Page 55 of The Vintage Dress Shop in Primrose Hill
‘You should go but… Look, I just wanted to be sure,’ he began hesitantly. ‘Neither of us want to start something that will end in tears, unless… are you definitely absolutely moving to Australia?’
‘I am. I really am.’ Sophy hoped that she sounded firm, but for the first time doubt was clouding her mind. Could she stay? Was that a thing that she could do? She hadn’t actually shelled out any of her hard-earned cash yet, hadn’t signed any legally binding documents.
Then again, she really wanted to spend time with her grandparents, Bob and Jean, who shared approximately twenty-five per cent of Sophy’s DNA and yet she’d never met them. Then there were aunts and uncles and cousins. All her life, Sophy had felt like she barely had enough family to go round, but there was this whole other family waiting for her on the other side of the world. And then there were the places that she wanted to go. The adventures she wanted to have.
More than anything, she wanted a do-over. Ever since she’d left school, she’d felt as if she’d been drifting. Into the relationship with Egan. Into every job that she’d ever had. It had been a small life. An OK life, but maybe you couldn’t have a bigger, better life without making some huge decisions.
When Sophy was an old lady looking back on her life, she didn’t want to be full of regrets about all the things she hadn’t done. All the chances she hadn’t taken. Always opting for the easy way out of a situation.
What a boring life to look back on. Everything black and white. No light, no shade. No glorious technicolour.
And what was it that Charles had once said? You can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs.
So, she pushed the doubt away because yes, it would be the easiest thing in the world to not go to Australia and disrupt her safe, boring little life. Especially when there was all the promise and potential of starting something with Charles. But Sophy didn’t want to be one of those women who was only defined by their relationships or let their relationships define their life.
Even if there had been some stellar, life-changing kissing.
‘I am going to Australia,’ she said again, slowly this time so that the words would sink into her own head as well as Charles’s. She didn’t want to give him false hope. That would just be cruel. But… ‘The kissing. I get that it’s not the right time for us to jump into something but we could still kiss, right? If we both agreed that it was commitment-free kissing.’
‘It’s something to think about.’ Charles wasn’t stroking Sophy’s hair any more but cupping the back of her head and, when she did finally unclip her seatbelt, it was only so she could wriggle in her seat to get closer to him.
‘It seems a waste when we both like each other and we’re not kissing anyone else…’ Sophy frowned. ‘Are you kissing anyone else?’
‘I am not.’ Charles sounded quite affronted at the very idea. He pressed his thumb to the pout of Sophy’s bottom lip as if he was staking a claim on it.
‘Well, if we’re not kissing anyone else and we’re both clear-headed about the future, then there’s no reason why we couldn’t kiss,’ Sophy whispered against Charles’s mouth because he was so close now that she could see that the blue of his eyes had darkened to the colour of the sea in winter.
‘We could take the kissing under advisement,’ he whispered back but there wasn’t time to take it under advisement because his mouth was on hers. In the old car there was no console, just a gap between the passenger seat and the driver’s seat, so it was easy for Sophy to slide nearer, the gear knob jabbing into her thigh, so she could grip Charles’s shoulders and kiss him back with a fervour that she couldn’t quite believe she was capable of.
Despite the cramped and confined location, once again, when they started kissing and Charles did that thing with his teeth and Sophy did that thing with her tongue, time seemed to slip away. It only came back when Charles tried to pullSophy even closer and his elbow knocked the horn, which sounded out loud enough to wake the dead.
Or loud enough for them to spring apart.
Sophy smoothed down her hair, which was feeling very bird’s-nesty, and got out of the car. Charles got out too to open the boot and then, with one last kiss, a respectable peck on the cheek this time, he said goodbye.
‘I’ll see you soon,’ he said. ‘Very soon.’
‘Can’t wait.’
As Charles got back in the car, Sophy saw a movement at the living room window. It was no surprise that the front door opened before she’d even got her keys out of her handbag and there was Caroline craning her neck as Charles drove off.
Sophy should have known. Her mother was a curtain-twitcher from way back.
‘Why aren’t you at work?’ she asked, having to fight her way past the immoveable object that was Caroline, who was still staring after Charles’s car.
Caroline was a receptionist at a dental surgery round the corner. ‘Oh, we had to close early. Suspected gas leak in a house a few doors down,’ she said vaguely, then hurried after Sophy, who was already halfway up the stairs. ‘Not so fast! Who was that? Is that the famous Charles? I thought you were just friends. My goodness, I hope you don’t kiss all your friends like that! So, is it serious? Is this why you didn’t want to get back with Egan? Does this mean that you’re not going to Australia after all?’
‘Oh my God, just listen to you!’ Sophy sat down heavily on a stair because otherwise Caroline would follow her to her room and continue the haranguing.
‘Yes, that’s Charles. And he’s just a friend… But a kissing friend,’ she said unwillingly because Caroline already knew that much.
‘What’s a kissing friend then?’
‘Friends who kiss but it’s not serious. It’s justkissing.’
‘Really? Just kissing is it?’ Scepticism oozed from every single syllable and Sophy was pinged back to being fifteen years old and in trouble for staying out after her curfew.
Except she wasn’t fifteen years old. She was a proper grown-up. An autonomous being who could kiss whomever she liked without getting her mother’s approval first.
