‘I know. But we have work.’
Matt groaned and then pushed himself slowly up into a sitting position. ‘Yeah. I do have to go. I have to get home and change. I have a busy schedule today. Back-to-back meetings until mid-afternoon and then picking up Elmer and working the rest of the day from home. I have to fly to Edinburgh tomorrow for a couple of nights but I’m free this evening. Would you like to come over and meet Elmer?’ He swung his legs out of bed with another groan and began to gather up clothes.
‘I’d love to.’ She loved dogs. They grinned at each other inanely for a couple of beats and then Lily said, ‘Who’s dog-sitting while you’re in Edinburgh?’
‘My neighbour, Cynthia. Remember her?’ Matt reached down and planted a kiss on Lily’s lips, and then leaned in for more. A couple of minutes later, he pulled away and said, ‘I really do have to go. I’ll call you later.’
Lily checked the time on her phone when she’d seen him out of the door. Five thirty. The actual crack of dawn. Definitely time to crawl back into bed and get another hour and a half of sleep in before she started her day properly.
As she drifted back off, images of their week in Greece and snippets of things they’d said to each other swirled around in her head. It still felt like there was a conversation that they should have started and finished properly. Like, could things really be as simple as Matt had made out?
Lily arrived on Matt’s doorstep that evening straight from work. She rang the bell and waited, her heart thudding like she had… what, first-date nerves? Silly.
Matt opened his front door, half bending down holding Elmer’s collar and wearing a huge beam and Lily felt herself beam too.
‘He’s liable to get a bit over-excited when he meets new people,’ Matt said, still smiling broadly at Lily and still holding onto Elmer as she closed the door behind her. ‘I should have asked whether you’re okay with dogs – any allergies or anything – but I’m guessing you’d have said?’
‘I actually would have done,’ Lily said. ‘If I’m honest, I might not have done in the past, I might have just tried to avoid the situation without saying, but I would tell you now. But luckily I don’t have animal allergies.’ She bent down to pet Elmer. ‘He’sgorgeous.’
‘Yeah, he is. I’m a very proud dog-dad.’
Lily straightened up and opened her shoulder bag. ‘I have a couple of little presents for the two of you in here.’ She handed a bottle of wine to Matt and took out a natural rubber ball attached to a rope for Elmer. ‘Are you okay for him to have this?’
‘Absolutely. He’s going to be a very happy dog. And this wine looks great. Both completely unnecessary but both very gratefully received. Thank you.’ He smiled at her and then kissed her.
They took Elmer for a walk around Highgate Wood before going back to the flat for the dinner Matt had, ‘just whipped up from store-cupboard ingredients, honestly,’ he said, pushing three supermarket bags and two cookery books into the corner behind him.
‘That was delicious.’ Lily spooned out her last little bit of the lemon posset pudding Matt had made to follow his prawn and shiitake mushroom dish. ‘I’m not saying you weren’t a good cook when we were younger…’ he’d been a terrible cook then ‘… but your cooking skills areamazingnow. Properly impressive.’
‘If I’m honest, I don’t cook that much, I’ve just learnt to follow a recipe a lot better. For special occasions.’ Matt smiled at Lily and she smiled back at him. ‘I’m so pleased we met each other again,’ he said.
‘Me too.’
Matt moved his chair towards Lily’s and she moved hers towards his and put her hand into the one he was holding out to her. And Elmer pushed between the two of them and placed his front paws on Matt’s – nicely solid – thigh.
‘Does Elmer ever sleep in bed with you?’ Lily asked, nottotallypleased at the prospect of things being constantly interrupted by him, if she was honest.
‘Nope. He used to when he was a puppy but we…’ Matt tailed off and Lily tried hard not to mind that he’d clearly been about to mention being in bed with Gemma, and actually pretty much succeeded. He shook his head and frowned. ‘Sorry.’
‘Hey, no, nothing to say sorry about.’ Lily looked down at where they were still holding hands, in a slightly rigid way now. ‘I ended our relationship, you met Gemma, I met a couple of other people, although nothing long-term, nothing for either of us to apologise about.’ She relaxed her hand and squeezed Matt’s fingers. ‘And of course I don’tlovetalking about her but it really is fine. Genuinely.’ She smiled at him and his frown eased.
He pushed Elmer gently off his leg and stood up. ‘Maybe we could go and watch some TV? And then maybe an early night?’
‘I’d love that.’
The three of them curled up together on the sofa, Lily and Matt with their arms round each other and Elmer snuggled up on Matt’s other side.
‘This—’ Matt kissed Lily ‘—is perfect.’ And then his phone started pinging like mad. ‘Oh my God,what?’ he said. ‘Oh, okay. It’s Norm. He’s arrived in Bristol to stay with his brother because he’s upset that Carole didn’t follow him to Naxos. And he’d like to come and visit. And he has a lot to say. Maybe he wants me to repeat all of this to Carole. I’m just going to send a very quick reply saying I’m very busy this evening but I’ll speak to him tomorrow.’ He kissed her again.
‘Mmm.’
The next day, Lily’s phone was going silent-vibratingly ballistic as she finished up the last appointment of the morning’s ante-natal clinic. She took it out of her bag to check it and discovered that she had literally about fifteen missed calls from her mother.
She went completely cold, all over, really fast.
She actually wanted to speak to Matt, tell him she was scared that something terrible had happened. But that was stupid. What she should actually do was speak to hermother, and find out for certain what had happened rather than speculate.
Help, she couldn’t get her fingers to work on the phone. Okay, stop panicking. Deep breath, focus, finger into home button, press the right things. Okay. She’d done it.
