Page 156 of Carry Me Home

Still there.

The box is small. Velvet. Dark blue. Inside, a sapphire ring. Not aquamarine, like Peter’s. A different stone. A different man. But the same woman – the woman who told me once, walking past an antique shop in Truro, that sapphires were the colour of the sea when it catches the light. Peter never knew that. That memory is mine.

‘Back again?’ she’d said. ‘For yourself this time?’

‘For myself this time.’

I stood in that shop and I thought about the last time I was there – watching Peter’s face as he chose, the shape of joy of a man about to change his life. And I thought: I’m not replacing him. I’m continuing what he started. He chose the aquamarine because of me. I’m choosing the sapphire because of her.

Not today, though. Today belongs to Nina and the boat. The ring stays in my pocket. I’ll know when.

The harbour is transformed by noon.

Bunting everywhere – strung between lampposts, draped along the quay, fluttering from masts. Someone’s set up a speaker that’s playing sea shanties, which is either festive or aggressive depending on your feelings about maritime folk music. There are tables laden with food, a makeshift bar courtesy of The Ship, and what looks like half of Cornwall gathered on the cobblestones.

‘Bloody hell.’ I stop at the top of the lane. ‘Did we invite these many people?’

‘I invited twelve people,’ Nina says beside me. ‘Dot invited everyone else.’

‘Of course she did.’

‘She says it’s good for tourism. “A floating café launch is exactly what this village needs. Puts us on the map.”’

‘We’re already on the map.’

‘Not Dot’s map. Her map is very exclusive.’

We make our way down through the crowd. Every few steps, someone stops us – congratulations, good luck, can’t wait. Mrs Henderson from the bakery. Old Malcolm from the chandlery. A cluster of teenagers who seem to know Nina.

‘Miss Ellis! Is it true you’re serving coffee on a boat?’

‘That’s the plan.’

‘Can we get jobs? We’re very responsible.’

‘You’re fifteen.’

‘Responsible fifteen-year-olds.’

‘Talk to me in three years.’

They disperse, disappointed but not defeated. Nina watches them go with an expression that’s half-amusement, half-recognition – seeing herself at that age, already dreaming about coffee on the water. Peter thought she was mad.

She was. That’s never been mutually exclusive with brilliant.

‘Come on,’ I say. ‘Let’s go see your boat.’

Lavender Dreams looks incredible.

The sage-green paint gleams in the sunlight. The fairy lights – not lit yet, but ready – are strung along every rail and rafter. The serving hatch is open, revealing the espresso machine within, polished and gleaming, the twin of the one in the café. On the deck, cushions in shades of purple and blue. Weatherproof. Inviting. The kind of place that makes you want to sit down and stay.

‘Nina.’ I stop at the gangway. ‘It’s perfect.’

‘It’s not. The awning’s crooked and I think one of the cushions is already stained and Marcus says the wiring might still⁠—’

‘It’s perfect.’

She looks at it. Really looks – maybe for the first time today, through the fog of anxiety and logistics and the three-hundred-item checklist she’s been carrying in her head.