Page 77 of Holiday Romance
“I don’t mean a crash,” he says casually. “But at the very least a three-hour delay resulting in a missed ferry.”
“You’re being pessimistic.I’mthe pessimistic one. I’m the most pessimistic.”
“Are you seriously trying to beat me at pessimism?”
“Trying?” I ask, and he grins, letting the conversation drop.
We haven’t talked about last night yet. It’s not like we’ve ignored it. We only left the house an hour ago and before that we were getting ready. We’ll have to acknowledge it at some point. And say what I have no idea. No idea because I don’t know how I feel about it yet.
I don’t regret it. But I’m not sure what it means either. I’ve never been one of those people who overanalyzed their relationships. But that’s because they’ve followed a traditional set pattern. Meet a guy, talk to a guy, date a guy. That’s it. Not whatever this is. Not whatever we—
“You know you make these faces when you’re thinking really hard about something?”
I start, spilling my coffee over the lid as I squeeze the cup too tightly. “Huh?”
“Like you’re having an internal conversation,” Andrew continues, watching me curiously. “You start making these expressions. Did you know that?”
I did not.
“What are you talking to yourself about?”
“You.”
His eyebrows rise, a smile beginning before I shut it down.
“You’ve got crumbs all down the front of your coat.”
His smile drops as he brushes them off and I turn, a little primly it must be said, back to the concourse.
Maybe he’s waiting for me to bring up last night. And that’s fine. That’s totally fine, I have after all initiated the majority of non-platonic friendship events between us. I know he doesn’t regret it because he’s acting completely normal just like he promised he would, so maybe he’s just waiting. For me. For aHey, remember when we almost had sex a few hours ago?Remember when we made out for a good several minutes and felt each other up and—
“I will give you one hundred dollars if you tell me what you’re thinking about right now.”
“Just don’t look at me!” I exclaim, and I step in front of him so he can only see the back of my head. Almost as soon as I do, the board changes and Andrew points to where our platform number has just appeared.
“A seacht,” he says, speaking in Irish as he pulls the handle of his suitcase up. “Numero siete. Lucky number seven.”
“Okay.”
“This way, Molly. Let me show you the way to go home. To the green hills of Ireland. The old Emerald—”
“I get it,” I snap, and he laughs.
One good thing about his ridiculous suitcase: it carves a neat little path for me through the crowd. Around us, dozens of people break away, doing the same. This train, like all the others, is standing room only. There are lines at the barrier and again on the platform with some people going so far as to hoist their luggage over their heads in order to squeeze their way to the doors.
It gets a bit tense, and it isn’t long until something bumps into my shoulder, followed by a muffled apology as a man with an acoustic guitar shoves past.
I gaze after him suspiciously. “If he starts playing that thing, we’re moving to a different carriage,” I tell Andrew.
“That’s your line?”
“That’s my line.”
By some miracle, we manage to find a spot for our bags and no one is sitting in our booked seats, so we don’t have to make anyone move either.
Still, I hold my breath, waiting for something to happen. For a tree on the tracks or a failed engine. But everyone gets onboard and eventually, warily, we pull out of the station and chug our way through the buildings of North London.
I start to feel a little better.
