24
It’s the early hours of Sunday morning when Flynn climbs into bed, and I purr sleepily as he curls himself around me and nuzzles close.
I’m vaguely aware that I need to wake up, that we have things we need to talk about.
But I’m wrapped in a weighted blanket of pure Flynn, that sweet verbena smell, and his soft breath in my ear, and the next thing I know there’s a buzzing from the locker and a horn honking loud below the window. Bloody Finbarr again.
‘Damn it.’ Flynn jumps out of bed, hits the alarm on his phone, and starts pulling on his jeans. And I curse Finbarr in my head like he’s personally responsible for taking this beautiful man away from me, for dragging him out of my bed.
The horn honks again and two minutes later there’s rapping on the front door.
‘Fuck, I’m so late. I hit snooze and I must have gone back to sleep.’ Flynn grabs his passport from the locker and shoves a toothbrush into the front pocket of his backpack. ‘Finbarr’s driving me. I have to go or I’ll miss my flight.’
‘Go. Go.’ I pull myself up and wave him on as he moves towards the door.
He dashes back over, takes my face in his hands, and presses his forehead to mine. ‘I love you, Gracie. You know that, don’t you?’
‘Do you?’ I mean, I know Flynn loves me, but the way he’s saying it . . .
‘Of course.’ He draws back and smiles. ‘Best friends, always.’
The rapping starts again.
‘Sorry, I’d better go.’
‘I love you too,’ I whisper, almost to myself, as he walks out the door.
‘He told you he loved you?’ Sarah says later as she grips her hood tight and dips her head to fend off the biting wind.
‘He didn’t say it like that.’ I drop down on the wrought-iron bench facing the lake and stare at the swirling carpet of gold and copper leaves at my feet. ‘He said it as a friend.’
She perches at the other end of the bench and turns to face me, nose scrunched. ‘You sure about that?’
Best friends, always. Yeah, I’m pretty sure.
‘Did you not hear what I told you earlier?’ I throw up my hands in frustration.
‘He’s flying home to Natalie. He told his mother he’s going to see her as soon as he gets back to Cricket Falls.
He’s never gotten over her. He was in bits after they broke up.
You should have heard how heartbroken he sounded that time he called me in London. ’
I lost the person I care most about in this world, and I only have myself to blame. I wish I’d tried harder. I wish I’d never left.
And then Jamie interrupted before Flynn could say any more, and started ranting about us being late, making sure Flynn could hear him, and Flynn said he had to go anyway, and to have a good night.
He never got to tell me why it ended or why he gave up trying to fix things with Natalie, and I never even bothered to call him back, because I had long ago convinced myself I needed to move on from Flynn, even though I realise now that I never really did.
‘He was so cut up about losing her, and he needed a friend he could talk to,’ I tell Sarah now. ‘And I wasn’t there for him at all. I really let him down.’
‘That was two years ago, Gracie. He doesn’t seem the least bit sad now. And you said you had the best sex of your life this weekend. Sounds like more than friends to me.’
‘Good friends who have good sex.’ I huff a bitter laugh. ‘Same as him and Meghan. She probably thought it was the best sex of her life too. That’s why she clung so hard even though Flynn made it clear he didn’t want more than a fling.’
‘You mean more than a shag?’
‘Yeah, Sarah, that’s exactly what I mean.
And he felt so guilty about it, even though he had no reason to, because Meghan told him that’s all she was looking for.
He called her again to sort things out but he doesn’t see her any more.
Because he’s worried about hurting her. And I can’t let that happen to us. I won’t.’
‘What will you do?’ Sarah stands and rubs her gloved hands, stomps up and down on a bed of soggy leaves. A not-so-subtle hint to get moving, back to the cosy crackling stove in the Corner Bar where Tim and a fully recovered Pat are waiting to meet us for lunch.
I stand and start walking the lakeside path that leads to Hazel Cottage and Sarah falls into step beside me. ‘I’m going to write a letter and send it to his home in Cricket Falls.’
‘A letter?’ She cocks her head, throws me a questioning look. ‘Would it not be better to talk to him?’
‘He’ll be gone for twelve days. He has to talk to his parents, he has to sort stuff out at work, and he has to talk to Natalie.
’ I sigh. ‘The last thing he needs in the middle of all that is me on the phone wanting to chat about our hot night of passion and how I don’t think we should do that again. He’s got bigger fish to fry.’
Sarah frowns, but I keep going. ‘Letters work for Flynn. They’re his love language.’
‘His what?’
‘His love language, the way he likes to express himself, process things. We always wrote letters to each other, even when we were sitting a few tables apart in the same class.’
I swallow the lump in my throat, remind myself to breathe and let go of old wounds.
‘I was hurt that he didn’t write a letter that week before he left.
I was so sure he would, and it would have made all the difference to know why he laughed, why he left without telling me how he felt about leaving me behind.
But he’s written every year since, even if it’s only just a card.
And I’ve written back. And it’s been our lifeline. The thread that’s held us together.’
‘What will you say?’
‘I’m not sure yet. I don’t think I’ll know until I start writing, until I see the words on the page. Maybe it’s my love language too, my way of processing.’
Sarah smiles softly. ‘I’m pretty sure your love language is singing soppy songs.’
I try to laugh but it’s strained as my chest aches at the bittersweet memories of Flynn singing at Sarah’s birthday party, and me murdering my favourite song from Twilight so many times.
‘Maybe when I was sixteen. But those days are gone and I’m done being soppy.
I’m done pining for someone who was only ever truly mine as a friend. ’
I lift my chin as we pass by Hazel Cottage.
‘I still love him as my friend.’ My voice sounds as heavy as my heart as I try to help Sarah understand.
‘And I want to keep him in my life, even if all that means is a few lines every Christmas, to know that he’s happy, to let him know I care.
So, I’m going to write him a letter, and explain.
And he can take his time to think it over, and when he’s ready, when he’s back here in Oakwood, he can come and find me, and we can talk. ’
‘I’m so sorry, Gracie,’ Pat says as we tuck into lunch a small while later. ‘I should have made it clear I was talking about the house.’
We’re in the back corner by the stove. Sarah and I are on the couch, and Pat and Tim are across from us on the bench. And the table between us is piled high with bowls of steaming soup, pots of tea, and plates of toasted sandwiches and garden salad.
‘It never occurred to me that you’d think I meant the shop. It was always the house Gemma wanted for the extension. I thought you and Gertrude knew that.’
He takes his knife and slices through his ham and cheese toastie. ‘And I know Flynn told you I want him to have the shop. It’ll be his eventually anyway, and I have more than enough from the sale of the house and the land behind to keep me comfortable.’
‘He did tell me,’ I say. ‘But I assumed he decided not to accept it or that you’d both agreed to sell it on.’ And I thought that maybe he hoped helping me realise my dream would make up for leaving again.
Pat furrows his brow as he chews on his sandwich.
He seems to be considering something, making up his mind.
‘He needs to talk to Elaine. I get that. It should have been hers in the first place. But she’ll want him to have it, I know she will.
That husband of hers might have other ideas but it’s none of his damn business. ’
He tilts his head, narrows his eyes on me. ‘But it is your business, Gracie. You’re the main reason Flynn would want to stay here. Did you not ask him about it? Did you not try to persuade him to make the right decision?’
I pull back, shake my head. ‘That’s not up to me.’ Because, if he is thinking about going back to Natalie, that’s his choice to make.
‘Really?’ His brows lift.
‘Of course not,’ I say. ‘Flynn has his own life to live. I can’t expect him to move here just so I can keep my friend close.
’ I sag into the soft leather behind me.
‘I know he’d enjoy running his own garden centre, and I know he misses you, and this place.
But he has a lot of reasons to want to stay in Cricket Falls.
His parents, his job . . . And now that Natalie’s back. ’
‘Natalie.’ Pat’s face darkens. ‘But she hasn’t spoken to him for two years. I know she keeps in touch with Elaine, but she cut Flynn off completely.’
‘Well, she wants to speak to him now,’ I say. ‘And Flynn wants to talk to her too. He’s going to see her as soon as he gets home.’
‘I hope she doesn’t start all that nonsense about you again.’ He gives an exasperated grunt. ‘I know she was good to him and I know she was a great support to Elaine.’ He shakes his head. ‘But that doesn’t give her the right to tell him who he can and can’t be friends with.’
‘What?’ Sarah jumps in before I get the chance, and I follow with ‘I’m sorry, Pat, I don’t know what you mean.’
Tim lays his hand on Pat’s arm, and I catch a slight shake to his head as though he’s asking Pat not to say too much more.
‘You, Gracie, I mean you.’ He twists back to Tim. ‘I know it’s not my place, but Flynn’s not here, and if Natalie’s laying down the law again, Gracie needs to be told.’
Tim sighs and Pat turns to face me again. ‘You’re the reason they broke up.’
‘What?’ Sarah squeaks across the table. ‘How can it be Gracie’s fault? She didn’t see Flynn all those years.’ She sniffs. ‘He didn’t even come back to visit her. Not once.’
I never got to tell her that the reason he came home two years ago was, at least partly, to comfort me.
‘Of course it wasn’t Gracie’s fault,’ Pat says softly. ‘But Natalie got some notion in her head. I think she found Flynn reading through your letter.’
Sarah swivels her head to face me, eyes wide.
I feel bad I never told her, but she was with Scott, and Scott was team Jamie, and it was easier not to mention it. It was only a letter.
‘I wrote to him after Jamie and I broke up that time. Before I went to London.’ I swallow. ‘I used to tell him everything. Before. And I missed that.’
She nods in understanding and I slouch back against the couch.
Pat clears his throat. ‘Natalie wasn’t happy about it. She told him she wanted him to move in with her, but first he had to choose.’
‘But he didn’t move in with her,’ I say, and Pat shakes his head.
‘No. He didn’t.’
I wonder if that’s what Flynn was talking about when he told his mother that he regretted holding back.
‘I’m not sure what happened exactly, or what was said, and like Tim says, it’s not really my place.’
He goes quiet, then adds, ‘Flynn should be the one to tell you that.’
‘But why would they break up just because he got a letter from a friend? A friend he hadn’t spoken to in years.’
‘I don’t know.’ Pat sighs. ‘But I do know she didn’t want him writing to you, or calling you, or flying back to see you.’
‘Oh.’ My heart sinks like a stone and I drop my sandwich quarter back down on my plate. ‘I see.’
I’ve been wrapped up in worries about losing Flynn’s friendship and fixated on plans to keep him in my life. I haven’t given nearly enough thought to how those plans affect him, how they could mess up his chance of working things out with Natalie.
If our friendship is the reason they broke up, then he’ll have a far better chance of happiness if I give Natalie what she asked for. Flynn promised me once that he’d always be my friend, and I know he won’t go back on that promise. That’s not who he is.
I’ll have to be tough enough for both of us. I’ll have to be the one to let go.