Scottlander

by Samantha Liddell

  SCOTTLANDER

  A JOURNEY TO A NEW CHAPTER

  SAMANTHA LIDDELL

  First Published in 2018

  Copy Right Samantha Liddell

  Edited by Andrea Reeves

  Printed and Bounded by Ligare Book Printers

  Written by Liddell, Samantha ISBN 13: 978-0-9922702-2-3 (PBK) All rights reserved.

  No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise without the Prior permission of the Publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Dedicated to

  My two daughters Patience and Alexis.

  Of all the things I’ll ever do in my life time, mothering my children will always be my greatest accomplishment.

  And for Diana

  Without her there would never have been a Jamie or Claire.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  A Leap of Faith

  Chapter Two

  The Hard Conversation That Needed To Be Had

  Chapter Three

  Preparation For Departure

  Chapter Four

  The Journey Through The Rocks, Aka, The Flight Across One Huge Ocean!

  Chapter Five

  Scotland, Here We Are!

  Chapter Six

  First Day On The Job

  Chapter Seven

  Morning Tea Service

  Chapter Eight

  Glasgow Music Festival, Here We Come!

  Chapter Nine

  Last Month In Scotland

  Chapter Ten

  Heading Home After Six Months And Four Days

  Chapter Eleven

  Ozlander – No Place Like Home

  Chapter One

  A Leap of Faith

  “Sassenach! Sassenach! Oh, my Sassenach, over here! Where have you been?”

  I heard the voice of my beloved Scottish Highlander calling out to me in that oh so manly, yet sweet, accent of his. His face expressed such worry, concern and love towards me, towards his very own Sassenach. Me, the woman he loves, the woman he adores and protects with his body and soul, the woman he respects the most.

  I ran towards him, wearing nothing but my shift which was ripped at the bottom and falling off one shoulder after walking, lost on my own, through the rugged wet highlands of Scotland, and after falling into an icy cold Scottish river and ditching the rest of my clothes on the bank to avoid catching hypothermia. The day before, I had wandered off from the Outlander tour group as we were exploring the lands where the very popular TV series was filmed. Me, being the adventurous type, and a person who loses focus fast, got so distracted by some beautiful dear leaping around in the lush Scottish green grass, that I forgot about the world around me and got my camera out instead. I had followed the creatures, trying to capture the most perfect photo, and by the time I had realised what I was doing, and had turned around to see where my new, Outlander obsessed friends were, they were nowhere to be seen. I had gone so deep into the Scottish woodlands that I had no idea which direction I had come from.

  I walked and walked for what seemed like days. I caught rabbits with my very own hands, and cooked them on an open fire that I started by rubbing two rocks together. Yes, it actually works in reallife, not just on Outlander! I even surprised myself how fast it caught alight! I fell asleep next to the fire that night, feeling the heat of it warming every part of my body through my thin, ripped shift as I dreamt of my Scottish lover, my Scottish man, my Scottish soul mate, dreaming that we were spooning together, our bodies connected as one. We were meant for each other. I knew he would find me and scoop me up with his strong, bare hands, wearing just his kilt, and protect me from the harsh elements and wild animals that lived out in the Scottish woods.

  I woke the next morning to the sound of bagpipes playing, and no fire in sight, then found myself running down the Royal Mile. The Royal Mile runs through the heart of Edinburgh, and I could see the Edinburgh Castle in the distance, overpowering everything with its unique beauty, apart from one thing of course: the thing calling out, “Sassenach, Sassenach. Oh, my Sassenach, I have found you!” His beauty outshone the Edinburgh castle in more ways than one.

  As I ran towards him, my feet felt like they were made of concrete, lifting each foot to step forward towards my man felt impossible. One step forward, two steps back it felt like. I was making no ground in getting any closer to my soul mate, yet I wondered why he was not running towards me. He just continued to stand at the other end of the Royal Mile, calling out to me, calling for me to come to him. His glorious red hair was blowing in the cold Scottish wind, his perfect cheeky grin making one side of his mouth longer than the other as he smiled, his kilt blowing up around his oh, so perfect knees.

  The noise of the bagpipes continued, I normally loved the sound of bagpipes, of course I did, they were Scottish. I loved everything Scottish – half my wardrobe consisted of tartan clothing, haggis was now a meal I ate weekly (I did grow to like it in time) and I owned a Scottish Terrier called Rupert. Yes, after the Outlander character, you guessed it! Today though, the sound of the bagpipes being played by a guy standing outside the Royal Mile Tavern, just wasn’t cutting it. I was trying to lift my feet to run into the arms of my beloved, but I was still making no great ground. I grew frustrated. I turned and looked at the guy standing there in his kilt and knee high boots, blowing through that magnificent masterpiece of an instrument; today the sound he created made my frustration grow stronger.

  I wanted to rip the bagpipes out of his cold Scottish hands and throw them onto the snowy ground next to him, but all I did was yell, “Do you mind? I need to focus! I’m trying to get to the other end of the Royal Mile and into the arms of my Jamie, and your bagpipes are disrupting me!”

  “Aye,” the bagpiper said. “As you wish lassie. On your way, then. Don’t let me stop ye.”

  “Well, thank you!” I replied. “I would if I could, but I’m not getting very far anyway.”

  At that moment, the bagpipes stopped, and were replaced with a new sound, a voice that sounded mellow, yet whiny. An Australian accent yelling at me, “Get up Sheila! Your bloody bagpipe alarm has been going off for the last five minutes! The kids are downstairs yelling out for their breakfast! Do your job woman!”

  I pulled myself out from under the covers, rubbing my eyes, and trying to bring myself back to reality, but the thought of that made me grab the phone out of the hands of the person that had just called me Sheila. I yelled back at him, “I’m a Sassenach, thank you very much!” and pressed snooze as quickly as I could so that I could fall back to sleep and find myself back on the Royal Mile, and back in the arms of Jamie. No such luck, normality had set in, it was time to face the harsh reality of life.

  I found myself off Edinburgh’s Royal Mile, with my two feet firmly planted on my own kitchen floor. Wow! What a contrast! It feels like I travelled from there to here within minutes. ‘Wow! I’m just like Claire,’ I thought. ‘I’m a time traveller.’

  “Mummy, Mummy! You are pouring too much milk into my cornflakes! It’s overflowing!”

  Oops, once again, back to reality I come….

  I now found myself, once I had regained my focus again, pouring half the bottle of milk into my daughter’s bowl of cereal, which was resulting in milk dripping from the kitchen bench onto the tiled floor. Luckily, Rupert our Scottish Terrier was there to save the day, and was licking it up. Just like Rupert on Outlander, he was always there saving the day. ‘Oops, I’m slipping back into Outlander world, I
need to focus, and keep my head. Things to do: feed children, dress children, brush children’s hair, pack children’s bags, get children off to school, then get myself off to work. I can do this. Stay focused.’ Every part of me wanted to slip back into the world I had just left, thanks to my damn bagpipe alarm. Oh, and my so-called husband who calls me Sheila.

  I pulled up to the building site where my husband Paul works. He opened the door of the car to get out, but before he did, he turned around to the back seat where our two precious daughters sat in their school uniforms, all ready for their day at school. He said goodbye to them and blew each of them a kiss, which they caught and put in their pockets.

  “See you tonight,” he said, leaning over to make a cursory kiss in the air next to my cheek. This is what our relationship had come down to. We had found ourselves in a make or break situation.

  Next stop was school drop-off. I finally found a car-park, after losing a few spots to other school mums who were obviously more focused than I was. My two daughters, Leah and Polly, enjoyed school and had lots of friends, so were happy to be dropped off at the gate every morning. This meant that I could be on my way to another day of work at my, oh so exciting catering job. I did enjoy baking and cooking, but found myself needing a change from routine.

  I bent down to give my children a kiss and told them how amazing they were, how proud I was of them, and to have a wonderful day at school. They gave me a big hug and said, “Love you Mummy,” and off they went to find their friends, which left me standing at the school gate, watching them run and skip off in states of pure happiness.

  ‘Oh, to be a child again,’ I thought. ‘Not a worry in the world. Why can’t you be an adult but still play and think the way children do? Children live in the present, they don’t look much further than that.

  They don’t start thinking about what to cook for dinner that night at 10am in the morning; or damn, I left the washing out and now it has started raining, we’ll have no dry clothes for days now. Oh, why can’t I find a hot Scottish man who will sweep me off my feet, build me a log cabin and make passionate love to me every night? Okay, I don’t think a child would ever think that, but I for sure do. Children are happy right where they are at that very moment.’

  I was consumed with my happy thoughts, when I was brought back into focus by my friend Carol, who was also dropping her children off to school.

  “Oh my God!” she said. “I just finished the book Outlander that you lent me, and wow! Oh, my God wow! Do tell me, where do I find myself a Jamie?”

  I looked at her, and said with half a smile, “Only in your dreams Carol, only in your dreams.”

  I got back into my car, and pulled out of the school car park with my windows up and the air con cranking. It was another hot Australian day, forecast to reach thirty-five degrees by midday, for the fourth day in a row. I have never been a person who enjoys the heat. I always said give me a cold, wet day over a hot, sticky humid day. I laughed to myself and thought, ‘I know just the place where you can get those days all year round: good old Scotland.’ Scotland seemed to be the answer to all my problems lately. Scotland and Outlander that is.

  I glanced over to my handbag that sat on the passenger seat and saw, out of the corner of my eye, the Outlander book, Dragonfly in Amber poking out. Yes, that’s what I did on my one hour lunch breaks each day; I ate as fast as I could, then solved all my problems by having a quick Outlander reading fix.

  It was bumper to bumper traffic this morning. I pulled over to get some petrol and sent a text through to my boss to tell her that I would be late. Fifteen minutes later I was back on the motorway and just sat there, the cars were not moving at all. The cold air blowing from the air condition vents of my car’s dashboard blew my hair like I was in a hair commercial, telling people to buy this shampoo if they want hair that looks and blows like mine. I looked in the car mirror and thought, ‘Wow! I look pretty damn good for a 37, almost 38year-old. But my looks will be on the decline soon, I’m almost 40! I will need to find my Jamie before that occurs.’

  ‘Thank goodness for air con in this country,’ I thought. My next thought moved on to my husband Paul. We met seventeen years ago in Melbourne, through friends. We were 20 years old, and both didn’t have a care in the world. We drank and partied, and couldn’t get enough of each other. We were so in love. His brown hair and blue eyes melted my heart, but as the years went on we grew apart, as so many people do. We both had different goals and ideas in life, I was a dreamer and a go-getter; and he was more of a ‘stay in one place and just get through life, happy or not.’ I believed in chasing happiness if you were not happy. I believed happiness was found within but to be happy within, you had to be with and be around things that made you happy, and people who build you up, encourage and support you.

  Somehow, Paul and I had lost this spark, and we were going through each day just like the last one. We still loved each other, but we were not in love with each other. We were together for the children’s sake, although I often thought that this wasn’t the best option. As they say, ‘Happy parents make happy children.’ Our children were happy because Paul and I put on our happy faces around them, and were determined to create happy childhood memories for them. Our children were the most important things in both of our lives, and we loved them more than anything else in the world. This we agreed on. But we were most certainly not happy being with each other. Which made me think, isn’t life too short not to be happy?

  At that very moment, I yelled at the top of my lungs, “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING LETTICIA?” Then a thought popped into my head again: ‘Thank God for air con,’ which meant everyone’s car windows were up that day, so they were unable to hear my crazy outburst. Thank God for the Australian heat, today anyway.

  I continued to yell, after confirming that nobody waiting on the Bruce Highway, in Queensland, at 9am in the morning, could hear me. ‘Damn you Scotland, damn you Outlander, you have ruined my life! You have made me think, and want more in life and not just settle. Sorry Scotland, I don’t really mean that, I love you Scotland and Outlander.’ Oh my God, what’s happening to me?

  I turned to the car that was stopped in the lane beside me, and saw P plates stuck on the front and back windows. A surf board was tied, not very carefully, onto the roof racks. The guy driving had long, straggly hair that was just touching the tip of his shoulders, and looked like it could have done with a good wash with the shampoo I had been advertising in my car before. He was looking at me through the window, mouth opened wide, gawking at me like I was some crazy person. I looked at him and mouthed, ‘Bluetooth; talking to my boss,’ and gave him the thumbs up.

  At that moment, the traffic started to move, and our cars lost each other within minutes, and I may have lost my mind within those minutes too: I had decided that I would follow my dreams. However, my dreams will also contain the two most beautiful children in the world, they will come along on my adventure with me. ‘The More the Merrier,’ don’t they say? I hope that’s what they say. Is that what they say? Please tell me that’s what they say. More to the point, what will my husband say?

  Chapter Two

  The Hard Conversation That Needed To Be Had

  I got to work thirty minutes late that morning, and was greeted by my overly motivated and over enthusiastic boss rushing out the door.

  “Hello Letticia! Goodbye Letticia! I’m late for the meeting about that very important contract. I’ll be out all day!”

  ‘You know what that means?’ I thought…. Internet surfing! Time to organise my adventure! I’m a dreamer, I’m a go-getter remember. Yes, before I even talk to my husband, my mind is off on the prospect of this adventure. First though, I need to do all my day’s work in an hour, then the rest of the day is mine, with no boss asking if I had iced the chocolate eclairs, or if the order for Mr. Lowe’s 70th birthday is ready to go.

  My job is great; I have a passion for food and a passion to create. I work at a catering company in Brisbane called
‘First Class Catering’, where I am the head caterer. It is a job, and it pays well, although I would prefer to be working in a little Scottish country café, providing food to all the hot sexy Scottish guys coming in for their daily meal after riding on horseback through the Scottish Highlands collecting rent from their tenants. Does that still happen? Or is that just on Outlander? Maybe I truly am losing my mind.

  I spend the day looking for the cheapest flights, looking for tours the kids and I could go on, looking at accommodation options; all the things that I should be looking at after I had the very hard conversation that needed to be had with my husband. Though after 37 years of life, I have learned that my brain just doesn’t work that way – sort out the exciting stuff first, then work out the hard, essential stuff second – that was me!

  My work day came to an end. What a day! I was stuffed. I’d worked so hard on stuff that was unrelated to my job, and now it was time to do the reverse trip from this morning. It was time to pick the kids up from after-school care, then Paul from the work site, then back home to cook dinner, put the kids in the shower, and help the kids with their homework. Which I totally disagree with, children are at school for six hours a day, surely they don’t need more work to do at home as well. Let them be kids after school, let them relax and play instead of doing their spelling words and times tables over and over again. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for educating children, but there are other ways of doing so, like taking them on a trip overseas for six months. What do they say? That ‘Travel Broadens the Mind?’ Isn’t that what they say? I hope that’s what they say, because that’s what I’m going to do, with my two children in tow.

  The evening went smoothly and to routine, like most evenings – the girls played Lego after school and we walked Rupert to the park. Paul sat on the couch and watched TV as he ate from a bag of spicy tomato chips and dropped crumbs all over the couch and floor. I chose to pick my battle though, and not say a word. I needed to save my words for that very hard conversation that needed to be had, once the children were tucked up in bed and fast asleep for the night.