Lovely Little Things in Pretty Beach : A magical feel-good romance book to escape with in summer 2021.

by Polly Babbington

  Lulu pulled frantically on her brakes and tried to swerve around the door but as she did so she knew she wasn’t going to make it. She was going to collide with the car door. She tried in vain to veer to the right but it was no good. Bang.

  One minute she was on her bike reminiscing about her childhood by the sea, gazing at the bakery, the next minute she was lying on the road looking at a pair of men’s boat shoes and the side of a car door and a voice. A not that sorry-sounding voice.

  ‘Are you okay?’ the voice asked.

  Lulu blinked looking up at the sky, put her hand on the floor and went to get up, stopped, and looked down at both her hands as trickles of blood mixed with gravel and dirt ran down the sides of her palms. Her hands then moved to her face where she could feel burning on her cheek. Then the pain hit her in the back of her leg.

  The man squatted down and placed his hand on her arm and Lulu looked up. Looking back at her was the tanned blonde man with the green eyes from the bakery when she’d dropped her sunglasses.

  Lulu scrambled to get up, felt pain sear into the back of her thigh and fell back down again. She held out her hands in front of her and continued to stare at the mess on her palms, shaking her head in disbelief.

  ‘Take it slowly,’ the man said and put his hand on her arm as Lulu gazed up at the handsome face and didn’t say a word back at him.

  What in the world was that? Did my heart just skip a beat? I’m lying on the floor and I’m noticing honeyed skin? What? I must be concussed. Yes, that’s it. Gah! I have a head injury as well as blood everywhere.

  Lulu felt tears prick at the edges of her eyes as she looked down at the blood on her trousers, the grazes and cuts on her palms, and the pain in her leg throbbed from behind.

  ‘Take a deep breath,’ the man said, and as Lulu’s eyes widened she did the complete opposite and looking into the green eyes she felt as if she had lost the capacity to breathe. To think. To do anything at all. Whoever this was she wanted him to put his arms around her, scoop her up, and make everything better. Make her whole life better.

  Had she lost the ability to inhale as she’d fallen off the bike? Had the world tilted backwards and forwards and then suddenly stopped turning? Had the air frozen and rooted her to the floor?

  Lulu blinked slowly and gasped as she went to stand up. ‘I, I’m, umm, I’m fine, I think,’ she said thinking that she wasn’t but not wanting this stranger to know. What she really wanted to do was get up, leave the bike where it was, and run off into the sunset with him never to be seen again.

  ‘I’m so sorry. I did look behind me. You must have been right in my blind spot. I don’t know how that happened. God, I feel awful!’

  Lulu again didn’t say anything back. She couldn’t stop staring. How did she breathe again? She had temporarily lost her mind and the ability to do anything but gape.

  ‘I’m Ollie,’ the man said as he started to pick up Lulu’s bike. ‘Wow, nice bike. It’s one of those e-bikes. Ahh, right, is that why I didn’t see you? You were going too fast, were you?’

  Lulu continued to stare and didn't reply. It was as if her mouth wouldn’t move. It had frozen still along with her heart.

  ‘Hello. Are you okay? You’re not saying much. The e-bike. Was it going too fast?’

  Lulu spluttered. ‘No! I didn't even have it turned on!’

  Ollie propped the bike up and helped Lulu up as she winced from the pain in the back of her leg and held out her hands in front of her. Ollie looked down at the hands.

  ‘You’re going to need those hands looked at,’ he said, shaking his head.

  ‘No, no, I’m fine. Thank you. All good. I’ll just sort them out when I get home.’

  ‘No. You’re not fine. Those cuts are pretty deep. Come on. I’ll drive you over to the surgery. We’ll see what they say. Hopefully, they’ll be able to patch you up in there,’ Ollie said as he held onto Lulu’s elbow, put his hand in the small of her back, and led her around to the passenger side of his car.

  ‘My bike. I can’t just leave it here!’ Lulu suddenly remembered.

  ‘Not a problem. I’ll put the seats down in the back. I think I’ll just about be able to squeeze it in.’

  As Lulu leant down into the car she started to feel disorientated and grabbed onto the stranger’s arm.

  ‘Woah. See, you’re not fine at all. You’re all over the show.’

  Lulu nodded, climbed into the passenger seat and rested her head back onto the headrest feeling now as if pain was hitting her in every part of her body. She closed her eyes as she heard the seats behind her going down and her bike being put into the back of the car.

  With silence in the car and Lulu with closed eyes, Ollie drove slowly through Pretty Beach and parked in the car park of the surgery. ‘Wait there. I’ll go in and see what they say.’

  After what felt like ages as Lulu dealt with the pain, Ollie came back out, opened the passenger door, and leant in. ‘We’re in luck. The nurse is in for a clinic and she’s free for a bit.’

  Lulu sighed, undid her seatbelt and slid herself slowly out of the car. ‘I’m feeling fine now. Thanks for dropping me off.’

  ‘I’ll come in with you and make sure you’re okay.’

  Thirty minutes later, Lulu was sitting with the nurse who had cleaned up and bandaged Lulu’s hands, sorted out the gash in the back of her leg, and told her that the wounds were not serious but would need to be redressed.

  Lulu had closed her eyes, sighed, and ever-so-quietly tutted.

  Great. I turn up at a new job where one must be meticulously turned out limping and with the palms of my hands bandaged. Fabulous. I need this like a hole in the head.

  Once the nurse had finished, Lulu had booked an appointment for the following week, had been prescribed painkillers, she looked down at her outfit, and grimaced. The white chinos were filthy, the little scarf at her neck she had tied just so was stuffed into her pocket with her phone, and there was a nick in the cuff of her exceedingly expensive cream jumper.

  Idiot. Absolute idiot who opened his door. Idiot who is so handsome that in itself would have knocked me off my bike.

  Lulu shook her head and admonished herself for even registering that the man who had opened his door into her was gorgeous. He looked much younger than her, had an air about him of she did not know what, and would not be looking twice at a newly-divorced forty-two-year-old needing to lose a few pounds.

  Lulu went to push open the surgery door and it opened from the outside and there he was again, the handsome younger man.

  ‘All done?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. Look, thanks for dropping me here that was really kind of you.’

  ‘Not a problem. Right. Let’s get you home.’

  ‘Yeah, umm, no, I’ll be fine to ride my bike now I’m all patched up.’

  ‘You’re a very funny woman, Lulu. So, I knock you flying off your bike, which I now know thanks to Google is actually known as ‘dooring,’ and you come out of the doctors neck-high in bandages and you think that I’m going to let you ride your bike home? Funny lady. Wrong. Get in,’ he said as he clicked the remote on his car and opened the passenger door for Lulu.

  Lulu blinked, got in the car and sat back in the seat as Ollie leaned over. ‘Where are we off to, then? Do you live in Pretty Beach?’

  ‘I do. Correct,’ Lulu replied.

  ‘Okay. Yep, where?’

  ‘Over the other side on Seafolly Passage.’

  ‘Ooh. Very nice too. One of the best spots in Pretty Beach, I do believe,’ Ollie noted.

  ‘Thanks,’ Lulu said, thinking about the dilapidated house she’d just inherited and how she was going to go now with trying to do something to it while she was bandaged on both hands and limping. This accident was going to put her back loads.

  Lulu said nothing as the car turned this way and that through Pretty Beach. She tried to sneak a glance at the profile of this handsome man and made a pointed look at his left hand.

  No wedding ring! D
uh, that means nothing. He’s like five years younger than you. Stop it. Stop it right now.

  ‘So, Lulu. Lulu what? As in surname?’

  ‘Lulu Drinkwater. True blue Pretty Beach. Well, I used to be. I’ve just moved back,’ Lulu said as the car indicated to turn into Seafolly Passage. ‘Right down at the end there.’

  ‘What, the beach end?’ Ollie asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Wow! Very nice. I love it down here. I’ve been looking myself for a while.’

  Lulu repeated what he had just said in her head, “Myself” hmm. Interesting.

  ‘Yes, it is a nice spot,’ Lulu replied quickly wondering whether or not she should pretend she lived in another property other than Seafolly House.

  As the car went further and further down Seafolly Passage Lulu saw her Audi and pointed it out. ‘Just there on the right. The one with the blue car outside.’

  Ollie pulled the car alongside Lulu’s and peered up at the house. ‘What? This one! Goodness, I’ve walked past this one a few times. I thought it was a squatter’s house a few years ago.’

  Lulu closed her eyes. ‘Hmm. Well, it’s now very much all mine.’

  ‘Sorry, you actually live in it currently?’ Ollie exclaimed. ‘You live in it now? In this state!’

  ‘Yep. I actually do,’ Lulu said in a very small voice.

  ‘Christ alive. It’s a beautiful house under all that, errr, work. The bones of the place are amazing. It has a jetty out the back too, doesn’t it?’

  ‘It does, and a small boathouse. And a shop too, actually.’

  ‘A shop? Wow!’ Ollie replied.

  ‘Yep, not a big shop. It’s tiny and not on the property itself. That little lane that runs down the back there. There are a few shops there. They used to be quite run-down but slowly the area has changed. Do you know it there at all?’ Lulu asked.

  ‘I do actually. There’s a little fishing shop along there. More a kiosk really. I’ve used it a few times.’

  ‘Yep. That's the one. Well, I have a shop there too. I’m just waiting for the tenant to finish up the lease. He’s been there for years and has had enough. Anyway, well that’s me. Thanks for dropping me off,’ Lulu said, gingerly moving her legs towards the door.

  Ollie got out and sprinted around to open the door and help Lulu get out. ‘Where shall I put your bike?’ Ollie said, looking again at the house and raising his eyebrows at the condition of it. Lulu held onto the car and gaped yet again at the honey skin.

  ‘In the garage, if you wouldn’t mind. I’m not sure when I’ll be riding it again now.’ Lulu laughed as she held up her bandaged hands. A few minutes later Ollie had got the bike out of the back of the car and was wheeling it across the weeds on the driveway. Lulu passed him the keys to the garage from her basket.

  ‘You don’t see garage doors like this nowadays. Look at them. They’re beautiful,’ Ollie said as he turned the key in the lock.

  ‘I know. They are. The whole house is beautiful, actually. I didn’t appreciate it before. It just needs a lot of work,’ Lulu said as Ollie opened the garage doors and wheeled in the bike.

  ‘Oh! Okay! What, so the garage has been cleaned up? And you have a fridge and stuff in here?’ Ollie asked.

  Lulu sighed and smiled. ‘Look, it’s a bit of a long story to be quite honest, and I’m really tired after all that.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, sorry. I’ll be off, then. So sorry again about before.’

  ‘Not a problem. Okay then, Ollie. Thanks again for helping me and taking me to the surgery.’

  ‘Why don’t you take my number in case, I don’t know, you need to sue me or something,’ Ollie said with a chuckle. ‘Or you need some help getting to the surgery again.’

  Lulu laughed, pulled out her phone, and took his number and then he walked back out onto Seafolly Passage and got in his car.

  As Ollie pulled away Lulu looked down at his number.

  I don’t think it’s suing I’d be after if I did so happen to call you.

  10

  The next day after an uncomfortable sleep, Lulu woke up with the palms of her hands throbbing, the graze on her cheek sore, and the cut in the back of her leg pounding. Mabel looked up at her from her bed with her big brown eyes as Lulu winced when she swung her legs around the side of the bed, reached for her glass of water and painkillers, pushed the tablets out of the packet, and swigged them back with the water.

  ‘Yes, Mabel. That certainly was a bit of a disturbed night. Sorry about that,’ Lulu said as she pulled open the temporary curtains she’d pinned up at the study window and bright light flooded into the room.

  ‘Right. A pot of tea and breakfast is needed and then somehow with these, we need to do a little more work in the garden,’ Lulu said holding up her bandaged hands. ‘No rest for the wicked in this household. The clock is ticking, Mabel. Once I start with the Cavendish Group I’m going to have even less time to get this place ship-shape. I am not letting these injuries stop me,’ Lulu stated.

  Mabel seemed as if she nodded in agreement, stretched, and slowly dragged herself out of her bed and trotted along behind Lulu as they made their way through the inner hallway to the kitchen.

  Lulu grimaced as she pushed open the kitchen door and as she stepped in, she stopped suddenly and looked around. Her hands might be hurting but the kitchen wasn’t. The beautiful sunny day and the newly-painted kitchen, which she hadn’t really been able to ascertain the progress of before, looked so much better.

  Sunshine flooded in through the paned windows running all the way across the back landing on the huge farmhouse table in the middle. The double butler sink was now clean and the tap working, the white cupboards underneath almost shone in the sunlight, and the wall on the right leading to the conservatory where Lulu had reglued the Lincrusta wallpaper and painted was now adding its gorgeous textured pattern to everything.

  ‘Oh, Mabel! What a turn up for the books! Gosh, it looks so much brighter in here!’ Lulu exclaimed.

  Mabel barked in response and went and stood over near the door to the boot room, and sniffed underneath as Lulu ran her bandaged hands and fingers along the newly painted white cupboards on the left wall and gazed around the room. The huge shelf fixed to the alcove over the Aga was now white and the once creamy yellow wall behind had been rollered twice with white emulsion.

  Lulu smiled and turned around. Even the sight of the massive dresser which was yet to be painted and the vast bank of open shelving couldn’t dampen her spirits. She could barely even admit it to herself but the kitchen was looking as if it could have just walked out of a Pinterest board. Only six bedrooms and the whole of the ground floor to go.

  Lulu smiled wryly to herself as she flicked on the fancy smart kettle Willow had bought for her, and thought about the state-of-the-art hot water tap in the kitchen she’d left in London. Fenton had liked all the mod cons and cars, bathrooms and kitchens to be replaced every few years. There were certainly no mod cons in Seafolly House. It was like going from chalk to cheese.

  The Seafolly House kitchen was original: the last time the plumbing had been properly overhauled had been many moons ago and the nearest it got to having any mod cons was the central heating system which itself looked as if it had been installed when Lulu was a child. Oh, the bones though. How good were the bones? And now that Lulu had been in the house for a while, had got used to its strange creaks and sounds, its vast rooms and plot just by the sea, she had begun to see just how lucky she was to be in Seafolly House, modern touches or not.

  Making herself a cup of tea and warming a chocolate croissant in the microwave, Lulu made her way around the kitchen being careful not to knock her bandaged hands. With the croissant and teapot on a tray, she opened the back door, stepped out onto the terrace, and made her way to the little suntrap outside the kitchen window where she’d set up a makeshift table and chair.

  Putting her tea on the table she propped up her phone against an old terracotta flower pot and sent a picture of her bandaged
hands to her friend Lottie, who lived in another part of Pretty Beach on Strawberry Hill. A response came back instantly.

  What the heck! How on earth did you manage that?

  It’s a very long story.

  That’s not very helpful with all the work you’ve got on your plate.

  Nup. It’s not too bad though. I’m not going to let it stop me. I’m determined to break the back of it and finish the kitchen.

  Is that really a good idea?

  Who knows but I’m on a mission before I start the training for work.

  So where did you get treated? Did you have to go to Newport?

  No, I was lucky. The nurse was on at the surgery.

  Right. So, is it a cut or grazes?

  Both, hence the dressing.

  Yeah, be careful then. One of the boys, I think it was George, had something similar and he wouldn’t sit still so it just kept opening up and wouldn’t heal. It got infected in the end too.

  Thanks, Lottie!

  Ha! Soz. You know me always being a mum. Right, so how’s this going to affect the job?

  I’ve still got a week to go so I’m hoping I’ll be healed by then.

  Don’t hold your breath. Those look like serious bandages.

  I presume you know about the dress code etc. in there?

  Yeah. Willow told me but I’ve heard it before.

  Bandaged hands are not part of the look of the Cavendish Group I don’t think. Lulu typed and sent a laughing emoticon.

  They are most definitely not. You are, though. You’re right up their street. I reckon you’d be able to teach them a thing or two about accessories actually. Lottie replied.

  Oh, you make me laugh! I thought the same. I found myself mentally analysing how I would change the accessories and add a base uniform to consolidate it. It’s hardly bad but a few little tweaks, a beautifully cut pair of trousers, and it would be much better.