Page 91 of One Last Try

“Oh.” Molly’s blushing now, and Mathias is looking at neither of us.

“So . . . um . . .” Mathias starts. I get the feeling he’s trying to make things a little less awkward, but unsurprisingly, it’s not working. “What Master’s are you going to study?”

“Engineering,” Molly says.

“What . . .” He rubs his bare foot along the skirting. “What kind of engineering?”

“Uh, advanced mechanical engineering.”

“Oh, yeah? Awesome.”

I smother my snort of laughter. Pass it off as a sneeze.

“Did you go to uni?” Molly asks.

Mathias shakes his head. “No.”

“Who’s hungry?!” I jump in before it spirals into the most painful ten minutes of my life. “We could go into town and get a pizza?”

“That sounds great,” they both say in unison.

We pop into the pub on the way to let Daisy know. There’s only one customer in there, Viv. Well, two if you include Will Shakespeare, but since he’s never once paid off his tab, I don’t count him.

“MOLS!” Daisy screams, running from behind the bar and sweeping her sister into a big hug. They are so alike. Molly’s a little taller, and her hair’s two or three shades darker. She also dresses a lot more practically than Daisy, and has never been into party culture. But they’re similar enough for me to confuse one with the other a thousand times a day, and if I get either of them on the phone, I sometimes don’t know who I’m speaking with.

“We’re going for pizza. Wanna come?” Molly says.

“Sure.” Daisy’s already taking her apron off. She glances over at Viv and Mr Shakespeare. “Shit! No, I can’t. I’m bar manager now.”

“What? Oh my goodness, that’s great news,” Molly says.

“Deputy bar manager,” I correct.

“So you’re not going to uni then? You finally told Dad?” Molly grabs Daisy’s arm, and I realise they’ve talked about this before in secret. I hate that they’ve hidden it from me, that perhaps they felt too scared to be honest.

“Nope to uni, but I am going to do an online bar and restaurant management course,” Daisy says, proud as punch. “This is my calling. Probably. At least it’s my calling for now.” She sighs as she glances around the pub. I can’t tell if it’s a sad sigh because she wants to go for pizza with her sister, or a contented smile because I caved and “promoted” her to deputy bar manager.

We’d had such a long chat—chats, plural—about Daisy’s future, and she explained to me that she doesn’t know what she wants to do with her life and is simply enjoying things as they are. I realised it wasn’t fair for me to demand she get a “real job,” as though bartending or pub work isn’t a real career. If anything, she and Mathias have shown me just how important my “not a real job” is—for the community, for friendships, for family, for a sense of belonging. Why wouldn’t she want to be involved in that for longer?

“We can mind the pub while you guys have a little family catch up? Can’t we Willy?” Viv says. The dog doesn’t even lift his head. “There are only two couples in the beer garden. I know how the tills work, how the taps work, how to change a barrel if I need to. And Tyler will be here in three hours to start his shift. Go. Have fun.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Mathias says, forcibly removing Daisy’s apron from her grip and passing it to Viv.

Family catch up.Family.Including Mathias.

Fuck, I wish he wasn’t leaving in two weeks.

Mathias drives us to town in his black Range Rover. It feels like we’re on our way to some red-carpet event. I suggested I could drive in my seven-seater, but I was shot down immediately.

“Absolutely not. I’m starving and I’d like to get to Zia’s this side of Christmas,”he’d replied.

The girls giggled as though they were all in on this big joke, and jumped into the back seat.

I didn’t mind too much. I got to watch the bunch and flex of Mathias’s forearm muscles as he changed gear and turned down the winding Wiltshire country lanes.

It’s Saturday afternoon and Pizza di Zia is busy, but since they’re one of the sponsors of the rematch, and we let them snap a picture for their social media, they squeeze us into a table in the corner.

The girls order pasta—duck for Daisy, and veggie for Molly. I go for a stonebaked pepperoni pizza because it’s a classic, and Mathias orders a calzone with two portions of patate al forno as a single side and enough garlic bread to bankrupt the Isle of Wight. He shares his food . . . reluctantly. All the while the girls are side-eying each other and jabbing their elbows into each other’s ribs.

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