The Last Love Note(86)

What collateral impact? Is this about Justin? Mum’s going full Mrs Bennet about both of us.

‘Hugh is my best friend,’ I say. It’s news to me. And would be news to Grace, not that I’d ever tell her. He can’t replace her, of course, but he’s seen me through so much of the big stuff, right up close, it’s unexpectedly obvious that’s exactly what he is: my best and closest friend. When I try to imagine the last four years without him, I can’t fathom how I’d have survived a single day.



‘About last night . . .’ I start to tell him, back at the house. He’s standing in the kitchen, in dark blue check flannelette pyjama bottoms and a white singlet, looking like he’s barely slept. Sidenote: he is delectable. The singlet clings to washboard abs that I’m staggered he’s kept hidden under business suits all these years. Quite frankly, he’s ‘fit AF’, as Sophie would say. And he’s looking at me through the rising steam of the kettle like he’s thoroughly DTF in this moment – a proposal my own body would accept and pass without amendment if I let it.

‘Don’t apologise, Kate. I get it.’

He gets what, though? The wrong idea? In the silence that passes between us it becomes painfully obvious that I’m at risk of losing Hugh altogether. But I don’t know how to fix that. I’m not ready. I can’t be sure he is, either. To leap straight into another relationship now, in a context as messy as ours, when I haven’t really thrown myself into life on my own wouldn’t be fair on either of us. I can’t make a promise I’m not sure I can keep. And I wish I could look past the thing about Cam and Hugh, but it has a permanent hold over me.

Last night proved how compatible we’re likely to be in ways that extend far beyond what we’ve ever had, but that won’t fix this problem. Going there now would only make all of this even more difficult.

The idea of losing Hugh is unthinkable. Him being in my life has become synonymous with breathing.

I want to cry, but I can’t. It reminds me of something from the night Cam died. What was it Hugh had said? The times he’s saddest, it’s so deep it doesn’t come to the surface at all. He looks almost as bad as he did when he showed up on our doorstep that time, after going AWOL to think. I want to fix it. Every instinct is telling me to hug him and tell him I can’t bear this.

‘I didn’t hold your hand last night because I was terrified of where it would lead,’ I explain.

‘Is this meant to make me feel better?’

‘Yes. Because the reality is, that kiss in the rain was . . .’

We look at each other and the chemistry is undeniable. How has it only just materialised, after all this time?

‘Terrifying?’ he asks.

‘Exactly! Terrifying how out of control I felt. Terrifying how into you I am, Hugh.’

He’s listening.

‘More than all of that, though, I’m terrified we’re going to royally screw this up. And I can’t afford to lose your friendship. It would destroy me.’

I lead him out into in the garden and we sit beside each other on the grass in the sun, legs outstretched, with our mugs of coffee. The day is so promisingly warm, the sun is a security blanket that I very much need to get through this conversation.

‘I’m worried if I get wrapped up in you – and, believe me, after last night I know I would – I’ll move straight from this holding pattern of grief into another relationship, without ever having taken any risks on my own. This is hard to explain . . .’

‘You need to travel,’ he explains. ‘You need to make a home somewhere only you and Charlie know. You need Charlie to see you as a happy, independent mother. You need to write your book—’

I do. I need all of that.

‘I don’t expect you to wait for me,’ I say, and it feels like the words coming out of my mouth are launching a personal attack on me. Like I’m kicking an own goal. Tears start to well.

He leans over and kisses the top of my head. I feel like we’re seventeen and saying goodbye after a summer romance.

‘I won’t hold you back from any of the things you need to do,’ he says. ‘They’re all important. Maybe you need an adult gap year. Sell up, travel, write . . . See what the world offers you.’

I can’t deny even the idea of it stirs something new in me. I need adventure. New horizons. Different challenges that don’t revolve around watching a husband die.

‘I need time to catch my breath,’ I explain. ‘This feels too fast. I think I’m a bit behind you. It feels like you’ve had longer than me to get used to the idea . . . while I’ve been so in love with Cam. So obsessed with his memory. So . . . fractured.’

‘Of course you have been. That’s why I never said anything, all this time.’

He is ever respectful of Cam and me because he’s lived this.

‘Kate, it took me years to even consider the real possibility that there could be someone else for me. Someone I’d actually let into my life, instead of endlessly pushing people away. You’re barely two years into life without your husband. Don’t ever feel rushed.’

It would be easier not to feel rushed if he was less amazing. People search their whole adult lives for someone like this.

‘Our entire relationship has been built on my catastrophe,’ I tell him. ‘You’re instinctive with me when I’m struggling, but how will this work when I’m back on top? Are we going to be the same when I don’t need you any more? When I’m driven and decisive and accomplished and successful? Because those are all the things I haven’t had a chance to aim for, and I need them like I need oxygen.’