The following is a teaser snippet from chapter three 'Christmas is coming' of my new up coming novel 'An Extra Ordinary Journey'. The novel is based on true events that occurred during my time living off gtid on a narrow boat in the UK.
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Dec 19th, five days to go to Christmas. It was decided over breakfast that Lorimar just wasn’t feeling Christmassy enough, she needed to be decorated. So this morning had become earmarked for Christmas shopping in Hinkley.
Hinkley town centre was not a particularly affluent area so as well as the usual array of high street shop offerings there was an abundance of charity and £1 shops to be found along with a fair sized local market to boot. Ideal for buying cheap decorations.
There was a buzz about the place when they arrived, It was the last weekend before the big day and the place was thronging with people and ambient noise.
Needs must, the first stop on the agenda was a local key cutting shop. A spare set of keys was essential.
”I’ll stay outside with Duke while you go in and get the keys cut,” said Jessica, reaching to take Duke’s leash. “I’ll sit on that bench over there.”
Duke had become centre of attention while Jason was gone and was loving it. Many people stopped to stroke, pet and offer him treats. He played up to this by giving his paw and nuzzling people, usually in the groin.
“Got them,” called out Jason, happily waving the new bunch of keys in the air.
“Well done, won’t matter so much when you lose them now then,” quipped Jessica.
“As if,” said Jason knowingly. It probably would be him that lost them if anyone did. He pointed across the street. “Look, there’s a street cafe over there let’s go get a coffee.”
There was only one table free and it had one empty seat with it. They looked around for a second empty seat. An elderly man sitting on his own called out to them. “Excuse me! This seat is free if you would like it,” He gestured to an empty seat beside him.
Jason went over to collect it. “Thank you,” he said.
They ordered, one coffee, one tea and a bowl of water for Duke who continued playing his look at me games with the waitress.
“There’s a crazy amount of people here today. I think we should split up,” said Jessica sipping at her tea.
“What do you mean?” asked Jason.
“Well, what if I go and get the decorations while you wait here with Duke?” suggested Jessica. “It will be a lot easier than trying to walk him through the crowds.”
Jason paused for a moment then agreed. “OK, but only as long as I get to pick the Christmas tree.”
They finished their drinks and Jessica headed off. Jason ordered another coffee and was quite happy to sit it out. Shopping wasn’t really his thing anyway, unless it was for electricals and gadgets, that was a different story. He sat people watching for a while then began listening to a pair of buskers across the paved area in front of him. One was playing on the guitar while the other sang. They performed a repertoire of Christmas songs to applause from the surrounding crowd.
‘I hope she hasn't gone and got herself lost’ Jason thought to himself after a third cup of coffee had been downed. ‘She’s not very good at finding her way around. I shouldn’t have let her go alone’.
His fears proved unfounded when he spotted Jessica making her way over to him after the crowd around the buskers had dispersed. She was laden with bags.
“Phew, I need to sit down,” She said, placing the bags on the ground next to Duke.
“You OK?” asked Jason. “You look a little pale."
“Yes, I’m OK just hot,” replied Jessica.
Jason stroked Duke then looked back up at Jessica. “I've ordered you a tea, it should be here in a minute.”
“Thanks, I just need to sit and rest for a while,” said Jessica. Then she looked down at the bags on the floor. “I got loads of stuff.”
Jason glanced at the bags. “Yes, I can see. What did you get?”
“All manner of Christmassy things including a wreath for the door, some hanging decorations, new baubles, a star to to go on top of the tree and a bottle of port.”
Jason grinned. “Sounds good, especially the port, we’ll have fun tonight then.”
Jessica’s tea arrived and was drank quickly. Duke was getting restless now so they made their way to the market stall where they had seen the Christmas trees.
“Look at this one,” said Jason, excitedly handling the biggest tree he could find.
“No,” said Jessica. “It’s way too big, we’d never get it on board Lorimar.”
“Well that’s a downer, thought I was picking the tree?” said Jason. “Well what about this one then?”
Jessica shook her head. “No, still too big.”
“I know, we’ll stand it outside on Lorimar’s bow,” said Jason, determined not to have a small tree. “I’ve seen a couple of other boats doing the same thing. It looks good on them and we won’t have to get such a small tree.” He held up a small to medium sized tree about four to five feet tall. “How about this one then?”
Decision made they tied the tree to the roof of the car and headed back home to Lorimar.
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I will be releasing further teaser snippets of each chapter as I complete them. You can read teaser releases from other chapters using the links below.
chapter 2 - LORIMAR, GETTING TO KNOW YOU.
I hope that you all have the best Christmas you can have in these COVID 19 days..dupater
