It's gardening time!

Day two of work and we are rapidly catching up on the present day drama, good thing too, I think I’m going to bust a gut if I don’t write it all down soon. But for the moment there’s other stuff to be getting on with.
The next day is not as pleasant. When I wake it is drizzling, water clotting the dirt and making the weeds unpleasant to handle. The insects are low and biting viciously before the sun is fully up and the builders bad tempered after a harrowing boat ride over the troubled sea.
I work in the garden, yesterdays clothes dampened with sweat and the humidity, slightly crusted with salt. Vikkie goes into town on the boat to buy fresh food to cook on the stove, not to mention the right kind of pot, which I tracked down to a junk shop and have sent her to collect.
It feels like I’m fighting a constant battle against the garden. Every time I turn away from a cleared section new tendrils seem to sprout, curling around woody immovable stems that had escaped my notice. I hack at them with the spade, which is sharper than the axe, heaping up sizeable chunks for the stove and throwing what is left into the bin. Halfway through the morning the metal container is filled, so I take my lighter and a chunk of the magazine that I was reading on the boat and set it on fire. With the wood soon burning fiercely, despite the rank weather, I turn back to my work, throwing branches on top of the fire and watching the green wood smoke and eventually succumb to the blaze.
After yesterdays work on the garden my body is protesting, every muscle is screaming for mercy and rest on a proper bed rather than the floor. After a while I give up and retreat to the side of the house where I sit on the ground, wrapped in a coat and flipping through sample books. The builders brought several of these glossy white folders for me to look at, because it is they who will be building my shower block. I flick through thick card inserts supporting slivers of tile, trying to make definitive choices, but it’s hopeless. Sighing I set the folders aside, there is nothing else I can do, too tired to work in the garden and too miserable to attempt anything productive. I find my bag and dig out some violet nail polish, kick off my boots and begin painting my nails. Anything to distract myself from the utter misery of being bitten all over by insects, wet, unfed and having to use a bucket as a toilet.
I am halfway through my second foot and thinking about starting on my fingers when a shadow falls across my feet. Thinking it’s Vikkie I look up, but, instead there is a man, the man I saw on the beach. I feel immediately self conscious, as I used to when someone knocked at the door and my comfy tracksuit bottoms and unwashed hair were suddenly, painfully displayed to a stranger. I am very aware of my filthy jeans and shirt, of my tangled hair and unwashed face, and also of the fact that he may have seen me as good as naked. The look he’s giving me doesn’t help, a mixture of mistrust and distaste, the kind of look I give worms, knowing that they can’t hurt me but still hating their presence.
“You left this on the beach” he thrusts something damp and sand speckled at me, my undershirt.
“Oh” I take it from his hand and try to stand up, balancing weirdly on my freshly painted feet. He gives my polished nails a glance, his lip curling into a sneer. He’s older than I am, his hair brownish and grizzled, face unshaven making him look older still and haggard. I feel uncomfortable, his dislike of me is washing off of him in waves.
“Don’t let it happen again, some of us value this place. I suppose that’s hard for you to appreciate.” Before I can say a word he turns and stalks off, cutting through the garden without a backward glance. I find myself close to tears. I have always hated being told off.
I am still sitting on the grass when Vikkie returns, clutching three plastic bags stuffed to brim. She drops them on the grass and sits down opposite, pulling things out and talking excitedly.
“I got your pots, they’re bloody heavy though, you owe me new arms. I picked up some chicken as well, and some vegetables. Oh! And tea! don’t know about you but I have been dying without…” she catches sight of my pinkish eyes “what happened?”
“I left this..” I wave at the clump of wet, gritty fabric “on the beach, and some guy brought it back. He was mean.” There is a brief silence as Vikkie considers this.
“I thought that was the point of you living here, that whenever someone pissed you off you just pushed them off the side.” I let out a weak spurt of watery laughter.
“Come on, I’ll make some tea”
From the back of the house, where the builders are packing up, there come shouts of “Hurray!” and “About bloody time.” Vikkie and I haul the bags inside and, dubiously, wrangle with the stove.
I pack some fuel in and light it, then unwrap the parcels from the junk shop, finding a frying pan, an enormous kettle and a pot, all made of gleaming copper. We fill the kettle with water and set it on one of the massive burners to heat. Thankfully the builders were thoughtful enough to bring their own mugs, as we only had two tin camping cups. After everyone had drunk their fair share of scalding hot tea I tucked the box of teabags into a niche above the stove with the jars of jam.
That night, when all the builders were gone, I cooked chicken casserole with Ilensay rosemary, dubbing it the Ocean House special. We sat on the floor, the formerly austere cottage brought to life and made welcoming with the light of a fire and the scent of fried chicken and stock. But, when the fire is reduced to mere embers, and we have turned in for the night, I lay on the hard stone floor and my anxiety creeps back like damp. Somewhere, on this island, is a man who hates me, I think. The thought troubles me more than it should and for hours I cannot sleep, but imagine instead his face, twisted in scorn.
With the promise of caffeine to lure Vikkie out of bed we begin to make astounding progress. We finish clearing the garden and turn to digging it over, exposing dark moist soil. I clip the wild hedges of rosemary, lavender and lemon balm into soft globes and straight rows. Vikkie marks out square beds with rounded stones from the beach. In the last few days of our stay on the island we go to he mainland in search of plants, leaving the builders to install my sink.
I wander through the gleaming glass greenhouses of the local garden centre, stroking the thick succulent stalks and wavy fronds of tray after tray of plants. Eventually I select a few things that I can plant and leave to grow on their own in my absence, onions, potatoes, beans, peas and tomatoes. I also find marigolds, which supposedly subdue caterpillars and a few more herbs to fill the space and provide colour. With my wide wire trolley brimming with greenery I browse through the other sections, those that sell gifts and fair-trade products. I’m not intending to buy anything, but I notice a heap of gorgeous blankets, all soft and grey natural wool. I’m fingering the fringe of one, having left my trolley at the head of the narrow aisle, when I catch sight of him. The same guy as yesterday, wearing grubby jeans and a jersey. I’m about to duck out of sight when he looks up, his dark eyes flick between me and the designer blanket, then the same sneer appears and he strides away angrily.
What is his problem with me? I drop the blanket as though I’ve been burnt and grab my cart, heading for the till. My cheeks are burning and I feel very small and stupid, though I’m not sure why. I cart my plants outside and get out my phone to call Vikkie, who is browsing in a comic book shop a short journey away, to get her to pick me up. But as I do so I release the handle of the wheelbarrow-like cart, which tips, sending plants rolling, soil spilling from their pots. Swearing I try to pull them back in one-handed, listening to the dialling beeps and then ringing as I wait for Vikkie to pick up. At last I have all the plants in the cart, but as I try to level it they tip again. I realise that I can’t right it without dropping all the pots again.
A hand suddenly grabs the handle of the cart, brushing against mine. My heart catches as the unbidden image of my grumpy stalker fills my mind. The cart lurches up and I release the pots, turning to see…Vikkie.
“Hi!” I say, weakly.
“I got done early.” she explains, hefting the plants into her tiny boot.
I’m quiet on the ride home, unsettled by my mistake. This cannot be a normal response surely? My first reaction to a strange and hostile older man should not be of the heart beating faster variety. I’m still berating myself, cringing in remembered embarrassment as we lug the plants up the hill and drop the pots on to the ground inside the boundaries of the garden. Not content with simply putting in vegetables I have brought fruit trees from a separate nursery, fragile little things that will hopefully grow quickly and give me fruit in the summer. For a few happy hours I am content with my role as gardener, setting seedlings into the bare squares of soil in odd patterns. I plant the trees at the sides of the house and edge the brick path with thyme. Behind the house is my favourite place, and I save the best job till last. On the side of the house facing the sea is a staircase that leads to nowhere, worn sandstone steps and plastered sides ending in a flat square of stone with twisty railings, like a balcony. I plant some stubborn little plants at the base, ones that will eventually grow and climb all over the little private space.
That’s a lot of intrigue for one entry, but there you go, it was a lot to deal with at the time.