Tales from Greta's Health Store. 3

The door slammed behind her and she heard the Indian chimes jangle frantically. Greta tensed up, annoyed with herself. Why did she always seem so loud and brash? Her father's words echoed in her head even after all these years. He was always telling her to slow down, not to be so gushing and to be more lady like.

At the beginning Fergus had seen her differently, calling her his silver mountain stream. As they lay on the wet grass outside his croft counting the stars he would roll on top of her and call her his passport to happiness, his source of bubbling joy.
It wasn't long though that he seemed to find her annoying. All the qualities that had drawn him to her turned against her. Whereas once he had rejoiced in her spontaneous attitude to life he now seemed irritated by her all the time. She was too messy, her cooking skills needed improving, she wore too much make-up, her clothes were too flamboyant, she laughed at inappropriate moments.

Greta sighed and pulled her jacket tighter against the cold wind. She wished she'd brought her gloves and scarf. She shivered and walked faster towards the caffe.
Greta looked again at the text on her phone and her heart leaped. She had told Jemma that she was meeting her friend Gabrielle. It would have been too complicated to have told her the truth. Then she had seen Hattie come in and cringed with embarrassment and rushed out of the door to avoid her. Greta knew she had overdone it a bit with Hattie, given her a long list of things to take, It's just that she had reminded her so much of the state she herself had been in when Fergus said he needed space.