Jason bought the holiday on a Thursday evening, after a day of unanswered emails, unreasonable deadlines, and a meeting that somehow created three more meetings.
The advertisement promised something wonderfully simple.
TWO DAYS AWAY FROM IT ALL.
Underneath, in smaller lettering, it added:
Blackpool, England. Summer 1935. Female host, aged twenty-five. Travelling with friends.
He had hesitated over the last part.
Then his work telephone had rung again.
He booked it.
The first thing he noticed was the train moving.
The second was a stocking seam digging into the back of his knee.
Jason opened his eyes to find himself sitting beside a carriage window, a handbag on his lap, and a woman's reflection in the glass.
She had brown hair arranged in careful waves beneath a small hat, a softly rounded face and a mouth painted a cheerful red. Her pale blue frock had a neat collar, a narrow belt and a skirt that covered her knees.
"Well, Margaret," said the blonde opposite him, "if you sleep through Blackpool, we're leaving you on the train."
Names and small details rose to meet him, supplied by the company's memory-assistance system.
Margaret Bennett. Twenty-five. Unmarried. A shop assistant from Lancashire.
The blonde was Elsie. The dark-haired woman beside her, currently rescuing a paper bag of sandwiches from beneath a suitcase, was May.
His friends.
For two days, anyway.
Beyond the window, rows of brick houses gave way to a town bright with advertisements. The carriage smelled of cigarette smoke, warm upholstery and egg sandwiches. Somewhere down the corridor, a child was firmly told they were nearly there.
Then Jason glimpsed the Tower.
"There!" May exclaimed.
All three leaned toward the window.
For the first time in months, Jason had absolutely no wish to look at a clock.
Their boarding house stood in a narrow street a short walk from the promenade. Its front windows displayed lace curtains, a flourishing aspidistra and a card announcing VACANCIES.
Mrs Pritchard, the landlady, inspected them over her spectacles.
"Breakfast at eight. Evening meal at six. You'll be out during the day unless the weather turns. No gentlemen upstairs, and I lock the door at half past ten."
Elsie smiled with the innocence of someone who had heard such instructions before.
"Yes, Mrs Pritchard."
"And mind the wallpaper with those cases."
Their room contained a double bed, a narrow single, a washstand and a wardrobe that smelled faintly of lavender and old wood. The bathroom was along the landing.
May bounced on the single bed, testing it.
"This one's mine."
Elsie was already removing her hat.
"Come on, Margaret. The sea won't wait while you admire yourself."
Jason turned away from the little dressing-table mirror.
He had been admiring himself.
Or, more precisely, trying to understand the curious feeling of seeing a stranger's face brighten when he smiled.
Blackpool seemed determined to entertain every person in Britain at once.
Trams rattled along the promenade. Bells rang, gulls screamed, and stallholders called above the crowd. Postcards, paper windmills, sticks of rock and comic souvenirs made Elsie laugh and May pretend she hadn't understood.
The air carried salt, frying fish, cigarette smoke and the sweet smell of warm sugar.
On the sands, families had established little territories with deckchairs, towels and coats. Men sat with trousers rolled above their ankles. Children laboured over castles that the approaching tide would demolish without a moment's consideration.
So many people that Jason wondered how anyone had found enough beach to sit on.
"Shoes off," Elsie ordered.
He bent to undo the straps, immediately discovering that bending in a skirt required more thought than he was accustomed to giving it.
May caught his hat before the wind did.
"You're all fingers and thumbs today."
"Holiday excitement," he said.
That explanation served him remarkably well.
They paddled first.
The Irish Sea was cold enough to make him squeal.
Elsie laughed so hard she nearly fell over.
"There she is! Thought you'd left your voice on the train."
They rode donkeys, Jason clinging to the saddle while May shouted entirely unhelpful encouragement. They ate ice creams quickly before the wind and sunshine could finish them. Later, they bought little dishes of whelks, picking them out with wooden points and pulling faces over the vinegar.
By afternoon, Jason had sand between his toes, a pink nose, and aching cheeks from smiling.
He had not thought about work once.
Changing for a swim proved considerably less carefree. In Margaret's case, the bathing costume was a dark, close-fitting one-piece, perfectly ordinary to her friends and surprisingly substantial to Jason.
Nevertheless, stepping out in it made him feel conspicuous.
His shoulders were bare. So were much of his legs. He noticed people looking, then realised most were occupied with their own holidays and probably hadn't noticed him at all.
A passing young man did notice.
His gaze lingered long enough for Jason to reach instinctively for his towel.
May saw.
"Don't mind him."
"I wasn't."
"You were."
She said it kindly, settling beside him.
They lay in the sunshine while Elsie discussed a young man from home who wrote beautiful letters and apparently spoke almost exclusively about his motorcycle.
Around them, women wore an assortment of bathing costumes, summer frocks and sensible cardigans. Several older visitors remained dressed as though the sea might behave like a drawing room.
Jason began to understand that there was no single way to be a woman here. Elsie enjoyed being noticed. May preferred to decide who deserved her attention. Margaret, judging by the memories that surfaced, usually worried about what her mother would say.
Yet all three had learned to keep track of other people's opinions.
When Jason stretched out too carelessly on the towel, May discreetly tapped his knee.
When he suggested walking back through the streets in his costume, Elsie stared.
"Put your frock on, you daft thing."
The beach offered freedom, but it had a boundary.
That evening, getting ready became an entertainment in itself.
Three women shared one small mirror with the determination of generals dividing a battlefield.
Stockings needed straightening, powder needed applying, and a stubborn fastening at the back of Jason's dress defeated him until May stepped in.
"Hold still."
Her fingers worked briskly.
"There."
The evening dress was green, falling softly below his calves. Underneath it, a smooth slip moved against his skin. A little lace edged the garments Margaret had packed so carefully.
He had expected the unfamiliar clothes to feel like a costume.
Instead, as Elsie dabbed perfume onto his wrists, he found himself enjoying the small rituals: choosing a lipstick, smoothing a seam, turning to see how the skirt hung.
May lent him a necklace.
Elsie stood back.
"Well?"
Jason looked into the mirror.
"I feel lovely."
The words escaped before he could make them less revealing.
Elsie's expression softened.
"Good. You should."
They began with a drink in a busy hotel lounge, where conversation competed with cigarette smoke and the clink of glasses.
Jason discovered that three young women entering together attracted a particular sort of attention.
Some men merely glanced up.
Others seemed to regard their arrival as an invitation.
A fellow with a loud voice offered to buy them all drinks and looked offended when May declined.
"Only being friendly."
"And we're only having a quiet drink," she replied.
Outside, Jason asked if she thought he was dangerous.
"No. Just tiresome."
Then she added, "But you needn't wait until someone's dangerous before you say no."
He carried that sentence into the ballroom.
There, beneath ornate plasterwork and warm lights, the evening opened into music.
A dance band played foxtrots and quicksteps. Shoes whispered and shuffled over the floor. Men with brilliantined hair approached women who had already noticed them approaching and had usually made up their minds.
Jason's first partner was a young clerk named Arthur.
"May I have this dance?"
Jason nearly answered that he didn't know how.
Then Margaret's borrowed familiarity stirred, and he placed his hand in Arthur's.
The first few steps were awkward.
"Sorry," Jason murmured after treading on his shoe.
"No damage done."
Arthur adjusted his pace.
Gradually, Jason relaxed.
He had expected being led to feel restrictive. With a considerate partner, it felt like listening: a pressure of the hand, a change of direction, an invitation answered through movement.
When the dance ended, he was smiling.
Arthur noticed.
"Another?"
"Yes," Jason said.
This time, he didn't hesitate.
Not every partner was considerate.
One drew him closer than he wanted and, when he tried to make space, responded with a grin.
"Don't be shy."
Jason stopped dancing.
"Then don't mistake me."
He pulled his hand away nd walked back to his friends, his heart beating unpleasantly fast.
Elsie shifted her chair to make room.
"Bad dancer?"
"Bad listener."
"Worse."
She passed him his handbag without asking why.
Later, Arthur returned and asked if he wanted some air.
Jason wanted to say yes.
Instead, he looked towards May.
She raised an eyebrow.
"The terrace," she said. "We'll be by the doors."
Outside, the night smelled of the sea.
Arthur offered a cigarette. Jason declined. They talked about ordinary things: train journeys, dreadful employers, whether the weather would hold.
When Arthur asked to write, Jason felt an unexpected sadness.
He could borrow Margaret's dancing steps. He could not make promises on her behalf.
"I'm afraid it wouldn't be fair."
Arthur studied him for a moment, then nodded.
"Well. I'm glad I asked you to dance."
"So am I."
He offered his arm for the walk back inside.
Jason took it.
They reached the boarding house with minutes to spare.
Mrs Pritchard watched them enter as though she had personally negotiated their safe return.
Upstairs, Elsie kicked off her shoes.
"If I ever marry, he can carry me home from dances."
"If you marry that motorcycle fellow, he'll strap you to the handlebars," May said.
Jason laughed until he had to sit down.
Then the conversation drifted towards home.
Elsie's wages. May's mother. A girl they knew, told by her employer that married women belonged at home.
"Easy to say when somebody else earns enough," May remarked.
Margaret's memories supplied the rest: tired feet behind a shop counter, careful savings, questions about when she intended to settle down. Being twenty-five and unmarried was apparently a subject acquaintances felt entitled to comment on.
Jason looked at the dress hanging from the wardrobe door.
He had enjoyed having someone help him into it. That did not make the expectations attached to it any lighter.
His friends had saved for this holiday. Duties waited at home, and people were ready to judge how they spent their little bit of freedom.
Yet here they were, laughing in their nightclothes, refusing to let the day end.
He felt privileged to be among them.
The second day passed much too quickly.
They walked along the pier, leaning into the wind. At Pleasure Beach, Elsie persuaded them onto a ride Jason immediately regretted, then insisted on discussing it for an hour.
They ate fish and chips with salt on their fingers.
May bought a postcard and spent ten minutes composing a message that said almost nothing.
"Can't tell my mother we've had fun," she explained. "She'll worry."
On the beach, they posed for a photograph with their arms linked.
Just before the shutter clicked, Elsie said something outrageous.
All three were laughing when the picture was taken.
That was the moment Jason wanted to keep.
Not simply the dress, or the dancing, or Arthur's hand resting politely at his waist.
This: friendship arriving as naturally as breathing. Being drawn into a huddle to share a joke. Someone straightening his collar without making a fuss. Feeling pretty, tired, happy and entirely included.
The return came as they sat above the sands.
May was brushing crumbs from her skirt.
Elsie was arguing that there was time for one more ice cream.
A discreet chime sounded somewhere inside Jason's mind.
His forty-eight hours were almost over.
He looked at his friends.
"What?" Elsie asked.
"Nothing."
He swallowed.
"I've had a wonderful time."
She nudged his shoulder.
"You sound as though you're never coming back."
The sea flashed silver beyond her.
Then it disappeared.
Jason woke in a reclining chair beneath the travel clinic's clean white lights.
His own hands lay on the armrests.
His own shoes stood beside the chair.
A technician smiled.
"Welcome back. How was Blackpool?"
"Wonderful," he said.
The word seemed terribly inadequate.
For several days, he blamed the feeling on the ordinary disappointment of Holiday.
He missed the sea. He missed having nothing urgent to do. He missed Elsie and May.
But there were quieter absences.
His wrist no longer smelled of perfume.
His clothes hung differently.
One evening, he reached automatically to smooth a skirt before sitting and found only his trousers.
He stood still for a moment.
That was harder to dismiss.
He missed the silk and lace. He missed the reflection he had smiled at before going dancing. He missed being called a lovely girl and discovering that the words pleased him.
He also remembered the intrusive looks, the unwanted hand, the small calculations his friends made before walking anywhere after dark.
He had no wish to pretend that their lives were easy.
But Margaret's life had let him feel something he had never quite imagined.
A week later, Jason returned to the Holiday company's website.
He searched for Blackpool first.
Then he stopped.
The destination had been wonderful, but it was only part of what he wanted.
He opened the booking preferences and selected a female host.
This time, he didn't rush past the choice.
Before confirming, he went into town and bought a small bottle of perfume.
At home, he touched a little to his wrist.
The scent was different from Margaret's. He had chosen it himself.
Jason sat beside the open window and breathed it in.
For the first time since returning, the feeling he missed seemed a little closer.
And this time, it belonged to him.
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