Each night the hotel staff would set up a table for two, with a small beach fire and hanging lanterns, at the apex of this view I first had. They advertised this as the ‘where the waves break’ table. I both wanted to eat at this table and knew I could not subject myself to the scrutiny of it. Is she a divorcée? Was she jilted? Why is she here alone? These questions were not simply the paranoid thoughts of someone holidaying solo, they were the questions in the minds of the couples holidaying there, who probed me – the why? pressing behind the actual questions they asked, the slightly pitiful way they invited me to join them for a drink or an excursion. I did not take them up on it. It can seem an affront that someone would prefer, would find it more enjoyable, to be alone. When I’m sat at a table alone, I wonder how I can indicate to others that I am not waiting to be joined by someone, I don’t desire that to happen. I am alone without regret. But it would be better to reach a point where I’m free of thoughts of how others perceive me.