I hear the curtains blowing around upstairs in the breeze like they always do. I don’t really like it much, for it reminds me of Lundy.

I think a lot about Lundy and our time there. Every afternoon, like clockwork, as I hear the wind, that farmhouse by the cliff comes to mind.

Julie-Ann comes in, at last. She looks freezing cold. With the wind and the bright sharp overnight, the temperature has been minus five, or thereabouts, all day.

“Any coffee on the stove. For the worker?” she says. I feel the pain of the rebuke deep inside me. I quickly get over it and shuffle over to the kitchen. I respond to her sharpness, not out of guilt, but out of fear.

For she knows.

Julie-Ann always knows. All about me, that is.

“What are you doing now then?”

It is barely a question, more a sweeping statement of what we have here.

Two bitter people, holding themselves together, for no other reason than lethargy and money and memories of brighter times.

Now she’s looking at me, closely, as she does sometimes.

Even across the parlour, I sense that she actually hates me. For what I stand for. For who I am. For, well, everything about me, actually.

How can I go on like this, I reflect as I sit there in this super-toxic atmosphere? Where can I go, right now to get out of this?

We have the place on Lundy, of course. Is that an option, I ask myself quietly?

Suddenly, she speaks.

“Why do I do this?” She asks. I think self-reproachingly. I don’t know how to answer that, so I bide my time.

I know from past experience that there’s a trap hidden in that sort of question, somewhere. I just don’t know how to interpret it, that’s all.

So I wait. Give her space.

“Why the fuck do I do this?” I’m silent. The air is thick with drama. And I don’t want my head on that plate right now.

“I get so disillusioned. Why must it be this way?”

I’m breathing, just a little now, for I see a chink in the words that might just mean it’s not about me. But it’s fragile and I know this is going one way, or the other.

“What do you mean, pet?” I ask, trembling so much inside, I fear that she sees. If she looks at me closely and sees, once again, that I doubt myself.

“Why do I hate you so?” Now, she’s thinks out loud and I think it’s better not to help out with some suggestions, for it is still on a razor’s edge. Say the wrong thing and I’m back in the firing line, and we all know what that means.

Over the hill, there’s the sea. A fine wind is blowing and yet, it is so refreshing as the gritty salt air attacks my face. Still we walk towards it, for there is an attraction; a magnetism that draws us along the cliff edge to the sea.

“I love you,” she whispers, “I do. I just know it.” She tucks herself into my sleeve to keep her self as warm as the smile on her face.

“I am staying here forever,” I smile back, in the wind and the bright sunshine that makes my eyes squint.

But we cannot. We know that. It’s illicit this time we have here on the island. And we both know it. We go back and hope we can make something work out.

And we do, slowly, despite the odds, we make it and run away for good. No-one follows us. No-one cares enough to chase.

It is even less likely now. With me sat on one side of the draughty room and her on the other, having a little meltdown, while I cower.

“What’s to become of us?” She pleads.

“Nothing.” I venture, not knowing what to expect, for she can be erratic.

“We’re stuck with what we have right now, to the end of time.”

“Life’s a bitch. And then you die.” It’s an afterthought. And a worthy one.

I smile.