It Couldn’t Have Been Any Other Way
“Hello, Penelope. How are you? Long time no see. Has your daughter tied the knot yet?” An old acquaintance stopped her friend outside the shop.
“Same to you. And why the sudden interest? Got a groom in mind? We’re not just anyone’s charity case. My Rosie’s well-mannered, reads clever books,” Penelope replied sharply, unamused by the turn in conversation.
“Don’t take offence, but books won’t do her much good, Penelope. Too much reading brings sorrow. If you’re too picky, she’ll end up an old maid and won’t thank you for it.”
“Don’t jinx it. Or are you angling to pawn off your own son?” Penelope shot back.
“Oh, Penelope. That sharp tongue of yours…” her friend sighed.
“Better she reads than runs around nightclubs. Look at what happened to Dorothy’s girl—had a baby with no father, dumped the child on her poor mother and vanished.”
“But keeping your daughter locked up isn’t right either,” the old friend countered.
“Stick to minding your own, especially that son of yours before he drinks himself into oblivion.” Penelope snatched up her bags and marched off, muttering under her breath. “Should’ve avoided you altogether…”
At home, Penelope set the shopping on the kitchen counter and stepped into Rosie’s room.
“Still reading? Even Shakespeare said wisdom brings sorrow,” she blurted.
“That was Byron, not Shakespeare,” Rosie corrected.
“What difference does it make? Go fetch some milk. Or take a walk—cooped up all day with your books, ruining your eyes.”
“Mum, what’s got into you? One minute you won’t let me leave, the next you’re shoving me out.”
“Just tired of the gossip. I’m not against you settling down, but who’s good enough for you?” Penelope waved a hand and left.
Rosie closed her book and sighed. Her mother had raised her alone. Whenever she scolded Rosie, she’d snap, “You’re just like your father.” As a child, Rosie begged to see his photo.
“No idea where it is. Must’ve got lost. I’ll find it someday,” her mother always dismissed.
Older now, Rosie understood there was no photo. Her father likely didn’t even know she existed.
Maybe she *was* like him. Unlike her sturdy mother, Rosie was slender, with fine, pale hair. Her faint eyebrows and lashes made her face seem washed-out. At sixteen, she’d tried mascara for the first time before a school dance.
“Copying your friends? They’ll lead you nowhere. Wash it off!” her mother shrieked.
Boys ignored Rosie. Plenty of prettier girls around. So when bespectacled Nigel, a quiet bookworm at university, asked her to the cinema, she was thrilled. She invited him over once while her mother was at work.
Fate intervened—Penelope felt unwell and came home early. They were only discussing books, but Penelope clutched her chest and feigned a faint. Nigel fled, and Rosie endured a scolding that ensured no future visits.
It fizzled out with Nigel. Her mother declared he was only after their flat since he came from a tiny village. “Once he’s on the lease, we’ll never be rid of him. I won’t let him split my home—I worked hard for it.”
After university, Rosie took a job at the library. Teaching suited her shy nature better, but she lacked the confidence.
“You’ll never find a husband there. It’s all women. Should’ve studied medicine—at least you could’ve treated me. Men respect women in white coats.”
But Rosie despised medicine. Books were her escape—living vicariously through heroes and heartbreaks. She dreamed of a dashing prince, yet real life offered divorced men old enough to be her father. Any younger prospect was swiftly dismantled by her mother.
If Rosie protested, Penelope gasped dramatically, hand on heart.
“Rosie, you must leave home. Otherwise, you’ll never marry. Time’s slipping by… How old are you now?” The librarian, Margaret Whitmore, asked over tea.
“Thirty-four.” Rosie ducked her head.
“Well? What are you waiting for?”
“What should I do?”
“Move out. Before it’s too late. Live for yourself,” Margaret said firmly.
“I can’t. Mum’s heart—”
“Are you sure? From what you’ve said, her ‘attacks’ only happen when a suitor appears. Am I wrong?”
“No one’s ever… courted me properly.”
“Precisely—because she won’t allow it.”
“But she worries. I’m all she has.”
“She’s smothering you. Go to Brighton. I’ll cover your shifts. Let her fend awhile. The sea air might bring romance.”
Margaret arranged it. Yet at the beach, only middle-aged philanderers noticed Rosie. On her last evening, she watched the sunset, longing to stay forever.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” A man’s voice startled her.
She looked up—a handsome stranger, slightly older.
“Mind if I join you? I’ve seen you here alone each day. The sea invites solitude. Makes you want to stay, doesn’t it?”
“Funny, I was just thinking that.”
“Were you?” He smiled.
They talked for hours, strolling the shore. Shared tastes in books and films. No wedding ring. Rosie thought, *Maybe this is it…*
When Oliver kissed her under the stars, she didn’t resist.
She left the next morning, regretting she hadn’t exchanged details.
Back home, tanned and brighter, her mother eyed her suspiciously. Margaret prodded for news. Rosie confessed.
“You didn’t even ask where he’s from? Rosie, honestly.”
When Rosie discovered she was pregnant, she rushed to Margaret.
“What do I do?”
“Bare the child. This might be your only chance.”
“But Mum—her heart!”
“Leave it to me.”
Margaret’s cousin, Evelyn, worked at a London paper. She secured Rosie a job. “Tell your mother it’s a golden opportunity—London beats this backwater. She’ll cope.”
Rosie hesitated. “She’ll find out eventually.”
“By then, it’ll be too late for… other choices. Or do you want to grow old under her thumb?”
To her surprise, Penelope relented—though not without lectures.
Rosie thrived in London, staying with Evelyn, who resembled Margaret. The spacious flat echoed with each step on its grand staircase. When Evelyn noticed Rosie’s pregnancy, she insisted she stay.
Rosie worked, awaiting the baby, grateful yet aching for her mother. She called daily, visited weekends, hiding her growing belly.
Penelope’s intuition struck—she arrived unannounced. Rosie’s secret was undeniable.
“Knew this would happen. Got yourself knocked up on holiday? When were you planning to tell me? Do you know how hard single motherhood is?” Penelope ranted.
Yet no clutching chest this time. Too late for objections.
“Fine. I’ll help. Silly girl. I warned you books bring trouble.”
Five years on, Rosie remained in London, renting her own place despite Evelyn’s protests. Penelope, retired, doted on grandson Charlie each summer.
One day, Charlie fell at the playground, splitting his brow. Blood gushed as Rosie panicked, sprinting to Evelyn.
“Call an ambulance! He needs stitches!”
The ER overflowed, but Charlie’s bleeding won priority. A masked doctor assessed him swiftly.
“He’s a brave lad. Barely cried. Return in a week for suture removal,” he said, mask now off.
Rosie froze—*Oliver.*
“Come back here if you prefer, though it’s always packed,” he added, then paused. “Wait… have we met?”
“No, first time.” She averted her gaze.
A week later, removing stitches, he studied her. “Rosie… that’s rare. Only met one before. Wait—*you!* At Brighton! Why did you leave? I looked for you.”
“You… did?”
He visited her flat days later with a toy train for Charlie.
“How did you find me?”
“We record addresses. Charlie’s mine, isn’t he?”
“Yes. But we need nothing—”
Oliver beamed. His wife and daughter had died in a crash years prior. Friends sent him to Brighton to heal.
Fate had granted Rosie her chance—first the seaside meeting, then Charlie, now a husband and father.
The most pivotal encounters seem accidental. But when hoped for, they arrive. The sea draws such meetings. Or perhaps Someone orchestrates them for lonely souls.
