Chapter 22
Mark
For the first few days after the call, I keep expecting Philip to mention it.
He doesn’t.
Not Whitstable. Not the photo. Not the fact that he admitted he nearly stayed.
Instead, the next message I get is a picture of a burnt bagel with the caption Toronto continues to disappoint me.
I stare at it for a full ten seconds before replying.
That sets the tone for the next four weeks.
Heath updates.
Work complaints.
The occasional sarcastic observation about women in my comments section.
Everything exactly where it was before.
Except not quite.
Philip stops calling.
Stops sending the late-night messages that drift too close to anything honest.
Whenever a conversation edges towards that night, he turns it neatly back towards safer things.
Heath.
Work.
Weather.
Anything that keeps us firmly in the long distance friendzone.
I tell myself I’m reading too much into it.
That one overlong phone call does not automatically equal emotional breakthrough.
Still, by the time the first Saturday of August rolls round, there is an unpleasant little part of me wondering whether we said too much that night.
Whether Philip woke up the next morning and decided distance was the better option after all.
I go for a run because sleep gives up on me just after six and a run at this time will guarantee me an empty Whitstable beach.
By the time I turn back into the lane forty minutes later, sweat cooling on my back, the early morning sun is illuminating the cottage.
Then I see the suitcase.
Dark blue, standing upright beside the front step.
I slow.
There is someone at the door.
One hand against the glass panel, face tipped towards it as he tries to look inside.
Suit jacket over one arm.
Head bent.
I stop at the gate.
Because I know that shape.
Even from here.
Philip.
For a second I genuinely think I am hallucinating from lack of sleep.
Philip shifts.
Turns slightly.
Sees me.
And freezes.
We stare at each other across the small patch of gravel.
He looks tired.
Not casually tired.
The kind of tired that sits in clothes. In shoulders. In the way someone is holding themselves together through force of organisation and caffeine.
His shirt is creased. His hair is flattened oddly at one side. There are shadows under his eyes, and his grip on the suit jacket looks unnecessarily tight.
He opens his mouth.
Closes it.
Then says, “Hi.”
I stop just inside the gate.
“Hi.”
He nods once.
Too quickly.
“I realise this is…”
He gestures vaguely around himself.
“…not ideal in terms of surprise management.”
I stare at him.
He exhales.
“I had a better opening in the car.”
“I’m sure you did.”
“It made more sense.”
“That would not have been difficult.”
That almost gets the corner of his mouth moving, but nerves wipe it away again before it can settle.
I pull the key from my pocket and walk towards him slowly.
Not because I’m afraid he’ll bolt.
Although maybe that too.
Mostly because I still haven’t caught up with the fact that he is here.
Actually here.
At my front door.
In Whitstable.
I stop a foot away.
Close enough to see the crease between his brows, the way he is breathing slightly too fast.
“What are you doing here?”
There.
Simple question.
Philip blinks.
“Yes,” he says. “That is, in hindsight, the obvious question.”
I wait.
He looks over my shoulder at the cottage, then at the suitcase, then back at me as if hoping one of those objects will provide assistance.
“I came down from London.”
“Not the bit I’m confused about.”
“Right.”
His throat moves.
“I know this is strange.”
“A bit.”
“I also know turning up unannounced at seven in the morning probably suggests either poor judgement or an emergency situation.”
“Which is it?”
He lets out a breath.
“Poor judgement, mostly.”
I fold my arms.
Philip notices and visibly gathers himself.
The result is not especially convincing.
“I landed yesterday,” he says.
I stare.
“Yesterday?”
“Yes.”
A laugh catches in my throat.
He presses on too quickly.
“I stayed in London overnight because coming directly here from Heathrow felt unhinged even by my current standards, and then this morning I drove down and spent twenty minutes sitting in that car trying to decide whether this was a catastrophic mistake.”
I glance at the unfamiliar blue suitcase.
Then back at him.
The sea is somewhere behind us, low and steady beyond the houses.
A seagull cries.
Philip looks like he may be physically sick.
I realise I am not helping.
“Come inside,” I say.
He exhales sharply.
Not relief exactly.
More like temporary postponement of death.
I unlock the door.
Philip lifts the suitcase and follows me in.
The cottage is cool from the open kitchen windows. The faint smell of sea air and the tea I made before my run still hangs in the room.
Philip stops just inside the hallway.
His eyes move over everything.
The stairs.
The kitchen.
The patio doors.
Like he is checking that memory and reality still match.
From the kitchen comes a rustle.
Then Heath appears at the front of the cage, nose twitching.
Philip sees him and some invisible guard drops.
“Hi,” he says quietly.
Heath stares.
Then, with all the emotional generosity of a grumpy hamster, turns around and disappears back into the beanie.
Philip lets out a breath that is nearly a laugh.
“Right. Fine. Good to see you too.”
I put a hand on the kitchen counter.
I have no idea where to stand.
No idea what shape this conversation is supposed to take.
Philip sets the suitcase by the wall but keeps hold of his jacket like he might still need to leave quickly.
I nod towards the kettle.
“Tea?”
He looks at me.
And I can see the same thought crossing his mind.
Tea is absurd.
Tea is painfully normal.
Tea might be the only thing from getting us through this.
“Yes,” he says.
My hands are steadier than expected as I refill the kettle.
Philip drifts further into the kitchen.
His footsteps slow near the sideboard.
I do not turn around.
I know what he is looking at.
For a few seconds all I hear is water filling, kettle clicking, Heath rustling.
Then silence.
When I turn, I find Philip holding the frame.
Just staring at it.
At us.
His thumb moves once over the edge of the glass.
I lean back against the counter and wait.
Eventually he lets out a breath.
“I nearly talked myself out of coming six times between London and here.”
That is not what I expected him to say.
I watch him.
He gives a small shake of his head.
“Possibly more. I lost count somewhere around Maidstone.”
Despite everything, the corner of my mouth twitches.
Philip notices and huffs a breath that might almost be a laugh.
Then he looks back at the photo.
“I kept thinking Sophie was being dramatic.”
A pause.
“That I was being dramatic.”
He swallows.
“That maybe this”—he lifts the frame slightly— “didn’t mean what I thought it meant.”
I say nothing.
Because if I speak now, I’ll say too much too fast.
Philip’s fingers tighten fractionally.
“So I came because I needed to know whether I had completely lost my mind.”
There it is.
Messier.
Truer.
I push away from the counter.
Take two slow steps towards him.
“You haven’t.”
Philip looks up.
His face does something painful at the edges.
Relief colliding with nerves.
“You say that very quickly.”
“I’ve had a lot of time.”
His laugh is brief and thin.
“Right.”
I stop in front of him.
Close enough now that I can see the exhaustion in his eyes.
The travel.
The month.
All of it sitting there.
Philip lowers the frame carefully onto the sideboard.
His hands stay there for a second, braced against the wood.
Then he says, without looking at me, “I needed to know if I was the only idiot still stuck in Whitstable.”
My chest tightens so hard it is almost a physical pain.
“No,” I say.
He closes his eyes.
Just briefly.
“No,” I repeat, quieter now. “You really weren’t.”
Philip laughs once.
And this time it sounds dangerously close to breaking.
He drags a hand over his face.
“I spent a month trying to make Toronto feel like the right choice again.”
I do not interrupt.
“I kept telling myself I missed home in a general sense. England. Sophie. Luke. Proper tea.”
His hand drops.
He looks at me.
“But every time my phone went off, I wanted it to be you.”
There.
The simple truth.
Far more devastating than any speech.
I step closer.
Philip inhales sharply.
“I didn’t know if I was making this bigger than it was,” he says, voice lower now. “I didn’t know if I was reading into messages because I wanted to.”
“You weren’t.”
He searches my face.
As if he still cannot quite trust the answer.
So I give him more.
“I drove back here every month because it was the only place I could miss you properly.”
Philip’s eyes close again, and this time the exhale that leaves him is almost shaky.
“Jeez,” he whispers.
“Yeah.”
For one second neither of us moves.
He is standing inches away.
Our photo behind him.
Heath rustling in the cage.
Sea air moving faintly through the open window.
All the waiting of the last four months packed into the tiny space between us.
Philip opens his eyes.
“I missed you,” he says.
I lift my hand to the side of his neck.
His pulse is hammering.
“I missed you too,” I say quietly.
Something in his face gives way.
Not dramatically.
Just enough that all the held-together edges loosen at once.
He makes a small, uneven sound and then he is moving.
One hand fisting in the front of my damp running shirt, the other catching at my shoulder as he leans into me like the months between us has suddenly become physically unbearable.
I kiss him.
Harder than I intended.
Not because I want to rush it.
Because relief is apparently not a gentle emotion.
Philip kisses me back with the same desperate lack of grace, mouth warm and slightly trembling, breath catching when I slide my hand into his hair.
The frame rattles softly against the wall behind him when his hip bumps the sideboard.
Neither of us pays it any attention.
Four months of distance.
Four months of restraint.
Four months of saying everything except the thing itself.
It all crashes into this.
His fingers clutch tighter in my shirt.
I pull him closer.
He tastes like tea he hasn’t had yet and airport air and something achingly familiar that my body remembers long before my brain catches up.
Philip breaks the kiss first, but only by an inch.
Forehead against mine.
Breathing hard.
“This was a stupidly long flight for a nervous breakdown,” he murmurs.
I let out a breath that could almost be a laugh.
“You do look mildly stressed.”
“I am mildly stressed.”
I brush my thumb once along his jaw.
“You should’ve told me.”
His eyes flicker open.
“Told you what?”
“That you were coming.”
Philip gives me a tired, disbelieving look.
“If I had told you, I’d have had to commit to it while still in Toronto. This way I could panic internationally in stages.”
I smile.
He frowns. “What?”
“You really do have a lot in common with Heath.”
Philip gives me a look.
“I am not discussing that.”
“Thought not.”
His eyes narrow, but the corner of his mouth shifts.
Good.
Just enough.
Just enough to take the sharp edge off the panic still sitting in him.
Then he leans forward, forehead briefly against my shoulder, and the weight of him says more than any speech has so far.
He is exhausted.
Not just tired.
Done in.
I slide one arm around his waist.
My other hand settles at the back of his neck.
“Come on,” I murmur.
He lifts his head slightly. “Where?”
“Shower.”
He blinks.
I glance pointedly at his shirt, his creased trousers, the faint film of travel still clinging to him.
“You look like Heathrow won.”
That earns me the smallest breath of a laugh.
“Rude.”
“Accurate.”
I keep my hand at his waist and turn him gently towards the stairs.
Philip goes with me without protest.
That more than anything tells me how wrung out he is.
Up the narrow staircase.
Slowly.
My palm stays warm against his side, steadying him whenever he hesitates, my thumb brushing once against the damp cotton of his shirt.
At the bathroom door he stops.
Just for a second.
I move in behind him, close enough that my chest touches his back.
“You can still panic internationally in here if you want,” I murmur near his ear.
Philip lets out a tired huff of laughter.
“Helpful.”
“I try.”
I reach around him and turn on the shower.
Water starts to strike softly against tile, steam already beginning to gather.
For a moment neither of us moves.
Philip stands in front of me, shoulders lowered for the first time since I saw him at the door, one hand braced lightly on the sink.
I can feel the residual tension in him.
The fear that this might have been a mistake.
I slide my hands to the buttons of his shirt.
Undo the first.
Then the second.
Then the third.
My knuckles brush warm skin.
Philip exhales.
Slowly.
As if each button opened is one more layer of distance finally giving way.
He turns his head slightly.
Not enough to lock eyes with me.
Enough that I can see the line of his jaw, the pulse fluttering there.
“You’re really here,” I say quietly.
He swallows.
“Yes.”
I press my mouth just below his ear.
His eyes close.
And for the first time since he appeared at my front door, he leans back into me fully.