouldn’t want to start life over in this place? It was magical.
Ahead of us were some single-story shops, flat fronted and painted magnolia yellow.
I recognized it instantly: it was the Rue, the dusty track that serves as Ormer’s high street.
The carriage pulled away ahead of us, the cart horse swishing its tail to bat the summer flies away.
There was a Wild Westness about it all, as though any second now a ball of tumbleweed would go rolling by.
Rog hopped off the tractor as Red helped the slightly shaken tourists out of the trailer.
“For Bramblebay Farm, you want to go thataway until you see the dairy,” Rog said to me, producing a bottle of water from one of the pockets in his cargo pants and taking a swig. “Then turn right. If you hit the sea, you’ve gone too far.”
“Right,” I said. “Thank you. I think I’m supposed to be staying at the old stables—is that near the farm itself?”
“Everything’s near everything, love,” Rog said with a grin.
Felt horribly aware that I sounded like the archetypal city girl turning up in the one-horse town in stilettos. (Metaphorically—obviously wore trainers, I’m not that clueless.) Drew myself up a bit.
“Of course. I’ll figure it out.”
Twenty minutes later, standing in the middle of a field surrounded by cows, was not quite so confident.
There was the dairy. There was the little footpath cut into the undergrowth, heading right. Hadn’t hit the sea yet, but could see it hazily in the distance between two trees. And between the cows.
When they first came sauntering over to me, I’ll admit I panicked a bit. Cows are a lot bigger and more…muscular than they look from a train window, and I don’t think I’ve seen one in person (in cow?) since I took that hungover hike after Bri’s wedding.
But the new me is a countryside person. She loves the great outdoors.
She’s going to work on a farm, for God’s sake.
So I pulled myself together and held my ground, plotting a reasonable escape route if the cows’ slow amble developed into a sudden urge to stampede.
As it happened, they just hung around, a bit like men who dance over in a club but don’t know what to do next.
Fine: I know how to handle hoverers. I stared at my phone, resolutely ignoring the cows, perplexed to find that Google Maps was convinced I was standing in the middle of a supermarket.
Looked around, then back down at the map. Everything else was right—it had me loaded in the right spot. But…Can Google Maps be wrong, I typed into Google. No, apparently. And yet, this was definitely not a Carrefour.
A brief foray down an Ormer-specific rabbit hole on Reddit and I discovered the problem: this tiny island is so random and remote the maps haven’t been updated for years.
No street view option either as there are no cars allowed.
Once upon a time, presumably, a Carrefour had stood here, but now it was just grassland, and Rog’s directions were all I had to go on.
Trudged on, trailing cows. The path had long since disappeared, and I was just starting to lose hope when I spotted a barn behind a hedge. Perking up, I set off toward it, but I’d obviously gone wrong somewhere, because there was no break in the hedge, and no way through.
Hadn’t seen the farm shop at this point—no picture with the job ad—but it was described as a converted barn on the edge of the farm, and this looked promising. A bunch of old crates lying by the back door, a bike rack to the side…I figured I was just approaching it from the back.
I weighed it up. Return the way I had come and try to find the main entrance? Or hop the hedge?
It looked sturdy. Obviously had no idea what sort of bush it was made of, but there were branches in there that I could use as footholds, and I was hot and sticky from walking in the sun and did not fancy running the cow gauntlet again.
The less I write about this bit the better. I don’t fancy dwelling on it. The shredded Oliver Bonas dress, scratched-up thighs and entirely lost dignity are enough of a reminder.
I had bits of shrub in my hair. I was sweaty and disheveled. I had a strong suspicion I smelled of cow. This wasn’t the first impression I’d hoped to make on my new employer, but by this point I was just desperate to get out of the sun, so headed around for the front entrance.
There was no front entrance. I walked all the way around the gray stone barn and ended up back where I started: the back entrance. The only entrance.
Now that I was right in front of the door, I could see that a piece of A4 paper had been stuck beside it with the words “Bramblebay Farm Shop” scrawled in pen.
“Farm shop hours vary. If you’re after one of the Nicoles, try the farmhouse,” it said underneath, with a helpful arrow pointing north, or possibly up to the sky.
Then, in smaller, different handwriting, “Don’t forget Rog does all sorts!
Call this number!!” And at the very bottom, in different pen altogether: “If you’re Charlie Jones, head on in, will be with you in a mo, just dealing with a goat thing! ”
I was, apparently, in the right place.
To say that spirits had dipped at this point would be an understatement. The barn was almost as disheveled as I was: corrugated-iron roof clumsily patched up, windows filthy, wood peeling on the wide barn doors.
And, stepping inside, things only got worse.
Not the shop itself. That was surprisingly bright and clean, given the outside of the barn. There were fridges full of—yes, milk bottles, and sacks of potatoes on the flagstones, and shelves of chutneys and pickles in charming jewel tones.
The problem was the familiar-looking man standing directly in my way.
“Excuse me,” I said, trying to step around him.
There wasn’t much room—the shop was set up with crates of vegetables narrowing the space between the door and the till.
Man didn’t move. He had his back to me and was looking around the shop. It was cap guy. He’d lost the cap, but clearly not the attitude.
“Excuse me,” I said again, louder, in that particular British way that can mean a great number of things, all offensive.
“We’re not open,” he said, barely looking at me—he seemed to be examining the stock.
“That’s fine,” I said. “I work here.”
He turned at last. Arms folded, he stared at me.
His eyes weren’t quite gray, as I’d thought earlier—they were actually a washed-out shade of denim blue, shadowed under a broody frown that was way too engrained to be only on my account.
He had the sort of fair skin that can end up looking tanned because of the sheer number of freckles—there were darker ones around his eyes and across his nose, too.
I generally think of freckles as cutesy, but there was nothing cute about this man.
Even his stubble looked pricklier than average.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“Charlie Jones.”
Wondered about shaking his hand, but his arms were resolutely folded, so aborted this plan and just stood there. It took powerful strength to resist the urge to check my hair for shrubbery.
“The new farm shop manager,” I added.
“That’s right,” he said. “And who are you?”
“What?”
“Yes, correct, I’m Charlie Jones, the new farm shop manager,” he said impatiently. “And who are you?”
“No, sorry…I’m Charlie Jones, the new farm shop manager, is what I meant.”
The deep furrow between his eyebrows became—impossibly—deeper.
“No,” he insisted. “You’re not Charlie Jones. I’m Charlie Jones. And I’m the new farm shop manager.”