McCredited: UTM April 2025

MCCREDITED

Clemmie frowned – the road was unusually busy this November afternoon and the skies were dark. She gripped the steering wheel as if that would somehow get her there faster.
Why exactly why was she driving down to the family holiday home in the Norfolk salt marshes at this busy time of year before Christmas? She needed to get away – that was the 'official' reason. But from what exactly?
‘We could, you know, go away somewhere?’ her friend Paul had said before she set out on her own. ‘A break for both of us . . . ?’
     She’d noticed what his gaze really meant and stepped back.
‘Don’t decide now,’ he’d said. ‘Later. I can wait.’
Let him wait, then.
     Rounding a corner, she saw the vast North Sea come into view. She took a deep breath and relaxed. Bill always loved that first glimpse of the sea. Oh Bill . . . All those plans.
     She turned on some folk music for company. They had last come here three years previously. They’d known he was ill and had wanted to spend his remaining time near his beloved Norfolk Marshes. Later, she’d adapted to life on her own and felt confident this more-or-less settled, planned existence would continue.     
She’d left work two years before – three years after Barney’s passing. But all of her plans fell apart. She’d planned her retirement for the summer. Plenty to do in the garden and some travel. But she hadn’t accounted for the fact that, when it came to it, she neither wanted to work in the garden or travel. Could she find her once-happy state? Or was this it?

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