“Don’t be stupid,” Ollie said. “There’s a spare room you can have.” He stretched and then turned to me. “I put the fan on earlier in our room,” he said. “It’ll be nice and cool by now.”
Our room.
“Um, I’ll take the sofa,” I said.
Ollie’s face fell. “Oh, but … that’s silly. You know that sofa is horrible to sleep on.”
“I think it’s the best idea. Simon can take the spare room, and I’ll take the sofa.” I was going to stay firm on this.
Simon watched both of us as we talked. “Sounds good to me,” he said eventually. He stood and offered his hand to Ollie. “Thank you for all your help.”
Ollie didn’t take his eyes off me even as he reached to shake Simon’s hand. His eyes were beseeching me.Please come to bed with me. Please lie with me in the dark, and let’s hold each other.
I broke eye contact. No, no, no. It had to be done. The other week had been fun, but it was clearly a mistake to let anything like that happen between Ollie and me. My emotions for Ollie were still TBC in the long run, but he had made it obvious that his feelings for me were as strong as they ever had been. To do that to him again was cruel. For his own sake, I had to keep a distance.
Simon gave us a look over his shoulder as he departed for the bathroom before turning in.
I began to clear detritus from around the sofa. “I’ll get you a blanket and some pillows,” Ollie said, his voice thick with emotion.
In a moment of madness, I watched him go up the stairs to our old room and then followed. He was in front of the large linen cupboard in the corner of the room, finding me a blanket. I walked in, and he turned to stare at me. I hadn’t been in here since the day I took my stuff.
It was the same. My side of the bed was emptier and a bit tidier, but a few things I’d left on the bedside table were still there. Ollie’s pile of non-fiction political memoirs and pop science paperbacks were still piled up on his side. Some clothes strewn about. The print I’d chosen to go above the headboard was still there. I’d seen it in an art gallery in central London and knew it was perfect. It was a map of the clans of Scotland in the style of a London tube map. Simple, not particularly original, but it represented our lives and who we were. After we’d put it up, Ollie put his arm around me and gave me a kiss on the forehead. “We need to find one for Poland.”
“We absolutely do not,” I’d said and shrugged off his arm, but grinned.
I stared at it now. I cleared my throat. “Thank you for doing this. You didn’t have to…” words failed. I sat down on the bed and stroked the duvet cover.
Ollie sat down next to me and took my hand in his own. “You know I’d do anything for you,” he whispered.
I sighed. But then I lowered my head onto his shoulder and nuzzled. “I’m sorry I slept with Errol. If it makes you feel better, he turned out to be a bit of a bastard.”
He chuckled. “Not really.”
“I … I do appreciate you calling me. I do, I promise. It’s … there’s so much between us, Ollie. Sometimes it overwhelms me, and I can’t face it. Every conversation between us feels like some momentous thing. That’s why it was so nice in Surrey. It was just us again.”
“I understand,” he said quietly. “know if you changed your mind about getting back together, I’d be there in an instant. I’d move to Dorset. It could be us again. And Kenny.”
“You’d be bored stupid in days. You think anything further out than Clapham is provincial.”
“I mean, have you been to Streatham? Dear God.”
I laughed, and he gave me a peck on the cheek. “I’m glad you came to me with this. I liked helping,” he said.
“And you did help. Well, truly, not at all. Now it all makes even less sense.”
The sound of a toilet flushing and the door to the main bathroom downstairs opening roused me from my little holiday of self-induced angst. I stood up and took the blankets and pillows that Ollie had dug out for me.
I ran my hands through his hair as I stood above where he sat on the bed. I leaned down and kissed the top of his head. “Goodnight, Ollie,” I said and left the room.
When I got downstairs, I looked up and saw the light from underneath his bedroom door go out. Simon was leaning on the hallway wall. His hands in his pockets.
“I thought you’d changed your mind,” he said quietly.
“What do you mean?” I whispered.
“About sleeping on the couch.”
I shook my head. “Simon, don’t.”
