No Gentleman

                                    

                                          
"You're late."
Oof. That's not friendly, is it? A pity too as when I saw who was waiting for me outside Kirsty's home, I sent prayers heaven-wards. Katya, guess what? I imagined how the conversation I'd promised her as soon as I arrived would start. Only Jamie bloomin' Fraser was waiting to greet me in the village. Kirsty had said one of her friends would be waiting with the keys, but she never mentioned any names.
And darn, if he isn't even better looking than the pictures we saw of him on the town website. In those, he grinned at the camera and his dark-red curls touched his shoulder. Now, his hair's been cut buzz-cut short. I'm not always a fan of hair you can't run your fingers through, but the short length of it shows off his razor-sharp cheek bones and a jaw that is at this moment clenched tight. You can see his eyes better too, and they are so dark brown they are almost black. They flash with irritation, instead of laughter and immediately I'm reminded of school and the chemistry teacher who took a dislike to me after I blew up a lab. 
[Hey. You give teenage girls the means to create chemical combinations that are highly flammable and what do you expect to happen?]
Jack's dressed in combats too. Perhaps he really is soldier. The cargo pants mould to his shape precisely and it looks like he's giving that black tee shirt another airing. His foot taps in irritation. 
"You told Kirsty you'd be here at two o'clock. It's now half-past four," he says, the eyes turning from annoyance to a full-on basilisk glare. I want to poke my tongue out at him, but I sense such an immature response would only inflame him further.
"I stopped at Glencoe," I say. "Isn't it obligatory?"
To prepare for my move to Scotland, I read lots of travel blogs. All of them told me drivers heading north west to stop at Glencoe. The A82 road took me that way anyway. My journey started at eight thirty this morning—half-an-hour later than planned because my farewell to Katya proved more tearful than we'd both anticipated. Despite her jokey promise that she'd be coming too so she could check out Jamie Fraser, in the end I was the only one to say good-bye to Great Yarmouth. I stuffed my tiny Toyoto Yaris with everything I thought I might need—my Mac, my clothes, wellington boots and a lot of toiletries and food as Mum and Katya both insisted that Scottish villages in the middle of nowhere have no shops—and set off. The minute I reached the Scottish border, the heavens did what everyone tells you always happens in Scotland. They opened and let it all out. Honestly, every cloud reminded me of me, post the engagement party and coming to terms with the non-Ryan future that now beckoned me.
It made slow progress. Scottish drivers, I decided as I hunched over the steering wheel and peered through the windscreen wipers swishing back and forth, must develop specialist driving skills that make them good at this kind of thing. Unfortunately, I couldn't master it at all as the occasional angry honk of the horn proved me. Yes, yes, I muttered at the other cars on the road. I know you're allowed to go 70 miles per hour here, but 40 is fine in these conditions isn't it? Learn some patience!
Something miraculous happened as soon as I got to Glencoe, though. The travel bloggers all said the same thing. "Glencoe," they announced, "is THE most magnificent sight you will see. The problem is seeing it. Expect shyness from this glorious glen and its surrounding mountains. It rarely likes to peep out between the clouds." Not so for me. A few miles before my car drove through, the rain stopped and the clouds cleared away. Honestly, it was like someone had taken a duster to the skies, rubbed hard and revealed a light polished blue and a bright sun that sent rays down to spots where it lit the whole place up. I had to stop. 
And the minute I did so, I got caught up with two coach loads of tourists, giddy with excitement. The first load had spent a week on the roads and the rain hadn't stopped once. They'd travelled to castles, cliff tops, ancient battle fields and more, accompanied all the time by rain or at least drizzle. Like me, they clung onto the bar at the viewpoint and stared in wonder at the purple-topped mountains glistening in the sunlight. As they were Japanese, most of them had those top of the range cameras and they shoved them at me. "Please take our photos!"