Page 60 of Enemies to Lovers

‘Oh,’ Mum replies, ‘are you beach-hopping? I thought you needed to know about sailing, Flo?’

I haven’t had to explain the specifics of why I need to know about boats for my imaginary project. I’ve had it in the back of my mind that if I simply say enough words, it might confuse people and they’ll press me no further. Here goes nothing.

‘I’m building on the PhD, my specialism. It’s still the sea and water that I’m interested in, Mum. I want to take it further, because I think there could be a novel in it, maybe …’

Mum nods. ‘Oh, how exciting. A novel!’ she exclaims. ‘Well, how very good of you to be thinking about all that on holiday. I’ll have a lunchtimevinofor you.’

I laugh. ‘Love you, Mum.’

‘Darling?’ she says, before I climb out of the back seat. I glance at Jamie, who has already walked ahead to the kiosk. ‘I just wondered …’

‘Yes?’

‘If you might need this?’

She’s holding up my notebook. My heart stops. How could I have been so stupid not to at leastpretendI needed it?

‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Urm—’

She hoots out a laugh. ‘I’m joking, darling. Givingyou shit, as your brothers like to say.’ She flings it at me, and I catch it. ‘Go on. Have fun.’

I sigh with relief. Although – no, it’s not possible she’s figured out what’s going on, is it? I mean, to be honest, I’m not entirely sure I know what’s going on, so how she could is beyond me.

‘Go!’ she urges.

I climb out of the car and wave her off.

We’re halfway through a sailing lesson when Jamie drops the knot he has been showing me and says, ‘Flo. It’s just hit me. You didn’t actually want to learn about sailing, did you?’

When we climbed aboard, Jamie got right down to business, showing me how to move this and wrap that, and talking about wind speeds and direction of travel. It was disorientating, not least because he is obviouslyverypassionate about being out on a boat. It’s kind of a turn-on to see him excited about something. But also his words have been crashing into each other and he’s not stopped talking for about forty-five minutes. The way he looks at me now, colour flushing up his neck, makes me understand that he’s nervous. And I’m nervous. So we’re two nervous people scrambling to figure out what happens next.

I bite my lip, hiding a smile.

‘I mean …’ I start, and Jamie begins to laugh.

His laugh makes me laugh and it goes on and on, every time one of us catches a breath, the other laughingharder and pulling them back in. This is ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous. I’d havepushedJamie off a boat less than a week ago. I don’t have words for what I want. I’m not even sure I really know. But the closer we get, the more I like it, even knowing all the reasons I shouldn’t.

‘Let’s swim,’ I suggest. ‘Can we do that?’

Jamie nods, slowly. ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Let’s.’

We lower the anchor and make sure everything is secure, and then Jamie flings himself off the edge of the boat, screaming,Woooooo!on his way down.He lands with a splash and I look overboard to make sure he comes back up. It takes a minute – he’s a good swimmer, and I can see him cutting through the water with strong legs and even stronger arms, pushing alongside the boat with impressive speed. He comes up for air dramatically, flinging back his head, water spraying everywhere.

‘Get in!’ he cries up at me, but I suddenly feel a lot less adventurous, now it’s my turn.

‘I’m scared,’ I yell back.

He shakes his head like he doesn’t believe me. ‘No, you’re not,’ he shouts back, with the kind of Harry Styles grin that means we’re not talking about the jumping.

I launch myself in like a pencil, arms crossed over my body and one hand holding my nose. I slice through the water and am startled by the cold. I hadn’t thought it would be this chilly out here, when it’s so warm at the shore. I push up to get to the surface, feeling like Ariel inThe Little Mermaid. I like the weightlessness of being underwater, with the weird combination of strength that it takes to swim up.

I feel the warmth of the sun before I can take a breath, but once I’ve made it to the surface, I do exactly what Jamie did and flick back my hair and wipe the water from my eyes. I search for him, but can’t immediately see him. I look left and then right, and spin round with difficulty to locate him. And then I feel a tug on my ankle and he pops up beside me to make me scream. He loves that he’s got a reaction – this smarmy smirk of satisfaction bleeding across his features – so I splash him and cry, ‘Arsehole! You’re supposed to be nice to me now.’

He doesn’t retaliate, but instead considers what I’ve said.

‘You’re right,’ he replies, his voice serious, and we tread water opposite one another, staying where we are.

When we get out, I pull my hair over one shoulder and wrap it around itself to get out the excess water, and then fling it back. My skin glistens with droplets from the sea, like tiny jewels all over my body. I’ve got a bit of colour now, and the way Jamie looks at me has never made me feel more beautiful.

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