Page 80 of Better Left Unsent

I smile. ‘I suppose anything is alluring in the right circumstances.’

‘Depends who you’re with.’ He flashes me a smile then, full of cheek, and my stomach flips.

Oh, I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to leave this forest, or for us to get into our cars, drive away from each other.Give it a couple of weeks and he’ll be flying away, says a little voice in my head and I shake it away. Because how can that even be true? How can it even befair? This is just .?.?. starting. It’s like watching two amazing episodes of a twelve-part series and never, ever watching them again.

‘So, you remember Jonny?’ he says. His bare foot touches mine under the table, as he moves in his seat. Neither of us shift.

‘Certainly do. He seemed nice. Cool.’

‘He said the same about you,’ he says.‘Because apparently if Elton licks someone, it’s a good barometer.’

That moment with Cate on the bridge feels like so long ago now, despite it not being that long at all. I had no idea, back then, that I’d be kissing Jack in a candlelit shed, or here, with him, in a treehouse, then. So much has changed, but in the most natural, smooth way .?.?.

‘Well, he’s a pastry chef. Runs this amazing, tiny Turkish bakery place in Chelmsford. And he’s been approached by this company – they run events and stuff? It’s all about being able to try new things without like, signing your life away before you even know if it’s for you? Anyway. They want to work with him, for him to run and teach classes on, I dunno, how to be a Turkish bakery genius, I guess?’

‘Classes?’

‘Yeah, like, a limited courses, accessible to everyone?’

‘That’s amazing,’ I say.

‘Well, I was actually thinking of you,’ Jack says, the words land there, in front of us in the sunny kitchen. ‘I know you like learning new stuff, and .?.?. I just thought of you and therhubarb.The cake. The – goaty cat thing.’ He grins. ‘One starts after Christmas. Runs for like, eight weeks I think? Evenings?’

‘Oh.’ And it’s sweet. It’s so sweet. Because Jack knows me. He remembers; remembers all the little things about me, collects them, like keepsakes. And the classes with Jonny is definitely something I’d like. Itisso very me.

But something hurts too. That Jack is so easily, breezily, discussing me doing something away from him. That, without any sort of sadness, he’s handed me something to do with my life, when he’s out there, living his own. Both of us, separate.

Obliviously, he hands me his phone. ‘So, this is Jonny’s stuff. His food. His art, I’m sure he’d say. And if you go on this profile, you can see the stuff on the classes. Thecoming soonpost .?.?. battery’s almost dead, but, there’s enough.’

It feels weird to have Instagram in my hands again. Everything pricks up. Ears, eyes, longing to scroll. Like a switch flicked, my fingertips tingling. It’s like a drug. I suddenly want to spend a whole day scrolling.

‘Take a look,’ he says and stands up. ‘No pressure but I told him I’d suggest it to you. Throw it out there. You can throw it back at me if you like. At my head and everything.’ He laughs. ‘Anyway. I left my charger in the car. I’ll dash down there, have a look .?.?.’

Jack pads through the tree-house. I hear him pull on shoes, grab his car keys, in the next room, and the exit, close.

I havesomissed my phone. This alone, makes me miss it, Jonny’s kaleidoscope of photos. And Jack is right. Heisa genius. Beyond talented. His food does look more like art. Lime greens and fuchsias and utterly perfectly piped creams in things I have never seen before, let alone eating. I watch a video of him kneading dough to a SZA song; there’s a beach in the background which isdefinitelynot anywhere around here. And now my stomach feel like it’s being kneaded too. With .?.?. yearning. Envy. Jonny, just out there, living his life fully. And I don’t know if it’s this that I want – but it issomething.I really do want something else. I’m just not sure what. But it feels closer than ever at the moment. As if my fingertips are just centimetres from touching it.

I scroll and scroll. Then I have no idea what I’ve done, the layout has changed since I gave up my phone, but I’m accidentally on Jack’s main grid. ‘Ah, shit,’ I say, but Jack is still out. And then it pops up. A looping video of a pair of running trainers on concrete, in a perfect slice of sunlight. Caption:Never want to run. Always glad I did! *sun emoji* Good morning, everyone. If we keep expecting things to get better, they will. This morning’s mantra. *praying emoji* #postbreakup #movingon

Posted by Chloe Katz ten minutes ago.

And it’s all too easy – all too deliciously close, in the palm of my hand. I press onto her main profile. I watch her stories. A share of a post from a friend’s baby announcement. A quote about new beginnings. A flow-chart of how to – truly – ask how someone is. ‘Talk to your Friends’ says the infographic. There’s a dog meme, then a dark, line-drawing post leading to a carousel of, ‘signs of covert emotional abuse’. I scroll. I press. There are still some photos of Owen on here. Not many, but some, a lot further down her page. Owen and Chloe selfies. A close up of their hands, holding each other’s. India sunset after India sunset. Looped clinking glasses.

And then I find Owen’s account. I’ve of course, looked before. An open, non-private account, of course. For all to see. All of his posts are artsy, with one-line captions, interspersed with distant, posey photos on beaches, or him at work, hunched over a camera, silhouetted. But then there’s a photo of him in the IT office. It’s been filtered to fit with his feed, but it’s him, Leona and Steve and the table is littered with pizza boxes. ‘When it’s all hands on deck and IT hold you hostage with fast food’ says the caption. ‘#workinglate’.

And the date .?.?.

The date is the day the servers were down.

The date is when my emails were sent.

I stare at the screen.

But .?.?. Owen said he wasn’t there. Owen said he was in Manchester. He did, didn’t he? I remember so clearly, that’s what he said that evening we talked in the rain.

I close down the app. Lock Jack’s phone and put it on the table, as if it’s a firework about to go off.

The door behind me closes again.

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