Part 9 (2/2)

”Don't let his pretentions towards being an intellectual fool you. Callum is a champion Spit Meister.” It's a weak attempt at humour and so is the smile she gets for it.

By the time I've finished brus.h.i.+ng my teeth and cleaning my face, Ruby's already down and out on her back, arms folded above her head, breathing with the kind of depth that comes with too much alcohol. The eyeliner she slicked on so thick this morning has held fast, but it looks wrong on her sleeping face, like graffiti on a statue.

When she's awake, Ruby is as big as her personality, but sleeping she looks as small as she really is. Her arms look snappable and I feel a p.r.i.c.k of dismay at how thin she is at the moment. Without the smiles and the energy, the enthusiasm and the pa.s.sion, Ruby looks ... vulnerable.

As I unlock my phone to set an alarm for the morning, it buzzes in my hand.

Tom.

11 * IT'S BEEN A WHILE

RUBY.

There's a rustle somewhere near by. A swoosh of the zip, a whiff of cool night air. By the time my beer-befuddled consciousness claws its way out of oblivion the tent is still. I roll over and see that Kaz's sleeping bag is open, slipper socks and pyjamas flopping out like entrails. Her shoes are gone when I pull open the front flap. Toilet trip, I guess.

Until I hear a familiar laugh.

Just outside of our camp, silhouetted against the glow of the fires beyond, I see Kaz. And Tom.

I yank the zip shut as if not-seeing can turn into not-believing.

But who am I kidding? Everything Kaz has done today has been leading to this moment with Tom.

Now it's here, I'm no longer so sure why I thought it was my place to stop it.

Tom broke her heart before, but who's to say he'll do it again? Maybe he made a mistake? Maybe he's been regretting it all summer and now he's finally got a chance to make things right?

Maybe I'm not thinking about Tom when I say that.

Go home, brain, you're drunk.

Tomorrow, when I'm sober, when I know how to use my indoor voice, I will tell Kaz I'm sorry and I will mean it.

KAZ.

Tom hands me back Ruby's phone. The battery is at thirty-seven per cent and I make a mental note to remind her to take it to the charging tent tomorrow.

”Stu found it. I thought you'd rather I was the one who brought it back.” He smiles and brushes a bit of floating ash off my cheek with the back of his fingers.

”I should head back.” I half-turn towards my tent, but Tom lays a hand on my shoulder.

”Wait.”

When I turn back there's no mistaking his expression.

”Yes?” My voice might be light, but the look I'm giving him is so heavily loaded I can barely lift my lashes.

There's a second in which he swallows and I expect his gaze to dart away, for him to remember that we (presumably) broke up for a reason.

Tom doesn't move an inch. ”Let's go somewhere for a bit. Just you and me.”

We make our way towards Three-Tree Field, pausing to cross the main track. Even though it's past midnight, late arrivals are still tramping down from the car park, rucksacks on, ground mats rolled under their arms as they carry crates of beer and carrier bags. Mostly it's the older crowd people who have driven here from their day jobs and the conversations I catch seem to be focused on whether there's s.p.a.ce to pitch their tents. I don't think there's anywhere left unless they're prepared to camp up a tree. When I make this joke to Tom, he huffs a laugh at me.

The smell of roast pork and popcorn, candyfloss and hot chips engulfs us as we pa.s.s the food vans lining a track marked WEST WALK, fading into the night as the track peters out on the far side of the site. There's a choice between turning towards Tom's camp, or turning away.

It's Tom who decides, each step he takes pulling us away from the noise of the campsite and up a slope that starts off gentle before taking a savage turn up into a copse of trees. There's no one here and we let the hill get the better of us as soon as we're beyond the first of the trees. My hands are shaking. Every part of me is consumed by energy, my skin buzzing with suppressed excitement like it's opening night and I'm singing the solo.

”So what exactly are we doing here, Tom?” I look up at the sky, at the trees near by and then, finally, at Tom, who shrugs. The setting might be romantic, but the boy isn't. After all, this is Tom. The person who thought an umbrella was a suitable Valentine's gift ”because we're having a wet February”.

”I just know it's been good seeing you,” he says. ”I didn't know how much I'd missed this us until I saw you.”

And there it is: the gulf between the way I feel about him and the way he feels about me. I've missed him every second of every day since we broke up.

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