Page 2 of You Belong With Me

‘Listen, I’m a twat who can’t do anything else – I mostly enjoy acting. And I need to keep all my hot sluts in bunches of roses.’

Edie properly laughed. She was a fool for him when he dropped posh actor Elliot and used his real accent.

‘But I’m the only person in charge of my life. If I want the jobs I take to suit having a girlfriend in the East Midlands, they will. Simple as that.’

A pause.

‘Elliot …’ Edie began. ‘It’s amazing you’d offer.’ She adjusted her hands on the brown paper around the roses, felt her fingertips dappling it with sweat marks. ‘But I didn’t give you up for trivial reasons. It was the hardest, most grown-up decision I’ve ever made, but I thought about it from every angle, and there wasn’t any other way.’

‘You sound like my mum when she had our cat, Inspector Boursin, put down.’

‘Inspector Boursin?’

‘Don’t ask – Fraser named him. OK, look. Saying this next thing is more intimidating than when I auditioned for Christopher Nolan and he said nothing for thirty seconds and then kind of nodded …’

‘Name-dropping, even now,’ Edie said with warmth, rolling her eyes.

‘I’m gabbling because I’m so nervous,’ Elliot said, andwhether he knew it or not, Edie was already in love with him harder than ever.

‘The practicalities are pretty much irrelevant. You’re not …’ He paused and swallowed, hard. ‘…replaceable,Edie.’

‘Hah, well,youdefinitely aren’t.’

That was glaringly obvious. She wasn’t easily going to settle for John Bloke after Elliot Owen. She felt like Lois Lane after a night sky flight with Superman.

‘I don’t mean in superficial ways. The time apart has proved it to me. I already knew it when you ended things – I just couldn’t articulate it. It’s all so clear to me now. From my perspective, anyway. I don’t want to shake hands, leave you as some golden memory when I’m toothless watching quiz shows in a fireside chair, Edie. I don’t want to try to fill the space where you should’ve been with other people, because we didn’t eventry. There isn’t another you, for me. If you feel as much as I do, then we shouldn’t be bothering with the “if”, only the how.’

Edie couldn’t speak. Her throat had seized up, and she had a dull pain behind her ears. Comprehending that she’d been made a surprise offer of true love replicated a sinus condition.

It was more than this overwhelming confirmation of his feelings; it was discovering that she’d so efficiently minimised and denied hers.

Edie honestly thought she was done with living behind expertly constructed facades, and lying to herself. It seemed she wasn’t, because Elliot had turned her case for their separating inside out.

He was right: the first principle was that they were, andremained, madly in love, not that his job involved a lot of travel. He had offered compromises – never demanded she leave her home – and she had still rejected them out of hand.

Why? All of Edie’s objections really meant:you’re destined for bigger and better things (than me).She hadn’t been able to bear attempting a relationship with him not because it was truly impossible, but because she was so certain of failure. She’d used these two concepts interchangeably, when actually, they weren’t the same at all. Acknowledging this put Edie’s insistence they split up in a very different light.

She hadn’t dumped Elliot. She had pre-emptively dumped herself.

‘… The only thing I don’t know is if maybe you didn’t feel quite enough for the huge hassle involved in being with me. If so, I get it,’ Elliot continued. ‘I’m sorry to put you on the spot. This definitely felt like a meeting not an email.’

She could tell that while his voice stayed steady, inside, he was writhing. As soon as she found the words, she’d put him out of his misery.

Elliot’s brow knitted. ‘Unless you’re seeing anyone? I told Fraser not to tell me if he found out you were, but I’d hoped he understood that meant he should still tell me, and then I could blame him for it when I lost my shit.’

‘No, I’m not.’ She paused. ‘I can’t find a single flaw in your argument, to be fair. Never seeing you has felt a lot like bullshit. Also, if you think I’ve got the strength of character to say no to Elliot Owentwice, you’re wrong.’

‘You’d be saying no to Elliot.’

She understood his meaning. ‘Well, the answer to either of them is yes.’

Elliot’s eyes lit up, and hers shone with incipient tears she was definitely not going to cry, not when they weren’t even at the trifle and cheeseboard course on the other side of that door. She owed him honesty about why she’d let him go, after his courage.

‘The truth is … I’m scared,’ she said. Saying it out loud it actually felt cathartic, rather than stupid.

‘So am I,’ Elliot said.

He stepped forward and kissed her, and it was exactly the right moment. It stopped them overthinking it. She’d forgotten how his mouth on hers could make her feel, in that way you did when remembering was too potent and inconvenient.

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