‘You really shouldn’t say that,’ I tell him, cosying myself in the armchair and knowing I was feeling exactly the same as when I’d had his rugged, handsome, tall, strong physique wrapped around me. His voice makes me automatically close my eyes and imagine his face.
‘I know, I’m sorry. I just feel that seeing you again and getting to know you better has changed me. Sorry.’
Lying in bed, I spent the whole night imagining what it would be like to meet him in person again. I know he belongs to another, but in the confines of my mind, somewhere he is holding me again and I’m breathing in his manly scent and feeling the strength and safety of his arms just once more.
And deep down I know that in my mind is the only place that can really happen, because there’s simply no way our friendship would be accepted where we come from, yet the more I get to know him, the more I want to know.
I know now that his favourite restaurant at home is the same one as mine, that we both ultimately are food geeks and could spend hours talking about recipes and fine wine to go with different dishes, that we both love psychology and the spiritual mind and an admission to sometimes reading horoscopes for a bit of geeky fun.
Lesley is Aquarius, he tells me – smart and intelligent and a little bit mysterious, which is what he found attractedhim to her in the first place when they met during his time in the RAF.
‘She sounds like a wonderful person,’ I say, feeling just a pinch of envy at how Lesley gets to know him in the real world, whereas my friendship with him is mainly through notes, emails and phone calls. ‘She’s a very lucky girl.’
I hear him sigh a little before he replies.
‘You’re right, she is truly wonderful,’ he tells me with gratitude in his voice. ‘She travels a lot with her job and, to be honest, Kate, we haven’t been getting along so well lately. I sometimes wonder if I really deserve her or if I’m good enough at all.’
‘You deserve it all, David Campbell,’ I say tautly. ‘When I say she is wonderful I mean you sound wonderful together. I mean that she is just exactly what you deserve and I’m not at all jealous that you two are living the happy-ever-after dream and I’m still searching for my own Mr Right here in Dublin. I’m totally fine with that.’
He laughs a little, but I still get a sense that something just isn’t right.
‘And you, Kate, are a Leo, led by the heart and the perfect soulmate match for the fiery, passionate Aries like me,’ he laughs, and then he stops before he takes it any further.
We both go quiet.
‘We can still be soulmates,’ I whisper, pinching my eyes at the unfairness of it all. I wish we had met earlier. I wish he wasn’t engaged; I wish we weren’t from such oppositebackgrounds. ‘Soulmates can be friends even if it has to be a secret, you know.’
‘It shouldn’t have to be a secret,’ he says, and I hear a nip in his voice.
‘Does Lesley know we talk?’
‘No …’
‘David!’ I exclaim, sitting up in my armchair. ‘So it is a secret, then!’
‘Well, it’s not a secret as such … have you told your family?’ he asks. I have a feeling we might be about to have our first argument. ‘Your reasons for keeping it secret aren’t too far from mine.’
‘I don’t live with my fiancé!’ I say, my eyes widening. ‘And I don’t even live with my family back at home any more, so I’m not exactly tiptoeing around this like you are!’
‘I don’t care what anyone back home thinks. We don’t need anyone’s permission to be friends.’
I let out a sigh.
‘Well, Idocare what people at home think, David, and I don’t want any trouble for either of us,’ I tell him. ‘The last thing I want is for Lesley to wonder if this is anything more than what it is.’
‘Why can’t I tell Lesley about you?’ he asks a week later. I’m sitting on a bench, phone in my right hand and coffee cup in my left, and I freeze, my left hand stopping in mid-air.
‘What?’ I reply. ‘You still haven’t told her about me at all? I thought you said we didn’t have to be a secret to anyone.’
‘I can’t tell her,’ he says, whispering now, and I hear the school bell ring in the background which tells me his lunchbreak is over. ‘I’ve tried so many times to put our friendship into words, but every time I do, I just can’t find the right way to describe it.’
I pause for thought.
‘I know. How about you tell her I’m a woman you met during a horrific bomb explosion ten years ago, after a brief flirtation in the shop you worked in, and who you now talk to almost every single day?’
‘Doesn’t sound good, does it?’ he mutters.
‘I guess not,’ I agree, putting my coffee cup down on the bench beside me and absent-mindedly drawing imaginary hearts on my leg with my finger as we talk.
