‘What are you doing here?’ I ask.
‘I’ve got a flight tomorrow. I’m going to San Sebastian.’
‘Oh,’ I say, feeling immediately distraught. ‘On holiday?’ I’m hopeful. Hopeful it’s only a holiday.
He shakes his head. ‘No.’
‘I was hoping to see you at the hotel when I got back. I’m heading up next week.’
‘I know.’
‘Damn!’ I whisper, taking a quick swig on my beer.
‘It’s only for a few months,’ he says. ‘I’m doing a short placement at a new restaurant there. It’s a barbecue seafood place, just south of the city, right up on the cliffs. A bit of a different set-up for me, but they do a really amazing local, foraged menu and I thought it was time to try something new for a bit. But only for a bit …’
‘And then?’
‘Well, I’ll be trying to do something at the bay.’
‘You mean … your house?’
‘Yes, that’s the plan. The second building, next door to the main one, do you remember it?’
‘Of course I remember it,’ I blurt out, wanting to grab his hand.I’ll never forget it.
‘Well,’ he says, his eyes flicking to mine and then back to the safety of the pizza. ‘Yes. I’ve spoken to the bank and they are going to lend me some money for the renovation. It’s not going to be anything fancy …’
‘It’s going to be perfect.’
‘Well, it’s going to be all mine.’
‘Won’t you miss Loch Dorn?’
‘Miss it? No. It’s a drive away. Besides, we’ll work together. Loch Dorn will hopefully offer horse treks with Brett to my place, for some kind of fancy brunch,’ he says.
‘Brett & Breakfast,’ I say.
He laughs. A warm, spontaneous laugh, covering his mouth with his hand as he does so. I laugh too. We catch eyes, and it’s all I can do not to throw myself across the table and into his lap.
‘Oh, that’s great,’ I say instead. ‘I’m happy for you. It seems right.’
‘It’s right,’ James says, nodding his head like he’s just accepting it himself, and then there is a silence again. I know he didn’t come all the way to London – flight out or not – simply to tell me that. He stands up and begins to pace the short length between the doorand the kitchen sink. ‘Look, I need to know how much ofyouI knew.’
‘Uh,’ I put my head in my hands. ‘I don’t know how to answer that.’
‘Heather talked to me about you a lot.’ He stops by the fridge for a moment.
‘Is this about Tim?’
‘I don’t care about him,’ James says, waving his hand dismissively. ‘But Heather – the way she talked about you, it sounded like the person I knew.’
‘It was all me.’
‘All of it?’
‘Well, apart from the wine stuff. I had to work hard to pull that off,’ I say. ‘I mean, I workedreally hardat that, and working really hard is definitely not something that I could have consideredme, before. But all the rest – I mean, it was as much me as was possible.’
‘The stuff when we went fishing, about wine not being your passion? That’s why you were so evasive.’
