‘It’s a useful phrase,’ Niall agreed. ‘There’s a lot of them about this place. I say “give it a birl” to the kids cause it’s like “give it a burl” in Aussie, and they tell me I’ve got it wrong, then I tell them burl is birl in Scottish and means whirl or spin. So they get a wee education and forget that they are in a bad mood or whatever.’ Niall crouched down to hammer in the pegs on the near side of the tent. And that’s when Carli saw it. Her heart pummelled the inside of her ribcage as if laying eyes on it for the first time.
The tattoo on his left lower back.
Just one word.
Cass.
Carli’s mouth turned as dry as the sand on Kinshore beach. She’d known Niall had the tattoo; she’d been with him when he got it done. A trip to Glasgow, wandering through gloomy, rain-soaked alleyways to hunt down a tattoo artist who didn’t ask for ID. Then Niall got the name only he called her tattooed on his lower back. And it had taken so long that she hadn’t had time to get hers done. But he had his – still. That threw her across to the other side of the loch.
I don’t think our love is strong enough to withstand thisdistance thing. I don’t know what our love is anymore. If it’s even love.
Why keep it if those were his feelings?
Somehow, mentioning the tattoo now seemed wrong. Like she’d seen something she shouldn’t. But what did it mean that he still had it?
Maybe he never got round to getting rid of it. And it’s expensive to get these things lasered off. Were you worth that money when it was easier to not think of you? It’s on his back after all.
But seeing it again – seeing it still there – Carli’s heart was billowing and expanding through her whole chest. Questions batted around her mind. What if the reason he still had it wasn’t anything she’d considered? What if he didn’t want to get rid of it?
No.
You could ask him.
No. I couldn’t. It feels like an invasion of privacy that I’ve seen it at all.
So Carli sucked in a silent breath and employed the full gamut of breathing and mind control techniques to calm her down and not give away to Niall what she had seen. She held on as they cooked dinner together and filled in some of the gaps in their knowledge of each other: she learned that Niall had owned a dog for three years, until it got sick, passed away and broke him for months, that he lived in the suburb of Manly because the beachy village vibe reminded him of Kinshore and that he’d developed a bit of an obsession with Tim Tam biscuits and always had them in the office under the pretence that they were for the kids. And she told him how she planned to train Glen as a therapy dog and take him into hospitals and schools to help sick or troubled kids, how her favourite thing to do on a Saturdaymorning was go for a decaf flat white and walk in the park with Glen and how she also worried that her life was so ordinary that she might be about to skip straight through her thirties into her forties. Niall had laughed at this.
After dinner, the whistle of the kettle cut into the air and Carli got two teabags out of the supplies bag.
‘Your tea’s black, right?’ she asked. ‘I mean, the answer has to be yes, since we don’t have any milk. Wait, you don’t like milk, do you?’
‘Well remembered.’ Niall took the mug Carli offered and sat back on his camping chair, angled towards hers.
As she sipped her own tea, Carli shivered.
‘You cold?’ Putting down his mug, Niall pulled off his hoodie and placed it in her lap. ‘Get that on you.’
‘It’s okay. I’ve got another sweater somewhere.’
‘Don’t search for it in the dark. Wear that.’
Pulling on Niall’s hoodie was like a warm, safe hug. It smelled of him, all citrus, salty, manly and, quite frankly, of sex. Wearing his clothes was a bad idea. She was letting her physical, instinctual attraction to him override so many other things. Sure, they might be patching up some potholes, but Niall had a bridge he needed to rebuild and her heart did not have a licence to drive until that happened.
‘Your heid okay?’ He leaned over and tapped Carli’s beanie.
‘Mostly,’ she said. ‘Thanks for the hoodie. It’s so cosy.’
‘No bother.’ He stretched out his legs, bringing them closer to her own, but caught her noticing and apologised. ‘Sorry,’ he said, pulling them back under his chair.
‘It’s okay.’ It had been more than okay, a flashback to a time they had been so comfortable next to each other, their bodies fitting into one another’s. Niall’s legs stretched outin maths class. Carli leaning hers ever so slightly against his under the desk. Subtle but the shared understanding as loud as the school bell. Did he remember that, too?
‘So, the tents are all good?’ she asked.
‘Aye, well mostly. Turns out mine doesn’t have a fly sheet. This is what you get when you borrow a tent from your brother. God knows how Sean can lose such a significant part of a tent, but he did.’
‘Ah, right. Does that mean…?’
‘Don’t worry,’ Niall said, reading Carli’s worries about where he might sleep, should it rain. ‘If it rains, I’ll sleep in the car. But I’m sure it’ll be fine.’
