Page 271 of The Long Way Home

“I was running away from some shit that happened back in Sydney, and when I met you, I kind of thought — cool, this is probably it — we’ll be together. You have like, a thing about you—” She stares over at me. I frown, waiting for her. “—like a, you save people, thing.”

I sniff, a bit chuffed.

“And it was so fun being wanted by someone like you. It was such a good feeling. To walk into a room with you, the way people would look at me.” She lifts her shoulders up merrily at the thought. “I loved it. And then I saw you with Magnolia—” She gives me a bit of a grimace. “And I thought — well, fuck. That’s what it looks like when he loves you.”

My face pulls sorry. “I should have just ended it the night I told you I slept with her.”

She considers this. “I probably should have ended it the night you told me you slept with her.”

I laugh.

“I had fun.” She shrugs.

I nod. “Me too.”

I eye her for a second. “What’s going on with you and that DJ?”

She starts laughing.

“I don’t know.” She shrugs. “We had sex once and then he was scared you’d find out and have him blacklisted from all the good clubs.”

I cock an eyebrow playfully. “Might do. What’s his name again?”

“Jett.” She flicks me a look. “And you won’t.”

“Are you into him?”

She stretched her arms up over her head. “Don’t know. We’ll see.”

I stare over at her, my head spinning a bit. A good spinning, but still spinning. “I’m sorry,” I tell her. I mean it.

She reaches over and pushes her hand through my hair. “We’re good.” She rolls back onto her stomach and keeps watching the TV. “I’m also not moving out yet because I don’t have anywhere to go.”

“Right then,” I laugh.

And then we hear the front door close. Voices fill the house.

“Oi,” I say, flashing them all a collective smile as I get to the top.

Magnolia looks over at me, eyes wide and bright, happy to see me.

I want to take her hand, pull her to the side, tell her I’m done, that we don’t have to do this anymore, but then Julian wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her away from the window she’s perched on and onto his lap.

Jordan sidles up next to me, catches my eye before she rests her head on my shoulder.

“We’ve been imagining how different our days at Varley would have been if Uber Eats had existed,” Magnolia tells me, holding my eyes.

Julian rolls his eyes. “Not that fucking different, because what was there to Uber Eats out in Kent 15 years ago?”

Magnolia eyes him. “Not all of us are practically geriatrics, Julian.”

Jordan looks over at him, interested. “You went to their school too.”

He nods. “Few years ahead.”

Daisy rolls her eyes. “More than a few.”

“You were in Upper Sixth when we were started year 7,” Christian tells him.

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