Chapter Twenty-Six #2
The streets fell quiet with the snowfall, and already the roofs looked sprinkled with sugar.
They walked to her place in comfortable silence, Chloe pondering everything.
They were both grieving and vulnerable, but she felt she was ready to date.
Harry seemed so, too, even if he wanted to take things slowly.
Their entwined fingers were a testament to that.
‘So is this why you don’t want anyone to know that we’re going out?’ she asked Harry as they strolled up the street towards her house. ‘Because of Jason?’
‘Not only because of him,’ said Harry. ‘I was worried, I suppose. Of what people might think of me seeing someone new. Of what I might think. Part of me felt I was betraying her. I know that’s silly.’
‘It’s not.’ They had stopped walking now.
Here between the houses, the wind was gentle.
Snow fell silently all around them, settling in Harry’s hair and melting on his pink cheeks.
‘I can’t understand it fully, but I can try.
Like I said, I sometimes feel guilty when I’m not grieving my parents.
When I start to enjoy being in their old house without crying for them.
Even though they would want me to be happy. ’
‘Julie said that to me, as well,’ Harry said. ‘When she was . . . near the end. She told me to find happiness.’
‘Then let yourself find it.’ Chloe cupped his face, feeling the stubble beneath her palm. She remembered seeing him at the graveyard, the book about flowers he had borrowed, how he had added daisies and freesias to the bouquet.
A snowflake fluttered between them to land cold on her nose. ‘Let yourself be happy. With me, or with whoever else. When you’re ready. Jason is angry now, but he won’t be for ever.’
‘I didn’t smile for a long time after her funeral.’ Harry covered the hand on his face with his own. His warm brown eyes roamed over her face. ‘And as you know, I was grumpy all the time.’
A reluctant laugh escaped her. ‘Yup.’
‘But that first time, meeting you in the library that day. The way you shouted “You’re welcome” after me when I was . . . less than polite.’
She groaned. ‘You heard me say that?’
‘I did. So did Mrs Cook.’ His eyes crinkled.
‘You made me smile again.’ He leaned towards her, his warmth draping over her, until their faces were nearly touching.
‘I smiled all day after that. People so often treat me like I’m fragile, awkward, they don’t know what to say, like I’ll fracture at the wrong word.
But you only ever treated me normally. And ever since that day, you’ve only interested me more.
Even when we argued at the pub. I was fascinated by you. ’
He inclined his head to kiss her, tasting of peppermint. Chloe closed her eyes, savouring him as the snow fell in a flourish around them. His heat was delicious, and she leaned into his strength as his tongue slid along hers, full of hunger and promise.
When he broke the kiss, Chloe said, ‘I’m okay with taking things slowly for now. We’ll tell people when you’re ready to.’ She still hadn’t told Gwen about Harry, after all. All her sister knew was what she had worked out for herself.
The drama with Jason made Chloe think of her ex-boyfriend.
Not Liam, her ex-fiancé who had kissed Gwen, but the guy she had been seeing in Sheffield.
She told Harry about him as they covered the last few paces to Chloe’s house.
‘I was seeing this guy, but it wasn’t anything serious.
’ She glanced skyward, briefly hoping the snow wouldn’t stick.
‘When I got the news about my parents’ accident, I came straight to Derbyshire to see them in the hospital.
I was supposed to be meeting him that day, but I switched off my phone and forgot to tell him I couldn’t make it.
I’d forgotten all about it.’ She sighed, recalling the nail-biting anxiety as she had driven as fast as she’d dared to the Royal Derby Hospital, everything related to Sheffield and the people in it completely gone from her mind.
Harry squeezed her hand. ‘That’s understandable. Who wouldn’t forget?’
‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you?’ Chloe said.
‘I went to visit them. I was at the hospital for hours.’ She didn’t want to go into all the terrible details about her parents’ injuries.
‘I finally remembered to switch my phone back on sometime later that night. Simon had blown up my phone. So many missed calls and text messages. I told him what had happened, hoping for some sympathy.’ She could still smell the garish antiseptic scent of the bright hospital hallway, taste the cheap coffee, hear the clack of her shoes as she’d stepped outside, trying to find enough phone signal to call him back.
The angry tears she’d shed. ‘He just gave me a hard time over it, saying I should have let him know and that I was selfish for keeping him waiting.’
‘Selfish?’ asked Harry, appalled.
‘Right?’ Chloe nodded. ‘He went on and on about the plans he’d made, as if I hadn’t just told him my mum and dad were . . .’ The word ‘dying’ caught in her throat.
‘Some people have no empathy.’ Harry looked satisfyingly irked on her behalf. ‘What a jerk.’
‘Yeah.’ It still annoyed her when she thought about it for too long.
She had ended things shortly afterwards and blocked him on everything.
After that, Chloe had been truly alone. Until she had come to Wellbridge.
‘What I’m trying to say is that people can be insensitive. They can’t see past their own needs.’
They had reached Chloe’s front door. The cold was starting to seep into her toes, and she couldn’t wait to get warm. Chloe turned to face him. ‘Sorry,’ she said quietly. ‘You don’t have your car with you, do you?’
‘I’ll manage.’ He smiled and kissed her on the lips. It was a slow, seductive kiss that promised so much more, and Chloe found herself breathless and hot as he held her face, his fingers firm but gentle. His thumb slid along her jawbone, settling delicately on the hollow of her throat.
The question rose to her lips. Do you want to come inside for a bit? But maybe – clearly – he wasn’t ready for that. She wanted to move things along when they were both ready. He wanted to take things slowly, and that’s what she would do. Surely she could control herself.
Even if she could see the spark of desire in his brown eyes as they roamed over her face as though trying to commit it to memory.
‘Goodnight, Harry, I’ll text you tomorrow, thanks for walking me home,’ she said all in one breath.
She gave him one last peck on the lips and went inside.
His absence felt like she was stepping into a cold room rather than a heated home.
She glanced through the frosted window to see his vague shape leaving, hands thrust into his pockets as he took long strides down the street.
She watched until he had disappeared around the corner.