Chapter 12 #2
‘And you somehow turned that into me wanting to move back in with my ex? My ex who is seeing someone. Never mind the fact that I am seeing you and I thought we were kind of in love and in this together.’ Conal looks as confused and hurt as I have felt, and suddenly I can see how ridiculous I’ve been and I’m desperate to paddle this whole situation backwards and bring us back to a very comfortable and safe shoreline.
My mouth is as dry as the mouth of a twenty-year-old the morning after a particularly heavy night before, but I don’t know what to say.
I don’t trust myself not to make this worse and, God knows, I do not want to make this worse.
I want to make it better, and fast. Ideally I’d like to go back in time about ten minutes and make it not have happened at all, but I have not yet perfected the art of time travel and there is no sign of either Doc Brown or Marty McFly and their DeLorean about either.
In another location – of a more private nature – I might be able to distract him from my stupidity by doing something silly, like flashing my boobs.
The park might be empty, but I don’t think an act of lewdity would be right just now.
This feels bigger than something that can easily be brushed over with a quick flash of tit.
And besides, it’s cold. I’m going to have to use my words instead.
‘We were,’ I say, immediately panicking at my own entirely unintentional use of the past tense. ‘I mean, we are. But… but you said we need to talk and I… well… I…’
‘Put two and two together and came up with seventy-five?’ he asks.
‘Something like that.’
Conal shakes his head slowly, turning away from me and directing his attention to the dogs again.
I follow him as he sets off towards Daniel and Lazlo at a pace.
This is an angry walk. I’d know it anywhere, even though I’ve not seen it from Conal before.
It’s obvious in the way he hunches his shoulders, and in the length of his strides.
It’s there in the way he has pushed his hands down deep into his coat pockets and very much out of the hand-holding arena.
If I wasn’t worried I was actively being chucked, it would really be quite sexy in a Colin Firth as Mr Darcy in Pride and Prejudice way.
But as I am worried, it is not sexy. It just very, very worrying.
‘Conal!’ I call after him. ‘Hang on!’
I’m walking as fast as my legs can carry me, but still he is getting further and further away. I don’t want to start running after him, because as we’ve already ascertained, running and I are not friends. Think Phoebe from Friends, but with less grace and more need for ibuprofen afterwards.
‘Conal! Please!’ I hate that I can hear desperation in my own voice, and I hate more that this is my fault, and I have caused a problem where none existed.
Conal and I have not fallen out before now.
We’ve been sickeningly happy with each other.
Not so much as a cross word. It’s just been every kind of lovely and I have very much enjoyed the every kind of lovely phase.
I had hoped that it would continue and last for the longest time.
It had made me believe that happy-ever-after might actually be possible.
But now?
Tears prick at my eyes, along with a really deeply unpleasant suspicion that I might actually be inherently unable to maintain a relationship and that I don’t deserve one anyway.
An embarrassingly loud sob is about to burst forth from my lips, when suddenly Conal stops his angry march dead.
I freeze to the spot, not sure if I should move closer to him or just turn and walk away and ugly cry to myself until I get to my car. Of course, I have to hope that Daniel will come when he is called and doesn’t decide to show off in front of his doggy pal by acting all defiant.
I’m still frozen in that indecision when Conal turns around and looks at me, his face set in a serious expression.
‘I don’t want to move back in with Shannon,’ he says.
‘Yes, I want to be there for Ryan because he needs me to be there for him. But when I say he’s acting up, I mean he’s just being a bit of a ball ache.
I don’t actually think he’s doing hard drugs and robbing old ladies.
He’s being a bit lippy and going a bit too hard on his mum’s drinks cabinet.
So while yes, I do want to be there for him, I don’t feel the need to live under the same roof as him to do that. ’
He pushes his floppy dark hair back and I swear the emotion on his face, coupled with the tenseness in his jaw, has me weak in the knees. It’s proving to be quite the U-turn from the upset I was feeling just seconds before. Now I really do have to fight the urge to flash my boobs at him…
‘I’m sorry. It’s that phrase,’ I tell him, stepping closer.
‘It makes me nervous. It doesn’t usually mean anything positive.
Not in my experience anyway. And in fact, I still don’t know what it is you need to talk to me about, so it might still be something not positive.
So can we just get to the point please? I’ve been on edge since yesterday and Laura isn’t replying to my messages… ’
‘You talked about this with Laura?’ he asks, incredulous for a moment before realisation dawns on him. ‘Of course you have. And Niamh too, I suppose?’
I nod.
‘And your mum too, I imagine?’ If I’m not mistaken there’s a hint of amusement on his face. He thinks he knows me so well, but I’m about to prove him wrong.
‘Ha! No! I haven’t spoken to my mum about it because she would never forgive me if I fucked things up with you, so I wanted to know what was going on before I said anything.
’ I say it in an accusatory way, but I think it’s more the case that I am revealing the secrets I should probably keep hidden.
Isn’t the first rule of dating to not let them know just how invested you are?
But Conal is not, and never was, just dating.
It is not casual. It could never have been.
I’d known that from the very start. My long history with Laura was one factor, but also the long history I’d had with Conal, and his mother, meant I had to approach it as something potentially serious.
I didn’t want to play any games and neither did he.
So how have we found ourselves in this state, in the country park?
‘You think I’m going to break up with you?’ Conal asks, his eyebrow raised.
‘Well… are you?’ The knot in my stomach swells and I want to be sick.
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Becks. I don’t want to break up with you! I love you! You know that, or at least I hope you know that. I thought I’d made it exceptionally clear, but it sounds like I haven’t.’
Blinking, I feel tears slide down my cheeks as my nose starts to run. I don’t want to give in to the wobble of my lips.
‘I love you, Becca,’ he repeats, and now he is walking towards me and it’s just as sexy and appealing as his angry walk away from me had been.
‘I love you too,’ I tell him.
‘But we do need to talk. It’s not something scary though. At least I don’t think so. I think it’s exciting. I’d really, really love it, if you would consider…’
Time stops. My heart thuds. Is this man about to propose to me?
I… I don’t know how to feel about that. I love him of course.
I do. But I’m not sure I ever want to get married again.
The institution of marriage doesn’t appeal to me any more.
It’s a construct and it doesn’t guarantee anything.
I had learned that the hard way. Oh, shit.
I don’t know how I’m going to respond to this.
‘…God,’ he says, the nerves beating off him. ‘This sounds like I’m going to propose. I’m not going to propose.’
My shoulders drop, my body sagging with relief, but then again, now I’m completely confused as to what is going on. Clearly he reads the confusion on my face.
‘I just wanted to talk to you about maybe moving in together?’ he says – and I realise I don’t know how I feel about that either.