246. Once more unto the breach

She wouldn’t have picked him as her sort, which she found strangely reassuring. Her ‘sort’ often resulted in disaster – a man who was all package and no content. It was difficult to imagine that result with Derek.

She had met him in the early morning, squiggling amongst the residue of the previous autumn to photograph the ducklings nestled beside the lake. Large signs proclaimed the proclivity of the parents to ‘have a go’ at intruders, which Derek simply ignored on the assumption that they did not include him.

She sat on the wooden bench, back from the water’s edge, tracking his progress toward confrontation, laughing uproariously, as he high-tailed it up the rise with the confected outrage of one flapping mother-duck in hot pursuit.

Now, as she watched him walk toward her across the forecourt, she agreed that he may not be ‘her sort’ but, by golly, he would do.