Page 56 of Best Summer Ever

‘Where are you going?’ I asked, following him. ‘It’s almost lunchtime.’

‘I thought we’d take a quick turn around the garden.’ I stopped walking. ‘I really want to show you my cut-flower project. I’d like your opinion on it, Daisy, and I can’t believe you’ve been back all this time and still not seen it.’

When I first arrived back at Wynbrook, I had intended to see it, but with so many memories being stirred up since then, the ones about how my connection to the garden had been diminished and eventually snuffed out now most prominent amongst them, it was the last place I wanted to visit. Especially the walled garden.

‘I’d rather not,’ I blurted out and Algy looked hurt.

‘Is it because I was clumsy about the book?’ he asked. He sounded mortified. ‘I know you didn’t take it, but I didn’t offer it to upset you.’

‘Of course, you didn’t. I know that.’

‘In that case,’ he carried on, sounding rather bossy, ‘I think you should come into the garden.’

‘I’ve already been in the garden,’ I told him, taking a step back. ‘Part of it, anyway. And I don’t want to go back in again.’

‘But I’m sure if you give it a chance, it will make you feel—’

‘Please don’t push this, Algy,’ I pleaded. ‘Let’s go back to the kitchen. Mum’s bound to have lunch ready.’

‘You go back then,’ he said, turning away from me. ‘I’ll be in again in a little while.’

I watched him walk through the garden gate and along the shingle path. I felt distressed about not following him, but I couldn’t force my feet to take a step towards him.

I hadn’t thought properly about the garden for years and my former feelings for it hadn’t even entered my head when I had made the decision to move back to Wynbrook for the summer. However, Algy seemed hell-bent on making me think about them now, even though, under the circumstances, they, and the memories of my monumental row with Dad, were the last thing I needed to become preoccupied with. I did love Algy dearly, but sometimes he could be a total nuisance.

Chapter 13

The following morning, I was still feeling rather riled with Algy for bringing the garden up again and as a result, my parents were perhaps undeservedly out of favour too, but there was no avoiding them as we were all living under the same roof.

During breakfast, I was smiling over a rather sexy message Josh had sent my mobile, when I looked up and caught both Mum and Dad staring at me over the top of their matching plates of boiled eggs and precisely cut soldiers.

‘What’s up?’ I frowned, as I put the phone down on the table, screen side down for modesty’s sake. ‘What have I done now?’

‘Who said you’ve done anything,’ Mum tutted. ‘No one’s said a word.’

‘I’m sorry I was on my phone,’ I apologised rather sulkily, remembering too late that devices were banished during mealtimes.

I picked my phone up again and lent over to put it on the dresser, hating the fact that moving back into the cottage had turned me into a terrible teenager, especially given that mylater teen years had been far from happy. Cue more thoughts about the garden.

Though, I supposed in many ways, my current situation, working at a summer job and indulging in a fling and sunny days on the beach, was actually a teen dream holiday, wasn’t it? My return to the fold had enabled me to literally turn back time and rewind an entire decade. If only I could conveniently jump about further in my past and avoid ever meeting Laurence, either at university or after, that would have been perfect…

‘Well,’ I sighed, ‘I can tell there’s something.’

I’d rather bicker with Mum and Dad over my breakfast than think about my ex or the opportunity I’d been goaded into giving up ahead of applying to university.

‘We were just wondering…’ Mum finally began, but the sentence fizzled out practically as soon as she had started forming it.

‘We heard a rumour,’ said Dad, picking up the baton Mum had dropped.

‘A rumour?’ I grimaced. ‘What, like local village gossip, you mean? Because I thought we didn’t listen to that.’

‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ Mum said loudly, making me jump. ‘Just tell us, Daisy.’

‘Tell you what?’

‘Are you seeing someone? Have you taken up with some tourist in the village?’

I wanted to laugh at her archaic way of putting it, but could sense that it wouldn’t be in any way helpful in smoothing over what was clearly a sensitive subject. For them, at least.

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