Page 46 of The Last Train Home
‘Do you want me to come with you?’ I ask.
He looks at me like I’m mad. ‘Of course,’ he repeats.
I need to think. ‘What would you do if I said no?’
‘I hadn’t envisaged you saying no.’
‘So what if Idosay no?’ I push.
‘Then I won’t go,’ he says.
‘Really? You won’t go?’
‘I haven’t even applied yet. I wanted to talk to you about it before I did.’
I smile at that. He’s not making big, life-altering decisions without me. He’s factoring me in. And we’ve not been together a year yet.
‘You’ve not been at your new job all that long,’ I say.
‘Yeah,’ he says with a shrug. ‘But I can put in for a transfer.’
‘What’s brought this on?’
‘I want to earn more.’
I laugh. ‘We all want that.’
‘I reckon you could earn more too, out there.’
‘I reckon I could earn more literally anywhere else than where I currently am,’ I confess.
Sean laughs. ‘That’s true.’
But now I’m thinking. Over the last few months I’ve been away for work quite a bit and I’ve a few more trips planned, but I only go away in Europe. ‘I’ve never been to Asia before,’ I say.
‘Do you fancy it?’ he asks. ‘Or not really?’
‘That’s a leading question,’ I reply, abandoning my laptop on the coffee table. ‘I don’tnotfancy it.’
‘So why don’t we think about it? Why don’t you do a bit of research and see how you feel. The expat life over there sounds great. Weather’s always good too.’ He brushes my fringe out of my eyes. I had it cut in a few weeks ago, when I realised the scar I gained on my forehead from the glass on the train wasn’t ever going to go away and foundation wasn’t quite fixing it.
‘I love you, you know,’ he says.
‘I know,’ I reply. ‘You honestly wouldn’t go without me?’
‘I don’t think so, no. No, I wouldn’t. I want to be with you, Abbie. I think you and I are meant to be. I think we’re supposed to do all that crazy shit, like get married and have kids. But I think we’re also supposed to live a bit first. Why not, let’s move country, do something wild. Although I’ll be moving country to take up another job in banking, so it’s not that wild really.’
I laugh again. His enthusiasm is infectious.
‘We can save some really decent money, come home and buy a great big house somewhere to raise a little brood of kids.’
‘Whoa, Cowboy!’ I say. And then, ‘Are we going to be together for ever?’ I ask.
‘Sure,’ he says, as if it’s so simple, as if it doesn’t need thinking about. ‘What are we doing this for, if we’re not in it for good?’
I swallow. He has a point. I guess I was going with the flow. I was just living … not thinking about living. Just getting on with it.
‘Wow,’ I say.
