32.
Joel
I take a minute or two to come round when I wake. No dreams.
Relieved, I roll onto my back and stare skyward. Toward where my bedroom ends and Callie’s begins.
“I think the universe might want us to give this a go,” I whisper to the patch of scruffy ceiling where I imagine her bed to be.
I already know I can’t wait to see her. Knock on her door, suggest coffee or brunch. Experience the effervescent rush of kissing her again.
All the reasons I shouldn’t are still there: falling for her, fearing what I might see if I do, and everything that brings with it.
But all the reasons I should are slowly beginning to outweigh them.
She knows about my dreams. I bared my soul to the first person I’ve truly cared about since Kate. To Callie, who’s breathed hope into my heart. Yet still she stopped me for that full-on kiss in the hallway last night. Something’s drawing us together, powerful as gravity. And now, after all these weeks, perhaps I’m finally ready to let gravity win.
I’ve watched possibility drift by over the years, connections I’ve held myself back from pursuing. Like Kieran’s cousin Ruby, who played footsie under the table with me five minutes after we met. The whip-smart veterinary nurse I got chatting to in a gin bar, that time Doug persuaded me out. The girl behind the counter in the post office, whose filthy joke about package sizes still causes me to smile and swerve the place in equal measure.
But Callie eclipses them all.
I turn my face into my pillow, permit myself a smile. And as I do, the reluctant clunk of Callie’s water pipes stirs into life. The sound of her running shower is like a standing ovation against my ceiling. And now, here it comes: the first tuneless verse of this morning’s song.
“I Want to Know What Love Is.”
Couldn’t have put it better myself.
•••
I resist knocking on her door for almost twenty-three minutes.
“Morning,” she says shyly, when eventually I give in. She’s wearing jeans and a pair of slippers, an oversized knitted jumper the color of morning mist.
Oh, my word, she looks beautiful. What was I going to say, again?
I smile at her. “How’s your appetite? Scale of one to ten.”
She bites her bottom lip, tucks a strand of damp hair behind her ear. “A solid nine.”
“Can I tempt you to breakfast?”
“Always.”
“What do you fancy?”
She blushes a little. “Um, I’m a sucker for pancakes.”
“Handy. I know just the spot.”
•••
The pancake joint’s tiny. It’s fairly new to town, but already has a cult following with queues out of the door, even on Sundays in late November. But today we get lucky with the last two stools in the window. Callie’s excited, says she’s been wanting to try this place since it opened.
The waitress who seats us is curt as cold air, but I assure Callie the pancakes will be worth it.
“Poor woman. I might be crabby too, if I had this many covers first thing on a Sunday,” Callie confesses. I’ve noticed that about her, that shealways gives people the benefit of the doubt. She inclines her head to mine. “Have to say, I’m in a bit of a frenzy about these pancakes now.”
My stomach flips with hunger and something else.
