She nodded. “He worked at the hospital as a psychiatrist.”
“You talked about him loads. You hadn’t been on a date for ages and then you mentioned him at least once each time we spoke and sent me a selfie of you together at drinks after work one Friday.” I’d hated that photo, Rose smiling, Fallon next to her, and Theo’s arm around Rose’s shoulders.
“I remember.”
“I messaged Fallon to find out what he was like and whether you were interested in him.”
She raised her brows, studying. “I didn’t know that. What did Fallon say?”
“That Theo really liked you and he’d asked her to set the two of you up. That was the same day I offered to marry Laurie.” I rubbed my hair, hearing how pathetic it sounded.
“You idiot.” She said the words softly, making them hit all the harder.
I took a long hard lungful of air. “I know. Maybe I hoped something would happen with Laurie because I didn’t like the idea of you seeing someone and me moping over it.”
“But I wasn’t interested in Theo – I mean I was at first, he was a flirt and a proper rake. He did ask me out but I knew he’d shagged one of the women who worked on reception the night before and she hadn’t exactly given him a good review.” Rose was chuckling now. “That’s why I stopped talking about him. Do you remember, you even asked why I hadn’t mentioned him.”
“And you said you hadn’t seen much of him.” That was when I’d realised I’d made a fuck up of things.
“I’d avoided him. But you’re still marrying Laurie.”
I nodded. “I am. It gets her out of a bind, and if it weren’t for you, it wouldn’t matter anyway.” My throat felt tight and everything had tensed, because I was laying everything out to potentially get trampled on.
“Okay. But what if you came back and we don’t work out? What if we find out we were better off as friends but in the process we ruin that?” She edged closer to me, blanket askew.
I stretched, needing to move and took another deep breath. “Remember when Fallon jumped off that cliff?”
“And you followed her? I do. It was terrifying.”
“Sometimes you’ve just got to trust your gut.”
She looked concerned and I remembered this was Rose. Decisions and their possibly outcomes had to be considered seven ways till Sunday before committing.
“That’s not always easy to do.”
“Depends on who you are. I’m sorry about Laurie and that situation, but it’s performative. It helps her out and I’m not going back on it, that’s not me.” I’d considered what would happen if Rose said she couldn’t handle that, but I knew her and I knew how rational she could be.
She nodded slowly, then finished the rest of her tea. “We need to just hang out anyway. Slow things down because you’ve just moved back and Harriet’s moving away and the Laurie thing. There’s a lot going on.”
“There is. I can wait, Rosie.”
“It might not work.”
“It might not.”
“But I want to know if it would.” She edged closer again, pushing the palm of her hand against mine, entwining our fingers, the first time we’d touched since the last time I’d kissed her. “Not every relationship works out.”
“It doesn’t. There would be no guarantee that it would.” My fingers wrapped around hers and I tugged her closer, reliefand something like hope that I hadn’t fucked things up with a moment of impulsivity combined with self-pity.
“And it’s better to know than to wonder.” She moved closer to me, her heat spreading through the blankets and my jeans, the hand that wasn’t in mine on my knee. My back was against the sofa, while Rose was facing me, her legs up on the seat. I tried to absorb the moment, the flat almost totally silent now, the music having stopped. Just our breathing, the rub of the blankets if we moved.
I didn’t think we’d ever gone so long without speaking. My other hand slid up her arm to her hair, my fingers twisting in it. We shifted, our faces closer, and this time when my lips met hers it was without any chance of an audience, and no reason to stop because Rose now knew. It was still complicated, I still wasn’t available, but it was temporary, and when she knew more about Laurie and why the trust was so important to her, she’d understand even better.
That wasn’t mine to tell though.
But she was mine right now to kiss. I cupped her face in my hand and felt the softness of her skin, her lips warm against mine with the slight taste of tea on them. It felt like Clapham Common again, but she wasn’t seventeen and I was back permanently in London.
She shifted onto my knee, moving closer, her hands around my neck, her breasts pressing against my chest. I’d shifted my hold to her waist, wanting to stand up and cheer that I finally had her on the same page of the same book. I tugged at her bottom lip with my teeth, feeling her shiver, slowing down the kiss because I wasn’t sure how far this should go right now and I didn’t want impulsivity to derail us any further. But I couldn’t stop it completely.
