“Yeah, I gathered that,” I said. “It’s pretty much the only piece of information you actually gave. How do youknowPoppy?”
“We met on Hinge, I think? Or maybe Bumble? One of those.”
I nodded. “Okay, so you dated. Just once?”
He shook his head. “No, a few times. Not in a row, though. Just when we felt like it.”
“So she was a fuck buddy.”
Phil shushed me as an orderly passed. “I mean, sort of. More like a date buddy?”
“So you didn’t fuck?” I asked, no quieter than before. Phil sighed and stopped walking.
“Yeah, Amy, we did. Because we were single adults.”
I narrowed my eyes as I rounded to face him. “I didn’t suggest you weren’t. I’m just trying to understand the nature of your relationship.”And why you didn’t tell her I’m your girlfriend, I added mentally, but it sounded petulant even in my mind, so I kept that part to myself.
But Phil had always been able to read me, and his face softened as he stepped forward to take my hands in his. “I was on a date with Poppy when you met up with Chris and Niamh,” he said. “I ditched her without even saying goodbye to come and be with you because it was so important to me that you didn’t feel alone. Trust me, she knows what you are to me. She probably recognised you, which is why she asked.”
I felt myself soften as he spoke. It was still so hard to believe that even then, months ago, he’d felt about me the way he did now. How had we been so oblivious to one another for so long?
“I’m sorry,” I said, squeezing his hands, and he stepped forward to press a kiss to my forehead.
“You’ve got nothing to apologise for. I’m just still not used to getting to show you off in public.”
“Yeah, well, get used to it,” I said. “And if you’ve got any more fuck buddies we’re likely to encounter, let me know now, because I don’t like surprises.”
“Who do you think I am?” he asked, looking genuinely confused.
I shrugged. “I mean, Chloe jokes all the time about how you’ve been through half the town’s population. I’m honestly surprised something like this hasn’t happened sooner.”
He tipped his head back and laughed– rather loudly, too, given how much shushing he’d been doing.
“Yeah, well, she doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
“Doesn’t she? I’ve literally seen her swipe through your dating apps for you to find a date.”
He waved his hand dismissively. “I almost never went on dates she picked for me. Most of the time I’d just go to the cinema on a Saturday night, or take myself out for a drive.”
My mouth fell open. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I’d spent every Saturday night for months trying to distract myself from what I knew Phil was out doing, and most of the time, he hadn’t even been doing it. “You mean you had me sitting at yours with Ethel for months, and you weren’t actually dating?”
He shrugged. “I mean, I went out with people sometimes. But yeah, it was especially weird when you started coming over, so I mostly didn’t.”
“And Poppy?” I asked, narrowing my eyes. “When was the last time you saw her?”
“Well, the day you went to meet up with Chris,” he said, but I motioned for him to continue, and he creased his brow in thought. “Before that, I think maybe a month before you started coming over?” He snapped his fingers. “Actually, no, there was one week in the spring. But I didn’t go home with her. In fact, I think it was the only time other than that last one that I didn’t.”
I shouldn’t have felt as thrilled by that as I did– it would have been perfectly reasonable for him to go home with her before we got together, for real or for our arrangement. But the Aries in me liked the idea that he’d somehow been loyal to me even before that loyalty had been explicitly warranted.
“There’s been no one,” he said, reaching up to tuck a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “Not since you became a part of my life again. And if I’d thought I had a chance with you after that night five years ago, there probably wouldn’t have been anyone in between, either.”
I wanted to tell him the same had been true for me– that it had taken me moving away to be able to think about anyone but him. But everything was getting so emotionally hot and heavy so quickly, especially after his comment the week before about moving in, as casual as it may have been. And besides, a hospital corridor didn’t feel like the most romantic place for a declaration of any kind.
“God, babe, don’t be so dramatic,” I teased instead, deflecting, and earning myself a firm smack on the ass. An orderly did stop to glare at us that time, and we giggled as we turned and rushed towards the car park.
* * *
Later that night,when I was home in my own bed for the first time all week, I realised I hadn’t done a reading about Phil and me since we’d gotten together. It felt scary, for some reason, as if the cards could somehow undermine how giddy I felt about us. But I pulled out the oracle cards Phil had bought me, deciding they would be the best possible deck to help me understand where we stood.
