For Real (Spires, #3)

by Alexis Hall

“Sorry. I take it you didn’t expect to find me here?” “Hell no, but feel free to do it again. Whenever you like.” I gave him a slightly wry look. “How about the next time we argue, you just make me sleep on the sofa like a normal person?” “How about we don’t argue?” “Oh darling, all couples argue. It’s how you handle it that matters.”

The point is . . . the point is . . . the future is terrifying because it’s full of stuff, not because it’s empty.

I’m starting to think you should always push your luck. No, you can deal with. Don’t know is the most frightening thing of all.

It’s one of those moments when I realise that the gaps between people are always less than you’d imagine.

“So, you see,” he says, “my career was just something to work towards to please my parents. And now it’s just something I’m good at and helps me be . . . useful.” “But are you happy?” He gives me this smile. “Deeply.” When he puts it like that, in his straightforward way, it doesn’t seem so terrible a way to live. We can’t all be my mum, after all.

We make this list of all the places I like best in a reasonable commuting distance, and then I bottle it for a while. Laurie doesn’t push me. In a strange way, that’s what gives me courage.

We sit under a tree, and Laurie holds me, and it’s not so grim. Because, at last, all the bad stuff—the fear and the anger and the pain and the guilt—is gone, and this is just grief stripped of everything but love. And I’m okay to cry for love. I really am.