Back in the hallway I couldn’t see Andie or Darren anywhere, so I reached for my mobile, immediately regretting the move when it made Josh remove the hand loitering at my waist.
It was too noisy to call her, so I rattled off a quick message. Her reply pinged back almost immediately.
Have fun. C U later. Use condoms. xx
‘What did she say?’ Josh asked. I’d shut the message down as fast as I could, but still couldn’t be sure he hadn’t glimpsed it on the screen. ‘Will she be okay on her own?’
I loved the fact that he was concerned about the welfare of someone he’d only just met, unless it really was Andie he was interested in after all. The idea that he could think of me in any way other than purely platonically still didn’t seem feasible.
My own feelings were far less complex. He was the boy who’d stolen my heart without having the faintest idea that a theft had taken place. Fifteen-year-old me had been surprisingly good at hiding what she felt. I just hoped that, five years later, I still remembered the technique.
The night air was a cooling balm that hit us the moment we left the house. The driveway was still crowded with partygoers so we pressed pause on any attempt at conversation until we began walking back down the hill.
‘It’s incredible finding you again,’ Josh said, his grin wide beneath the amber glow of the streetlamps.
‘I don’t think I was the one who was lost,’ I said, immediately regretting the unfiltered retort that I hadn’t been quick enough to catch.
He had the grace to look a little guilty. He bit his lower lip, leaving tiny white marks on the sensitive skin.
‘I guess I deserved that,’ he said.
‘I just thought we were going to try to stay in touch, that’s all.’ That was definitely my fifteen-year-old self speaking, but I was powerless to silence her.
‘I wanted to. I mean, I intended to, I really did. But you know ... other things got in the way. And the longer I left it, the madder I knew you’d be that I’d not kept my word.’
‘You must be really scared about how I feel now, after five whole years have passed.’
His eyes weren’t serious, but his words were. ‘Are you angry with me?’
‘Fucking furious,’ I said, ruining it by breaking out into a grin. ‘I might never forgive you.’
His own smile was back, confident that I wouldn’t be mad at him for long, simply because I’d never been able to sustain it in the past.
‘It’ll give me something to work towards,’ he said, and as much as I tried to dismiss his words, they really made it sound as though seeing him tonight wasn’t going to be a one-time thing.
The walk back to the bus stop was filled with back-and-forth catch-up questions about our families. Josh seemed genuinely interested in how my parents were doing, and that scored him loads of points.
‘Who lives in our old house now?’ he asked, looking nostalgic as his thoughts went back to the first stable home he’d ever known.
‘A couple of solicitors moved in after your family sold it.’
‘Did they have kids?’ His question surprised me. I shook my head, my hair catching in the evening breeze and blowing around my face. I could feel his eyes on it.
‘No. They were an older couple. Why do you ask?’
He gave a shrug that tried to look casual and didn’t quite pull it off.
‘I don’t know. I guess I was wondering if you’d found anyone else to climb our tree with.’
I could play it cool. I could make him think he’d been easy to forget. But what was the point? We’d both know I was lying. ‘No. I never climbed our tree again after you left.’
He gave a slow nod, and something that hadn’t been there before began to glimmer in the dark.
We hadn’t discussed where we were heading, and it wasn’t until we reached the bottom of the hill that I thought to ask what he wanted to do. ‘We could go to a pub, if you like,’ I suggested. ‘There’s a fairly decent one not far from here.’
His nose wrinkled a little. ‘I’m not sure if that’s just swapping one noisy environment for another.’
I bit my lip, Andie’s message still very much in my head as I made an alternative suggestion. ‘Or we could get the bus back to my place. Everyone is out for the evening.’
