Exhaling, he smiles. “All right. I’ve been giving you a hard time about this, but... I have something to confess.”
I wait.
“I wanted to tell you this when we first got together, but I thought you might think it was a bit weird.”
I smile. “Should I be nervous?”
He scratches the back of his neck, then releases a breath. “That day I met you in The Smugglers, when you ran outside to talk to Max, you both looked so... I don’t know. Giddy, or something. To be seeing each other. Anyway, I walked out the front door to leave, and I was going to say good-bye to you, but you were so absorbed in each other that... Anyway, I had my camera with me, so I took a quick shot. It just struck me, how you were looking at each other. I was going to e-mail it to you, if you got in touch. I thought maybe it could be an icebreaker, or something... until I realized that’d be slightly shooting myself in the foot.”
“Do you still have it? The photo?”
He shakes his head. “Deleted it. Felt a bit weird about keeping it once we’d got together.”
I frown. “Why are you telling me this?”
He shrugs. “I could see that night how much Max meant to you, and I guess... it goes some way to explaining why I feel a bit... sensitive about him. Aside from him being some sort of overachieving Adonis, obviously.”
“He’s not,” I say quickly. “But thank you. I appreciate you being honest.”
He dips his face to mine. “Any chance you could kiss me or something, so I don’t feel like quite such an idiot?”
I laugh, lean forward, and oblige.
We’re just about to head back inside when, from the back of the house, a door slams, making us both jump.
I peer around the brickwork to see Tash and Simon on the patio. Tash is crying, her face covered in blotches.
I glance at Caleb, eyes wide. He shakes his head, raises a finger to his lips.
“Tash,” Simon is saying. “You’re overreacting.”
“Overreacting?You went for a drink withher, of all people, and you think—”
“For the hundredth time, it wasn’t a drink, it was a sodding work thing! There were about a hundred other people there!”
“Isaidto you that if you saw her again, that would beit—”
“I haven’t beenseeingher, I bumped into her. What did you want me to—”
“Natasha?” My mum is stepping out onto the patio, her timing impeccably ham-fisted as only a mother’s can be.
My dad’s bedridden at home today with a migraine, apparently, which is odd—I can’t remember the last time he was ill, and I didn’tknow he suffered from migraines, either. Not to mention the fact that he adores his only grandchild. Maybe all the redundancy stuff has flared up again: I know how much that stresses him out. And Mum’s looked pretty miserable today, though she’s been trying to put a brave face on it. I guess she’s just used to always having Dad by her side.
“Dylan wants to know if we can cut the cake,” Mum’s saying. There follows a pause as she clocks Tash’s face. “Are you... okay, darling?”
“I’m fine,” Tash snaps, her voice so caustic it chills me. “I’ll be inside in a minute.”
There’s another pause before Mum retreats, pulling the door shut behind her.
I feel my pulse invade my throat. I’ve seen my sister get angry before, but I’ve never seen her lose control like this.
“Tash,” Simon says, his voice strung out like it’s being physically tugged from his chest. Ridiculously, he’s still wearing his top hat, hired—I hope—to align with today’s theme. “Andrea was a mistake. I don’t know how many times I need to tell you that.”
“If you can’t stay away from her, then I don’t even know what we’re doing, Simon.”
Across the lawn behind them, a blackbird whooshes past in a flurry, as if startled by all the commotion.
“Tash. It’s Dylan’s birthday.” Simon is pleading now.
