For a moment, Dominic wanted to just close his eyes and feel the warmth of Sam’s small body. ‘‘Night, monster,’ he said gruffly, as Pete picked Sammy up once more and headed upstairs. While he was gone, Dominic drifted in the direction of the kitchen in search of a drink.
He found Ellen in there wrestling a heap of pasta into a pan of boiling water. ‘Spag bol again, I’m afraid,’ she said, smiling ruefully at him. ‘I think we had that last time you came.’
He shrugged. ‘It’s home-cooked and I don’t have to reheat it in the microwave, so it wins on both counts. Besides, you make the best spag bol in Islington!’
‘Aw, you’re so sweet,’ Ellen said and left her sauce to come and give him a big squeezy hug. ‘We’ve missed you.’
Dominic hugged back. ‘I’ve missed you both too,’ he replied. And he really had. As much as he moaned about Pete, he and his wife were the one constant in his ever-changing world. He gave Ellen a kiss on the cheek and, as she pulled away, he said, ‘Can I help myself to a drink?’
Her mouth dropped open. ‘Oh, God. What must you think of me? I haven’t even offered you anything to drink! What do you want? Wine? Beer? Both?’
He smiled and opted for the beer. They chatted about nothing in particular until Pete came back down the stairs and joined them. He and Dominic rested their backsides against the counter of the galley kitchen and sipped cold lager out of the bottle. It was heaven.
‘Oh, yes!’ he said, after swallowing a swig. ‘I didn’t finish telling you about my upstairs neighbour.’ And he launched back into the story again, embellishing it here and there just to make Pete and Ellen laugh.
‘So, did she write back?’ Pete asked.
Dominic nodded, smiling. ‘You bet she did.’ He put his beer down and pulled a crumpled, folded envelope from the back pocket of his jeans. ‘Look at that.’
Pete took it from him and read it, chuckling, Ellen looking over his shoulder. ‘I’ve always thought you were “an unbearable, egotistical lout” myself,’ she said. And then the pasta boiled over. ‘Flip!’ she yelled. ‘That’s because you two are distracting me. Now get out of my kitchen so I can finish in peace!’
Pete saluted his wife and led the way back to the living room, where he and Dominic dropped down on different sofas. Pete handed the letter back.
‘Ah, I think your new pen pal is sweet,’ he said, giving Dominic a patronising look. ‘And she certainly is getting feisty in her old age! Maybe you should go and knock on her door, ask her out to an early bird dinner?’
Dominic looked at him. ‘Don’t be stupid. Why would I want to do that?’
Pete shrugged. ‘Because this is the closest thing you’ve had to a relationship in ages.’
The grin Pete wore as he finished his sentence got right up Dominic’s nose. He put his beer down on an end table and stared at his best friend. All traces of laughter had gone and his mouth was a thin line. ‘If you’ve got something to say, just say it.’
Pete held his hands up in mock defence. ‘Whoa,’ he said laughing. ‘What’s got your knickers in a twist?’
‘You,’ Dominic said simply. ‘You’ve been churning out the same old gag for years now. It’s getting a little old.’ Pete shook his head, still smiling, but there was a narrowing in his eyes. ‘It was just a joke, mate.’
Dominic picked up his beer again, took a long hard swig. ‘Well, it feels like more than that when you just won’t leave it alone. If this is your way of trying to tell me you think I need to find a woman and settle down, just come out and say it. Doesn’t mean I’m going to listen, but at least have the guts to be honest about it.’
Pete looked back at him warily. Dominic knew his friend well enough to know that Pete was weighing up whether he should just blow the whole thing off by making another joke, or be serious about it. Dominic was secretly hoping he’d do the former. Why on earth had he picked this fight? It was all that snarky letter writing going on between him and Ms Claire Bixby, probably. For some reason she’d got him all riled up.
Pete eventually cleared his throat and looked down at the rug, the exact spot where the poo had been when Dominic had arrived. ‘Well, I do think you’d be happier if you’d just—’
‘For crying out loud!’ Dominic waved the letter at him. ‘I’ve got one bloody busybody trying to run my life already. I don’t need you making it a double act!’
Pete’s rather bushy brows drew together and lowered. He glared at that spot on the carpet now. ‘Stop being so bloody oversensitive!’
‘I’m not being oversensitive,’ Dominic said tightly. No one had ever labelled him a drama queen – far from it – and he wasn’t going to let his best friend start now. ‘But it’s hardly surprising, is it? I only see you once every couple of months and it’s always that – or something like that – that are the first words out of your mouth. Admit it. You think there’s something wrong with me, just because I don’t want what you’ve got.’
Pete, whose expression was normally as jolly and open as a teddy bear’s, frowned and his jaw tensed. ‘Well, maybe there is something wrong with you. You’ve got to admit it, you’ve been on a romantic losing streak for a long time. It’s been years since you scared Erica away. She was a great girl, you know.’
Silence, thick and complete, fell in the living room.
Dominic saw Pete’s Adam’s apple bob. He knew he’d stepped over a line.
‘Well,’ Dominic said, draining the last of his beer and standing. ‘If you really think that, I might as well go.’ He was tempted to throw the bottle at the wall, but he knew that would upset Ellen, so he just put it down carefully on the end table and walked towards the door.
‘Nic! Mate!’ Pete began to rise.
Dominic ignored him. ‘Don’t you “mate” me,’ he said, as he passed his friend and walked out the door. ‘Mates don’t judge each other! Mates don’t tell each other what to do! Mates support each other’s decisions even if they don’t agree with them.’
And then he walked out the front door and into the annoyingly warm night. He’d have really liked the salve of cold air on his skin.
Ellen rushed into the living room, wooden spoon still in hand. She looked at the open door, and then at her sheepish husband sitting on the sofa. ‘Oh, Lord,’ she said wearily. ‘What did you go and say this time?’
*
Dominic rode his bike home with little regard for traffic lights or pedestrians. He was really tempted to throw his bike in the hallway and be done with it, but he hauled it back into his spare room, muttering under his breath as he did so. The computer was sitting on the desk, its blank screen staring at him. He might as well check his email …
But he didn’t check his email. Instead, he opened up his web browser and went to Facebook. He spent a while faffing around reading things on his timeline – ‘meaningful’ quotes, status updates about friends’ pets, silly quizzes that everyone knew were silly but still did anyway. He discovered his knowledge of rock lyrics was legendary, that his Hobbit name was Ogbutt Merryfoot and that if he were an ice cream flavour he’d be vanilla – which he was quite upset about.
Eventually, though, he clicked through to what he’d really come here to look at, even though he’d been kidding himself he hadn’t.
Erica’s profile popped up in front of him. She’d changed her picture, he noted. One of her on holiday, looking tanned and relaxed. She’d smiled at him like that at the beginning