"You're not from around her?" The man's voice is rough but I could tell he meant no harm in the question, just plain conversation he would usually make in a taxi ride from the airport. I nodded; hoping he caught it in the rear view mirror. I felt both relieved and guilty at the halt in the conversation that followed.

The silence dragged on for another half hour before we reached the 'Welcome to Point Winter' sign. Nothing had changed since I had left. The Jack's Ice Cream bar, it was way too cold for it but some how the place was still in business. The Hungry Diner was still there, the place to get a day's worth of calories in one meal. Next to The Nook, the only fine dining place and it wasn't even three stars, was the old theatre I recalled from having performed ballet recitals at when I was five or six but since had been converted into a movie cinema. Good Food Produce, Mudpie Café, The General Store and a few local owned boutiques all overlooked the shoreline on High Street but that was it.

Point Winter was never a tourist hot spot, the waves were harsh and the water too cold for swimming but sometimes you could still find the occasional surfer. If you went further out on the boardwalk where the waves were calm, fishing was a good option as well but rarely had I gone out there to see if people actually fished. There wasn't much in the form of entertainment in Point Winter but I had lived here for thirteen years of my life, one more year wouldn't be so bad.

I could read. Books were always my escape even back when I didn't need much of an escape. Hopefully my grandparent's house had Wi-Fi and I could probably watch Anne of Green Gables again at some point.

"It's further up the road, right?" The taxi driver asked breaking me out of my thoughts.

"Umm... yeah." I managed, "Just a little past town." My grandparent's house was a little further inland; a ten-minute drive from the edge of town. We past the Marin house on the way, a large colonial house, so big you could play hide and seek and not get found for hours. Technically they were the neighbours but their estate was large, a good five-minute walk to the edge of theirs and the start of ours, two if I ran.

"This is it." I said quietly, grabbing my backpack off the floor of the taxi. The car pulled into my grandma's driveway; the house was big but not nearly as large as the house beside it. Grandma Susan came out to greet me. I quickly paid the driver and he got out insisting he help with the luggage. Gran helped him, thanking him before paying him an extra five when they were done. I should have done that. When the taxi had pulled out of the drive way she turned to face me. She looked at me with a look on her face I could only place once she started talking.

"Oh darling..."

"I'm fine, really." I smiled. It wasn't a surprise she knew, my grandparents would want to know why my parents decided to ship me off to Point Winter when I should be in classes at my first year of University. Of course they knew.

"You've changed so much Emily." All I could do was smile. The last time she had seen me was when I was thirteen and the thirteen-year-old Emily wouldn't be scared of anything; she took risks, she made friends with strangers, she laughed without covering her mouth, she had an awful haircut, wore denim with denim and looked like an absolute wreck most of the time. She did what she wanted and didn't care if anyone else was watching. Other than some of my obvious fashion missteps I kind of missed thirteen-year old Emily.

Gran showed me to my old room I shared with two of my other cousins. Our code names still carved into the bottom of the baseboard with a pair of sawing scissors my older cousin Lacey had stolen from her mother. Amethyst for me, Ruby for Lacey and simply Christmas for our youngest cousin Katie, mostly because none of us could place the birth stone for December. We had thought it was so cool and mysterious back then, it was kind of moving in a sentimental sort of way to find it still there. I almost had the urge to call up Lacey and tell her that her Jonas Brothers posters was still hung up but then I would have to actually call her. We were once close but other than awkward happy birthday wishes on Facebook we didn't talk much anymore. I knew my brother Thomas still spoke to Alfie and Davy, Lacey's younger brothers but then again Thomas was always much better at maintaining relationships. It was never out of anger that we stopped talking, when you don't see people for so long it just gets hard to begin again and I was the sort of person who shied away from hard things.

The rest of the day went by fast. Grandpa Ray came home from a doctor's appointment in Towerhill around noon. He didn't say much at lunch and left before I even finished. He simply patted me on the head before wandering off to his study, shutting the door behind. Gran said he was just in a bad mood because grandpa was a stubborn old fool who thinks he knows everything and is constantly getting lectured by the doctor to take his pills. It felt like she was just playing down the truth but I didn't question it, it was his business.

I returned to my room after lunch, curling up against the windowsill with the blanket off my bed. I covered my shoulders and picked up the novel I had started on the plane over. I barely begun reading before the view distracted me, resting the book on my lap I pulled the blanket tighter and rested my face against the cold glass.

I could see the Marin house from here, there white house contrasting the dark green valleys around it. The green hills surrounded the opposite side too, mountains behind it and in front the ragged cliff face that dropped down to the ocean, an intense blue that had always scared me. It was the lonely side of the house save for the small bus stop, the buses to and from Towerhill stopped there. Towerhill was the closest town to Point Winter, much larger than the latter as well. All of our major shopping and banking needs were done there. It also had the Towerhill Preparatory College I attended until the seventh grade.

My thoughts faded as I observed the bus pull up at the stop, there was a bus stop in town too and the only two houses that used this stop were the Marins and us. My heart sank as the younger Marin brother stumbled of the bus, his curly brown hair waving like mad in the wind. He pulled his school bag over his shoulder and he pushed his hair back out off his face.

It didn't take long for him to notice me, the window's curtains were open and I wasn't exactly sitting here inconspicuously staring at him. It had been six years but his face filled with recognition and he smiled a wide toothy smile I could see even from up here. I knew he had already seen me but something in my brain told me otherwise. I fumbled to pick up my book to pretend I hadn't seen him, my feet getting caught in the blanket and I came crashing onto the cold wooden floor. Managing to detangle myself from the mess of blankets I sat up, the road was empty.

"Emily!" I heard grandma's voice call from the first floor, "someone's here to see you."

"Ahh!" How long could I hide under these blankets without being seen.

Not long I found out as Oliver Marin knocked on my open bedroom door, chuckling at what I assumed was the blanket monster by the window. I pulled the blanket from over my head and looked up to see him leaning casually against my door. He pushed his hair out of his and his eyes met mine. He was taller than I remember, much taller; but somehow he managed to still look childish, with same giddy smile that had always played on his lips.

"Very graceful ballerina." I had forgotten his voice but I could tell it had never been this deep.

"I haven't done ballet since I was six."

"And you sucked even back then." He smiled, throwing his backpack onto the floor by the door, and falling back on to Katie's vacant bed. I flashed him a sheepish smile, there was really no reason I would protest that, the last performance I did I fell off the stage and into the student orchestra. The purple bruises from the brass section that broke my fall had refused to fade for weeks after that catastrophe.

"What are you doing here Em? Not that I'm not happy to see you, I am." My lips tugged into a half smile, he was always sweet.

"It's good to see you too, Ollie." He scrunched his nose.

"Ollie is a snot nosed twelve year old who was obsessed with graphic novels."

It hadn't take long for Ollie to get comfortable, before I knew it he kicked off his shoes and pushed himself off the bed and onto the floor in front of me.

"How's life?" I asked him awkwardly, wrapping the sheets a little tighter around me. He smiled, rolling his eyes at my ever so basic question.

"Life is perfectly dull, Em."

"And your brother?" I asked.

"Ben's good. He's coming back soon for mom's birthday." I always had the vague sense my heart was beating but at the thought of seeing Ben again I could swear it thumped a little harder against my chest wall. Ben was my everything when I was young, the handsome older boy who still paid attention to you even when he didn't have to. I didn't even have to wonder what he looked like now, his Facebook told me all of that. Hard cheekbones and dimples showed in every photo I had childishly looked through before coming to Point Winter. The thought of seeing him again was always at the back of my mind.

"And how's things with you?" I managed after coming back to reality.

"You already asked that." Ollie laughed.

"Sorry," I said covering my face with the blanket, "I'm bad at small chat."

"I can see that," he laughed pulling at the blankets covering my face "Tiny talk was never your expertise." As I realised he was as mocking me instead of overthinking it I pushed his shoulder. Ollie swayed back with a laugh and fell on his back, his legs flailing up at the momentum.

"Ooh I'm sorry." I laughed, ridding myself from my blankets to help him up to his feet.

"I didn't even hurt." He assured me, patting me on the head like a dog.

Running a free hand through the hair he just tousled, I hesitated before bringing the subject back to Ben, "So... is Ben enjoying college?"

"You should really ask him that but it's his final year so I think he's glad to have it over and done with. That reminds me, didn't you get into George Town?"

Biting my lip I looked away, trying to come up with any plausible reason for why I was back instead of college like I had always planned. At one point it did occur to me to tell him the truth, I mean this was Oliver Marin the boy who new all my hiding spots in hide and seek, the boy who fell into the Rock Pool when he was seven and blamed it on me. Then again he only knew me as Emily Tate the girl who liked to play childish games like hide and seek and the girl who pushed him in to the Rock pool when I was eight.

"Umm..." I rubbed my neck, "nothing really, I just thought a gap year might do me some good." That was true enough.

"Oh really? And you thought it would be fun to come back to boring as hell Point Winter?"

"It could be fun here, I mean there's the theatre."

"With one film."

"There's the beach."

"If you want to freeze to death."

"Well you're here." 

First Chapter done.

I do hope you give this story a chance. There is real life inspiration for this but how much of it is inspired and how much is pure fiction I'll leave a mystery.

Enjoy the new trailer, I like making videos so do tell me what you think.

old trailer:

https://youtu.be/gDAM8-l93pI

Feel free to leave feedback, comments, votes, anything really makes my day :)