The Wake-Up Call(83)

Lucas


I am stuck. I don’t have a clue how to move things forward with Izzy without scaring her off, but I can’t go on like this for much longer, having her without having her. I know it’s exactly what I agreed to—but it’s also torture.

Surprisingly, it’s Pedro who finally gives me an idea. He comes over for a beer in the evening, and he tells me that if you want to change the way someone sees you, sometimes all you need to do is change the background. This is actually a comment about optimising Smooth Pedro’s Instagram page, but wisdom can come from the most unexpected of places.

So on the night of December twenty-first, I tell Izzy that we aren’t going back to my flat, we’re going to Pedro’s caravan in the woods.

“Pedro lives in a caravan?” she asks.

“A very nice one. He needed someone to look after it while he’s away.”

(Staying in my flat.)

“And it’s in the middle of the woods?” Izzy asks with suspicion.

“What, do you think I am leading you into these woods to feed you to the ponies?”

“Well, no,” she allows. “But I’m not really in the right footwear for this.”

I stop and crouch in the middle of the dimly lit woodland path. It’s a beautiful, sharp winter evening. I can smell pine and moss: the deep, ancient scent of these English woods.

“Are we doing squats?” Izzy asks.

“No,” I say as patiently as I can manage. “You are climbing on my back.”

“Oh!”

She jumps aboard without hesitation, and another fragment of my heart goes tumbling. Her body trusts me now, even if the rest of her doesn’t. I shift her slightly so we’re both comfortable; she laces her hands around my neck and settles in.

Pedro’s caravan really is very nice. He’s strung lights around his porch, and they dangle over the bed inside, too, tracing tracks across my eyelids as I lie back in the sheets and close my eyes. I wonder if I will ever be able to see a string of fairy lights without thinking of Izzy Jenkins.

“Oof.”

She lands right on top of me. Knees on either side of my hips, and—I open my eyes—no trousers on. She snuggles in, doubling over to lay her head against my chest.

“Mm. Good duvet.”

I close my arms around her and hold her like she’s mine, but she’s not mine at all. She starts to kiss my neck and my body responds instantly. I put my hands on her upper arms, holding her back.

“The lasagne will be done in ten minutes.”

She pulls back. “Lasagne?”

“It’s just a pre-made one,” I say. “I thought we should eat.”

We never eat together, usually. But there isn’t a specific rule against it.

“Well, I guess . . .” She frowns. “I am hungry.”

“We could wait for it outside on Pedro’s porch. You can see the stars.”

Her frown deepens. “Umm,” she says. “Or we could . . .”

She presses a slow kiss to my neck. My breath hitches. I brush my hands up and down her arms, trying to ignore the way she wriggles in my lap, making this plan significantly more difficult.

“Come on,” I say, closing my eyes for a moment and then rolling her over, pressing a kiss to her lips as I shift off the bed. “There’s a heater out there.”

She pulls her trousers back on and follows me slowly. It’s beautiful out here. The caravan sits in a carefully mown patch of lawn bordered by the forest on all sides. Pedro has laid some pale wooden decking, with two chairs facing out to the trees. I bend to switch the lights off as Izzy settles in her seat.

I have to walk with my arms out in front of me to find my chair. Slowly, my eyes begin to adjust. The moon is half-full, bright white above the trees, and the stars are extraordinary. It’s as if someone has sown them like seeds across the sky.

“Oh, wow,” Izzy breathes, looking up. “I’ve actually never seen them looking so clear. I guess . . . less light pollution here than at the hotel.”

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

I can barely see her nod in the darkness. I sit back in the chair, trying to find calmness in the star-soaked sky.

“How was your day?” I try.

She pauses. “You have literally never asked me that before.”

“No?”

“Nope. Never. Anyway, you know how my day was. You were there.”

It’s a rare acknowledgement of real life outside of our evenings together. I pounce on it.

“You seemed irritated with Poor Mandy this afternoon.”

“She said she’d help me find out who Goldilocks is, and then got distracted doing a reel for Instagram. I love that woman, but she gets scattier by the day, and introducing her to social media means she’s pulled in even more directions at once.”

I hear Izzy sigh. An owl hoots in the forest and another answers. Through superhuman effort, I manage not to point out that asking for help to find the owner of the last ring could definitely be regarded as cheating. The bet was between me and Izzy. But I suppose I should have known she would play dirty.

“We’re all stressed with the new year looming, I do get that,” she continues. “I feel pretty scatty, too, to be fair. The renovation work is just so . . . consuming, but in a really good way, like I feel as though I’m doing something me, and . . .” She pauses. “Sorry. I shouldn’t be talking about work.”