I guessed good looks was a family thing.
Not wanting to pry any further, I put the photo I was holding back in the box and placed the lid on. I couldn’t wait to show him.
I couldn’t wait to see him.
One thing spending time with Jay had done was show me how much I’d changed. I remembered how things used to be with us. How much he’d meant to me, and how every time he was away from me, I missed him all the time. But it was so different now. Like we were best friends. No lurking feelings or tension, just mutual respect.
But Ash?
On the drive home, he was the only thing I could think about.
From the first night I met him, there was just something about him. It wasn’t attraction then, but there was definitely a pull of some kind. It was the reason I’d given him my card in the first place.
Somewhere, between meeting him and now, things had changed. I couldn’t pinpoint the timing, but I knew he meant more to me than I ever thought he would.
The timing was all wrong. I was pregnant and scared, and he was still dealing with the after effects of an abusive relationship. And yet, every time I was with him, there was a shift. It had been so very slow that I had barely even noticed it happening, like us sitting closer together on the couch, or him being a little more tactile, and us having our own inside jokes, and odd routines we’d sank into.
I hadn’t had those kinds of feelings in so long, I barely recognised them.
Jay had brought Ash up the day before. When he’d asked me about Ash, I was surprised, because he’d only seen us together for about a minute at Keely’s party. He’d seen how close Ash and I were standing beside each other, and I explained that away by giving him a very brief rundown of why he was even there. Jay had then added that, when he walked down the stairs towards Ash, for a split second, at the top of the stairs, he thought Ash looked as if he wanted to punch his head off when he realised what we’d been doing in that room.
When Jay had asked me if there was anything between Ash and me, I’d told him no. Not a firm no in the way I’d told Jay he and I had no hope of trying to patch up our relationship. More a ‘not right now, but… maybe’ kind of no.
The thing was, there was so much going on, and if Ash and I stayed friends, I’d be safe. He would always be my friend, and I wouldn’t get hurt.
But what about when he got a girlfriend? He still wasn’t ready yet—another reason for me to keep my distance—but one day, he would have one. When that thought had occurred to me before, I’d assumed it would sting. But it would be so much more than that in reality.
It would hurt.
I needed to talk to him. It was just that, now I was so close to admitting my feelings, I wasn’t sure how to even do that.
I glanced down at the photos in front of me again, and I had an idea.
I was pretty sure I hadn’t slept properly for about forty-eight hours. The night before Evie was going to see Jay, and the night she got there and called me to tell me what had happened after they’d talked, I’d been restless.
I was so happy that she was starting to feel better about being pregnant, and that she and Jay had started to figure out something that would work for them, but even though Evie had been adamant she and Jay weren’t getting back together, I couldn’t shake the thought that it could happen. If not right away, then at some point. Maybe when the babies arrived, and he was holding them, Evie would want back the life that was snatched away from them before.
But worse than that was the overriding feeling that, Jay or not, I would never be good enough for her.
Evie had text me to tell me she had got home shortly after mid-day, and while I wanted to see her, I didn’t offer to go over, or invite her to my flat in case she sensed how fucking messed up I was over all this. Over her. She had a way of always knowing how I felt, and I couldn’t let her see me like this. Not until I’d got it under control.
I had no idea how the hell long that would take though.
At about four that afternoon, there was a knock at the front door. Nobody ever visited me unannounced, mainly because I barely had any friends, and the ones I had always called or text if they wanted to come over. Couldn’t have been the postman because it was Sunday.
I cautiously approached the front door, then gave myself a shake, telling myself to stop being a fucking wuss. Who was really going to jump out at me on a Sunday afternoon? Shaking my head, I opened the door to find… nobody. I looked down my short path then up and down the street, but there was no-one around. I’d probably taken too long wondering who it would be. As I went to close the door, I saw a shoebox on the doorstep. It had brown tape around it, but the tape had been cut and then re-taped.
Hoping this wasn’t some weird 13 Reasons Why thing, I picked up the box and took it into my living room, putting it on the couch and sitting down.
The box hadn’t been re-sealed very well, so I peeled the end of a piece of tape and pulled it off enough to get the lid off.
The first thing I saw was a folded piece of notepaper, which I picked up and unfolded.
I thought you would appreciate getting these back. It’s not enough to make up for everything, but I hope it helps a bit. We need to talk. xx
I put the note down on the couch and looked properly into the box for the first time.
My photos.