‘It’s such a pity you don’t date baristas. I swear Gus fancies you. He likes the pink hair.’

I laughed as she let me go.

‘Bye, Cait.’

‘Bye, Leen.’

And I turned and crossed the street.

20 TUESDAY, JULY

20

TUESDAY, JULY

We were moving really fast. I kept expecting it to slow down, but it didn’t. If anything, it sped up. Questions became assumptions became routine, in the best possible way. We worked, we went home together and slept wrapped up in each other, woke up and did it all again. Over and over.

‘Humour me,’ I asked, over and over, late at night. And every time he grinned, and I saw that dimple, so perfect it made me whimper, and his eyes twinkled and he did. London, Paris, Santiago, Montenegro. I stopped asking, and he kept doing it, grinning, eyes twinkling, and it felt less and less like humouring me and more and more like something real, something I could almost touch. A plan. Ridiculous, maybe, and much too fast, but real. Guatemala, Sri Lanka, Rome, Athens.

Lina and I had booked our tickets to Bali and Tom was just waiting for his leave to be formally approved before he booked his. Lina had a dress, she had a cake, flowers. She’d even written her vows.

It was the coldest winter in a few years but I barely felt it, lost track of the days. I was warm all the time, safe all the time. I didn’t walk anywhere, except to and from the cat-piss house some mornings to switch over my clothes. Every time I did there was a different empty wine bottle on the kitchen bench and it was the only way I knew anybody lived there at all.

The sun came out every day, and it was cold but it was a nice cold, invigorating, refreshing, and then Tom was there and he warmed me up from the inside out, over and over again.

‘Caitie.’

I was dreaming and I didn’t want to wake up. Cobblestones. We’d been talking about cobblestones, and I’d dreamed about them. Walking along them, down alleyways and around corners, stopping every now and then to kiss.

‘Caitlin.’

His voice was soft. His breath on my neck. Barely there. But everywhere.

I rolled towards it.

‘I have to go, okay?’

Still dreaming. Sighing. A mouth on mine.

‘I’ll call you later on.’

I said something. Maybe. Cobblestones. Bright white sheets. Warmth. Little words, murmured. More kissing and more words and then I was asleep again.

When I woke it was midday. I rolled over and pushed my face into Tom’s pillow, inhaling deeply. It smelled like him and I could have suffocated on that smell, happily.