Island Hideaway 40 - You can see the sea

"I can't believe you own this island, it's beautiful. And you own the dodos. Every dodo in the world belongs to you.​"
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"No, I just own the island. The dodos belong to themselves."
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"Now the Boatman had seen Mo there was no reason not to go out in daylight.​"
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"It takes a lot of work. The paths soon become overgrown.​"
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"But you're surrounded by sea. You can walk round and round the coastal path and see sea everywhere you go.​"
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"Did you miss the sea when you left Swansea?​"
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"I missed it like crazy. Christ, corporate life, it's a mad world. I missed lots of things.​"
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Did you miss me, I thought, but didn't say, for I already knew the answer.
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xxx​

 

The beach was our confessional. We would take long walks at night, just the two of us, and reveal our innermost woes, amid the usual silliness, gossip, politics and puns. ​​
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"Julie's left me," I would confess to her.​​
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"Which one's Julie?"​​
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"The one from the writers group."​​
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"The one you've fancied for months."​​
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"Yes."  That Julie.​​
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"I didn't know you were going out."​​
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"We went out on Saturday. I persuaded her to see a film and we went for a drink afterwards."​​
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"Well?"​​
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"She left me on Sunday."​​
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"And?" Even though I couldn't see her face in the clouded night I knew her expression, eager, interested, interrogative. 'Did you?' is what she wanted to know.​​
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"I stayed at hers," I said, using the most neutral words I could find. ​​
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"Yay! You shagged Julie. You've been dying to do that."​​
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"I suppose," I said. "But it couldn't have been a great shag, she left me the next day."​​
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"Oh well," Mo said.​​
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"Oh well," I said.​​
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We walked over a mile in complete silence between her 'Oh well' and my 'Oh well'. It was that sort of night.​​