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‘God, you know how to treat a woman.’ I rake my hands through the loot.
‘Sorry, that was ridiculously underwhelming. I just didn’t wanna waste the food I had in my cupboards.’
I burst out laughing at his grimace and open one of the packets, crossing my legs under me on the sofa. ‘There is no gift I enjoy more than salt and vinegar crisps, and I mean that with my whole heart.’
‘Well, now I wish I’d brought more.’ He leans in and takes a handful. Once he’s finished eating, he adds, ‘Think of me every time you see them from now on.’
I’ll be thinking about you more often than that, I’m sure of it.
My clothes suddenly feel like they’re too tight and I leap to my feet again, Finn glancing over at me in surprise. ‘I’m gonna put my pyjamas on. If you eat all those without me I’ll kick you out.’
When I come back to the living room Finn’s rooting through his rucksack. ‘I’m gonna put mine on too.’ He puts on an American accent and says, ‘Slumber party?’
‘Please never, ever do that again.’
He laughs to himself all the way to the bathroom.
I wait for him to come back, the gift I’d grabbed from my room for him now tucked behind my back on the sofa. By the time I hear the bathroom door open, I’ve made an impressive dent in the snacks. I look up as he comes closer and have to immediately avert my eyes, narrowly avoiding choking on a crisp in the process. In theory, plaid pyjama trousers should be wholesome. Somehow, on Finn they border on obscene.
One corner of his mouth lifts infinitesimally but he doesn’t say anything straight away. He eyes the packet I’m clutching. ‘Don’t worry about saving any for me.’
‘Wasn’t going to,’ I say, crunching my way through a few more crisps and keeping my eyes on his face.
‘I assume you’ve noticed my shirt. Got it at the museum.’
I hadn’t noticed, actually. I was otherwise occupied. He stands in front of me in the kind of emotionless pose of a kid waking their parents to tell them they had a bad dream, wearing a ridiculous blue t-shirt that readsI survived a night with the dino-snores.
‘Firstly, I have no recollection of you making that purchase andabsolutelywould have talked you out of it had I known.’I tilt my head back like I’m praying to the heavens, but I can’t help the laugh that spills out of and over me. It turns his deadpan expression into a grin. ‘Secondly, and most importantly, why are you like this?’
‘I’m like this because I have minimal shame.’ He stretches, all faux-awkwardness gone from his posture, dropping back onto his spot on the sofa. ‘Hey, so I know I should be likeoh no, Ava, you shouldn’t have got me anything,but the suspense is killing me. What did you get me?’
‘Give me your phone. Wait, no, unlock it first.’
‘You’re very commanding.’ He does what I say anyway. He usually does.
I catch a flash of his lockscreen and my heart pangs when I realise he’s changed it to one of the photos we took under the archway at the Barbican. That was before I really knew him. Before he really knew me.
‘Now close your eyes,’ I say, clearing my throat. I place two items in his hands and he opens his eyes. He looks at the larger item first; a pack of hazelnut wafers. One of those sunshine smiles spreads across his face, and I repeat his words back to him, ‘Think of me when you eat them.’
He shakes his head with a small chuckle. ‘I’m not gonna eat them.’
‘You don’t want a reminder of me?’ I say it with a laugh, but when he meets my eye he says what I kept to myself just a few minutes ago.
‘I’m gonna be reminded of you all the time anyway.’ He blinks a few times and looks at the second item, turning the plastic over in his hand. ‘What’s this?’
I slide along the sofa until I’m pressed against his side. ‘I removed Mateo’s name from his badge when he left the coffee shop and added yours instead. As proof of your last bucket list item.’ I show him his phone and the final point on the list stares at us, waiting to be crossed off.Become a regular.‘Finlay O’Callaghan, I hereby declare you a regular.’
A sad smile tugs at his mouth and he nods at his phone. ‘Will you do the honours?’
The act itself is kind of anticlimactic; I press the tick mark and then it’s over. But seeing the whole list in front of us is unexpectedly heavy. For a while we both stare at it, at all the items we’ve completed. A scrapbook, of sorts, of the summer. I feel the sway of the boat bar, smell the plants at the Barbican Conservatory, taste the bagel from that shop on Brick Lane. It’s all here, on this note in Finn’s phone.
‘Can you believe this whole thing started because I wanted to run away from a dickhead in a pub? It feels like forever ago.’
‘I’m glad he was a dickhead,’ he says simply. ‘But I think I would’ve found a way to hang out with you anyway.’
I often feel like I got caught up in Finn’s orbit. All those times I’ve tried to close myself off, be alone, wallow, and he’s pulled me towards him instinctively; easy and warm and safe. But when he says things like this I wonder if maybe he got caught up in mine too; two lonely satellites tumbling through the cosmos, some gravitational pull drawing us together.
I don’t know how to say what I want to say without making it the sentimental goodbye I was hoping to avoid. But in the end, I lean into it. ‘I think I’ve had more fun in these last few months than I have in years.’ I push my arm against his. ‘And it’s because of you. So thank you.’
