Page 129 of Brighter Together

Maybe because, for the first time in a long time, there is somewhere else I genuinely want to be.

Chapter 12

Ella

Itwist the towel tighter around my wet hair and survey the bedroom.

It looks as though Tommy has started quietly moving in without either of us officially discussing it.

His overnight bag is slumped in the corner, half open and overflowing with clothes. There are two clean T-shirts draped over the back of the chair, a pair of socks under my bedside table and, unless I’m mistaken, three shirts now hanging in my wardrobe.

I pick up the T-shirts and add them to the hangers.

The sight makes me stupidly happy.

There is something about his things mixed in with mine that feels far more intimate than the sex. His razor beside my toothbrush. His shoes by the door. The fact that I automatically bought the tea he likes when I went shopping yesterday without even thinking about it.

Domestic.

Ordinary.

A little bit permanent.

I throw the rest of his dirty clothes into the laundry basket and add mine from today before pulling on yoga trousers and a soft top.

No bra.

We are well past the stage where I feel the need to pretend my breasts sit where they did when I was twenty.

Tommy has seen them enough times to know exactly what gravity has been doing over the last two decades.

He has certainly never complained.

A grin pulls at my mouth.

Definitely not.

I drag the basket into the kitchen and load the washing machine while music plays from the speaker on the counter.

My hips move automatically with the beat as I sort darks from lights.

I am debating whether I can be bothered to walk to the corner shop when the front door opens.

I glance at the clock.

Just after six.

That is suspiciously early.

Tommy has a key now because waiting up until ten at night for him to finish working became ridiculous. Most evenings I hear him let himself in long after I have changed into pyjamas.

Tonight he appears in the kitchen carrying two bulging shopping bags.

“Hey, Ella-Bella.”

He drops them onto the counter.

I lean back against the units and try to ignore the thousand butterflies I get every time he calls me by the nickname he started using last week.