Meet Me at the Lighthouse: This summer’s best laugh-out-loud romantic comedy

“I don’t think he has good moods. Sorry.”

Ten minutes later, I was still staring at on-trend summer looks for the wonky-titted fashionista when some sort of pager on the receptionist’s desk buzzed. She looked up from her book to examine it.

“You’re up,” she said, jerking her head towards the ornate wooden doors leading to the council chambers. “They want you in the meeting.”

The councillors – ten of them, all in suits, all men and with an average age of at least 60 – were seated in a horseshoe around a large table. The only one I recognised was Alex Partington, the youngest councillor. He tried to catch my eye but I ignored him.

No chairs had been provided for me and Ross, who huddled together on the carpet as if we were being tried for murder. The bony, leather-skinned man with the watery eyes who was chairing the meeting – Councillor Langford, he’d introduced himself as – had us fixed in a stern gaze.

“So. Mr Mason and Miss Hannigan: welcome,” he said without smiling. His flat-toned voice echoed off the chamber’s oak panels, and I could tell that good moods were out. “Let’s make a start, shall we?”

Councillor Langford put on a pair of reading glasses and looked down at the document in front of him. “I see you’re asking for £60,000 to have the town lighthouse cleaned and repaired.” He glanced up at us from over the rim of his glasses, not lifting his head. “Now. That’s a lot of money, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I said, squirming under his unsympathetic gaze. “The place is in quite a state, as you can see from the photographs. But we’re not asking for money towards maintenance; the project we have in mind will be self-funding. And we’ve already been approved by the Coastal Heritage Fund for a £70,000 grant that’ll partially cover repairs.”

“It’s a lot of money,” the man repeated, as if he hadn’t heard me. “Public money. We see a lot of projects here, Miss Hannigan. Just this month we’ve considered bids from the Cragport Clean Beaches Association to have the beach huts weatherproofed and another from the Women’s Institute to repair the Edwardian bandstand in the park. What makes you think we should choose your lighthouse over competing bids?”

“Well…”

I faltered. This was harder than I’d expected. Despite the nerves that had hit me before coming in, I’d been quietly confident the council were so desperate to see the place done up that they’d cough up a grant with ne’r a grumble. And now this demon-headmastery old bastard seemed determined to give us a hard time before he rolled over.

“The lighthouse is over 100 years old.” Ross jumped to my rescue with something from the notes we were both supposed to have memorised. “It’s a historic icon of the town, one of the first things visitors notice. We want the emblem of Cragport to be something we’re proud of, don’t we, gents? Not a broken-down wreck.”

That hit a nerve. The chairman kept his face fixed, but I noticed a few nods around the table.

“So can you tell us why you decided to launch this project?” Langford asked, once again ignoring the point raised. He shot Ross a pointed look. “I believe the lighthouse has been in your family some years, Mr Mason, with no attempt made before to tackle the state of decay it had fallen into – in spite of our frequent requests.”

I could see Ross was trying to keep up a polite, detached expression, but his hand clenched at the reference to the council’s persecution of poor Charlie.

“I’ve just moved back to the area,” he said with forced calm. “The lighthouse was my uncle’s property, as you all know, and he’s too elderly now to keep up with repairs. The deeds were only signed over to us in April.”

“A month ago. Have you done any work since then?”

“No. We only got approval for our Coastal Heritage grant last week. Plus, of course, we wanted to wait until we’d seen all of you.”

“And this young lady is your… business partner, is it?” Langford said, examining me with lip curled.

“Yes, and an old friend.”

“So you have some expertise in this area, do you, dear?” Langford asked me with that patronising air we ladies just bask in.

“What, renovating lighthouses?” I gave a nervous laugh. “Not exactly. Well, who does? But I’ve got experience setting up projects like this one. My mum – Janine Hannigan, some of you know her – started the Cragport youth club a few years back.”

“And you were instrumental in that, were you?”

“Not exactly instrumental. I helped a bit.” I noticed Langford eyeing me with a barely concealed sneer. “A lot,” I corrected, meeting his gaze. “I was involved with all the planning, start to finish. I can show you the paperwork if you need me to prove it.”

“That won’t be necessary.” Langford shuffled his documents, taking his time; an obvious power-play that I had to admit was bloody effective. Out of the corner of my eye I could see beads of sweat standing out on Ross’s face, and felt sympathy prickles on my own forehead.

“I notice you haven’t answered my question,” Langford said at last. “Why did you decide to commence this, frankly, bizarre-sounding project – this music thing?”

God, he had to ask. We could hardly confess it had been a drunken plan fuelled by tequila slammers and snogging.

Ross recovered before I did. “It’s been a long-held dream of mine, to open a performance space for young people,” he said, his voice carefully formal. “I’m a musician myself, and I know from experience how hard it is for kids in this community to find the support they need. But I’d never considered the lighthouse. It was Roberta who convinced me it could work.” He flashed me a little smile. “She’s got a talent for spotting potential in things others don’t see.”

“This could put us on the map,” I said to Langford, sensing the tourism angle might be the way to win them round. “How many seaside towns have got their own music venue inside a lighthouse? Cragport could have something nowhere else in the country – the world, maybe – has got.”

I thought that was a pretty strong argument, but if Langford was impressed he didn’t show it. He was sneering again, not bothering to hide it now. “Right. And this madcap plan you concocted over, what, a couple of beers in the pub is something you think the two of you, with next to no experience, can pull off?”

In the pub … shit, he only bloody knew, didn’t he? We should have realised the ever-restless town tongue-waggers would’ve been at work. Well, that was it then. He’d clearly made up his mind against us. Unless we could win round the other grave, silent men at the table, it looked like it was game, set and fucked to Councillor Langford.

Alex had been trying to catch my eye all the time we’d been talking, and so far I’d done pretty well ignoring him. I’d spent a week mentally preparing myself for seeing him, knowing full well I needed to stay calm and professional if we were to have any shot at the funding. But he finally managed to arrest my gaze, flashing me a warm smile before he turned to face his chairman.

“Sorry, Arthur, I have to take issue with you. I think you’re being rather harsh.” Alex patted the paperwork in front of him. “No matter where the idea came from, Bobbie and Ross have come to us with a solid, well-researched plan. That alone should deserve applause from us rather than censure, whatever our ultimate decision.” He caught my eye again, but I kept my gaze fixed straight ahead. If he thought that little intervention was enough to earn him a place in my good books, he could think again.

“I agree,” another man joined in. “I think this music venue idea is capital, something the whole community can benefit from. Vital as it is to our economy, I’ve long argued this council needs to think less about tourism and more about the people resident here all year round.”

“They already have a sizeable grant from the Coastal Heritage Fund,” Alex said. “If that body were willing to put their faith in this project, I see no reason we shouldn’t be.”

There was a rhubarb-rhubarb murmur around the table, but whether it represented assent or disagreement I couldn’t tell.

“Questions from the council at the end, gentlemen,” Langford said, not taking his eyes off me and Ross.

“My granddaughter’s in a band, they’re very good,” the second councillor went on, ignoring his chairman and speaking directly to us. “This sounds like it could be just the thing for her. She’s always saying how hard it is to find anywhere to practise.”

Alex nodded. “Very true, Bill. I’m sure lots of young people would benefit from somewhere to rehearse without disturbing people. It’s about time the council started encouraging creativity instead of punishing it.”

“Questions at the end,” Langford repeated firmly, turning to frown at Alex. “Due process, please, Councillor. Keep to your agenda.”

“Yes. Sorry, Arthur.” Alex looked down at his papers, but I saw him flash me a smile as the chairman gave his attention back to us.

“I repeat,” Langford said. “What makes the two of you believe you can pull off this little scheme?”

Ross glared at him. “We’re perfectly capable, thank you, Arthur – er, Councillor. We’ve got drive, energy and incentive: the rest of it we’ll learn as we go. Anyway, it seems to me you don’t have much of an alternative, do you?”

“There is one alternative, one your uncle always stubbornly refused to countenance,” Langford said, his mouth twisting into an unpleasant half-smile. “You could sell the lighthouse to us. The two of you would get a tidy payout each and the lighthouse would get the future it deserves.”

“Future? What future?”

“A visitor centre, like lighthouses the country over. Pay a pound to see the view from the top, get a sandwich and a cuppa in a little tearoom at the bottom. It’s a relic and it ought to be preserved, not filled with feral adolescents doing God knows what damage.”

Ross looked angry now. “It bloody well isn’t a relic. It deserves better than that. It’s …” He paused.

“It should be alive,” I chimed in. “Not just a pretty thing to be kept in bubblewrap. It was someone’s home, once. It’s saved lives –”

Langford scoffed. “You’re too sentimental, my dear. It’s a building, not a pet. A historic building, which should be admired as just that. Not used as a –” he paused, fumbling for the word – “a damn … speakeasy.”

“Performance space.” I crossed my arms. “And you can’t just buy us off. We won’t sell and that’s that.” I turned to Ross. “Will we?”