CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
EMMA
I wake up before the alarm.
Not because Ruby is crying. Not because someone has kicked me in the ribs. Not because I’ve mentally remembered six things I forgot to do.
I wake up because I’m warm.
Dan’s arm is heavy across my waist, his breath slow against the back of my neck. There’s something deliciously smug about it. About the fact that I’m sore in places I haven’t been sore in years.
I lie still for a second, replaying yesterday. The glances. The upstairs detour. The ridiculous knickers-in-his-mouth moment. The messages later that night.
Twice in twenty-four hours.
I almost giggle.
The house is quiet. Properly quiet. The kind of quiet that feels like a gift rather than a warning.
Carefully, I turn in his arms.
He’s asleep, mouth slightly open, hair messy, one eyebrow twitching like he’s mid-dream. And I feel it again. That tug in my chest.
God, I love him.
Not in the dramatic, heart-exploding way. Not in the nineteen-year-old, can’t-breathe-without-you way.
But in the steady, familiar, “you are my person” way.
I trace my finger lightly over his collarbone and he stirs.
“Mmm,” he mutters. “Morning.”
His voice is rough with sleep.
“Morning,” I whisper.
He opens one eye, then the other. A slow grin spreads across his face.
“Well. You’re glowing.”
I roll my eyes. “Shut up.”
“I’m serious,” he murmurs, pulling me closer. “You look…”
His thumb brushes along my jaw.
“Happy.”
Something settles in my chest at that.
Because I am. Not euphoric. Not fixed. Not magically healed. Just… lighter.
The kids eventually thunder in, because of course they do. But even that feels softer somehow. Less sharp around the edges.
Oscar complains about cereal distribution fairness.
Sophie announces she needs a cardboard box for a project she forgot to mention. Ruby appears wearing someone else’s knickers on her head.
Normal chaos.
But Dan doesn’t vanish into the kitchen with his coffee.
He’s in it. He pours cereal. He finds the cardboard box. He wipes milk off the counter without being asked.
And when I catch his eye across the kitchen, he winks.
A stupid, teenage wink.
And my stomach flips.
The school run is smooth again. We move around each other easily, like we’ve remembered the choreography.
At the school gates, he squeezes my hand before peeling off toward work.
“See you at home,” he says.
There’s something loaded in the way he says it.
And for once, it doesn’t feel like pressure.
It feels like possibility.
Back home, the house feels different.
I make tea and actually sit down to drink it while it’s still hot.
I open my laptop and manage to write two full pages before checking Instagram and the PTA WhatsApp group.
My brain feels… clearer. Maybe intimacy isn’t just about sex. Maybe it’s about being seen. About being wanted. About feeling like you’re not carrying everything alone.
Around midday, I hear the bins being dragged down the driveway.
I smile to myself.
See? Effort.
I wander into the kitchen and find Dan there, rinsing out Ruby’s lunchbox without being prompted.
“You okay?” I ask lightly.
“Yeah,” he says. “Figured I’d get ahead of it.”
Ahead of it. The words do something warm and hopeful inside me.
Maybe this is what change looks like.
Not grand gestures. Not declarations. Just small, consistent shifts.
We work through the afternoon in companionable silence. He makes coffee and brings me one without asking how I take it. He remembers.
At one point, he passes behind the sofa and brushes his fingers along my shoulder.
Not sexual. Just there.
I feel chosen.
It’s nearly four when the first crack appears.
He’s back at the kitchen counter, laptop open. His posture has changed slightly. More rigid. More distant.
I notice because I’m looking for it now.
“Can you grab the washing from the machine before the school run?” I call casually.
“Yeah,” he says, eyes fixed on his screen.
I wait.
The washing machine beeps.
It beeps again.
Nothing.
“Dan?” I try again.
“Just a sec,” he mutters, typing faster.
I stand there for a moment. It’s not a big thing. It’s a small thing. But I feel it. hat tiny shift.
That almost-familiar sensation of being the one who will do it anyway.
The machine beeps a third time fifteen minutes later.
He sighs loudly.
“I’ve got a deadline, Em. Can you just do it? I’ll sort it later.”
There it is. Not cruel. Not malicious. Just… default.
I don’t snap.
I don’t roll my eyes.
I don’t make a passive-aggressive comment.
I just walk past him and move the washing into the dryer.
My chest feels tight.
It’s fine. It’s one moment. Change isn’t instant. And I guess I can’t expect him to realise that I have a deadline too since I haven’t told him.
But as I’m loading the dryer, I glance over at him.
He’s leaning forward, jaw tense, completely absorbed.
And I realise something uncomfortable.
The spark is back.
The desire is back.
The laughter is back.
But the habits?
They’re still there too.
And this, this is the real work.
Not the sex.
Not the flirting.
The choosing, again and again, even when it’s inconvenient.
I close the dryer door a little harder than necessary.
The sound echoes.
Dan looks up briefly.
“You alright?”
I hold his gaze for a second longer than usual.
“Yeah,” I say lightly.
“I’m fine.”
But this time, I’m not sure I am.