One of the little girls had fallen off the swing – and Becki’s initial instinct made her run over to help. Making the little girl (Aimee, Marc’s niece) smile again was what had broken the ice between her and Marc.
Now she was packing up her room to go and live halfway across the world with him and his family. They would be leaving tonight. They had to as his little sister was very ill, and needed urgent treatment which could only come from Australia. Becki hadn’t even told her parents she was leaving home yet – she didn’t know if she could deal with what they’d say. Her mum was at a business meeting in Cardiff, so Becki had phoned her mobile after Marc had proposed to her, and she hadn’t exactly said what Becki was expecting her to say.
“You’re what! Getting married! But you’re so young, and what about your degree? Now Rebekah, I don’t know what on earth you agreed to this . . . this charade, but just you listen to me and listen hard. You phone Marc up now and tell him you can’t possibly go through with it. Tell him you’ve had a think, and you’ve realised you’ve got far more important things to do in life!” And with that she’d slammed the phone down.
Becki sat there and looked at her engagement ring. Marc was so confident that she’d say yes that he’d even bought her a ring! It was just a thin band of white gold with a small diamond on top that sparkled in the sun light coming in through the open window and reflected its rays all over her bedroom. Becki was really excited, but her mum had hurt her so much. She phoned Marc immediately to say that she’d fly with them tonight, instead of joining them a week later as they’d originally planned.
She got a suitcase from the wardrobe in the spare room and started to pack what seemed to be her whole life into it. She left clothes she knew she wouldn’t wear in her wardrobe, but she made sure that the last of her favourite teddy bears were packed into one of her two suitcases. Maybe she was really too old for teddy bears, but she was leaving her family to go and live on the other side of the world and they were part of her familiar surroundings – so they were coming too! Anyway Holly and Aimee (Marc’s nieces) would love to play with them.
Looking through the stack of photos on her desk, she realised that whatever she did she knew that she couldn’t leave without saying goodbye to her best friend Tash. She quickly phoned her oldest friend (they’d been best friends since they were still in nappies), and spent a tearful ten minutes saying goodbye to the person who probably knew her the best in the entire world.
Then she slammed her cases shut, checked she had her passport in her bag and took a last look around the room that had been hers since the day her parents brought her home from the hospital. Just as she was wheeling her heavy suitcases out onto the landing, she heard a car pull into the driveway and she knew that she was in deep, deep trouble.