Chapter 7. My 30s (part 2)

By MissT

We flew out to Lanzarote the day before Christmas. I let the girls open their presents a day early so we could still celebrate before we left. R drove us to the airport—and borrowed my car while we were away, which saved me having to pay for airport parking! 

Everything still felt so raw. I was grieving the one dream I had left—of having another child—and trying to forget the madness of a fling that had left me feeling completely unsettled. It was chaotic, wild… and now, I had something to compare my marriage to. As painful as that was, it made me realise just how far I’d strayed from peace. 

I was clinging to the hope that this holiday would give me space to breathe. The girls were buzzing with excitement. I’d asked the travel agent which resort would be best for a single parent travelling alone, and she suggested Playa Den Bossa. She’d ruled out Turkey, warning me I’d get too much unwanted attention there. 

After the flight, we had a 45-minute transfer to the hotel. The El Trebol was tucked away from the main road, hidden between buildings and out of view from the street. Reception was clean and welcoming, and we were shown to our room, which looked out over the pool. The weather wasn’t quite as warm as I’d hoped, but it was still a welcome escape from everything waiting for me back home. 

The holiday was everything I’d hoped for. The girls adored the karaoke bar down the road in the evenings—it became a little ritual for us. Life felt carefree there, and I loved not having to worry about anything for a change. That was also the first time I ever tasted tequila—and honestly, it was amazing. 

I was still sore from the op, the pain a constant reminder of everything I’d been through. But I pushed it aside. The most important thing to me was that the girls had a good time. They’d had a rough few months, and I just wanted to see them smiling. 

We befriended a family who had children around the same age as mine. The woman seemed to take a shine to me. I wasn’t sure if it was sympathy—maybe she just felt sorry for me, being there alone with the girls—but they were nice enough, and it was comforting to have a bit of adult conversation. 

On our third night, we were watching the hotel entertainment when Lauren came over with one of those plastic balls with a toy inside. She’d bought it with her pocket money and couldn’t get it open. I gave it a go, but it was stuck fast—it honestly felt superglued shut. I turned to my right and spotted a young man sitting there with a pint. I asked if he’d mind giving it a try, to save me from disappointing my daughter. Much to Lauren’s delight, he managed to get the damn thing open! 

We started chatting, and he asked if I fancied a drink. I thought, why not? I was on holiday—what was the worst that could happen? 

I remember that night like it was yesterday. He told me he was there with his brothers, his mum and dad, and even his grandparents. He was from Marston Green near Birmingham, and I couldn’t help but think he sounded like Ringo Starr when he talked. He told me he was 25. I laughed to myself—an eight-year age gap had worked for Richard and Judy, hadn’t it? 

I told myself it was just a holiday. Things didn’t have to be serious. I had too much tequila in my system and a world of hurt buried inside me. I threw caution to the wind. 

The spark was lit. I didn’t think for a moment that it would lead anywhere. I’d come away to forget my heartbreak—to recover from the divorce and the loss of the baby. But for a little while, he took all that pain away. We were sneaking around the hotel like love-struck teenagers. Every time I saw him, my heart flipped. And while the kids played by the pool, I found myself smiling in a way I hadn’t in a long time. 

The first week was almost over, and it had been exciting and thrilling in ways I’d never imagined. Thursday was the hottest day yet, and the girls were in the pool from the moment the sun came up—practically wrinkled like prunes from being in there so long. 

We decided to take a walk to the shops and see if I could find a camera to buy. The girls wanted to message their dad on Facebook, and there was a little internet café where you paid a euro for five minutes. They both asked for a drink, so I popped into the shop next door while they logged in. 

On my way back, I heard a familiar voice call out: “Hi there, beautiful.” 

I froze. 

As I turned around, my heart sank straight to the floor. There he was—SH—sitting outside the pub opposite the café. 

This couldn’t be happening. 

 
But it was. 

Reflection 

Seeing SH sitting there—thousands of miles from home, in a place I’d come to escape everything—was like the universe playing a cruel joke. For a second, time stood still. All the joy, all the lightness of the past week drained out of me in one breath. My stomach turned, my heart raced, and the weight of everything I’d been trying to leave behind came crashing down. 

I’d come to Lanzarote to heal. To reset. To let the sun warm the parts of me that had been frozen for months. I’d found laughter again, felt my girls smile with ease, flirted with someone new, and remembered that I could still feel something other than pain. 

And then he appeared, as if summoned by some cruel twist of fate. 

Looking back, I see that moment not just for what it was—but for what it taught me. 

SH showing up in Lanzarote felt, at the time, like the universe trying to knock me off balance. But now, I see it as something else entirely. A test. A mirror. A chance to see, with crystal clarity, who I was becoming. 

That woman standing outside the shop, hearing that voice and feeling her heart drop? She wasn’t weak. She was still healing. She was still carrying wounds so fresh they stung in the sunshine. But she was also brave—braver than she knew. Because instead of collapsing under the weight of that moment, she stood up straighter. She remembered what she had come there for. 

She didn’t run toward him. She didn’t let him rewrite her story, not this time. 

The truth is that some people arrive in our lives like storms. Loud, sudden, disruptive. They shake things up and leave debris behind. And for a while, we confuse their chaos with passion, their inconsistency with excitement. But in the quiet that follows, we see them for what they were—a lesson. A spark. A mistake we no longer need to repeat. 

He didn’t belong in that new chapter. And neither did the version of me that thought attention equalled affection, or that being wanted was the same as being cherished. 

So now, when I think of Lanzarote, I don’t let SH’s shadow stain the memory. I think of my daughters laughing by the pool. I think of the sun on my skin, the freedom in my chest, and the first sip of tequila that made me feel alive again. 

And I think of the woman I was becoming—one drink, one laugh, one heartbreak at a time. 

My first instinct was disbelief, followed by a tidal wave of emotion I didn’t know how to contain. Shame, confusion, anger, curiosity—every part of me clashed. Part of me wanted to run, and part of me wanted to walk over and ask why. Why was he here? Why now? 

But mostly, I just felt small. Powerless again, like the universe was reminding me how little control I really had. The holiday had felt like mine—a space carved out just for me and the girls. And in that moment, it didn’t feel like mine anymore. 

I had come so far in just a week. But healing isn’t linear. Sometimes, it takes just one ghost from your past to pull you right back into the place you’ve been fighting to escape. 

What were the chances? What were the odds that the person who’d unsettled me so deeply, who had stirred up so much chaos inside me, would be right there, feet away, in this tiny holiday town?