I was hot, had a sore neck, and felt kind of sick when the sun woke me. Armed with a twelve-pack of Pepsi Dean hadn’t stopped all night. The twisting and turning of the van meant sleep was snatched five minutes at a time.

When I blinked my eyes open, I saw the front seats and then the back seats were empty. I stood, feeling like I was about to throw up, and opened the passenger’s door.

The first thing that made me smile was the scent – almost minty but more comforting. Then there was the colour – light purple stretching as far as the eye could see. We were in the lavender fields.

‘Danny!’ Ayamin said, lavender hung from the French braid in her hair, ‘You slept in.’

I stepped out of the van. It was almost like stepping into a fairy tale – only Dean was swearing loudly in Dutch from the other side of the van.

‘What’s going on?’

Ayamin took a lavender stem and put it behind my ear. She smiled, ‘Apparently we got a flat tyre in the middle of the night. Dean got like two hours of sleep and spent the rest of the time yelling at the wheel for getting a puncture.’

We walked around the van where the wheel was propped off the ground on a flimsy tyre jack.

Mila sat on her bag watching Dean kick the deflated tyre across the road. He yelled in Dutch for half a minute before flopping into a sitting position on the road.

‘That’s the last time I try to take a shortcut.’

Mila laughed, ‘You said the same thing in Germany and Austria!’

Dean joined her laughter, ‘Yeah I suppose I did.’

‘Do you have a spare?’ I asked.

‘Nah I had to sell it for gas, along with pretty much every other tool that would be useful right now.’

He sighed and looked around, ‘Damn these are cool fields. I really dig the colour purple, and the scent, and Mila you look gorgeous this morning.’

He got up, threw the tyre back onto our side of the road and picked up Mila bridal style.

‘I’m going to make the most of this,’ he said, kissing her mouth and grinning and running for the lavender fields all in the same moment. Mila was screaming with laughter.

Ayamin stood opened mouth as they disappeared behind a row of lavender.

‘Are all Europeans this crazy?’

I shrugged, ‘Only when it comes to football.’

My fingers slid into her hand, ‘Where’s Conor gone?’

She moved closer, her legs brushed mine, and her free hand moved up my shoulder, ‘He said he was going to find something to smoke. He’s been gone a while.’

‘Well, we’re alone,’ I said.

‘I think you’re right,’ she said.

My lips found hers, her mouth was hot and her hands found my chest. The smooth skin of her waist felt heavenly under my rough finger…

‘Hey guys.’

We froze. I turned my head to see Conor standing there on the road with sunglasses on, a smoking blunt in his mouth, and a wheel under his bare foot.

Conor shrugged, ‘I found a new tyre.’

Ayamin touched my ear, ‘Let’s finish this later,’ she whispered. Reluctantly I let her go.

Conor seemed oblivious to everything. He had a serene smile on his face.

‘Seriously Conor where’d you get the tyre?’ I asked.

He pointed down the road, ‘I was just walking along looking at the flowers and then bam! There’s a wheel in my hand and I thought to myself, that’s serendipity because we were just looking for a tyre.’

Aya shook her head, ‘Serendipity?’

Conor stared out into the field. That serene smile floated over his lips again.

‘It’s kind of like when two stones from different beaches fit perfectly into each other.’

He took a long drag on his joint and exhaled. The scent of it mixed with the lavender. We waited for Conor to speak again, but he seemed content with just standing there smoking.

Ayamin helped me roll Conor’s wheel over to the van and with dusty fingers, we put the wheel back on.

Dean and Mila arrived back at the van just after we’d finished and Ayamin told Mila about the wheel appearing in Conor’s hands.

Mila just rolled her eyes.

‘That’s the sort of thing he’s always doing.’

She walked over to Conor, took his sunglasses off, and gazed into his eyes.

‘Did he mention serendipity?’

One laugh was all the confirmation she needed.

‘Dean, Conor’s wasted.’

Dean just shrugged as he finished his inspection of the ‘new’ wheel.

‘Who cares? The road’s waiting baby.’

With an insane grin on his face, Dean ran over to Conor and wrapped an arm around him.

‘Let’s go! Go! Go! Go!’

We ran for the van and barely had time to get in our seats before Dean threw the van into gear, sending dust flying.

The van thundered down the narrow country road. We screamed around a corner and swerved past a police van sitting on the side of the road.

‘Damn,’ Dean said as the police van’s lights flashed and it pulled out onto the road, ‘There’s no way we can outrun them.’

But the police van had other ideas. It skidded back onto the grass edge of the road, then refused to budge.

‘Oh my,’ Mila said as we zoomed off, ‘They’ve only got three wheels.’

Ayamin and I exchanged a look, then stared at Conor who was flopped backwards in his seat. He breathed out a puff of smoke, then spoke one word:

‘Serendipity.’