I could see the deep breathing had helped him too. Since the first night we met, I didn’t think he’d ever seen me have a complete meltdown, and it had probably shaken him as much as it had me. A few minutes ago, he’d looked as terrified as I felt, but now he too looked calmer. In my head, I was far from over my panic, but I knew I had to get myself together.
“Ash… just for today, would it be okay if we pretend this isn’t happening?”
“That depends,” he said, watching me closely. “On whether you promise to only hide from it today.”
His blue eyes were intense, and I realised we’d reached the point in our friendship where I could no longer hide anything from him. Not that I ever did, but if I’d wanted to, I couldn’t have.
As much as I knew about Ash and his past, he knew the same about me. And he’d learned that one of my biggest problems was trying to run from anything that might hurt me.
“I’ll talk about it tonight, after we’ve been out to eat,” I told him, with a confidence I didn’t feel fully. I hoped by then I might have had a bit of time for my mind to clear so I could explain how I felt properly.
“Deal,” he said, with a small smile. “Before we put it aside completely, we won’t be going ice skating now. We can’t risk you falling down and getting hurt.” My heart did an unexpected flutter at his thoughtful words. “So, what do you want to do instead? Do you still want to go to Manchester?”
I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess so. Maybe we can do something low key.”
“Not too low key. It’s still your birthday and you should still do something fun.”
“Any ideas?”
He smiled. “Yeah. What you need right now is to take your mind off everything. But, we have to be back here for four because there’s something else coming for you and you need to be home to get it.” I raised a questioning eyebrow, and he laughed. “I’m not telling. So, we should do something silly. The Trafford Centre has an amusement arcade with slot machines and bowling and pool. I say we go there for a couple of hours and chill. Grab some lunch over there, then come back here and open all the cards and presents. How does that sound?”
Anything that delayed me thinking, even for a couple of hours, was fine with me. The fact that he’d picked something so simple and relaxing just made it even better.
“Mind if I kick your ass at pool?” I asked, a small smile tugging at my lips.
“You think you could?”
I nodded. “I do.”
Ash grinned. “We’ll see about that.”
I did kick his ass at pool. He beat me at pretty much everything else we tried though, all of it fairly gentle. Although he wasn’t talking about me being pregnant, he was extra careful around me, keeping me close to him and surveying every game before suggesting whether we should play. I’d have thought it would have annoyed me when I was trying to forget about it. Instead, it somehow just made me see him more clearly.
The Ash I’d first met was always on edge. Always tense, only lightening up when he was totally sure it was okay. He used to be worried about saying something that would offend me, or accidentally breaking something of mine. Since staying at my place, he’d learned to be a little more okay with joking around, but it was when he moved out that I noticed even more of a change. With his physical injuries all healed up, he could go back to work, and doing work he actually enjoyed outside of Manchester had made a huge difference. In the beginning, he hadn’t considered not going back to live there, but once he’d gotten used to being in Stockport, he thought it was a better choice of place to live, if for no other reason than being farther from Natalie. He still had his moments, when he’d forget where he was and the old panic would set in. But those times were less now.
I couldn’t lie. If it weren’t for the fact that I assumed he’d never want to be with a mess like me, I would have considered testing the dating waters with him.
But that consideration about dating him was only ever that. Just fleeting thoughts. He was sweet, and funny, and Keely had been right. He was gorgeous. And I was sure when he found someone he wanted to be with, it would sting. But he deserved someone better than me. Someone with less baggage. I refused to dump all of that on him.
When we got back to my house, I was smiling again. Even if it was only to be short-lived, I wanted to enjoy as much of my birthday as I could, before I let reality in later. Ash told me to sit down while he made us some tea, and when he returned, he was also carrying the pile of birthday cards I’d ignored earlier. He put them on my lap after putting the tea down on the coffee table.
I was about to pick up the first one but I stopped and placed them on the floor, instead reaching for the gift bag he’d brought in earlier. “Yours first,” I said as I lifted it up and put it on the sofa between us.
I opened his card, and I wasn’t sure what to expect. Would it be generic, or humorous? I figured probably more generic, and I was right. It was cute. It had a large, bright butterfly on the front that glimmered slightly in the light. Inside, he’d written, ‘Happy Birthday, Evie. I hope you have a day that’s as colourful as the front of this card! Love Ash x.’
His written words made me laugh. It had certainly been colourful. Or maybe totally bizarre was more accurate. Of course, neither of us could have known what would happen when the card was written.
I reached into the bag and pulled out the first gift inside. I already knew what it was as I’d asked for it when he’d asked what I wanted for my birthday. I ripped open the new Chaos In The Courtyard album and hugged it to myself.
Yeah, I still preferred hard copies of albums.
“Thank you,” I said, setting it down beside the gift bag. “You know this would have been enough, right?”
He nodded. “Yeah. But it’s your thirtieth, so you should get extra gifts.”
As I was about to delve into the bag again, the doorbell rang, and he grinned.
“You should get that,” he said.