The Summer We Ran Away: From the author of uplifting women’s fiction and bestsellers, like The Summerhouse by the Sea, comes the best holiday read of 2020!

by Jenny Oliver

  Silently cringing, she held up her phone and took a snap.

  Awful.

  She exhaled.

  She tied her hair up and went to the dresser to put some blusher on. She put a bit on her front, then a bit on her thighs.

  She took another snap.

  Equally awful.

  She sat on the side of her neatly made bed. She couldn’t do it. She felt stupid and self-conscious. She wasn’t cut out for this kind of thing.

  Then she thought about Amber. Her bed in the hotel room had been immediately dishevelled, the sheets all mussed up, her suitcase had lain spilling its contents on the floor. She had seen her getting dressed, her underwear was all black lace, her perfume heady and dark, her tops scraps of silk. That was what sexy meant. Amber had no trouble being naked. She probably enjoyed it.

  Julia went back to her make-up bag and put on a bit more mascara and some lip gloss. She sprayed herself with some perfume to get in the mood, then she took down her hair, messing it up as best she could, and pulling back the bed covers, lay herself down draping one corner of the sheet over her thighs.

  She took another photo.

  Better.

  Although she’d maybe gone a bit over the top with the bird’s nest hair. Smoothing it down and repositioning herself she took thirty-five more shots until finally she found one she was happy with – eyes a little sultry, stomach sucked in flat, hair almost tousled. It wasn’t Kate Moss but it would do.

  She WhatsApped it to Charlie and waited. Lying back on the white sheets staring up with trepidation at the cracks in the ceiling.

  Her phone rang. She answered with her best sultry, ‘Hello.’

  ‘I’m assuming you meant to send that to me,’ Charlie’s voice said.

  Julia frowned. ‘Yes, of course I did.’

  ‘OK, good, just checking,’ he half-laughed.

  Julia didn’t want it to get all jokey. Trying to maintain the mood, she said all husky, ‘Did you like it?’

  There was a pause while Charlie was clearly looking at the photograph again. ‘Yes it’s very nice. Where are you?’

  ‘In an Airbnb in Noirmoutier,’ Julia said. Then rolling onto her side said, ‘Tell me what you’re wearing.’

  Charlie snorted a laugh. ‘Come off it, Julia.’

  ‘I’m serious,’ she snapped. ‘This is a moment.’

  Charlie paused, then said, ‘My Gap jeans and the blue T-shirt with the hole under the armpit. And…’ he paused again, ‘my grey stripy boxers.’

  Julia knew those pants. She’d washed them a million times.

  ‘Julia,’ Charlie said, ‘this isn’t really my thing.’

  She felt herself tense, despondent. ‘Well maybe it needs to be your thing,’ she said, pulling the sheet up over herself, feeling like a fool for baring herself.

  ‘It’s just not me,’ he sighed. ‘Not us. I don’t know what I’d say.’

  Julia didn’t reply. She wasn’t a hundred per cent sure what she was going to say either.

  ‘Whose idea was this?’

  ‘Mine,’ she said.

  He waited.

  ‘Amber’s,’ she admitted. ‘To get us back on track. To spice things up.’

  ‘I don’t think spicing things up is the problem,’ said Charlie. ‘Or not this way anyway. Look, Julia, to be honest, I’m not even sure where we are at the moment. With our marriage, with you, with everything, it’s all over the place.’

  ‘I know,’ said Julia, pulling the sheet up tighter.

  Charlie exhaled slowly. ‘Well, why don’t we talk rather than spice?’

  Julia nodded. ‘OK.’

  There was a pause.

  Julia stared up at the old chandelier hanging precariously from a chipped ceiling rose, half the lightbulbs missing. ‘What do you want to talk about?’ she asked, hesitant. Suddenly a bit apprehensive.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Charlie replied, maybe nervous, too. ‘What do you want to talk about?’

  ‘I asked first.’

  ‘Technically, I did.’

  There was another pause.

  Julia looked across at the strip of dusty light peeking through a gap in the curtain, a sliver of the old mottled glass of the French windows was just visible. ‘What’s your weather like?’

  ‘Boiling,’ Charlie replied. ‘What’s yours like?’

  ‘Pretty warm,’ Julia said, folding the sheet with her fingers.

  Charlie said, ‘I’m nodding, by the way.’

  There was another pause. They were like awkward teenagers. Julia racked her brains for something good to say, trying to come up with something to rival the abandoned phone sex. It felt so important but her mind was blank.

  Then Charlie said, ‘Lexi came round with a casserole for me.’

  Julia sat up. ‘She didn’t?’

  ‘She did.’ Charlie laughed. ‘I think they all think I’m destitute. My wife’s run away and I’ve been left cuckolded.’

  Julia rolled her eyes. ‘You haven’t been cuckolded.’ She could just imagine Lexi standing all big doe-eyes on her doorstep with her vegan lasagne.

  ‘No I know. Well I have kind of, but it was meant to be a joke,’ Charlie replied, tone frustrated with himself for having to explain.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Not a very funny one,’ he admitted.

  ‘It was funny,’ Julia urged, not wanting him to feel bad. ‘Now I know it was a joke.’ She did a little laugh to emphasise the fact.

  ‘Don’t give me a pity laugh.’

  Julia laughed properly. ‘I wasn’t.’

  ‘You were!’

  She sat back against the pillows, smiling. She heard the creak of a chair at Charlie’s end as he sat down. Then she said, ‘D’you know, I was remembering our first date earlier. Do you remember it?’

  ‘I do, Julia,’ Charlie said, voice more relaxed. ‘The premier seats of Cineworld with a large sweet and salty popcorn and a Diet Coke to share. Even though I hate Diet Coke.’

  ‘Such chivalry,’ she laughed.

  ‘That’s me,’ he said and she could imagine him grinning, pleased with himself. Then a few seconds later he asked, ‘Why were you thinking about our first date?’

  ‘I was thinking about all of it. You know, about us,’ she said, watching the slivers of light cast shadows on the creases in the sheet.

  And he said, ‘Go on…’

  So she told him everything she’d thought sitting on the bench after Amber’s arrest. All the things she’d discussed with Amber in the van. And when she finished, she added, ‘I think we’ve lost our way. Well I know I have. And I know you’re so unhappy at work and… Well instead of helping each other, I think we’ve retreated to our own corners. You especially,’ she said.

  Charlie thought for a while then said, ‘If someone makes you feel you’re not good enough, you tend to retreat.’

  ‘I know,’ said Julia, looking up and catching the reflection of herself in the wardrobe mirror at the end of the bed, thinking of how she was with her parents and her brother. How she was with her neighbours. With everything. How so often she felt not quite up to par. But as Amber had said, she needed to start focusing on her own opinion because, after all, whether one is good enough surely depends who’s defining good. ‘I think I lost sight of what I had.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he agreed, then added, ‘Because I am pretty awesome.’

  Julia laughed. Charlie chuckled. There was a silence. Then Julia said, softly, ‘I’m sorry, Charlie.’

  ‘That’s OK,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry, too.’

  After a pause, Julia added, ‘I don’t want you to feel like you’re not good enough.’

  Charlie didn’t reply.

  ‘Charlie?’ she said.

  ‘Sorry, I was just having another look at those huge pants in the picture you sent…’ he said. ‘Those babies are a hell of a pair of knickers.’

  Cringing, Julia lifted up the covers to have a look at her giant pants.

  ‘I’ve never seen them before have I?�
� he checked, suddenly doubting himself.

  ‘No,’ she replied. ‘I got them at the market.’

  ‘Sexy,’ he laughed.

  Julia blushed.

  Then they talked. Julia lying on her side on the bed, looking at the galloping horse ornament and the fraying rug. Laughing. Chatting. Smiling. She gave him a tour of the room with her phone camera. She showed him the cracks in the ceiling. ‘I think we should make ours a feature,’ she said.

  Charlie didn’t disagree.

  ‘How are your tomatoes?’ Julia asked.

  ‘Very well actually, thanks for asking,’ Charlie replied. And Julia suddenly appreciated the comfort of normality. How covetable her life felt from afar. ‘D’you know Old Harry popped round today to give me some advice,’ Charlie went on. ‘He’s really knowledgeable on planting. I know it’s not your thing but he’s helped me loads. We had a cup of tea and he’d made a sponge cake. Can you believe it? It was fun. Good cake too, not as good as yours. He likes to bake though. I told him you were a baker.’

  ‘Oh God, Charlie, you didn’t?’ Julia put her hand to her forehead, imagining the chats she’d have to have with weird Old Harry now in the Costcutter queue.

  ‘Why not? It’s good. You can be friends. He’s interesting. Did you know he used to live in Bulgaria?’

  ‘I didn’t know that,’ she said, remembering suddenly her thoughts on the echo chamber, the curated, exclusive views of Lexi and Alicia that had narrowed her own world. Maybe chatting to Old Harry wouldn’t be so bad. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘That sounds good.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Julia asked.

  ‘I’m smiling,’ said Charlie.

  Julia was smiling too when she hung up the phone.

  She stared at it for a moment, then pushing the sheet away, she got up and opened the curtain, letting the dusky evening light in. Then she went to stand in front of the wardrobe mirror and reached behind her back to unhook her bra. When she looked down at herself now, instead of noticing the rolls, she saw just the light tan from the French sunshine. She studied herself in the mirror. She did have good boobs, she thought. Then she tentatively stepped out of her giant pants, resisting the urge to reach for something to cover up with. She forced herself to stand completely naked in front of the mirror, unflinching. To stare at herself. She put her shoulders back, she pushed her chest out a little, she angled her hips, she laughed. Then she raised her phone and took one selfie. Smiling, confident.

  But she didn’t send this one to anyone. She kept it for herself.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Amber didn’t sleep well, tossing and turning half the night. She was too hot, the bed was too soft, the birds too loud. And she was nervous about seeing Billy. Nervous about what was going to happen and what she was going to say. She had lain awake staring at all the skulls mounted on the wall above the bed, an ominous reminder that things had the potential to go quite badly.

  As she got dressed, her hand shook so much doing her eyeliner that she had to give up, relying instead on a couple more lashings of mascara. She wore the bright blue shirt she had bought from the boutique. She wondered what Billy would think when he saw it.

  She wondered how Lovejoy was feeling.

  It was early, she was awake before anyone else. Downstairs she had some bread and jam and sat in the dawn quiet on the veranda drinking thick black coffee and watching blue tits peck the dead ivy on the side of the house for bugs. She watched the sun rise high in the bright pale sky. The thump of her heart echoing the sound of the sea as the nerves rose and fell.

  Julia appeared, barefoot, yawning. ‘I just called in sick to work for tomorrow. You can put very bad liar on my list of things about me. I couldn’t stop rambling into the answer machine. I told them all the gory details of my supposed chronic gastroenteritis. They’re going to think I’m insane.’ She flopped down on the other chair.

  Amber said, ‘Here have a coffee,’ and poured Julia a cup from the cafetière she’d made earlier. ‘It’s a bit cold.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Julia, taking a slurp. ‘It is cold.’ She put the cup down. ‘Shirt looks nice, by the way,’ she added, gesturing to Amber’s blue top.

  Amber waved the compliment away. ‘So does your dress,’ she said, pointing to Julia’s new red dress. Then she leant back in her chair and stared out at the lush green garden, at the towering pines and the jagged palms. ‘So did you brave the phone sex?’

  ‘I did,’ said Julia looking out at the garden.

  ‘Wow,’ Amber was surprised. ‘How did it go?’

  ‘Terribly,’ said Julia, raising a brow as she glanced her way.

  ‘Oh no,’ Amber couldn’t hold in her snigger.

  Julia smiled, leaning forward, hands wrapped round her cold cup of coffee, surveying the wide expanse of overgrown garden. ‘No, it was good. Not the phone sex bit but the conversation. It broke the ice.’ She turned back to look at Amber. ‘I’m not sure we’re phone sex people.’

  Amber looked her up and down, contemplating. ‘No, possibly not.’

  Julia sat back and laughed. ‘Thanks for the advice though.’

  Amber rolled her head to meet her gaze. ‘That’s OK. What are friends for?’

  Julia’s eyes widened a fraction. ‘Am I your friend?’

  Amber felt a little perplexed at the pleasure on Julia’s face. She couldn’t quite believe that her friendship could mean so much to a person. ‘Yes, course you are,’ she said.

  And Julia sat back with a grin, hair all askew from sleep, dress a bit crumpled, sipping her coffee and closing her eyes to absorb the heat of the sun on her face. ‘You’re my friend, too,’ she said after a second.

  Amber laughed, completely thrown by how good it felt to hear, amazed that those words could give her the much-needed shot of confidence that she had needed to face the day. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

  Julia opened one eye, rolled her head to look at her. ‘You’re welcome.’

  The shutters of one of the upstairs rooms flew open. ‘Morning!’ said Martin, stretching his arms wide to the view. ‘I feel like a Disney princess.’

  Amber laughed. Then the shutters on the window next door opened and Lovejoy looked out, his face tired and emotionless. His hair all askew and eyes hooded. They hadn’t spoken last night. ‘What’s the plan?’ he said.

  Julia got her phone out. ‘I need to check on Pandora.’

  Martin yawned and rested his elbows on the windowsill, chin cupped in his hands as he watched. ‘She’s probably still asleep,’ he said. ‘Great shirt, Amber, I did do well.’

  Amber gave him a warning look.

  Martin grinned back.

  Julia said, ‘She’s not asleep, she’s doing yoga on the beach.’

  ‘Really?’ Amber looked across at Julia’s screen. There was a photo of Pandora in a striped bikini doing some complicated upside-down pose with a backdrop of white beach huts.

  Lovejoy appeared on the veranda next to them, dressed in grey jeans and a black T-shirt. ‘Bloody hell, that’s impressive,’ he said, looking at Pandora’s yoga pose.

  Amber ignored him. ‘Do you know which beach it is?’

  This time the photo was tagged with a location pin. ‘It’s called Plage Rouge.’ Julia clicked on the pin. All the other tagged images were of the same rows of beautiful little beach huts, white sand and a lighthouse peeping out of pine trees.

  Martin came outside, phone in hand, already tapping in directions. He was dressed in double denim with his cut-offs and shirt, with camouflage pool sliders on his feet. ‘It’s over there,’ he pointed out past the giant fir trees.

  ‘Well let’s go,’ said Lovejoy, turning and heading back into the house to get his stuff to go out. Martin followed.

  Julia stood up and began to walk away.

  Amber stayed where she was for a second. The nerves suddenly rising again, clogging her throat, immobilising her. She wasn’t used to being out of control. She wasn’t used to not being t
he one directing events. For the first time, she was stepping into a situation and would have to wait and see how it played out. Whether it would at any point work in her favour. And that faintly terrified her.

  Julia paused and came back to stand next to her. ‘Are you coming?’ she said softly.

  Amber breathed in deep through her nose to steal herself. ‘Yes.’

  Martin tracked the route on his phone. Leading them halfway down the road before pointing towards a small forest path.

  ‘You sure this is right?’ asked Amber as they tripped over tree roots and through spider’s webs.

  ‘Google never lies,’ he said.

  It made Amber think of bloody I-work-at-Google Marcia. What she’d think of this debacle now. Lovejoy stalking silently beside her through the cool darkness of the towering trees. Her smugness level would be off the charts. She’d be all honesty-is-the-best-policy, we aim for complete transparency at Google.

  As she tramped next to Lovejoy, Amber had to begrudgingly admit that honesty probably was the best policy. An end of the lies. She’d never tell Marcia that though.

  She stole a quick glance at Lovejoy’s rigid expression, the tiredness of his eyes. He never looked her way. It would be weird when this was all over.

  When Lovejoy had first come back from the States she’d kept him at arm’s length. Watching him swagger into fairs and auctions she was at. Any guilt she felt at her lie was easily quashed when she watched him work his way through various girlfriends, leave them sobbing in the pub or brag about some complicated web of two-timing he had going on that he was barely able to keep up with. But over time the bantering friendship of their teenage years had gradually returned, Lovejoy always acting the underdog, Amber always out of reach. Him with his cocky, knowing glint in his eye as he sidled up next to her at six a.m. at a fair, smelling of dust, dirt and the same Persil washing powder his mum always used, and cracked some inappropriate joke, her eye-rollingly impervious. Now it was about to be taken away, she realised she was not completely immune.

  She glanced at him again, his dark eyes fixed on the forest floor ahead of him. She would miss what they had.