Tracy Corbett - The Summer Theatre by the Sea

Next to them, the ancient carpet-sweeper was bent at an angle, missing its handle.

Brilliant. Her pedantic sister was coming to stay, and Lauren couldn’t even vacuum.

Florence looked up, her blue eyes tearful. ‘Are you mad, Mummy?’

Lauren shook her head. ‘Of course not, sweetie. Accidents happen.’

She sat down next to her daughter.

Freddie jumped onto the sofa and resumed waving his sword about.

Yep, moving to Cornwall had been the right thing to do … even if it did still have its challenges.

Friday, 27 May

Charlotte battled her way out of the loos and queued up for a hot drink, needing something to calm her agitation. It was only ten a.m., but the motorway service station at Leigh Delamere East was full of people heading down to the coast for the May bank holiday weekend. She hadn’t realised quite how busy the roads would be. She’d been driving for three hours, and still had another hundred and twenty miles to go. At this rate, it would be dark before she reached her destination.

Collecting her takeaway cup from the counter, she headed outside, trying to remember what her GP had said about focusing on the positives of her situation, instead of dwelling on the negatives – which wasn’t easy. The grief she’d felt at leaving her old life behind was indescribable. But, much to her surprise, her visit to the GP had been extremely helpful. Far from dismissing her tearful ramblings, he’d listened patiently and had diagnosed a mild anxiety disorder. At first, she’d been reluctant to accept any failing in her mental health, but as he’d spoken about the impact of stress, and its ability to exacerbate physical pain, she’d realised that denying her condition was foolhardy. He’d said battling to keep things ‘just so’ was like clinging hold of a stick under water, the effort of not dropping it was so exhausting that, in the end, you’d drown trying to keep afloat. Sometimes you just had to let the stick sink to the bottom and trust that, eventually, it would float back up to the surface and continue its journey down the river. A nice analogy.

Ethan’s decision to leave was out of her control, he’d said. As was losing her job. The best thing she could do was stop beating herself up for not being able to control everything, try to relax, and take the opportunity of an impromptu holiday.

The spring weather had been steadily improving all week, so a spell at the seaside might improve her spirits. It would be good to spend some time with her family, and it’d been over a year since she’d seen her niece and nephew, so really, this trip was a blessing … even if it had been forced upon her.

She sipped her latte. It didn’t taste great, but it was warm and sweet and gave her energy levels a boost. She managed another few mouthfuls before binning it.

It was hard to believe that, up until a few weeks ago, her life had been going to plan. Her career was flying high, her finances were stable, and the five-year plan for achieving the ‘perfect life’, which she’d drawn up with Ethan, was on schedule. They’d planned that, within the next two years, they’d move to a town house with a good resale value, and they’d up their pension pots with additional contributions. It wasn’t the most dynamic of plans, and perhaps, on reflection, it lacked a certain sense of romance, but it was pragmatic and considered, and it’d been what they’d both wanted. Or at least, what she’d thought they’d both wanted.

Unbuttoning her purple suede jacket, she climbed into her car, gearing herself up for rejoining the M4.

It felt a lot longer than three weeks since Ethan had dropped his bombshell. The initial shock had subsided, but the confusion hadn’t. Why hadn’t she seen it coming? There must have been signs, clues to suggest Ethan wasn’t happy, and yet she’d been oblivious. While she’d been working long hours, carrying out the renovations on the apartment, adhering to their five-year plan, he’d been plotting his relocation to bloody Paris.

How had she got things so wrong?

His words still haunted her, how he’d described their relationship as a ‘business arrangement’. What a cruel thing to say, and unfair too. Not everyone was mushy when it came to romance. It didn’t mean she wasn’t invested, or that she didn’t have feelings. Their relationship was built on the merits of a shared life. It was uncomplicated, straightforward, and if she was honest, a little boring at times, but that was only to be expected after four years … right?

She moved into the fast lane, taking the opportunity of a gap in the traffic to put her foot down, blinking away the latest onslaught of tears threatening to surface.

It wasn’t just breaking up; she was still smarting over losing her job, and struggling to come to terms with how quickly everything had unravelled. One minute she was employee of the month, the next she was being handed her P45. The only chink of light had come when she’d contacted the government’s arbitration service and they’d advised her that she might have a case for unfair dismissal. Determined not to go down without a fight, she’d lodged a claim with the employment tribunal. But until her case was heard, she needed a place to lick her wounds and regroup. And Cornwall was the ideal setting to wait it out.

Previously, the idea of swapping her city life for fish and chips, and endless caravan sites, hadn’t overly appealed. But Cornwall was one of England’s finest tourist attractions, unspoilt and breathtakingly rugged, which was why her sister had moved there, along with their father, when the twins were babies. They’d become disillusioned by the frantic pace and congestion of London, and needed to ‘step off the treadmill’. Whatever the reason, it was still hard not to feel abandoned. Her entire family had relocated four hundred miles away, leaving her behind. And it’d left a wound. A wound aggravated by the strain of a five-hour drive that hampered her ability to visit. But Lauren and her dad couldn’t see that.

Thankfully, for the next forty minutes, the traffic kept moving and she made good progress. Bristol docks came into view, with its vast car park of new vehicles waiting to be shipped abroad, closely followed by the impressive Brunel bridge.

The switch from city to countryside wasn’t immediate, despite the enormous ‘Welcome to Cornwall’ sign. The roads narrowed, the houses shrunk, the air became salty and moist. The earlier mist had burnt away, leaving some semblance of spring-like weather in its wake.

She shifted position, trying to get comfortable and ease the tension in her upper back. She should have removed her jacket when she’d stopped for a comfort break. She twisted her head from side to side, trying to ease the stiffness.

It wasn’t long before the road became a single lane. Her satnav – or rather ‘Posh Joanna’ as she’d named her, due to the fact she sounded uncannily like Joanna Lumley – directed her through numerous towns and villages, each one decreasing in size and signs of civilisation. Posh Joanna estimated her arrival time was still another twenty-nine minutes away. Lauren and her dad really had moved to the sticks.

The narrow road led her through a small market town with a large clock centred in the main square. As she queued at the traffic lights, she studied the sights. The words ‘quaint’ and ‘old-fashioned’ sprung to mind. Interior design jobs in London usually involved wealthy clients spending a fortune recreating the period look. Here, they achieved shabby-chic without even trying.

According to her sister’s directions, they lived in the next town. ‘Ignore your satnav,’ Lauren had said. ‘Or you’ll end up face down in the ford.’ Useful to know, but difficult to adhere to, when simultaneously driving and reading scribbled instructions lying on the passenger seat.