A Windy Day at the Beach

Laura and her cousin Isabel had been planning their beach day since the beginning of the week, and by Saturday morning every detail seemed settled. Laura had packed sandwiches, a towel and the novel she was halfway through; Isabel had checked that the trains ran on time. The forecast promised unbroken sunshine, so neither of them gave the slightest thought to the wind.

By the time they stepped onto the sand, the sky was a flawless blue but the sea was restless and grey-green. Isabel tried to spread the towel while Laura held down one corner, and the instant they let go, a gust folded it over like a page. Sand found its way onto Laura’s sandwich and into the spine of her book, and a thin, steady spray made it impossible to keep anything dry.

“This isn’t exactly the quiet afternoon I had in mind,” Laura said. Isabel laughed at first, but then she realised that her cousin was genuinely disappointed. It was not the sand itself that upset her, but the quiet afternoon she had imagined. They had travelled for an hour to get there, and turning round at once would have felt like admitting defeat. Neither of them wanted that, yet neither could see an obvious alternative.

It was Isabel who spotted the small café on the path above the beach, its outdoor tables sheltered by a long glass wall. They climbed the steps with their bags, found a table facing the water and ordered two lemonades. Laura brushed the sand out of her book, settled into the chair and, for the first time that day, began to read. The wind kept howling, but now it was somebody else’s problem.

Later they watched a family struggle to keep an umbrella upright, and it was Laura who laughed so loudly that she had to put her book down. They never did go swimming. On the train home, however, she admitted that the afternoon had turned out better than she would have predicted. “Next time,” Isabel suggested, “we check the wind forecast, not just the sunshine.” Laura agreed that this was fair advice.