Me-Before-You-by-Jojo-Moyes

Nathan clapped his hands on to his knees. ‘Sounds great. Nice day for it too,’
he said. ‘You want me to pack some lunch?’
‘Nah,’ I said. ‘There’s a nice restaurant. When my horse comes in, lunch is on
me.’
‘You’ve been racing often, then?’ Will said.
And then before he could say anything else, we had bundled him into his coat
and I ran outside to reverse the car.
I had it all planned, you see. We would arrive at the racecourse on a beautiful
sunny day. There would be burnished, stick-legged thoroughbreds, their jockeys
in billowing bright silks, careening past. Perhaps a brass band or two. The stands
would be full of cheering people, and we would find a space from which to wave
our winning betting slips. Will’s competitive streak would kick in and he would
be unable to resist calculating the odds and making sure he won more than either
Nathan or me. I had worked it all out. And then, when we had had enough of
watching the horses, we would go to the well-reviewed racecourse restaurant and
have a slap-up meal.
I should have listened to my father. ‘Want to know the true definition of the
triumph of hope over experience?’ he would say. ‘Plan a fun family day out.’
It started with the car park. We drove there without incident, me now a little
more confident that I wasn’t going to tip Will over if I went faster than 15 mph. I
had looked up the directions at the library, and kept up a cheerful banter almost
the whole way there, commenting on the beautiful blue sky, the countryside, the
lack of traffic. There were no queues to enter the racecourse, which was,
admittedly, a little less grand than I had expected, and the car park was clearly
marked.
But nobody had warned me it was on grass, and grass that had been driven
over for much of a wet winter at that. We backed into a space (not hard, as it was
only half full) and almost as soon as the ramp was down Nathan looked worried.
‘It’s too soft,’ he said. ‘He’s going to sink.’
I glanced over at the stands. ‘Surely, if we can get him on to that pathway
we’ll be okay?’
‘It weighs a ton, this chair,’ he said. ‘And that’s forty feet away.’
‘Oh, come on. They must build these chairs to withstand a bit of soft ground.’