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the living room this morning!’ She reached into her dressing gown pocket and pulled out the letter.
    My face flushed and I tried to bury my head in my duvet. I must’ve forgotten to put it back in my bag after looking at it last night. Gwen was too quick and snatched it away before I could take refuge.
    ‘When were you going to tell me about this, this is absolutely massive! Your secret admirer’s back after six bloody years!’
    I couldn’t help but smile. Gwen was treating this significant development with her usual trademark enthusiasm.
    ‘I was going to show you today,’ I replied. ‘Don’t quite know what to make of it really; I mean, why’s he getting in touch after all this time?’
    ‘Well that’s obvious; he’s been thinking about you since he stopped writing the letters, kicked himself and now he’s decided to put things right.’
    I loved how simple things were in Gwen’s world; if only the real world were like that.
    ‘What if it’s not that though; what if it was just a huge joke the whole time and now he’s back for another pop to see how much he can get me to fall for him?’
    She wrinkled her nose up and scoffed. ‘Unless he’s a major sad case with nothing better to do, I don’t think that’s the reason he’s writing again! This is big Ava; he must’ve been thinking about you all this time. Maybe this is all meant to be and it was just the wrong time for you guys at uni.’
    I raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘This isn’t a Disney movie Gwen, things like that don’t happen in real life.’
    ‘
This
is real though!’ She waved the letter in front of my face to prove her point. ‘Whoever’s writing these is obviously mad about you. If you want my opinion, I think you should try and find out who this guy is instead of waiting around for him. If you want him, go out there and get him.’
    Oh great, I thought, first Max says it and now Gwen! If both of my best friends were suggesting this utterly mad, hare-brained scheme to find my secret admirer, maybe I should give it some consideration. I couldn’t deny I was tempted. Getting the opportunity to put my Miss Marple hat on in the name of true love appealed to me.
    ‘Maybe you’re right. I wouldn’t know where to start though,’ I protested. I folded my arms in defeat and sunk back onto my pillows.
    Gwen shuffled her bum across the bed until she was sitting beside me. ‘Nowadays, if you want to find anyone you go on the internet. Make a blog or something; didn’t you say you had to write about an unusual love story? This could be it; how many women can say they received love letters from a sexy secret admirer at uni
then
again years later! You’ll trump anything Maddie could come up with.’
    Excitement swelled inside me. Maybe this wasn’t as ridiculous as I’d first thought it was. I glanced over to my wardrobe and my breath caught in my throat. It was in there, wedged tight and hidden from view. Every single letter he’d ever written to me was stuffed into a shortbread tin. So much love had been crammed into that slightly bashed metal box. Was it safe to unleash it all again?
    I took a second to think before addressing Gwen. It wouldn’t be easy to find him and I could be in line for a nasty shock if it all turned out to be a massive prank.
    ‘I think I’ll leave it up to Fate for now,’ I replied. ‘If it’s meant to happen, it will.’
    Before I tackled the mountain of work that lay before me, I decided to devote some time to researching possible topics for my feature. I trawled the internet for quirky love stories, from bizarre meetings to ones that worked under unusual circumstances. I found the usual: met on a plane then saw each other again five years later, couples who lived on the other side of the world from each other and ones who only saw each other every few months due to work commitments. None of them had the spark I was looking for; I couldn’t find any fresh angle to take on any of them. They were