That's what it said on the front of the tourist guide. Martin had found it by chance in a charity shop window and had picked it up for 20p. Sure, he wasn't a tourist anymore, but he wanted to be as primed as possible before he actually got there. The tourist guide sat beside him, in the passenger seat.

On the front cover was an aerial shot of a busy sandy beach, inset with smaller photos of children on said beach, a couple hiking in a forest, and a bare and empty hill. Martin knew this wasn't Cornwall in all its tourist unfriendly honesty. If he looked at the photo of the hill close enough he would swear he could tell that a mobile phone mast had been airbrushed out of the top.

Cornwall - It's The Other Side Of Devon.

God, Martin thought, hope that doesn't mean the same thing that Brixton - It's The Other Side Of London would mean. Images of farmers' boys growing illicit crops and roaming the country lanes in gangs after dark drifted into his head. Even then, part of Martin realised his view of Cornwall was based entirely on popular stereotypes. However, being stuck behind the same tractor for the last three-and-a-quarter miles was doing little to challenge that.

After another twenty minutes behind Farmer Giles, Martin saw a turning up ahead. His heart fluttered slightly and he smiled. He supposed this was what living in the countryside was going to be like. The little things were already starting to matter to him again. He saw that the turning was indeed for Brinslow-on-the-Wye and his palms began to moisten with anticipation.

Then the tractor turned too.

Martin finally got into Brinslow two hours after he'd intended to. At first this pissed him off, until he realised that this was his Inner Commuter trying to take control again. It didn't matter that he was delayed. Lateness doesn't feature in the vocabulary of Rat Race ex-pats. You Are Not Your Schedule. His last counsellor had told him to write that above his desk but Martin had written it inside his yearly planner instead. He could laugh about it now.

As he drove slowly through Brinslow, the only car on the road, Martin began to relax again. It didn't matter that he was late, simply because there was no late. He didn't have to be anywhere, at anytime, to meet anyone. He could have turned up yesterday or even tomorrow and it wouldn't have made a difference. Oh, yes, thought Martin, I'm going to fall in love with this place.

Brinslow-on-the-Wye was a small village, not small enough to be a hamlet, but not large enough to have its own police station. Martin had already passed two pubs, though. The main road that went through the heart of the village was deliberately zigzagged. Martin realised why when he was forced to slow down to go round a sharp corner. The rest of the village was arranged around this main road, with numerous cul-de-sacs trailing off at lazy angles.

The houses along the main road were uniformly terraced and made of red brick. Some had shop fronts where they should have had lounges. Martin spotted the grocer's straight away. He had fruit and vegetables on a worn old table beneath the awning. But there were no oranges, pineapples or bananas. A hand-written sign in the window said "All local produce!" in proud permanent marker.

The houses down the cul-de-sacs were more like cottages. They were all detached, set in nearly an acre of land each. Some of them were thatched with black straw, but a lot more of them looked like they'd just been built in the last forty years to look like they were older. Martin's new home was like that. The photo had leapt off the page at him. So had the price. He couldn't connect the two, until phoning the estate agent and learning of the house's faux archaism.

NOTES:
This was the original opening to the story I was planning to submit as part of my MA application. The concept is the only thing that has survived, even if it has changed significantly. In this version, Martin was going to fall in love with a woman who insists her mother moves in with them. Her mother is a grossly obese bed-ridden old woman. Martin soon catches his new bride luring men to have sex with her mother, and eventually discovers that, actually, he has married the mother, who has stolen youth and beauty from her daughter, the fat cow, as to seduce him. No, it isn't quite as good, though I like this opening. The symbolism of the cottages not being as old as they appear was written entirely subconsciously.