The water jumps and waterfalls as he gets in and I paddle to the side, where a ledge offers me a seat to catch my spoons.

He disappears for a moment and, when he comes back up, he’s in front of me – hair slicked back and droplets hanging off his eyelashes.

He smiles wide and shakes himself like a dog.

It’s nothing like the sea.

Not cold or warm – just clear.

I open my eyes and see Alice.

He’s here and I’m here and he’s leaving.

The thought throws me up and under like a huge wave and for a moment I gasp and reach out, hooking my hand across his shoulders to stay afloat.

‘Hey, hey,’ I say,

sweeping towards her,

holding her waist under the water.

The water between us seems to boil.

I lift my feet off the bottom. Wrap my legs round his.

My breath catches.

Her skin on my skin.

I pull her closer.

Pull her wet fringe back from her face.

We’re achingly close.

I smile. He laughs.

And then I kiss him.

This. This.

THIS.

This could be everything.

We kiss and the world spins and swims and melts away, so we’re caught in between space and time – where a bedbound girl and a boy bound for a whole other world can find each other.

She kisses me like she’s trying to fit

a whole lifetime

into each brush of her lips.

‘I don’t have to go,’ I say between them.

‘We can work something out.’

Impossible, beautiful words.

I kiss his cheeks and nose. The curve of his shoulder blade.

‘We’d be awful. Like Fran and Charlie.’

I laugh and spin her round

so the water tornadoes round us.

‘We’d be worse.’

And I want to say, Stay.

Stay here and wrinkle with me.

Take a breath and dive to the bottom. Let’s float like this together, in the in-between.

But. Eventually. I come up for air. And paddle back over to the seat on the side.

She closes her eyes and I can see her counting.

‘Want to get out?’

No, no, I don’t ever want to.

I nod.

She’s silent as I

slip myself up and out of the water.

Dry myself quickly on a towel before

coming back to wrap her up in one.

She bites her lip and so I

smile. Make jokes. Spin her round

so all she can see is sky again.

He lays me back down on the sunlounger and I watch him struggling with the other one.

‘What are you doing?’ I laugh.

‘It’s too far apart, Alice!’

I point at the tiny space between the two bars.

‘Too far.’

I laugh and tug him down to me.

‘Well then, share mine.’