She laughs. “Of course I’m going to feed you. Duh.” She ducks out from under my arm and opens the fridge, frowning at what’s inside. “Hmm. Pizza okay?”
“Perfect.”
Sadie’s kitchen is a lovely open-plan room with an island in the middle. I sit on one of the stools and watch as she pulls two pizzas out and puts them in the oven when it’s warmed up enough.
When she turns to face me, there’s a twinkle in her eye that I’m not sure I like.
“So...” she says, taking the stool opposite me. “You were going to have dinner with Charlie?”
“Yep.”
She huffs when I don’t elaborate. “Comeon.You’ve got to give me more than that. Have you changed your mind about getting involved with him?”
My knee-jerk reaction is to sayno. But I think back to this morning and hesitate.
Sadie’s eyes widen. “Is that ayes?”
I grimace. “It’s anI don’t know anymore.” I take a sip of my drink, letting the warm chocolatey goodness thaw the last remnants of cold clinging to me. “I think he’s changing his mind about the whole staying-friends thing. I’m not certain, though,but maybe that’s what tonight was going to be about. He said he wanted to talk to me.”
“And haveyouchanged your mind?”
“Yeah. I think I have.” I let out a deep sigh, allowing that thought to sink in. It feels like the truth. “It’ll still be shit when he leaves next weekend, but I really like him. And I haven’t felt like that in a long while. Seems stupid not to do anything about it while I have the chance.”
The timer goes off and she pats me on the arm as she gets up. “Good.”
We eat our pizza, the topic of conversation moving on to other things like Christmas plans and work. When we decamp into the lounge with our coffees later, I immediately stop in the doorway.
“Tree looks good.”
She snorts. “It’d better, considering what we do for a living.”
It’s a big bushy Nordmann Fir, decorated with red, gold, and green baubles and tinsel. The soft white fairy lights wound around the tree fade slowly in and out. It’s beautiful.
“You still not got one up?”
I shake my head. “Not yet.”
“You got any decorations up?”
I think about Charlie’s reaction to my bare house and wince. “No. I’ve got them down from the loft, but that’s as far as I’ve got.”
She tsks. “Wait till I tell Mum.”
“Don’t you dare.”
“I’ve already sent her a pic of mine. It’s only a matter of time before she starts asking about your tree. You know what she’s like.”
I do. My mum loves Christmas. She and her sister have had their tree up for two weeks already. It’s an artificial one—whichis a travesty, I know—but at least they have a couple of small real ones outside the front door.
“You’ve got Monday off. Why not do it then?”
I wonder what Charlie’s doing on Monday. I think about Vic & Sean’s suggestion about taking him to my tree farm to choose a tree. The more I think about it, the more I like the idea. “Hmm. Maybe I will.”
It’s getting late, so I finish my drink and head home.
There are no lights on in my house when I pull onto the drive. It looks dark, miserable, and not welcoming at all. In contrast, when I walk around the corner to the back door, there’s warm light spilling from behind the curtains in the annexe.
Is Charlie still up?
