Page 57 of Rebooting Conor Flynn

As she turned away from me for the hundredth time today, I grabbed her hand. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

She didn’t pull away this time. “It’s...I think it’s probably for the best.”

“The best what?” I stroked my thumb along her inner wrist measuring her fluttering pulse, and she sighed.

She dropped her head, her hair creating a veil around her face. “Maybe the best for my mental health.”

“Noelle. Nollaig.” I wedged a knuckle beneath her chin and tilted her head back. “Why am I bad for your mental health? Why is it so bloody awful if the two of us reconnect? I haven’t felt this...myself since the last time we shared a bus together.”

“That’s just it, Con.” She jerked her head, and her hair whipped across her face. “That was the last time. The last time we saw each other when you asked me to follow you to Australia. And I wanted to. I texted you. I don’t know you can sit there and tell me you never got my texts.”

“You said that before.” I pressed two fingers against my temple. “How is that possible? I messaged you, Noelle. I swear I did. You can even ask Charlie, all of them. I drove them bonkers with my whingeing about it. They even devised a game where they’d hide my phone from me because I was checking it every two minutes.”

Her eyes lost their glassy stare, as she seemed to be taking in my words, maybe even considering them. “I never got any texts. Are you saying you never saw my texts to you?”

“I told you that the other night. I wrote a fucking song about it. When you didn’t answer my texts, I figured you’d chosen your job over me.”

“That didn’t happen, Conor. Baker Street, Gordon specifically, gave me the ultimatum—follow you to Australia and lose my job or stay in England and keep it—I told him to shove the job. But when I sent you my choice, you didn’t even respond. And I never heard from you again.” Tears pooled in her eyes, but she didn’t look away.

The hurt in their depths gutted me...gave me hope.

“Didn’t respond?” I clutched my hair at the roots. “Noelle, I texted you every single day. You never answered.”

“Th-that’s just not true, Conor.” She folded her arms across her chest, digging her fingers into her biceps. “I didn’t receive one message from you after that last one you sent before boarding the plane to Australia. It said, hope to see you down under. I followed the plane’s progress online and texted you a few hours after you landed. I’d decided by then to quit my job and use my own money to follow you down. Good thing I didn’t buy the ticket.”

“Not. Possible.” I flexed my jaw and shook my head. Was this some kind of next level gaslighting? “I texted you as soon as we got to the hotel, as soon as we got our new phones.”

“New phones?” She pressed a fist against her stomach. “As in a new phone with a new phone number?”

“I guess it was a new number. I didn’t pay attention. It’s not like I give out my number—not even back then. We all got new phones with our contacts pre-loaded. I was able to text my mum, my dad, even my brother. All the lads’ numbers were loaded in the phone and yours too. I saw the contact with your name and your picture. I texted you. Even if I did have a new number, that was my way of sharing it with you as soon as I could.”

She sucked in her bottom lip. “I never got that text...or any others. When I texted you, I was using the phone number you had in England.”

I squinted as if trying to see into the past. Then I steepled my fingers and rested my chin on the tips. “I don’t understand. That was your name, your picture. Every other contact in my phone was correct. Everyone else I texted, texted me back. Everyone but you.”

“I swear, Con. I never received any messages from you.” She caught her breath, her eyes widening.

We had the same idea at the same time. Had a simple misunderstanding, a swapped digit tanked our relationship? Or had it been something else? Something more sinister.

I spread my hands in front of me. “If I had that phone today, I’d show you. I’d show you all the messages I sent—each one more desperate and pathetic than the previous one.”

She searched my face, inches away, close enough for me to see the little sunburst of gold in the middle of her iris.

“I believe you.”

She dragged out the last word, making it sound more like a question. I didn’t miss the inflection, and a muscle twitched at the corner of my mouth. Not quite there yet.

“Do you think they got my number wrong?” Her teeth dug into her bottom lip. “The people who programmed your phone?”

I clamped a hand against the back of my neck and said, “I don’t see how that happens. When you get a new phone, you don’t sit there and re-enter every contact. It’s an automatic transfer of data—even back in those days.”

“I never got a text from your new number, Conor. I was sending messages to your old phone—without knowing it was your old phone.” She nibbled on the tip of her fingernail. “Do you believe me?”

“I believe you, Noelle.”

No inflection in my voice.

“I just don’t understand how it happened. Like I said, every other number that migrated to my new phone was correct.” A sharp pain lanced the side of my skull. “Wait. Why wouldn’t Baker Street give you my new number, anyway?”