Page 102 of Love Letters on Hazel Lane

She went to the fridge. She wasn’t particularly hungry – not pizza hungry – but decided to make a stab at the cold dough balls. Returning to the sofa with the box – no point creating washing up when you were eating alone – she picked up her phone and opened WordPals.

She was about to start a solo game against the app itself, when she realised she had a game request from Dazzle, a player she hadn’t seen before. She clicked accept.

Five minutes and three dough balls later, he made his first move. It was an ordinary game. She had a reasonable selection of vowels and consonants, the Q but sadly no U. The scores were pretty even and it was hard to tell who would win. Or it was until Dazzle played ZAX.

She’d only ever seen one person play that word, and that person was Razz. Of course, it could have been a coincidence. The word mightn’t be in everyday parlance – unless you were a roofer – but keen Scrabble enthusiasts might know it, since it appeared on several websites listing high-scoring words.

But even so… this was too much of a coincidence. Razz. Razzle dazzle. Could Dazzle be Razz?

He had said he was on the app, although he only used it occasionally. Might he be on it now, barely two hours since she’d since him disappearing through the doors of Garlic ‘n’ Games and thought he was out of her life forever? He would know it was her – she’d put her actual photo on the app – but she still wasn’t sure if it was him as he’d used an avatar.

If it was him, then perhaps he didn’t want to sever all contact. That was a good sign, wasn’t it?

The game ended. He won by over twenty points. Jo sent him a message via the app –

Thanks for the game

– but a minute later, the green dot disappeared from under his avatar. Dazzle was offline.

*

Jo hardly slept that night.

How could she get him to talk to her again, if he wouldn’t even reply through WordPals?

Assuming Dazzle really was Razz.

She tossed and turned, wondering what her best course of action should be. Another apology? Turn up at the Scrabble club and hope for the best? Send flowers to the surgery? Not that last one. He’d be mortified.

Next morning, she got up, went into the kitchen and put the kettle on. She made herself a mug of instant coffee, opened the fridge door to get the milk and saw the pizza boxes sitting there. And that was when it struck her.

In one of those first messages that they’d exchanged on Buzzz, those messages which had cheered her up so much after that terrible week at work, he had said that his favourite breakfast was cold, leftover pizza.

She messaged Dazzle through the WordPals app:

Have you had breakfast yet? Because there’s a cold margherita here with your name on it.

Ten minutes later, when he still hadn’t replied, she tried again.

I know it’s your favourite!

Still no reply. She poured the milk in her coffee and waited, praying she hadn’t sent a weird message about cold pizza to a random stranger.

But two minutes later, the doorbell rang. Jo sprung up from the sofa, where she’d been idly flicking through pictures on her phone. Her heart began to pound. It had to be Razz, didn’t it? She took a deep breath, wished she had a mirror in the lounge so she could check her appearance, but it was too late; he was here now.

She had thought their first date was awkward – the beginning of it, at least – but opening the door to Razz that day was awkwardness on a whole other scale.

‘Hi,’ she said. Her mouth had gone dry.

‘Hi.’

Silence. Awkward, obviously.

‘Do you want to come in?’ she said, at the very same moment as he said, ‘I’m here for the pizza.’

She stepped aside as he came into the hall, pushing a brown paper bag into her hands. She gave a slight shudder although she wasn’t cold.

He followed her into the lounge. She was conscious of the scruffy furniture and how bare it all looked.