Why, why, why hadn’t Georgie just told Raf the truth immediately? Well, not thetruthtruth, but the I-need-my-envelope-back truth.
‘On New Year’s Eve a group of us wrote secrets down and posted them to each other to make ourselves stick to our resolutions. I posted mine to Raf. It’s huge and nothing to do with him and I need it back. I was looking for it.’
‘What?’
‘If we don’t keep our resolutions, our envelope will be opened next New Year’s Eve and everyone will hear our secrets.’
‘Oh. Why didn’t you just ask Raf for it?’
‘Yes.’ Georgie nodded earnestly. ‘Yes, absolutely. Yes. Ishouldhave asked him. Obviously. Yes. And now, Iwould. I mean, I didn’t. Obviously. But I absolutely should have done. And I really don’t know why I didn’t, except I just, well, the secret ishuge. I can’t really describe how huge it is. Or might be. I just felt like I couldn’t even tell him how big it was, I just needed – need – it back without discussing it and without any danger of another person ever seeing it.’
The woman was just staring at her as though she wasmad. Fair enough.
‘The thing is,’ Georgie continued, ‘Ireallydo understand that it isoutrageousto go through people’s drawers. Properly outrageous. Terrible behaviour. Iknowthat. But my secret is just… I just, it can’t be uncovered. It just can’t. I’m so sorry.’
‘Obviously it’s Raf you should be apologising to.’
‘Absolutely, and I certainly will.’ Georgie pressed her lips together. Maybe this was a blessing in disguise. She would nowhaveto tell Raf and he could just give her the envelope and all would be well. Apart from him probably never wanting to speak to her again, which, she realised, would be really sad, because it felt like they’d become good friends recently, maybemorethan good friends.
‘Great.’
‘I’m going to call him. I’ll put him on speaker.’
‘Okay. Thank you.’
‘Hi, Mum,’ Raf said.
‘Hello. You’re on speaker. I’m in the house with your friend Georgie.’
‘Oh, hi, Georgie.’
‘I just found Georgie rifling through the drawers in your study looking for an envelope containing a secret?’ Raf’s mum sounded a lot more relaxed now it was obvious to her that Raf really wasn’t surprised that Georgie was in his house.
‘What?’ he said.
‘Hi, Raf,’ Georgie said. ‘Basically I’m desperate to get my New Year’s secret back because it’s truly awful and no one must ever see it, and I didn’t dare tell you that just in case so basically yes, your mum’s right, I’ve been going through your stuff this evening and I’m so, so sorry.’
There was a long silence and then he said, ‘Right,’ his voice completely flat.
‘I know that I should just have asked you for it,’ she rushed on. ‘But it’s such a big secret that I was kind of too scared to say.’
‘Right.’ Still flat.
‘I’m sure you would have given her the envelope, wouldn’t you?’ Raf’s mum asked.
‘Yep.’
‘So this was all very silly,’ his mum continued.
‘Yep,’ Raf said.
‘Yes,’ Georgie agreed. ‘Again, I’m incredibly sorry.’ Excruciatingly, she was now going tohaveto ask for it. She couldn’t not. She just wanted the earth to swallow her whole, right now. ‘Erm…’
‘You want to know where the envelope actually is?’ He sounded almost impatient now.
‘Yes, please.’
‘I brought it with me here. It was in my admin in-tray and I just bundled it all up and brought it.’
