Pastures New
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‘I think you might need this,’ said Amy, laughing now through her tears, and she held out the ring.
‘Where? How?’ Ben was laughing too.
‘You’ll never believe it, but I found it on a leaf,’ said Amy.
‘That’s unbelievable,’ Ben replied, and kissed her again. ‘So do I get an answer or what?’
‘Yes,’ said Amy. ‘You were right and I was wrong. I’ve been so miserable without you. I can’t go through life not taking risks and keeping myself wrapped in cotton wool. So, I’m not going to any more. I choose to live. And I choose to live with you.’
Ben wrapped her up in his arms and held her tight.
‘You have no idea how much I have dreamed that you would change your mind. You know, from the very first moment I saw you, and realised how vulnerable you were, all I wanted to do was fix you, and heal the hurt in your eyes.’
‘And you have.’ Amy smiled up at him, feeling content and safe and happy.
‘Good,’ said Ben. ‘I wasn’t sure whether we’d be able to have this or not, but now we can.’
He held out a glass of champagne and they silently toasted one another.
‘Oh, and there’s one last thing,’ said Ben, leading her by the hand out to the allotments again. ‘Stay there.’
Picking up a box, he walked into the middle of Harry’s allotment, where he had cleared a space.
‘I meant to use these at Saffron’s last fireworks party, but forgot all about them. I hope they still work.’ He knelt down and lit the box of fireworks, and then raced back to Amy.
And together they watched as the fireworks set the allotments alight. The last rays of the sun finally dipped over the horizon, and they stayed together as their happiness was written in the sky.
‘To Harry,’ said Ben, raising his glass. ‘Do you know, if it wasn’t incredibly fanciful, I could almost think I just heard him laughing.’
‘Me too,’ said Amy, raising her glass. ‘Here’s to us.’
‘And life,’ said Ben. ‘Let’s toast life in all its strange and painful glory.’
‘To life,’ said Amy, as the last firework faded and fell to earth. Wherever Jamie was, she had a feeling he would be pleased.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
So many people have helped me on the road to publication, it is quite hard to know where to begin.
Firstly, I would like to thank the Romantic Novelists’ Association for having given me so much support and help over the last nine years. I am hesitant to name names in case I forget anyone but I would especially like to thank Katie Fforde for endless support and encouragement, Jenny Haddon for frequent and sound good advice, Eileen Ramsay for wit and humour and Susan Hicks for sharing my love of rock music. Thanks go, too, to Penny Jordan and Rosie Milne for their helpful critiques when this book was at an early stage, and to Sue Moorcroft for giving me such a positive report for the NWS scheme.
Thanks are due, too, to Anne Finnis and David Fickling for so much encouragement and help.
I would also like to thank Kate Boydell, Joanna Clark and Penny Jordan for their insights into widowhood. For advice about various points of detail during the writing of the book, I’d like to thank Caroline Praed and Catherine Wheeler for checking medical facts, Tracey Kells and Jane Hunnable for gardening advice, Gaynor Kent for telling me about teaching, and Indira Hann, Jeannette Groark and Paula Moffatt for helping me with legal points.
I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Hilary Johnson who gave me the confidence to keep going at a point when I might nearly have given up, and to Kate Mills who showed me a way to open up my writing.
I am immensely grateful to my long-suffering and patient agent, Dot Lumley, who has had such faith in me over the years.
And to Maxine Hitchcock, editor extraordinaire, Keshini Naidoo, Caroline Ridding and the rest of the Avon team I extend my huge thanks.
I would also like to thank all the Radio 2 DJs who regularly brighten my day by being my friends in the kitchen, in particular Jeremy Vine whose programme frequently gives me food for thought, and the inestimable Terry Walton from the Official Allotment who has taught me such a lot about growing vegetables.
I also would like to thank my wonderful brother-in-law, Chris Coles, for coming up with such a fiendish Crucial Three! Finally, I have to say thank you to: John, Joanna, Paula, Lucy, Ginia, Hugh and Tom for being the best siblings one could hope for outside of an episode of The Waltons, and to my amazing mother, Ann Moffatt (who beats Ma Walton hands down), for teaching me to believe in myself.
To my wonderful mother-in-law, Rosemarie Williams, many thanks for reading and liking the book!
Without walking my children Katie, Alex, Christine and Steph to school every day, there wouldn’t have been a plot, although without them I might have written the book a bit sooner! Thank you for making my life so – er – interesting.
And for Dave. Thanks probably aren’t enough. But you know what I mean.
The course of true love never did run smooth!
Find out more about MIDSUMMER MAGIC by Julia Williams here ...
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PASTURES NEW
Julia Williams has always made up stories in her head, and until recently she thought everyone else did too. She grew up in London, one of eight children, including a twin sister, and now lives in Surrey with her husband and four daughters. For more information on Julia Williams, please visit her website at www.juliawilliamsauthor.com
Follow @JCCWilliams on Twitter
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This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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A Paperback Original 2007
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Copyright © Julia Williams 2007
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Julia Williams, Pastures New