Jane almost skipped out\nof the clinic. She had been told by her\nconsultant that she was free of cancer. \nStriding down the road, she passed the travel agents with its tempting array\nof holidays. Telling herself that she\ncould do this on her own, she went into the shop and bought a train ticket to\nAthens and a ferry ticket to the incredibly small island of Halki.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A month before the\nall-clear, Jane received a letter from Stella who now lived on Halkii. Jane had opened the letter with shaking hands\nand felt slightly sick. Stella and Jane\nwere the best of friends in the early 80s but in 1987 they had a row to end all\nrows, on a cliff top of all places! Jane\ntold Stella she did not want to see her and Stella cut all contact. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
The letter was fine. Stella told of her travels, her work with a\nlocal garden centre, falling in love with Halki when on holiday and purchasing\na small apartment there. More\nimportantly, she asked Jane to visit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAfter all,\u201d she wrote,\n\u2018a lot of water has gone under the bridge in the last 33 years.\u201d Stella added, \u2018For my part, I feel I have\nspent too long wondering how you are. I\nwas determined to find you. Can we meet and try to resolve this gulf between\nus?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jane sent a brief reply\nto say when she would be arriving. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now, here she was, nearing the island as the ferry turned. It stopped\nits engines and glided into the tiny harbour, which looked like an\namphitheatre. All sounds were amplified,\nlike a plate dropping onto a tiled floor. Jane could hear a child laughing\non-shore. Then she heard her name being called.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The two women had a\nlovely two weeks together. They rose early and walked to the monastery at the\ntop of the island; swam every day; watched the sun rise and set; and Jane made\nfriends with many of the islanders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now they are sitting\nhaving coffee at the harbour\u2019s edge. The ferry is waiting for passengers to\nboard and Jane is booked to sail on it. Only now do they raise the issue of the\nrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI can\u2019t believe that\nwe let that man lose you your job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI was glad to leave \u2026.\nbut you, Jane, all that publicity!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe shared so much\nthen, and it looks like we can again. I realised in hospital that life really\nis too short.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAnd how time has put\nit into perspective! We have much more to remember \u2026 like taking the year 7s to\nthe museum or \u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
They talked and talked\nand as they talked the ferry moved away from the harbour, leaving the island in\nits wake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They start laughing.\nJane says, \u201cIt looks like I\u2019ve missed my boat! Can I stay?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jane almost skipped out of the clinic. She had been told by her consultant that she was free of cancer. Striding down the road, she passed the travel agents with its tempting array of holidays. Telling herself that she could do this on her own, she went into the shop and bought a train ticket […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10158782359051062_103813597863211":"","twitter_1225722811282530305_1225722811282530305":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[121,120],"tags":[95,7,141,143,116,14,142,118,11],"class_list":["post-255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-121","category-newyearresolutions","tag-had","tag-her","tag-jane","tag-letter","tag-like","tag-she","tag-stella","tag-they","tag-was"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbrNJE-47","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":256,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255\/revisions\/256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}