Chapter Two

      The second I laid eyes on Jase Collins, when he’d walked into my shop not long after it had opened, in the summer of 1998, looking for a scented candle for his mum’s birthday, I knew he was the man I was going to marry. I just knew it. With his torn jeans and loose-fitting Metallica t-shirt, messed-up, light-brown hair and beard, and the most beautiful green eyes I’d ever seen, it was as though I’d been waiting for him to walk into my life forever. There’d been an instant connection, something he’d felt too, and it had been the most incredible feeling. Like a bolt of electricity shooting right through me, making me sit up and take notice of a future that had just been laid out in front of me. As soon as he’d smiled, as soon as he’d started talking to me, as though we’d known each other all our lives and not just that second met, it felt as though I’d found the other half of me. He had the same laid-back attitude, the same morals and beliefs; the same taste in music, not to mention that hippie/rocker edge to him that I’d fallen in love with straight away. It had just felt so right. He’d felt right. Jase Collins. My life.

      Our first date just two days later had been at a local pub to watch my brother Matt and my dad’s rock band play, and from that night onwards we’d become inseparable. We’d married a couple of years later in a small but beautiful ceremony attended by just a handful of family and close friends, bought our little house in the village of Tynemouth, and began the rest of our lives together. Jase had continued working in his surf shop down by the beach, and I’d carried on making and selling my jewellery and gifts. We’d never had all that much money, and life had been a struggle sometimes, but we’d had each other. We’d had the life we’d wanted, doing the things we’d wanted to do, and that had been more important to both of us than all the money in the world.

      Jase had been my soulmate, simple as that. I can’t say we’d had the perfect marriage – we’d had our ups and downs, whose marriage didn’t? But they’d never lasted long because we were both people who believed in living each day as though it were the last; we’d believed in making the most of life, so stupid arguments and disagreements were always dealt with quickly and forgotten even quicker.

      We’d been free spirits. Happy as long as there was food on the table and a roof over our heads. Jessie and Jase – just the two of us. And that’s the way it had been for over ten years. Until last Christmas, when he’d gone out with Matt and their friends, to a biker-friendly pub just outside of Northumberland for a mate’s birthday. Over the years, ever since Jase Collins had walked into my life, he and my brother had become really close friends. Best friends. With their shared love of surfing, motorbikes and rock music, they’d had a lot in common, and I’d never minded them spending time together. I’d loved seeing my brother and my husband so close. But I’d never been all that keen on Jase riding pillion on Matt’s Yamaha, even though Matt wasn’t some wet-behind-the-ears speed-freak. He’d been riding those things for years, both of them had, and it wasn’t the first time Jase had been out with him. But that night, something just hadn’t felt right.

      I’d watched him from the living room doorway as he stood by the Christmas tree laughing with Matt, joking about something, and whatever it had been it had made Jase laugh out loud and I’d always remember how handsome he’d looked that night. How relaxed and happy and handsome. So I’d tried to push those niggling feelings to the back of my mind, even though they were constantly fighting to come to the forefront.

      He’d kissed me goodnight, holding me close and making me smile with the things he’d whispered in my ear, things that I’ll never, ever forget because they were the last things he ever said to me. And I can only thank God that one of those things had been ‘I love you’ and I’d told him I loved him too, because he never came home. My beautiful husband died that night when a driver, who we later heard had been three times over the limit, had crashed into the bike as Matt and Jase had made their way home along a narrow country lane. They’d taken a short cut because Jase had wanted to get back to me, Matt had told me later at the hospital as he was treated for nothing but a fractured wrist and bruised ribs. Jase had missed me, and he’d wanted to get home before I went to bed because he’d just wanted to be with me. But fate had seen to it that he never arrived.

      I said my last goodbye to him just two weeks before Christmas, but, as far as I was concerned, there was no Christmas anymore. Not without Jase. Oh, my family had been there with more support and love and strength than I could ever have asked for, but without Jase I could see nothing ahead of me. I could see nothing but a bleak and pointless future, the guilt of his death weighing heavily on my mind because I should have stopped him from going out that night. I should have stopped him; I should have told him what I was feeling. Because he trusted me, he would have listened. I know he would. But I’d let him go, knowing that something just didn’t feel right. I’d let him go, and that guilt had never gone away. Ever.

      It had taken a good few months before I’d even attempted to start putting my life back together again after Jase had died. I’d thrown myself back into work at the shop, taking comfort from the warm surroundings I’d created and the people who came in to talk about Jase, because I’d needed to talk about him. I needed to feel as though he was still around, still a part of me, because it had scared me to think that I might forget anything of the life we’d had together, even one second of it. So I’d spent every day in the shop, and every night I’d go back to our cosy little home and relive every memory of my wonderful husband, replaying our life together over and over in my head until I could do nothing but cry myself to sleep. And every morning I’d wake up, and for a few seconds before I became completely lucid I’d be tricked into thinking that everything was fine, before, once again, being thrown back into a world of loss and loneliness when I realised that Jase wasn’t there. That he was never coming back.

      But whilst friends and family saw my routine as something that wasn’t particularly healthy, I saw it as a way of keeping Jase alive, of keeping his memory vivid and clear so that I could still see him there when I closed my eyes, still remember everything about him. And although it may have been a year since he’d died now, I still needed to do that, still needed to have him with me, despite what everyone else was saying – that I should move on. What did that mean anyway? Did they mean I should find someone else? Fall in love again? That was never going to happen as far as I was concerned. Jase had been the love of my life, and I knew I could never love anyone else the way I’d loved him. I didn’t want to love anyone else; I was quite happy being alone – with my memories.

      But I’d finally come to the conclusion that getting away from Tynemouth for a few days was a good thing. For almost twelve months I’d never really set foot outside of the town, preferring to stay in close proximity to my comfort zone. But, as another Christmas without Jase loomed, with only the prospect of days back home with my parents lying ahead of me, despite them being the best parents anyone could ask for, I’d had to do something. So, maybe making this effort, showing people that I was at least willing to try and move forward and get on with my life, perhaps that would make them back off slightly. And, in reality, maybe it really was time to try and move on. Even though that was going to be the hardest thing I’d ever done, because I just didn’t know if I could do it without Jase.

      Jase Collins. My husband. Now and forever. Always.