Page 35 of The Retreat
There was a long pause. Then Talia exhaled. ‘Fine. Lead.’
It was not an easy surrender.
‘I need to hold on to you,’ Imogen told her.
‘I can just follow the sound of your footsteps,’ Talia said instantly.
Imogen rolled her eyes and turned around, scanning for anything that looked remotely familiar. Broken twigs, disturbed soil, the way the light angled through the trees. Was she about to make this even worse?
She sighed and started walking.
They passed a fallen tree. A glint of red on a branch caught the light. A ribbon.
‘There. We’re back on track.’
Talia hesitated. ‘You’re sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘Yeah, but…’
Imogen took Talia’s hand and placed it directly on the ribbon. ‘OK?’
Talia nodded, feeling the ribbon. ‘Hey, umm…Maybe youshouldtake my arm. So I can follow you quickly.’
Imogen took her arm lightly without further discussion.
They walked in silence for a long while, the path growing clearer with every step. And then the trees began to thin, and the light shifted, becoming brighter, more open. Up ahead, a wooden sign had been strapped to a tree with twine. The paint was cheerful and slightly smudged.
‘Take off the blindfold and enjoy the view.’ There was a little bucket of badges that read, ‘I completed the Monroe Trust Walk!’ in Comic Sans font.
Imogen stopped walking. ‘You can look now.’
Talia reached up and pulled the blindfold off. She blinked against the light and looked ahead.
The trees gave way to a rise in the land and a shallow ridge overlooking a long, open valley. Grasslands stretched below, dotted with wildflowers and wind-bent trees.
‘Oh,’ Talia said quietly.
It wasn’t dramatic. No cliffs. No crashing waves. But it was… still. Quiet and golden in the late light. The kind of view you didn’t expect to find until you were already standing in it.
Imogen glanced at Talia, meaning to remark that if it had been up to her, they’d have been dead in a ditch instead of seeing this.
But the words never made it out of her mouth because the light caught Talia’s face, and her freshly revealed grey eyes were soft in this moment. There was a clearness in her expression that she hadn’t seen before. Something unguarded and striking.
It threw her.
Imogen looked away quickly, unsettled. There was a prickly feeling rising in her chest. She decided to ignore it. It was probably just nettle rash.
After a beat, Talia said, ‘No one else is here. We’re very late, aren’t we?’
‘Probably.’
Talia huffed a sigh through her nose and grudgingly said, ‘That’s my fault. Sorry.’ It sounded like it hurt her to say it.
Imogen smiled, not quite looking at her. ‘No problem.’
They turned slowly, ready to retrace their steps. The path was starting to darken. Talia went to the bucket and grabbed two badges, handing one to Imogen. She pinned her own to her chest, and Imogen followed suit.
