‘Did you enjoy last night? The moon and stars and all that malarkey.’ Rita filled the last of the goats’ tins.

  ‘Yes. It was lovely.’ Emily smiled. ‘It’s a funny old group. Like some weird dysfunctional family, but I fit in… so that’s OK.’

  ‘That’s good, then,’ Rita said plainly, not wanting to pass judgement on anyone.

  ‘I was pregnant once.’ Emily released a big freeing breath.

  Rita didn’t move, just stayed still beside her, listening.

  ‘Last year. It was unexpected. I showed him the test and he just… blinked. Said, “That’s not part of the plan, Em.” And I knew. I knew the way someone knows a storm’s coming before the clouds roll in. You know.’ She swallowed. ‘I tried to be OK with it. Bought vitamins. Told myself he’d come around. But I think the baby knew. Knew it wasn’t wanted.’

  Rita turned, eyes wet but unwavering. ‘No, Emily. Don’t you dare think that.’

  Emily bit her lip. ‘I lost it at eleven weeks. Just… gone. And I couldn’t help thinking… maybe it was my fault. Maybe I wasn’t enough. Or maybe it didn’t want me, either.’

  Rita took Emily’s hand in hers and squeezed it.

  ‘Listen to me.’ Her voice was low and steady. ‘They hang on if they want to stay. But sometimes they just don’t. Sometimes it’s not about us. It’s about timing. About their little soul not being ready yet.’

  Emily let the tears fall now, unbothered by the mess of it. ‘But I wanted it. Even when I didn’t think I did. I did.’

  ‘He or she would have known that. That little spark, that flicker of love. It wouldn’t have gone unnoticed.’

  They stood in silence until Camilla let out a long, irritated bleat.

  Emily laughed through her tears. ‘She’s judging me, isn’t she?’

  ‘I think she’s saying you’re stronger than you think.’

  Emily wiped her face with the sleeve of her jumper. ‘You always say the right thing, Rita; you’re so lovely.’

  ‘I just say what I needed someone to say to me once.’ Rita pushed down her own tears at remembering the miscarriage she had had, a year after the twins had been born. She had had feelings of not knowing how she would cope with three under two, had blamed herself for that tiny flicker of doubt. ‘So, are you still with your partner, Emily?’

  ‘No, thankfully, and also I have no job, either. I quit two weeks ago. I lied the other day. Taking a sabbatical for “creative recharging” sounded far sexier than “completely unravelling emotionally”. Sorry, Rita, you must have a million things to do. I’m going to go back to my yurt.’

  ‘No, walk with me back to the farmhouse. Here, carry this if you don’t mind.’ Rita handed her the egg basket.

  ‘He never hit me. Not with fists. But the other kind, you know?’ Emily blurted. ‘The kind that makes you feel like you’re made of shells like these and everything you say is a mistake.’

  ‘Emily, I’m so sorry. You really have been through it, haven’t you?’

  ‘I think I forgot who I was… and then I came here. The quiet. The sea. The yoga with strangers. It’s like… layers are peeling off. And underneath, there’s still someone worth saving. I just need to pick up a paintbrush now.’

  ‘Well, there’s a few outbuildings that could do with whitewashing.’ Rita grinned, feeling a sense of peace herself that the retreat was not only helping her but others, too, just as she had hoped for.

  Emily laughed. ‘I’d happily do that. But I meant messy, abstract stuff. I used to lose hours in it. It was like dreaming with my eyes open.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘He used to call it “my little hobby”. Said it was “cute”. Said it was a shame I never really had the “talent” to show it to others. I stopped.’

  Rita’s face darkened. ‘He sounds like a proper arse.’

  ‘He was and I miss it.’ Emily sighed. ‘But every time I think about trying again, I freeze. Like I’m scared I’ve lost it.’

  At that moment, with a crunch of gravel, Stan pulled up in front of them in his Land Rover and lowered his window. He smiled at Rita and acknowledged Emily with a nod. ‘Have you got a minute, Mrs Jory?’

  ‘I’m going to head back,’ Emily intuitively chipped in, placing the basket on the doorstep. ‘Thanks for listening, Rita.’ Looking lighter in her step, Emily walked towards the High Meadow.

  ‘You all right, Stan?’ It wasn’t like the farmhand to appear this early unannounced.

  ‘I’m good, thanks. Just wanted to say, him up there.’ He nodded his head in the direction of Hawthorn Acre. ‘Well, he may have said I can’t be doing stuff for you when August turns, but what I do in my own time ain’t nobody’s business.’ He produced a battered tin from the passenger seat. ‘Mrs Bodkin’s carrot cake, I know how much you love it.’

  ‘Thanks, Stan. I appreciate it.’ Rita deposited the cake in the kitchen, then wandered back across the yard to the barn, key ready in hand. The yoga class wasn’t for another hour, but she liked to let the morning air freshen the place. The back doors groaned open. A shaft of sunlight cut through the gloom, catching the dust motes like glitter in a snow globe. And then that magnificent, breathtaking vista up and over the fields and down to the cliffs and beaches yonder.

  How lovely that Emily felt she could confide in her; she had been so candid, and it made her realise that mums came in all guises. Rita’s thoughts then turned to Sennen, whom she realised she hadn’t spoken to in a while and made a mental note to call her.

  Thinking back to last night, to her and Paul, making out like teenagers on the beach, she felt a fluttery feeling go through her, like a shiver. It wasn’t just the act itself; it was the way it made her forget, even if just for a few seconds, the mess that was Jago Jenken.

  She’d never been this confused about anyone before. With Jago, everything felt tangled. But Paul? Paul was simple. Real. Like breathing fresh air after being underwater too long. Calm waters, to Jago’s stormy and tortured soul, who caused her to feel passion and tension with equal parts longing and frustration.

  Whatever it was with the laid-back musician, it had been fun and maybe having a little bit of fun moving forward wasn’t such a terrible thing after all. She surprised herself with how relaxed she was being about it. For the first time, she had had sexual relations with a man who wasn’t Archie. She had thought that it would be a lot harder to do. That she would have felt a guilt or some kind of angst. But no, it had felt good. And guest or no guest, she wouldn’t be averse to doing it again.

  Rita paused, took a huge breath as she looked down the barn and over the sea view. Peaceful. Then. Thump! She struggled to realise where the sound was coming from. Another thump, followed by an unmistakable rustle of hay. Looking up to the hay loft with its gaudy curtains pulled untidily across, she narrowed her eyes. A curtain twitched.

  Rita walked over slowly. ‘Please don’t be a rat,’ she whispered. ‘Or worse, a big fox.’

  A head popped out.

  ‘Jesus Christ!’ Rita nearly jumped out of her skin.

  ‘Tranquila, Rita, it is just me,’ Teo said croakily, his black hair sticking up at odd angles.

  Rita blinked. ‘What are you doing up there? Please don’t say Hilda has chucked you out.’

  Another groan, this one deeper toned, came from the hay loft.

  Teo’s eyes widened in panic. ‘Don’t look! Don’t look, OK? I… I didn’t mean to… it just sort of happened.’

  Rita began to laugh. ‘I’m not your mother. What you do in your private life is your business.’

  Jude’s head popped out next to Teo. Rita almost didn’t recognise him, his face looked so different without his glasses on.

  ‘I’ve seen nothing.’ She comically put both her hands over her eyes. ‘For a moment I thought it might be Annie,’ Rita joshed.

  Teo made a retching action. The bookseller looked worried. ‘You won’t tell anyone, will you?’

  ‘Tell anyone, what?’ She winked.

  ‘Thank you,’ Jude said. ‘The Seahaven Bay Facebook Gossip Group would dine out on this one for years. BOOKSELLER FOUND FORNICATING IN HAYLOFT WITH FITNESS INSTRUCTOR FOURTEEN YEARS HIS JUNIOR. I’d better go home and get ready to open the shop.’

  ‘I give you a lift.’ Teo popped his head back behind the curtain.

  Rita stepped back into the soft morning light, stretching her arms wide and letting out a long, hearty yawn. The air now hung heavy with the promise of rain, thick and electric.

  As she climbed into the Jimny to drive the breakfasts up to the yurts, she did something she hadn’t done in ages: she sang along to the radio. She felt light, happy. And she liked it that Teo and Jude felt happy too. They could all just live and let live. Last night was proof that life really could turn on a sixpence. And maybe, just maybe, Zenya’s moon mantras weren’t quite as woo-woo as she’d thought. After all, Jude’s wish on a star had definitely come true. Well, at least it had last night.

  Rita was already back in the barn in her yoga gear when Teo returned to run his session. ‘Glad we’ve set up in here today, first day of rain in a long time.’ Rita moved a stray cushion onto a milk churn.

  ‘Yes, perfecto. Let’s see how many leave their yurts after a late night and now this weather. I did go up earlier and see if anyone wanted a lift down, but I got no response.’

  ‘So, Teo. Now I am fully party to your love life.’ The handsome Spaniard grinned. ‘I realise I don’t really know much about you at all. If you don’t mind me asking, where do you come from? What is your story?’

  Teo gave a shy smile and ran a hand through his tousled dark hair. ‘It’s what you English call a mongrel, I think. I’m half English, mostly Spanish. My mother, she is a spirited woman from Sevilla. Met an Englishman, a fleeting romance, a summer fling. She never saw him again.’

  Rita’s eyes widened. ‘So, you never knew your father?’

  Teo looked a little unsettled as he shook his head furiously. ‘No. No. My mother raised me in Sevilla on her own. She is bajita.’ He put his hand to neck level. ‘Just under five foot, like your Hilda, but has a fire within that lights up a room. I think I must have inherited most of me from her. Her passion, her temper, her kindness, and love for life.’

  ‘She sounds incredible.’ Rita smiled.

  ‘Sí, sí. She is.’ Teo nodded, his gaze distant. ‘She taught me to embrace every momento, to find joy in the pequeño. Small, small, I mean. Even when times were tough after my accidente, she never let me feel the weight of the world. Instead, suggested I retrain in something that made me as happy, or nearly anyway.’

  ‘I’m so happy that you did.’ Rita’s eyes twinkled.

  ‘It was Mamá who suggested Cornwall actually. Said it was one place in England that I should visit. Wrote a list of places I could surf, one of them being here.’

  ‘She has good taste, your mother, clearly. It’s funny…’ Rita mused, ‘how our past shapes us, even the parts we don’t know.’

  Teo looked at her, his eyes thoughtful. ‘Yes. But it’s also about what we choose to do with it. Our past is a foundation, but we build the rest. All I know, right at this moment, is that it feels right being here in Seahaven Bay.’

  ‘I’m glad, because it feels right having you here.’ Rita squeezed his arm.

  ‘I know it sounds a bit… and I use your words here… woo-woo, but this place… it has a pull, doesn’t it? Maybe Zenya has lured us all here to find ourselves or someone else, maybe in my case.’

  ‘It certainly seems like magic is happening for a few people.’ Rita laughed softly.

  Teo looked coy for a moment. ‘Rita. I know it must be hard to talk about but please now that I have shared, can you tell me a little bit about your husband, your Archie.’

  ‘Well, he had a light in his eye too. Everybody loved Archie. He was fun and would do anything to help anyone in trouble. He was fiercely passionate about us.’ Rita put her hand to her heart. ‘He, too, had a temper; I used to hide and read in the hayloft sometimes, wait until it had blown over, but he was a fair man.’

  Teo was listening intently. ‘He sound like a good man.’

  Rita nodded. ‘He had his moments, like we all do. He’d disappear sometimes when things got a bit rough on the farm. I only learned recently from Stan that he’d sit under the Singing Tree and think. Just like I used to and still do, sometimes. Whenever he could find time for a beer with his mates in the Winking Pilchard, he would, and despite his mother not always being the easiest of women, he looked after her really well, especially after his dad died. Hence me taking on that mantle now.’

  ‘Hilda – her barking is worse than her biting, is that what you say?’

  ‘Nearly.’ Rita laughed and before she could correct him, Teo’s face dropped.

  ‘And your son? Maybe his biting is worse than his barking.’

  Rita took a deep breath and shook her head. ‘Let’s do some yoga, shall we?’

  Rita felt a sense of relief when Paul didn’t walk into the barn the morning after their unexpected encounter. It wasn’t that she regretted what had happened; she didn’t. But the uncertainty of how they’d both react upon seeing each other again made her hesitant. And the thought of anyone else discovering what they had done was something she wanted to avoid. Imagine that in her first online retreat reviews. Great stay, the owner is a complete harlot. Just give her a glass of wine, a can of beer and place her under a starry sky and she’s all yours.

  Annie, Michael and Lola were already sprawled across the floor of the barn, their yoga mats unfurled as the moist sea breeze gently ruffled their edges. The rain wasn’t strong enough to have to shut the barn doors – in fact, it felt lovely to have a warm breeze flowing through their space of tranquillity.

  Teo, dressed in relaxed linen trousers and a loose white vest, moved with the quiet confidence of someone completely at home in his own body. Maybe because somebody had been completely at home with his, the night before, Rita cheekily thought.

  ‘Buenos días, everyone.’ He rolled his shoulders. ‘I hope you enjoyed your time on the beach last night. This morning, I welcome you to Hatha yoga. Today, we go slow. We breathe. We stretch. We feel amazing, sí?’

  ‘As long as old blue eyes himself here doesn’t keep breaking into song,’ Annie announced, putting one hand into her tight yoga top and rearranging her huge breasts. ‘If I hear “Fly Me to the Moon” one more time, well…’ Rita was sure she was actually directing her comments with affection towards Michael. ‘He nearly got a croissant through his flap this morning.’

  Lola screwed her face up. ‘Please tell me that’s not a euphemism.’ Everyone laughed.

  Michael woke up. ‘Let this poor old bastard feel happy for one minute, at least, can you? Last night was the first time I’ve enjoyed myself for a long time.’

  Lola giggled. ‘And at least it was in tune.’

  ‘Thank you, Lola,’ Michael replied, looking to Annie, who smothered him in baby air kisses.

  Teo continued, his voice warm and steady. ‘In Hatha, we balance, sun and moon, strength and softness. No need to rush. This is not a race. We are not on our horses,’ he added with a wink toward Rita, who was at the back about to join in, and smiled back warmly in return.

  He stepped onto his own mat. ‘So… we start simple. Sit tall. Close your eyes. Inhale… exhale… forget the to-do list, forget the phone, forget the singing.’

  Teo smiled to himself as he stood up and looked around at everybody doing as they were told, serene looks on their faces.

  ‘This place,’ he whispered when he was alongside Rita, ‘is almost better than the racetrack.’

  Michael and Lola walked out of the barn, shaking out limbs and laughing about who would be the most sore tomorrow. An unlikely friendship, Rita thought, especially considering how much the young woman had despised the filter-free lawyer at first. Annie lingered by the door, rubbing her shoulder with a thoughtful expression. ‘Hey, Rita?’

  Rita stopped from tidying away the yoga mats. ‘You all right, Annie?’

  ‘I’m great, thanks. I just wondered, if it’s not too much trouble, would you… maybe show me where the Reformer Studio is one day? I think I’d like to try it properly. Get a bit fitter, you know.’ Her big personality seemed smaller somehow.

  Rita smiled. ‘Of course I will. I’ve been avoiding doing a full session, actually. We’ll go together.’

  THIRTY-ONE

  Rita jumped at the gentle tap on the kitchen window, turned off the iron and went to the front door. Zenya smiled as she bustled through the kitchen doorway, a basket of freshly picked herbs and vegetables tucked under one arm.

  ‘I thought I’d put together a special menu tonight.’ Rita noted her flawless skin tanned from the glorious weather they had been having prior to today’s rain. Her salt-stiff plaits were knotted with lavender stems. ‘The guests have been here a whole week now; feels like they deserve something a bit more celebratory. Something fresh, seasonal, and from the garden. If that’s OK with you, of course.’ She laid the basket on the kitchen table, spilling out glossy courgettes, ruby-red tomatoes, fragrant basil and a handful of wild berries.

  ‘Great idea. I’m not offering alcohol on a whim. We can use up the leftover elderflower fizz. I need to keep eye on our profits.’

  ‘They’ll probably be knackered after last night anyway. I saw Paul creeping back up with his head torch on way after the others.’

  ‘Oh, did you?’ Rita replied breezily.

  ‘You like him, don’t you?’ Zenya smiled, catching Rita’s eye knowingly. Rita flushed and busied herself at the sink.

  Zenya switched topics, ‘I’m thinking a roasted veg tart like I did at Hilda’s the other night, and for pudding, a raspberry crumble topped with coconut cream. Light, tasty and perfect for this time of year.’

  ‘You’re amazing, Zenya, that’s what you are.’ Rita wiped her hands on a tea towel.

  ‘I wish to be,’ Zenya replied coyly, her cheeks now colouring. ‘Being around you… it’s like having the big sister I always hoped for. Someone strong and kind who doesn’t pretend to have it all figured out but just keeps going anyway.’ Rita swallowed as Zenya’s voice softened. ‘I never really had that. A person who makes you feel like you matter. So, thank you, Rita. For letting me in.’