‘Yup. So how’s your evening been?’
‘Um, kind of average.’ She was done with pretending. It was much better not to. She was actually just going to tell him all about her dad.
‘Really? Would that be because you’re missing me by any chance?’ Oh. Maybe he hadn’t heard her tone of voice properly. Actually, there was quite a lot of noise in the background. She’d thought it was the TV but maybe he was out. Somewhere really noisy by the sounds of it; there’d just been a very loud crash.
‘What was that?’
‘Glasses smashing. A waiter just dropped a tray. I’m in the hotel bar with a couple of colleagues.’
Now was clearly really not the time to talk to him.
‘I’m really sorry but I’m going to have to get going,’ she said. ‘I’m really tired.’
‘Can’t wait to see you.’ Nice that he’d say that in front of other people.
‘Me too.’ She really wished his job involved a lot less travel. She’d like him to behere. ‘Night.’
He called her in the morning while she was having her breakfast, reading a very brief text update from her mum to the effect that her dad was doing okay and maybe Lily could visit in the evening. It felt like by the evening she’d suggest that Lily wait until tomorrow to visit. Like Lily was too delicate a flower to be able to visit her own father in hospital. Was she going to have to end up having an argument with her mum over this?
‘I’m just walking down the Royal Mile. It’s sunny but quite fresh. Glorious actually. How’s London looking this morning?’
‘Pretty much as usual, I think.’
‘Lily, are you okay?’
‘Yep. Well, just a bit worried. My dad had a heart attack. But he seems to be doing okay now.’
‘Oh myGod, Lily. When did it happen?’
‘Yesterday.’
‘Lily. I’m so sorry for wittering on about Carole and Norm last night. You should have interrupted and told me.’
‘Well, it was difficult to hear you in the bar.’ She blinked away tears. Right now it felt too difficult to tell himhow muchshe’d wanted to talk to him.
And how it just felt ridiculous that finally she did just want to talk – and talk andtalk– but he wasn’t here for her to talkto. Maybe that had been the real problem last time. Maybe it would always be a problem. Maybe this just wasn’t ever going to work. In real life, mutual love just wasn’t enough, was it? You needed other stuff, like regularly being in the same place at the same time. Maybe they should just leave things between them as a holiday fling.
Twenty-Two
Matt
‘So, tell me now what happened? If you’d like to?’ Matt said. ‘Is he in hospital?’
‘Yep. Being very well looked after, I hear. I’m sure he’ll be fine.’ Her voice wasn’t very steady.
‘Would you like me to come back? I can cancel my meetings or do them remotely.’
‘Honestly, that’s really kind but it’s fine.’
And he’d lost her. He knew he had. She’d just withdrawn from him again, put the barriers straight back up.
‘So what kind of a project are you working on in Edinburgh?’ She’d got her voice back under control. She sounded for all the world like she wanted to ask the question and was interested. ‘Is that the hotel you were telling me about?’
‘Lily…’ No. What was he going to say? Was he going to tell her that shehadto stop talking about his job and tell him all about her dad and how she was feeling? Or not tell him about her dad, just chat about anything she’d like to. But just talk to him. No, of course he wasn’t going to say that. It was entirely up to her whether or not she wanted to. ‘I’m here for you,’ he said. God. Lame. Also, likely to put her back up. ‘If you’d like to talk, I mean. Or not.’
‘Thank you. I need to go. I have work. Thank you so much for calling.’
God.
