“I can do that,” I offer.
“Nah. I want you to start stretching soon. I have other plans for you this evening.”
I nearly choke on my water… for probably the tenth time since this afternoon. Fuck me. All those years of pining for Kath, but not wanting to ruin our friendship. All that iron resolve that I’d built… it completely crumbled after one conversation.
I’m an idiot. Realistically I’m sure this will be fine. She was the one who offered. Everything’s on her terms, it’s two months, no hearts will be broken. Except now, every fantasy I’ve had for the last four years is playing out rapidly in my mind.
Who am I kidding? It’s more than four years of fantasies. I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to reset myself after this.
But it’s a risk I’m willing to take. I can hurt my own feelings. Just not hers. And she wants this, no strings attached. So I can give that to her.
I complete the fastest stretching routine of my life before heading back into the kitchen, where Kath’s standing by the microwave, heating uplasagna. She looks casual, oblivious to the havoc she’s played on my mind and body.
“It smells good,” she says. “Your dad’s a good cook.”
“He’s alright.” I pull out the cutlery and glasses to lay the table. Suddenly I’m not quite sure where to look. She plates up the food and slides into the chair opposite me.
“You’re being weird,” she says. “If you can’t do this, just tell me. I really don’t mind. We can just go back to pretending it never happened, and everything will go on as normal.”
“I’m not being weird,” I say around a mouth of lasagna. “I’m just adjusting, that’s all. You’ve thought about it for a while. Let me catch up.”
“OK.” She digs back into her portion. “Have you heard anything more from Florida?”
“Nah. Just some emails from the coaching team at the Gators.”
She snickers.
“What?” I ask, curious about what has got her laughing at me this time.
“Sorry. Florida Gators, it’s so American it makes me laugh.”
“All right, Little Miss Medicine at Exeter. I won’t give you any of my university T-shirts.”
“How dare you?” She looks horrified. “Those are the best pyjama T-shirts.”
We eat in silence for a few moments.
“Can I establish some ground rules?” I ask.
“Sure. Whatever makes you more comfortable, Sam. And if you don’t want to do this, we don’t have to.”
I push my finished plate away and look at her. I want her to be on board with this. I want to make sure nobody gets hurt.
“OK, well, rule one is can we take things a bit slowly for a week? No, like, full frontal sex.” I feel myself blushing at the words, and attempt to plough on before she notices.
“Of course.” She nods, and I let out a breath of relief.
“Rule two is that if either of us ever feel uncomfortable, we stop.”
“Yep,” she says. “But I’m always comfortable with you, so it should be fine.”
I know the feeling. I’ve always been comfortable around Kath too. The problem is that I feel too comfortable around her. That’s why we need the last rule.
“OK. And then rule three is that this is just friends with benefits. Nothing more. I feel like this is already blurring the lines quite a lot, and I really don’t want to ruin our friendship.”
I’m framing this for her, but in reality it’s for me. She means so much more than just these eight weeks.
“I agree. We can add all the rules to the pirate’s code.” She looks so sincere that my nerves start to dissipate. Maybe that clarifies that she never thought about me in that way anyway. I store that thought away to decode on my next long swim.
