Page 51 of People Skills

‘No.’

‘Is this silent-reading hour because of what happened on the beach?’

‘No, the silent-reading hour is to help your brain learn how to write again, and what happened on the beach was a drunken mistake that we are never going to talk about or think about again.’

‘Got it.’ He smiles at me. ‘Just checking.’

I open the first page, and don’t look up even though I swear I can feel his eyes on me.

I am not going to let this man get into my head. I have everything under control.

Autumn

16

IT’S FAR TOO cold to be in the water, even though my wetsuit is keeping me warm. It’s the concept of being in the sea at this time of year that I object to. I’ve never worn a wetsuit before in my life, but Xavier convinced me to invest in one, so I can join him on his mission to get into the ocean every day. Even though it was my idea, he has embraced the concept wholeheartedly as if it were his own, either swimming in the calm of the Barwon Bay beach or driving to a nearby surf beach to surf every morning, and he noticed, as summer progressed, that I didn’t swim much. Because the truth is, as much as I love living near the ocean, looking at it and paddling my feet in it and occasionally floating about in it, I’m not what you would call an enthusiastic participant. I like swimming straight, sensible laps in temperature-controlled pools. I respect the ocean and its creatures too much to get in it, is what I tell Xavier. He tells me that’s bullshit, that true respect would mean giving the ocean a chance.

Today, I relented and he’s taking me out on the surfboard.

Not into actual surf, but in the safety of the flat Barwon Bay front beach. It’s a chance for me to feel what it’s like to sit on a surfboard in the water, one step closer to maybe actually one day surfing.

I dutifully bought the wetsuit, and now I’m standing in thigh-deep water, hesitating.

He paddles towards me, his wet hair pushed back. ‘Come on, Dapkus,’ he says.

‘I’m acclimatising,’ I say.

‘What if I splash you? Will that help?’

‘What was my one rule?’

‘You said no dunking, you didn’t say anything about splashing.’

‘Splashing is a subcategory of dunking.’

‘Oh, I didn’t realise,’ he says, bumping up against me, smiling.

There are two kinds of people in the world—those who run into the ocean and dive under to get it over with, and those of us who inch in, slowly, slowly and take up to twenty minutes before our faces will get anywhere near the water.

I walk a bit further out, until I’m chest-deep, and then I lean back and float, looking at the blue sky dotted with clouds. Xavier’s first month of living with me passed quickly, and he paid me another two months’ rent and bills. We barely discussed him staying on, because it felt so natural. He started working at Simone’s bar, helping to solve her staffing issues, and we’ve fallen into a comfortable existence together. On the nights we are both home, we lock up our phones, alternate cooking, he always does the dishes because he says he likes the thinking time, and then we either read quietly in the lounge room together or sometimes we play chess. I convinced him to make chess his research project instead of me, and loaded him up with chess books.

And we never, ever, mention the kiss.

I have been very careful since that night. We haven’t touched at all. Which, in my small little cottage, is quite a feat. I squeeze past him in the kitchen, pressing my body into the bench or cabinets in order to avoid even the slightest contact. I make sure my feet never touch him when we sit on the couch together, and that my hands never brush his when we’re playing chess. No going out for a drink, no late nights together, no slip-ups. I have kept myself at a remove. Sort of. It’s hard. Sometimes we’ll have a glass of wine while playing chess and we’ll start laughing about something and the mood will shift towards the vibe of that night at the wine bar, or I’ll be lying on the couch reading and look up at him, sitting in the armchair reading, Rex on his lap or sitting on the end of the couch near me (he hasn’t yet deigned to sit on my lap, but we’re getting closer) and our eyes will meet, and a tiny feeling slips back in.

A teeny, tiny I-want-to-kiss-him-again feeling.

Rex is a good chaperone though—I swear he knows what I’m thinking and he judges me for it. He’s still with us because every time his return to Lana has been raised, she conveniently has more travel booked or someone with a cat allergy staying with her or ‘a lot on at work’, and so we agree he can stay a few more weeks.

Sometimes I work late simply because I know Xavier will be home and our last conversation felt a little too much, or I laughed a little too hard, and I need to re-establish boundaries in my mind. We’re friends. Maybe not even that. We’re housemates who enjoy each other’s company. We’re passing ships who sometimes pass very slowly and sometimes drop anchor together. We’re book coach and author. We’re two lonely adults who live in a small town and have no one else to talk to.

Today is the first time I’ve gone back to the beach with him. Back to the scene of the crime.

I stand up in the water, and nod at him.

‘Okay, I’m ready. Let’s do this.’

‘Have you ever been on a board before?’