Page 67 of The Best Ex of My Life

‘Yeah. See you then,’ he says, before leaving the flat.

A sound outside his window wakes me from a deep sleep.

I don’t mind. My body is still thrumming, and falling back into the memories of the hours we spent last night is better than any dream. We’d gone from slow and intense to fast and wild and all the way back again. We’d spent all night finding new ways for our bodies to blend together, and I’d laughed when Elliot had said there were so many things he’d like to do to me while barely able to keep his eyes open. When I told him I was sure there was nothing else left, he laughed and said ‘Oh, Lizzie,’ before falling asleep with his arm around my waist.

I want to stay exactly where I am, in this warm, safe cocoon I’ve built with Elliot, and I hate that we’re waking up on Monday morning. This should have happened on a Friday night so we could have had all weekend together. Or better still, at the start of the school holidays when we could have enjoyed uninterrupted weeks living in his bedroom. We could call in sick today and stay here, not leaving the bed apart from trips to the kitchen for snacks. I’d do it in a flash, but I know Elliot wouldn’t. He couldn’t live with the guilt. At least it’s still early. The light spilling in from the crack between his curtains is as weak as milky tea. We don’t need to be up for hours yet, and there’s a lot we could do with those hours.

My hand reaches out and hits cold fabric. I turn on my side, the brush of the sheets against my bare skin making my nerve ends tingle. I open my eyes properly. It’s light enough to make out that he’s not next to me, so I sit up and look for him in the room, call out for him, but there’s no response.

‘Elliot?’

I get up and after putting my underwear back on and a T-shirt El’s left on the floor, leave the bedroom to look for him, craving his touch again.

The spell is broken the moment I walk into his kitchen and spot one of Teddy’s bobbles on his worktop. Moving into the bathroom and spotting her toothbrush next to his is like having cold water poured down my back.

My body’s been keeping my focus squarely on how amazing last night was, but as soon as I see Teddy’s things in his flat, my focus zooms out and I see again the terrible decisions I’ve made to get me to this point. Teddy and Elliot’s break up is so fresh, he’s not even had time to get rid of her stuff. I bet some of his clothes still smell of her perfume. Elliot might be single – a point I was only too happy to remind myself last night – but this is so new. Too new. And the worst thing is I’ve not even spoken to Teddy yet. I don’t know what will hurt her more: that I’ve slept with Elliot or that I’ve not spoken to her about it. The decent thing would have been to ring her as soon as I kissed Elliot on Saturday afternoon. Now it’s Monday morning, we’re way past a kiss, and she has no idea.

I’ve spent so many years telling myself one of my greatest strengths is how good of a friend I am, but then I go and do this. It hurts that I’ve proved myself wrong so spectacularly. As much as I wanted to spend these hours before work with Elliot, I know the most important thing now is that I put this right, and the only way to start doing that is to start being honest. I have to talk to her. Not just about last night, but everything. How hard it’s been seeing them together, how much I’ve wanted him but always been too scared to do anything about it. Only then might we be able to find a way to muddle through this mess.

I plan to tell Elliot this before I leave, but he’s nowhere to be found. Confused, I check the time. It’s just gone six. Early but not too early for him to have gone into work. If he has, it’s a good thing. We can talk later. For now, I can focus on Teddy and on finding the courage to call her.

I return to the bedroom to get dressed, and that’s when I see it. Elliot cast off my clothes all over his bedroom last night, and I expect to be picking them up from his floor, but instead, they are on his chair in a neatly folded pile. On top of that pile is a note. My heart plummets when I read it.

I’m sorry.

I read it again and again. Notice how there’s no kiss at the end, no warmth there. Last night was perfect. So perfect we agreed we should have been doing this from the start, that it was madness not to. I can’t understand the change, but it makes me feel cold and suddenly ridiculous to be standing in his bedroom in my underwear. I go to the bathroom to take a shower, and the whole time I’m in there, I push down the urge to cry.

Him being Teddy’s ex makes this a mess, but it’s my mess, not his. I’m not sure we’ll ever get past it, that we’ll ever be able to be together, but for the first time since we first slept together, I’ve accepted that I want to try. Only he’s gone, and he’s sorry. As I get ready for work, I tell myself I’m reading too much into it. There’s every chance he had an early meeting this morning, or he overslept for something and wrote it in a mad panic rushing out the door. I try to believe that there’s nothing more to it, that I’ll see him soon and everything will be fine, but I still can’t get rid of the ache in my chest.

Once I’m in my car outside his flat, I try to call Teddy, but it goes to voicemail again. She’ll probably still be in bed, and I’m hardly going to leave her a voice message outlining what I’ve done. It’s going to have to wait until after work.

I start my workday with a weight on my chest which only grows heavier as more hours pass without owning up to Teddy. By the time my pupils go home for the day, I’m desperate to follow them out and to finally try and make a start sorting this mess out. I rush through my final jobs of the day, but just as I’m packing up my laptop there’s a knock on my classroom door.

‘Come in,’ I say, neutrally, professionally, although I know it’s him.

‘Hey,’ he says, his voice soft. ‘Are you OK?’

‘Yeah, you?’

He comes in and sits on one of the tables, his legs dangling. He looks tired, and a flutter of excitement I’m powerless to stop runs through me knowing exactly why that is.

‘Can we talk?’ he asks. ‘About last night. I’m sorry for the way I left it.’

‘For the I’m sorry?’ I say, unable to help myself.

‘Yeah. For that. It was shitty and cowardly, but when I woke up this morning and looked at you, knowing that you’d been nothing but clear about being friends and that when you woke up, you’d regret it, I bolted. I couldn’t face seeing that expression on your face again.’

He lets out a breath after he finishes speaking, like he’s been holding all that in all day.

My mind flashes back to the first moments of this morning and to how peaceful it felt waking up in his bed. How right it was and how incredibly wrong Elliot has everything. There are so many truths I could give him right now, all of which might lead us closer to understanding each other and even being together, but none of that matters as much as getting to Teddy.

‘Sorry,’ I say, repeating the word he left me with this morning. ‘I can’t do this right now, El. I’ve got to go.’

‘Course, yeah.’ He stands and moves back towards the door. ‘I get it,’ he says, shaking his head, a cold smile creeping up his face. ‘Stupid of me to think there was anything to talk about.’

Seconds pass when he’s looking right at me like I’m see-through and he’s trying to work out the jumble he sees on the inside. He waits for me to help him out, to say something that will either confirm he’s stupid or prove he isn’t, but I stay silent.

‘Just what I thought,’ he says eventually, his voice like ice.