Page 49 of The Friend Request

I should walk past him. Open the door. Go back in. Light the candles. Be a mum.

But my feet won’t move.

‘What do you actually want, Ross?’ I say. ‘This has to stop. All of it. Because I’ve told you. More than once. There’s nothing left to talk about.’

‘You keep saying that.’

‘Because it’s true.’

‘Is it?’

‘Yes.’

He pushes off the door frame and moves closer, and the worktop presses into the small of my back before I’ve made a conscious decision to lean away. He doesn’t come too close. He stops by the table and rests his fingers on the back of a chair. His coat is still on, and I can see rain on the shoulders from where he must have walked up the drive. He looks tired. Any attempt at charm is gone, replaced by exhaustion and an appearance of being worn through, like he’s been carrying something heavy for so long his arms have gone numb and he’s forgotten what it was like to put it down.

‘One moment,’ he says quietly. ‘That’s all I wanted. One moment with you, without—’ He gestures towards the wall, towards the noise, towards all of it. ‘Without everyone.’

My blood goes cold.

‘Don’t,’ I say.

‘In the library,’ he says. ‘Our first kiss. You remember it, Kim.’

I stare at him. My lungs are so tight I can barely draw a full breath. The strip light buzzes and buzzes.

‘And you know what we had was special,’ he says. ‘You’ve always known.’

The absolute worst part, and I hate myself for thinking it – is that he’s right. I have always known. I’ve carried that first kiss around for years like a stone in my pocket, turning it over when I’m alone, smoothing the edges in my mind until it fits perfectly into the gap that nothing else has filled. Not the wedding. Not Olivia’s birth. Not the good years with Alex, and there have been good years, I’m not pretending there haven’t. But that first kiss sits underneath all of it, quiet, small, and stubborn, and it won’t go away no matter how many times I tell myself it should.

But that doesn’t make it all right.

‘We broke up twenty years ago,’ I say.

‘I know.’

‘We were children.’

‘We weren’t, though.’ He’s so gentle it makes me want to scream. ‘We were old enough to know what we were doing.’

‘Old enough to know what, exactly?’ I fold my arms, because if I don’t I’ll grab the worktop edge again and I refuse to let him see me bracing myself. ‘We were kids, Ross. Kids do stupid things, then they grow up and get on with their lives, and that’s what I’ve done. I’ve got a husband in that room. I’ve got a daughter who’s eating too many sweets and enjoying my surprise party. I’ve got a life that has nothing to do with you.’

He doesn’t flinch. I want him to flinch. I want him to look stung, or angry, or caught out – something I can use to remind myself that I’m doing the right thing by pushing him away. But he just stands there with his fingers on the chair back, watching me, and his face is so still that I can’t make head nor tail of what he’s thinking.

‘I know you do,’ he says. ‘I’m not asking you to give any of that up.’

‘Then what are you asking?’

‘I’m asking you to stop pretending we didn’t happen.’

‘I’m not pretending anything.’

‘Kim.’

‘I’m not.’

But even I can hear how thin my voice sounds. Even I know.

Ross lets go of the chair and takes a step closer. He’s near enough now that I can smell his aftershave, and for a horrible, lurching second, I want him. Despite the threats, the terror, and all the disruption he’s brought into my life, I want him. I want to feel his mouth on mine again, feel that unique buzz of being the sole focus of Ross Mercer’s gaze. What the hell is wrong with me?