Page 78 of If I Never Met You

How did I get here? she wondered dozily, then it occurred to her that was a bloody good question.

27

Jamie decreed a Full Tourist Day was in order to Laurie, and pointed out that it would yield some killer content for the ’Gram.

Laurie was increasingly unsure she wanted to be killer content for the ’Gram, but agreed. It was obvious they could sell it aslook how serious I am, I’ve taken her to meet the folksand yet neither of them said so, because it was exploiting the real reason they were compelled to be here, his father’s illness.

They started with a trip to Lincoln Cathedral, and Jamie showed Laurie the Lincoln Imp, a little stone grotesque with sticky outy ears, nestled in the eaves.

‘First, he and his mates went to Chesterfield and twisted the church spire, a proper Imp ruckus. Probably all had cans on the train, you know the sort of thing. In a medieval justice version of a life term, this one’s behaviour was so bad, he got turned to stone,’ Jamie said. ‘Very punitive, considering he was a youth offender.’

‘Brutal,’ Laurie agreed, taking a photo. ‘Obviously Satan wanted to send a message to the other Imps.’

‘The lesson we take from this is, keep your demonic children under close supervision. Something anyone who’s eaten in a Nando’s during half-term can fully agree with.’

Laurie laughed. ‘Do you want kids?’

Jamie shuddered. ‘One hundred per cent no, no thank you. Do you?’

‘I’m more fifty-fifty.’

Laurie got a mental flash image, pulled straight from Boden Kids catalogue, of she and Jamie bumping a winter-bundled toddler up steps, holding one tiny hand each. She never fantasised her children with Dan, this must be happening because she was entirely safe from its possibility. She tested her emotions on this for the umpteenth time. It still felt like Item 5(ii) on the great agenda of life questions, and couldn’t be answered without 5(i) – If I Find Appropriate and Willing Father.

They walked Steep Hill, Laurie had a nosy around the florists and the gift shops. She admired a silver necklace, a leaf on a chain. ‘Can’t justify it, I have so much trinketry already.’

They walked on.

‘Hey, Laurie!’ she turned and Jamie snapped a photo of her above him on the street, turning to smile down at him. ‘Great for Christmas shopping, round here,’ he said, ‘Entre nous.’

‘Are you inviting me back?’ Laurie said, grinning over the bundle of her scarf.

‘My parents would have you back in a heartbeat.’

‘Unlike you,’ Laurie said, and Jamie rolled his eyes in an impression of a truculent pubescent.

‘OK, I would too. Whatever yeah. Girls are stupid.’

It was so easy, this platonic romance. She and Jamie could communicate their liking of and respect for each other without any fear of it shading intoand I want to jump your bones. Here was why she didn’t believe the caricature of Jamie at Salter & Rowson – he was so much a comfortable, easy joy to be around. A genuinely terrible person couldn’t mimic warmth like this, surely.

Laurie thought on something she’d not faced fully until now – she was very likely going to be alone on Christmas Day. Emily went somewhere long haul and hot, the day before Christmas Eve, having always declared herself ‘racist against Christmas.’ Laurie would be welcome to join, except she neither had the money nor the inclination for Bali, and Salter & Rowson wouldn’t give her the days off to make the travel worth it.

Laurie’s mum didn’t celebrate it and went to her friend, Wanda’s, in Hebden where they made a whole seabass and everyone got their instruments out after lunch for a singalong. She would most likely be happy to have Laurie, but the place was crammed to the rafters with randoms and she didn’t feel comfortable imposing herself. Also singalongs? Shudder forever.

Her dad, hah. God only knows where he spent the twenty-fifth. Face down in a pile of substances. She wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t keep track of the calendar well enough to know it was Christ’s birthday.

She and Dan had always either gone to Cardiff or hosted his parents, his sister and her boyfriend. She supposed it would be Megan’s debut, meeting the family.

Oh well. Laurie would shop and plan for a complete single woman bacchanal. And she fancied adopting a kitten, sod society’s sexist stereotypes.

They had lunch at the Wig & Mitre, a pub that had leapt straight from a magazine shoot of the cosiest and most picturesque in the country.

Jamie had posted the photo of Laurie – ‘Showing Laurie the historic birthplace of a legend etc’ – and his phone was the usual cascade of Likes and comments.

Then something else pinged, a different colour notification that wasn’t Instagram, and in a smooth practised move Jamie palmed his phone and turned it over, screen facing down. Laurie knew it was something she wasn’t meant to see and that it must be female interest, and yet wondered why he was hiding it from her. Did he imagine she’d object?

They both ploughed through lamb shanks and mounds of mashed potato. Well, Laurie did, Jamie declared himself short on appetite.

‘I’m stressed about my dad’s speech to everyone at the party tonight,’ he said. ‘I don’t know if he’s going to tell them about the diagnosis.’

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