Luke and I are finally paying attention to each other,deliberately connecting every day, even if that’s just sending some coded emojis while the other one is at work or somewhere else. Something to say ‘I see you. I’m thinking of you’. I love him even more than I did on our wedding day. It’s as if, now we’ve removed the walls and the filters, our marriage has gone from being black and white to being in colour. I never imagined it could be this good eleven years on.
Luke returns with a cocktail for me and a beer for himself, then stretches himself out on the sun lounger and we both devote ourselves to the bliss of doing absolutely nothing. That is, until my phone chimes and then Luke’s does almost immediately afterwards. We sit up, look at each other, then snatch them up. An emergency?
‘Cassie,’ he says after checking his screen.
‘Elena,’ I reply.
Not an emergency, then. Merely a coincidence. I open up my message app and read.
Having a good time? How jealous should I be?
I smile and text back‘Very’and then add a few cocktail glass emojis for good measure.
Bring me back a Greek god, she adds.
Sure thing, I reply.If I can squeeze him in my carry-on.
We’ve become friends – well,betterfriends – in the last year. I’m stunned I used to find her so intimidating, which I now realize was much more to do with me than anything Elena said or did. She truly is a marvellous, warm, loving person, and Lukeand I were happy to give as much support as we could as she finished up her cancer treatment. She’s doing okay now. Still not fully given the all-clear, but things are looking promising.
Gained a friend, lost a friend …
I haven’t spoken to Hannah since the night I screamed at her in the folly. The next day, I blocked her on everything. It was awkward, of course, because she worked for Luke for a short while afterwards. Thankfully, she didn’t fight it when he suggested it was for the best if she moved on from Harris & Sons. He even gave her a reference, which is more than she deserved, frankly.
How did I get it so wrong? The one person I should have trusted wholeheartedly – Luke – I couldn’t stop being suspicious of, and the one person I never thought to doubt betrayed me completely. I don’t care how messed up Connor made her. She crossed a line.
However, that’s all behind me now. I turn to put my phone back down on the small table between us. ‘What does Cassie want?’
‘Not sure,’ Luke replies. ‘I saw “emergency” spelled out in capital letters at the top and decided not to read the rest. She put it in the family group chat, so I’m sure someone else will step in. Besides, there’s not much I can do from Kos, is there?’
‘Nope.’
I smile as I lie back down and close my eyes. Luke and I chatted about his family not long after our last anniversary. I also had a quiet word with his mum, just letting her know how sometimes the pressure of being oldest son and big brother weighed on him. Things have been a bit better since then. Of course, Luke still occasionally dashes off at a moment’s notice, and healways will, but the load is shared more evenly across his siblings now.
Even better, he got up the nerve to talk to his dad about Harris & Sons. It turns out his youngest brother, Nick, is champing at the bit to do more for the family business but hadn’t wanted to tread on his brother’s turf. Luke has bought a house with Elena recently and they’re going to flip it, with plans to do more in the future. Eventually, Luke hopes he can hand over the reins of the building company completely to Nick, although he’ll always be involved in some capacity.
And things have got better with my family too. Well, on some fronts. We’re spending much more time with Dad and Lola. The twins are about to head off to university in the autumn and I’m really enjoying interacting with them as adults, even if they’ve lost none of their cheekiness. I hope I can do a better job of being their big sister than I have previously, maybe lending a sympathetic ear if they have uni or boyfriend troubles they don’t want to share with their mum.
‘You’ve gone quiet,’ Luke says.
‘I was thinking about family,’ I reply. ‘How much has changed in the last twelve months.’
‘Have you heard from your mum lately?’
I shake my head. ‘No.’
‘Are you worried about that?’
‘Yes and no.’ I met up with Mum a few times after our anniversary party. Only about once a month, as I wanted time to work out how to move forward without repeating the mistakes of the past. Going to Al Anon has helped. I’m more confident I can stand my ground and not enable her if things go sideways, and I’ve been very clear about my boundaries.
Maybe that’s why she’s gone quiet, something she used to do occasionally when she fell off the wagon – hiding away, feeling ashamed. Not wanting to reveal too much. I honestly don’t know if she’s drinking again, but my gut says she probably is, which makes me sad. However, there’s nothing I can do about it.
But I have hope. My experience in my ‘other life’ has at least given me that. A different future is there for her to reach out and take. If she wants it. And in the meantime, I have two wonderful surrogate mothers – Diane and Lola – to fill that void.
Luke and I don’t talk too much about what I told him about my time-hopping adventures the night of our tenth anniversary. We both have questions we don’t know the answers to, but I think he prefers to believe it was just a horrendously vivid dream brought on by the stress of the argument we had. Sometimes, I almost believe that along with him. Other times, I’m not so sure. But there’s no evidence of any of that time – I was the only eyewitness and even my memories of those thirteen days are becoming blurry and washed out.
After dinner, Luke and I go for our nightly stroll along the beach, hand in hand, and then back to our villa, where we pour ourselves a glass of wine.
‘Fancy a dip in the plunge pool?’ Luke asks.
