“I don’t know, Jack,” I said, and clambered for something else to add?—
We both know that can only lead to one thing.
I still don’t know what the future holds for me.
I’m still in love with you, and being your friend would be too hard.
—but none of those felt helpful, so I just left it. And the silence and stillness between us was long enough that Grey and Chloe finally poked their heads around the corner. I reached my hand out for Chloe, who walked sheepishly over to me and grabbed it. She led me away from Jack, who remained where he was, his jaw set, his eyes glued to the stone wall. And maybe it was just the dim light, but I was almost sure I saw them filling with tears.
* * *
By the endof the day, we were all so shattered that we could barely muster enough enthusiasm for a turkey leg. But for Grey’s sake, we managed, standing in a circle and dutifully taking bites as Fatima, our resident veggie, stood in the middle and filmed us. It was surprisingly good, actually, but we were all ready to be off our feet, and the staff were walking up and down the festival ground encouraging people towards the exit. So as soon as the camera was off, we started shuffling in that direction.
Back at the house, Phil immediately started on dinner whilst the rest of us disrobed. The spray paint on my chain mail had held up fairly well, and I folded the shirt up as carefully as possible so I’d be able to wear it again. And I hoped I did have an occasion to wear it again, even if I did need to create some distance.
My moment with Jack in the dungeon had confirmed that I needed to take a step back from our D&D nights, sooner rather than later, regardless of my upcoming move. I’d decided I didn’t want to – couldn’t, even – keep being around him that way. He clearly couldn’t handle it, either. After the last couple of weeks, I felt pretty confident that my other friendships would survive me not being in the campaign anymore. But Jack and I could not be friends. I didn’t have it in me.
Once I was changed, I snuck out the front door. It had been a busy few weeks making arrangements for the move, and I had some logistics still to deal with. It was already dusk, but I walked down the street far enough that I knew the others wouldn’t interrupt.
I took out my phone to make the call, but I saw that I had an email back from my mum. I’d finally responded to one of her updates – the one about her yoga classes – and for the first time in years we were properly talking. Based on the times her emails had come through, I suspected she was getting woken up by notifications so she could respond to me right away. And in just four days, we’d exchanged almost a dozen emails, and I had offered to help her design the logo and website for her travelling yoga studio.
Once I’d responded tomymum, I rang Cara’s mum. We had a few details to discuss, but most of all I wanted to know how they’d managed to get a moving truck onto the tiny, cramped road outside the house. I had one booked for next month to take away most of the furniture, but I had no idea how they’d load it without blocking the whole street.
I stopped walking when I came to a cul-de-sac, standing next to a McMansion identical to ours until I was done with the call. Then I started back and dialled the second person I needed to speak to.
“Hey Lauren, it’s Morgan,” I said when Lauren answered the phone at the R escue.
“Hey! I was just getting Pablo’s paperwork in order. Great timing.”
I smiled – Lauren had been so excited when I’d filed the adoption application, and she was doing me a massive favour by skipping a bit of red tape so I could take him home before the transfer happened.
“And you’re sure it won’t get flagged for not having a permanent address?” I asked.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” she said. “I may have changed your status to ‘pre-approved’ in the system.”
Pre-approved status was usually for applicants who had already rescued before, so they didn’t need to undergo a house visit or a background check. Not that I was worried about the background check, but the home visit might have thrown up some red flags if conducted by anyone other than Lauren, given that the house was currently full of moving boxes.
“You’re my hero,” I said. “I owe you a drink when we get back.”
“You bring that cute friend of yours, and you have yourself a deal.”
“Deal.”
I looked forward to the squeal I was sure I’d get when I let Chloe in on Lauren’s terms, but I couldn’t tell her yet. Jack cared so much about Pablo, and I wanted him to be the first to know, even if things were going to be different moving forward.
“Just the bank transfer now,” she said, “but you can do that when you’re back.”
“So I can take him home on Tuesday?” I asked, stopping at the end of the drive, my breath hitching. Images flashed through my mind of all the new places we’d explore as a duo; all the new adventures we’d have together. And I had a lot of adventures ahead of me; that much was certain.
“You can take him home as soon as you’re back,” she said, and I couldn’t help myself; I started dancing right there in the driveway.
Chapter49
Jack
The house was only a ten-minute walk from the Ren Faire entrance, but I felt like a weary adventurer by the time I arrived anyway, kicking off my boots, shedding my plastic armour piece by piece in a trail through my room and bathroom. I at least folded the trousers carefully so Phil could mend them. By the time I was done in the shower, all I wanted was to go to bed, despite the smell of food wafting down to the basement.
I grabbed my tablet and decided to have a wander before dinner. I had a nosy in Chloe’s giant primary bedroom, which had its own living room and everything; I checked out the deck, where Fatima and Grey were firing up the hot tub; and finally I went upstairs. There wasn’t a lot to see, but there were huge picture windows looking out over both the front and back of the house. I looked out towards the festival grounds; from up here I could just about make out the shape of the jousting arena. Then I crossed the room and looked out at the neighbourhood of almost identical houses, wondering why anyone would opt for something so starkly out of place in the landscape around it.
