The Offing

by Benjamin Myers

Weather talk is but a veiled code or a currency to exchange, a transaction as a means to moving things along to something more considered once reciprocal trust has been won.

‘No plan is a good plan,’ she said after some time had passed. ‘You never know what’s around the corner. A morning’s sunny spell can harbour an afternoon’s storm clouds. Life is long when you’re young and short when you’re old, but tenuous at any time.’

Romance needn’t mean love hearts and red roses, you know. Romance is feelings and romance is freedom. Romance is adventure and nature and wanderlust. It is the sound of the sea and the rain on your tarpaulin and a buzzard hovering across the meadow and waking in the morning to wonder what the day will bring and then going to find out. That is romance.’