Page 65 of Out of Control

He was making her sound cheap and heartless. He sat next to her on the sofa. She inched away until her thigh hit thearmrest. He took her hand. She didn’t know whether to pull away. She wanted to grab the mocking wedding bouquet from its pint glass and decimate it.

Meeko squeezed her hand, then fetched the bouquet, the stalk now dripping with water. Had she spoken aloud?

“I don’t want to be in one of your little time-controlled boxes.” He slipped off the sofa and knelt in front of her, the wet bouquet held out towards her. “Fiona Ormeroyd, please will you do the honour of becoming my wife as well as my best friend.”

Fiona’s heart hammered in her chest. Her emotions were on a fairground waltzer. This moment was important. Whatever came out of her mouth next would make or break her relationship with Meeko as well as her own future. Her heart wanted to shout ‘Yes’ from the rooftops. But the logical-thinking part of her was recovering from the shock and was repeating ‘No’ louder and louder. She had been down the marriage route before and it would require absolute trust in Meeko. The last time she’d placed that trust in a man it had been abused in a life-destroying manner. She couldn’t do that again. But what she felt for Meeko was bigger, deeper and scarier than anything she’d ever felt for any man before.

“Meeko, I love you.” Now she understood that when she’d uttered those words first to Rob, and then to Joe, her feelings had been lukewarm, and that she’d hoped saying those words would make the feeling come true. Saying them to Meeko, she was speaking an absolute truth.

His lips curled into a huge smile and his eyes danced in anticipation. His whole face was illuminated.

“But it’s too soon. Too fast. Too scary. We haven’t even become ‘an item’.”

His expression crumpled and was replaced by confusion and frowning. “But not too soon to stick me in a sealed compartment?”

“It wouldn’t be like that. We’d be a normal couple — a ‘courting’ couple, to use my grandmother’s words.”

“I don’t want to be used at your convenience as Joe was. I want to give myself properly to you, hook, line and sinker. Or not at all. We’ve had years of being friends. There is no need for us to ‘court’ — we already know everything about each other. Unless there are more secrets that you’re keeping from me?” There was a crack in his voice as he stopped speaking.

“No. No secrets. You know everything.” Tears were pricking behind her eyes and it felt as though her world was tumbling in. They’d tried to move beyond friendship and failed because they had different expectations from a romantic relationship. This had always been the risk and now it was a reality. Unlike most of the other people she knew, Meeko had never tried to change her outlook or view on life. But could she expect him to compromise on what he wanted from their changed relationship?

“What do we do now?” He stood up, swallowed and blinked hard, putting the bouquet back in the pint glass. “Agree to disagree?”

“Can we go back to being friends until . . . there might be a time . . . ?”

“We can try. But I love you as a woman, Fiona. I always will. And that is different to loving a friend. I will try to pretend tonight never happened but I can’t guarantee how things will turn out. Sometimes broken hearts don’t mend.”

Fiona reached for the hotel box of tissues and blew her nose. She was trembling and felt slightly sick.

“I’ll sleep on the settee tonight.”

“There’s no need.” She tried to bar the way to stop him fiddling with the hidden lever that would perform the magic act of turning the settee into a bed. “We managed together last night.” She was crying now.

“Last night was different. We hadn’t blurred the line.”

Hardly able to see for the tears, she grabbed her nightdress and went into the bathroom. When she came out, he was already in his pyjamas and the sofa had become a bed. Meeko was tucking in sheets.

After they’d turned out the lights, he spoke gently into the darkness. “Everything you’ve done since losing Amber has been built around never trusting anyone ever again. Is that how she would have wanted her mother to live? Would you have wanted her to live in this artificial prison cell you’ve created for yourself? Stop making yourself suffer for something that was nobody’s fault.”

He was right but she could think of no reply. The following morning they were polite to one another and managed to appear as ‘best friends’ in front of his cousins at breakfast.

They said little on the train journey home. Fiona tried to imagine a future without even his friendship. He had taken the risk of trying to move their platonic relationship, which had worked fantastically well for years, into the unchartered waters of marriage. It was a risk that hadn’t paid off and now they were both adrift without a lifebelt. Both wanting the same thing but in different ways. Was it possible to find some middle ground?

Chapter 45

“Take her, please! Before I get on that bus and dump her outside the maternity ward.”

“The hospital bus doesn’t run on a Sunday.” Fiona held her arms out to receive Natalie.

“In that case I’ll spend my last pennies on an Uber.”

“Has it been that bad without me?” Fiona planted kisses all over the baby’s face and then breathed in the sweet, sweet smell of her. A little of the Meeko tension eased. She felt needed on her home ground.

“Scary, knowing there was no one to call on.”

“Your dad’s not far away. Didn’t he come on Saturday?”

“He came but he had one eye on his phone all the time, checking the football scores. We both know that domesticity and practical childrearing aren’t his strong subjects. Don’t get me wrong — he adores Natalie, and me as well, but he doesn’t have a clue and doesn’t want to learn about nappies and burping and all that stuff. He doesn’t understand what it’s like being responsible for keeping a tiny human alive 24-7. Now your Meeko on the other hand — he’d be willing to help with anything.”

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