Page 9 of Better Left Unsent

And my phone. Ineverhave my phone off. If I’m not texting, I’m on Instagram, or TikTok, or Reddit, or I’m googling ‘90 Day Fiancéwhere are they now?’ But it was all too much, and my phone, lighting up and lighting up, like a portable disco ball, was only further tangling the huge, twisted ball of wool that is ‘today’. My life. After emails. (A. E.) So I panicked. This morning, I sent a message to Cate and Alexis, simply saying, ‘I’m so sorry, I’ll explain soon’ and turned it off, and that is how it has stayed. A dead brick in my handbag. And it’s not really helped. It’s made everything feel even scarier actually. Not knowing what I’ll be met with when I turn it back on.IfI ever turn it back on. Maybe I could just be like those people – the ones who denounce all technology, grow beards and live in a little stick house with a bonfire fire outside and clanky, metal camping crockery.

I pick up my glass and settle back down next to Ralph. ‘I think some people will actually think something’s going on between Owen and me, too,’ I say. ‘Because people at work will think he asked me out when he was with Chloe and we actually met up? And, I mean, hedidask me out.I wasn’t lying, Ralph.’

‘I know. The man is brazen.’

‘But it’s like .?.?. nobody has heard from him, just me. You know? It’s just my words, out there, for everyone to see, and thereforeI’mthe villain. And women always get the brunt of these things in rumours like this.’

Ralph nods, gently in the quiet. A property programme is on TV. A couple, holding hands, grinning, at a scaffold-covered terraced house. I wish I were them. Or the cameraman. Or the bloody scaffolder. Anything. I’ll takeanything.

‘They all know I love him now too,’ I groan. ‘And I don’t even know that I actuallydo,Ralph, buttheythink I do, regardless. That while he’s been off, getting engaged, launching brand new TV channels, I’ve just been .?.?. missing him and writing saddo emails with my life?’

‘That’s not true,’ says Ralph.

‘Isn’t it?’

‘No,’ he replies. ‘You’ve been learning German too.’

And that makes me smile. The first genuine smile of the entire day so far.

‘And don’t forget the accidental cervix I crocheted,’ I add. (It was meant to be a peony.)

‘Exactly,’ Ralph agrees, with a little balled fist. ‘And look, for what it’s worth, I still think something good might come of all this.’

I look up over my glass at him. His kind, obliviously hopeful eyes, the boyish peach-seam cleft in his chin. ‘I really am struggling to see that, Ralph.’

‘You’ll just have to trust me then,’ he replies, giving an apprehensive, lopsided smile. ‘We’re really not far off finishing them now. And once we’ve read them all, the sort of .?.?. dark mystique will be gone, because you’ll know. You’ll know exactly what got sent to whom, who to apologise to, and, heck, whonot to.’

‘Heck,’ I repeat, amused.

‘Because far be it from me to judge,’ carries on Ralph, ‘some of these emails have been very much warranted.’

‘Fine.’ I tip my head back and scrunch my eyes shut, like I’m about to be waxed. ‘Fine.Let’s do it. Let’s just get it done.’

‘Good. One step at a time, remember? Emails faced today. And then you can face your phone tomorrow, with knowledge and, therefore, power.’

I nod. ‘Yep, yep. Knowledge, power, into the fucking fire we go.’

‘And shall I light some incense?’ Ralph asks, bouncing up from the sofa, slapping his thighs. ‘I got some from that interesting little shop in the town.’

‘Sure.’ I shrug. ‘Why not? Can’t hurt.’

‘Which scent shall we have?’ asks Ralph. ‘Dragon’s Bloodor .?.?. ooh, how aboutPositive Vibes?’

Chapter Five

From: Millie Chandler

To: all LEIGH ESSEX office

Subject: Sorry

To all,

I just wanted to say I’m so sorry to anyone who has recently received or been affected by any emails from me. These were sent in error – due to both a server error and an error of my own judgement. Please erase and pay no mind. I meantnothingsaid in them. I’m so sorry again. I hope we can all move forward from this, and if anyone wants to chat, my door – well, my reception desk, lol – is always open.

Lots of love,

Millie xx

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