Page 106 of The Holiday Cottage

“Whether he’d look good in a woolly hat.”

Imogen laughed and strolled along the street searching for gift inspiration from the many stalls.

She chose a pair of earrings for Sara, and on impulse bought the same for Janie and Anya. They’d been good friends to her. Whether they’d still be good friends after she’d confessed the truth about herself remained to be seen, but she wasn’t going to think about that now.

At the next stall she chose a beautiful notebook for Rosalind by way of a thank-you. If it hadn’t been for Rosalind, she wouldn’t be here. She wouldn’t have met Miles. Dorothy wouldn’t have lent her the cottage, and maybe she wouldn’t have known Dorothy was her grandmother, although that would no doubt have come out eventually.

And maybe, if Rosalind hadn’t insisted she take a long break, she would have burned out. She saw now that she couldn’t have carried on working at the pace she’d been working, not just because it was unsustainable from an energy point of view, but also because it made her life so narrow.

She paid for the notebook, and Miles took the bag from her and slid it into one of the other bags he was carrying.

“Who is this for?”

“My boss.”

“You like her?”

“Yes, she’s brilliant. Inspirational, but also insightful. When she told me I had to take a month off, I was devastated. I had no idea what I was going to do without work to fill my days, particularly over Christmas.”

He looked at the number of parcels she’d amassed in a short time. “You seem to be doing fine with that.”

“Yes. And I’m sleeping well, which is a miracle. It took me a while to switch off, but now I have, I can’t imagine switching it back on again. It has made me realize that I need to do more. Get a better balance in my life. All I thought about was work. I’d send emails in the middle of the night.”

“Why? That fictitious boyfriend of yours should have made you leave your laptop at the bedroom door.”

She laughed. “He was useless. It’s over.”

“The breakup was bad?”

“Terrible. He won’t speak to me.”

“I feel for the guy. So why was your workload so heavy you had to answer emails in the middle of the night?”

“That was my own fault for never saying no to anyone. I took on more and more. I was always the first in the door and the last home. I told myself it was ambition and that’s partly true, but it was also fear.” She could admit that to herself now. “The drive to succeed came from a place of insecurity.”

“It sounds as if you’re good at your job, so why would you feel insecure?”

“I think it’s hardwired into me. It was tough when growing up. Money was tight. Tina sometimes had work, and sometimes she didn’t.”

He winced. “Hearing you call her Tina feels so wrong.”

Almost everything about her relationship with her mother had felt wrong.

“She insisted on Tina. We moved frequently when I was a child, usually because she couldn’t afford the rent. We never had anywhere that was ours. Nowhere that felt like home. I badly wanted something different. I’d visit friends and see their homes, and I wanted that. Nothing big or elaborate, just a place that was mine. At college, lots of the students had help from their parents, but I never had that. I had three jobs, which is why I got used to working in the middle of the night, I suppose. I’ve always known I have to be financially independent, and that’s been a driver for me.” She paused by a stall selling soft toys.

“Does Dorothy know how hard it has been for you?”

“I’m sure she has guessed some of it. I’ve given her a few details, but not all of them.” She picked up an alpaca. “This is very soft and cuddly. Do you think Ava would like this?”

“No idea. Probably. So you’re protecting Dorothy?”

“Partly. I know she feels guilty and I don’t want her to feel worse than she already does. But also I prefer to look forward. I thought I had no family and it turns out I do have family, and a loving family at that. I don’t want to focus on the time I didn’t have it. I want to enjoy the fact that now I do have it. Does that make sense?”

“It does. And in the spirit of looking forward, are you going to change things when you get back to London? Are you going to carry on working for Rosalind or will you look for something else?”

Something else. The thought hadn’t occurred to her.

“I love my job. I’m good at my job. I just need to learn to do it differently. To switch off. Maybe delegate more.” She thought about Anya and Janie, and how hard she found it to release control over work. “I need to give it some thought. But not now.”

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