21
A week passedduring which Tom tried, and failed, not to think about Carole.
He caught occasional glimpses of her coming and going from her house next door, rushing off to work early in the morning or coming home late at night. More than once he thought about opening his front door as she rushed by and saying hello and asking how she was.
Each time, he killed those impulses stone dead.
Carole had made it clear on Saturday night that she regretted the kiss they’d shared. After they’d climbed back into the taxi, they’d hardly said a word to each other during the rest of the short drive home. Once they’d arrived on Foxglove Street, Carole had waved an overly cheerful goodbye and all but ran inside her house.
They’d exchanged a few text messages, polite words about enjoying the wedding day and hopefully catching up again soon. Carole had alluded to busy days ahead at work and Tom had done the same.
He’d understood what they were doing—laying the groundwork for why they wouldn’t be in touch much over thecoming days, which would make it easier to simply fall out of contact altogether.
And easier for them to go back to being no more than next-door neighbours who said hello every now and again.
Next-door neighbours who’d silently agreed to ignore the searing kiss they’d shared beneath the summer starlight.
During the long week that had followed once Tom returned to work, he thought often about what Carole had said after she’d brought their kiss to a shuddering halt. She’d said it was a mistake to get involved because they were next-door neighbours, and he understood what she meant.
While it lasted, they might have had fun. Theywouldhave had fun; Tom was as sure of that as he was of anything.
But when it ended, they’d still have to live next to one another, which would almost certainly be awkward, strained, embarrassing, and much more besides.
Better to avoid that outcome by not getting involved in the first place.
That logic clearly made sense to Carole, and Tom understood it, too. There were plenty of other people out there to have a fun and distracting affair with. You didn’t have to do it with your neighbour.
And he reminded himself that Carole had just come out of a long relationship. She was resetting her life and starting over, and it made zero sense for her to upend that bright new start by jumping into bed with the next-door neighbour she’d only known for a few weeks.
And jumping into bed was, Tom knew, exactly where things would’ve ended on Saturday night if they’d let them.
Except Tom knew that’snotwhere things would’ve ended. It wouldn’t just have been some semi-drunken sex to round off the fun day they’d spent together. If they’d slept together, it would’ve meant far more to Tom than that.
And he would’ve wanted more than just a casual hook-up with Carole. He would’ve wanted to cook her breakfast the next morning and spend the entire day with her and get to know her better and…
… find out if she might feel for him the way he felt for her.
Because hedidfeel something—something he hadn’t felt in a long time.
But Carole had made it clear on that dark country road that she either didn’t feel the same way as he did, or she didn’t want to risk taking things further even if she did.
Tom wished things were different, and wished he’d had the courage to say something that night, instead of just letting her push him away.
For a long time, Tom had been content with his life. Or so he’d thought. The last few weeks had cast a different shade on his assumptions.
He loved his job and wouldn’t change it for anything, but over these past few years it had come to dominate his world and his time—not because he wanted it that way, but because… he had nothing else.
When he’d been at Lucy and Martin’s wedding, the reality of how stuck he was had dawned on him. He’d watched his ex-girlfriend marry someone she adored, and although he felt nothing but happiness for them both, and harboured no lingering romantic feelings for Lucy whatsoever, seeing her make that huge commitment reminded him that he’d never come close to finding someone he could ever imagine making that same commitment to.
There had been women in his life since he and Lucy separated, and there had even been a few relationships that had lasted a while. But he’d never met someone who made his heart race or made him light up inside or made him wonder what it would be like to spend forever with them.
Until now.
Carole made him feel those things and imagine a future that seemed as crazy as it was completely irresistible.
The wedding had given him another insight, too, one that he’d struggled to process.
Watching Evie run around in her pretty bridesmaid dress and having the time of her life with her mother and stepdad on their wedding day had made him realise that no matter how much he loved Evie, she wasn’t his daughter.
