1 I am floating. I am floating on the crystal-clear water of whatever ocean laps around the sandy Greek shores of Preveza. Is it the Aegean Sea? Hmmm. I should probably know that. I'll google it when I'm back near my phone. Obviously I don't have my phone in the water. It's just me and presumably some fish, early afternoon sun bringing my skin-and if I wouldn't get laughed at by my ridiculous family for poetic hyperbole, I'd go as far as to say my very soul-back to life after three long years under gray Scottish skies. Actually, that's not strictly true. The university is under gray Scottish skies, and so for the most part I've been under strip lighting. Either way, this is the first time I've felt any semblance of hope, or freedom, or possibility, in ages. I once read that we're all solar-powered. I get that now. It's like when the sun is out and the water glistens, everything that came before melts away. So much doesn't matter here, unmoored, bobbing about, the sound of my own heart surprisingly good company. Even last Christmas and everything that happened feels far away, and after my breakdown I didn't think anything could be any worse than that. Only I could hit rock bottom and then discover it has a basement. Classic. Recovery can mean different things for different people. That's what my therapist says. Having a breakdown at twenty-four is part of who I am, and two years on, it's part of what's made me the resilient, hopeful phoenix-rising-from-the-ashes that gets to float in the sea and let her mind drift, happy to be alive. I was a wreck back then. A year into my PhD and I had a depression and anxiety that got worse and worse until I was signed off sick from my course and had to spend a month in a residential care facility. Even after I left, I had to have daily visits from the crisis team-but that's when I met my therapist, and she's changed my life. Well, I have changed my life actually, but she gave me the tools to do it. I've done a lot of work to get better. I had to stop fighting myself. I've journaled, medicated, walked, stretched, got back into running. I've made best friends with Hope, which isn't a joke: Literally, the woman I saw waiting outside my therapist's office three times a week is called Hope. It's not a metaphor. In fact I called her Despair for a while, as we got to know each other. It made her laugh. But after Jamie slipped that note under my door at Christmas, it tested my new tools to the limit. I was so humiliated. I went home for the holidays feeling so in balance, and suddenly there he was-my brother's best friend joining us for the festivities-and the vibe between us had shifted. I was open to it. "Am I imagining this?" he'd asked, after three days of . . . something. "No," I'd said. "Knock on my door later," I eventually told him, after a family movie night where his foot ended up pressed against mine under the blanket and the nearness of him almost made me explode. He never showed. His letter said he'd bottled it. I'd put myself out there and . . . Well, it's a good job I'd had all that therapy, because I needed every trick in the book to pull myself back together. Yeah, it was only a few days of whatever-it-was developing between us, but all my "positive thinking" and "soothing visualizations" had me thinking I'd actually get to have a bit of fun for once. Because, spoiler alert: Nobody wants to date the woman who had a nervous breakdown. I had thought Jamie "got it," what with his own trauma. I thought he understood me. So that's what hit hardest. I know now that I should never have trusted him, because first impressions are nearly always right: He really is a vapid womanizer, and I will never fall for his charms again because I have worked too damned hard for my self-respect. I've not seen him since then. We've avoided each other. Which is why it pisses me off so much when, standing up, with the seabed squashing sand between my toes, the sun forcing me to squint, I notice a stranger up on the beach who looks exactly like him. There's Mum and Dad and my two brothers, Alex and Laurie, and there's Laurie's wife, Kate, too. We got in an hour ago, the owners of the villa having kindly packed us a picnic basket for an early supper, which we schlepped down here, along with some beach chairs and our towels. Just the six of us. Except . . . I'm here, so that should be five bodies up there on the sand. I lower my body back into the warmth of the sea and swim as close to the shore as possible, staying submerged so I can surreptitiously dislodge a wedgie. I turn to look again, now I'm closer. It's then that I realize the sixth person up there with my family definitely isn't a passing local or a figment of my imagination. It is Jamie. And I am suddenly absolutely furious. 2 I can see, as I climb out of the water, that he's the color of baked earth after six months of sailing yachts across the seven seas for millionaires who like to leave their boats in one place but pick them up in another. He's broad-broader than he deserves to be-and the thick dent of his spine looks like somebody has taken their thumb and smudged down the center of his back: lumps and bumps and pops all around it in, places I didn't even know there could be lumps and bumps and pops. His arms are as thick as my thighs. Jesus, what a show-off. I'm all for keeping fit, but Jamie takes it too far. That time could be spent on other things, like . . . reading . . . or . . . watching The Real Housewives of New York City. You've got to be super-vain to work out so much. But then that's Jamie Kramer: vain as they come. I take a breath, readying for that look he gives me: blank, unmoved, bored. It was always that way, until it wasn't. Years of ignoring me, then four days of . . . well, whatever Christmas was. The Big Almost. And then I might have egged Jamie's car when he pied me off. So now we're back to not speaking, as if Christmas never even happened. That's useful, really: Nobody else knows what happened, of course. Over my dead body do I want my family's pity. Kate has intuited some sort of dalliance, but even she doesn't know it all. I will say hello, because he's my brother's best friend, my parents treat him like a son, and I know Kate will be holding her breath to see if I'm going to be polite. Quite frankly I don't want to be the source of any gossip, and let's be clear: My family loves to gossip, about one another most of all. I wring out the seawater from my hair, shake the water off my arms, and make my approach to grab a beer and acknowledge Jamie's stupid arrival. As I walk up to the cooler that we stashed the drinks in, Jamie turns just enough that I know he knows I'm here, but after an almost imperceptible beat he focuses his attention fully back on Mum, without acknowledging me. I could write the book on how this will go. Mum is in sickening rapture at whatever ridiculous thing he's telling her. She's practically fawning-she finds him delightful and such fun, a really lovely boy-but I will do no such thing. This is how Jamie plays it with everyone. He lets people come to him, flexing his gravitational pull with that smile and that easy laugh. I tried to bring it up with my mother a little while ago, about how he's stealthily manipulative, and she told me not to be so sensitive, that I was reading too much into it. The implication is that I do that because I am a bit unhinged and so I never brought it up again. But I know I'm right. He is manipulative. And vain. And rude. He uses people. He used me. "Oi, oi!" Laurie hollers in Jamie's direction. "Here he is, flexing his biceps as he drinks, like he's posing for hidden paparazzi." Laurie suddenly has Jamie in a quasi-headlock, arm looped around his neck and pulling down so that he can rub his hair. Jamie pushes him off easily. I step back so I don't get caught in the crossfire. "Don't hate the player," Jamie says with a grin and a shrug. "I could never," Laurie says with a laugh. "Although ef me, you're showing the rest of us up a bit, don't you think?" Jamie chuckles and throws back the rest of his beer, and I sidestep around him. The smell of salt water on my skin is gently warmed by sun so friendly it's like a happy Labrador clamoring for a cuddle. And yet that's not enough to calm the thump in my chest as I get my drink and pop the lid off, raising it defiantly in Jamie's direction as I make my way over to Kate. "Hello, Jamie," I say, not looking at him, acting as cool and indifferent as I can manage. I've already sauntered off as he says my name in return. "Flo." No hello, no hey. Just intoning my name like we're lawyers in a B-list TV series and he's come to my deposition as a hostile witness. His timbre is low and gruff, like a country singer warbling about a broken heart. Would it kill him to clear his throat and enunciate properly? I'm probably not worth that to Jamie, either. Behind me I hear Laurie say, "It's so good to see you, mate. I know you're having the time of your life, but we've missed you." I don't hear what Jamie says in return. Time of his life? I'll bet there are women in every port, like he's had for his whole life. I've always known he's a player, right from when Laurie first brought him home and I heard them talking about their "number." Everyone knows Jamie sleeps around, but nobody judges him for it. It's as if because he looks like he does, it would be a waste if he didn't. His Lothario ways are part of his charm. Well, part of his charm for everyone but me. I'm simply mad I almost fell for it. "Christ alive, Flo," Kate says to me as I flop down onto the stripy deck chair beside her. My bum practically touches the sand through the low fabric of the seat. I misjudged the distance and flail inelegantly about-careful not to spill my beer, obviously-trying to get comfy. I'm sure this will be further evidence to His Lordship that I'm a mess and he was right to give me the swerve. "Oh, for god's sake," I tut as I get settled. My tone is a bit sharp. Urgh! I vowed I wouldn't let Jamie irritate me more than he has already. Kate looks at me, eyebrows raised in amusement. "That's the holiday spirit," she coos, taking the mick out of my sudden bad mood. "Sorry," I say, taking a long pull from my bottle. I lie about why, because Jamie's name will not pass my lips. "It's the four a.m. wake-up call to get to the airport. Blame Dad's obsession with arriving for flights obscenely early." Kate sticks out her bottom lip and pulls a "sad" face. It's a thing we do sarcastically to stop either of us ever moaning too much. "How horrible," she teases in a silly voice. "Shut up!" I scrunch up my face. "It was still dark when we left the house. At least we had time for a beer and a full English breakfast at the airport, I suppose. How many minutes did you and Laurie have to spare before you made it?" "Ninety seconds," Kate shoots back. "But we did get to ride on the golf-buggy thing after security, so silver linings." "Luck is always on your side," I say, reaching over for my beach bag. I need my sunglasses. "I have honestly never met somebody for whom all traffic lights turn green, all doors open, complimentary coffees are freely given . . ." "Speaking of which . . ." She shrugs, noticing that I seem unable to find whatever I'm looking for. She figures out it must be my sunglasses and pulls out a second pair from her beach bag, which I take gratefully. "We did get complimentary croissants at Pret, to apologize for the wait." "You almost missed the flight because you were at Pret?" I shriek, and she motions for me to hush. "How?" "Shush!" she hisses, looking in my dad's direction to check he hasn't heard. She lowers her voice. "I made Laurie swear he wouldn't dob me in for it. But I needed a ham-and-cheese croissant, and you know I can't function without a coffee in the morning." "You're preaching to the converted," I say. "Coffee is life." I gulp down my beer and take in the perfection of our surroundings: powdery-yellow sand stretching all the way around the cove, endless water, the sun lowering in the sky to envelop everything in its syrupy flame. With my back to Jamie, I can almost forget he's here-and then Mum titters at him yet again, and I'm reminded that he is. Before Kate can ask me about it, I say, "Anyway. Your 'Christ alive.' Don't let me distract you from taking the Lord's name in vain . . ." "The Lord's son technically," Kate points out, and I can't help but notice that she's already glowing, looking relaxed and in the holiday mood. I can't even imagine having relaxation so readily at hand. It will take me days, if not a full week, to get my shoulders to unclench from up by my ears. I'm just built that way. Hope says it's better to be highly strung and know it than to think you're low-key and chill when everyone around you knows the truth. I have to say, I think Hope has a point. But Kate is low-maintenance through and through, and I envy that. Kate continues, "I was going to tell you that you look ridiculous in that bikini, actually. Your waist, your boobs . . . if that's what almost getting sectioned does to a girl, I might need a breakdown myself. You, my friend, have never been hotter." Excerpted from Enemies to Lovers by Laura Jane Williams All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
