Me: Did he say that? That you were paranoid?

Tiffy, after a pause: No, he never said that exactly.

Me, catching up: Wait. You didn’t tell him where you live?

Tiffy: No. I’m not sure how he found me. Facebook or something, probably.

She rolls eyes like it’s a minor irritation, but I’m still frowning. This doesn’t sound right. Have nasty suspicion I know men like this from my mother’s life. Men who tell you you’re crazy for getting suspicious of their behaviour, who know where you live when you don’t expect them to.

Me: Were you together long?

Tiffy: A couple of years. It was all very intense, though. Lots of breaking up and shouting and crying and things.

She looks slightly surprised at herself, opens her mouth as though to correct that, then thinks better of it.

Tiffy: Yeah. It was about two years in all.

Me: And your friends don’t like him?

Tiffy: They never did, actually. Not even at the start. Gerty said she got ‘bad vibes’ even when she only saw him from far away.

Am liking Gerty more and more.

Tiffy: Anyway, so he turned up and tried to whisk me off somewhere for a drink to explain everything away, as per.

Me: You said no?

Tiffy nods.

Tiffy: I said he has to wait a while to ask me out for a drink. A couple of months, at least.

Tiffy looks out of the window, eyes flicking as she watches London slide away around us.

Tiffy, quietly: I just didn’t feel like I could say no. Justin’s like that. He makes you want what he wants. He’s very . . . I don’t know. He owns a room straight away, you know? He’s forceful.

Try to ignore warning sirens in my head. I’m not liking this situation at all. Hadn’t got this sense of things from the notes – but maybe Tiffy herself hadn’t got this sense of things until recently. It can take people time to notice and process emotional abuse.

Tiffy: Anyway! Sorry. God. Weird.

She smiles.

Tiffy: This is a very deep conversation to have with someone you’ve only just met.

Me: We’ve not just met.

Tiffy: True. There was the memorable bathroom collision.

Another eyebrow quirk.

Me: I meant, it feels like we’ve known each other ages.

Tiffy smiles at that.

Tiffy: It does, doesn’t it? I guess that’s why it’s so easy to talk.

Yes. It’s true: it is easy to talk, which is even more surprising to me than to her, probably, because there are about three people in the world I find it easy to talk to.

37

   Tiffy

I don’t understand what compelled me to go on about Justin like that. I’ve not mentioned anything about the counselling or the flashbacks in my notes to Leon – those Post-its make me warm and fuzzy, I’m not ruining them with Justin crap – but suddenly now I’m face-to-face with him it feels natural to talk to him about the things occupying my thoughts. He just has one of those non-judgemental faces that make you want to, you know . . . share.

We slip into silence as the train speeds through open countryside. I get the sense that Leon likes silence; it doesn’t feel as awkward as I would expect it to, more like this is his natural state. It’s strange, because when he talks, he’s really engaging, albeit in a quiet, intense sort of way.

He’s looking out of the window, squinting against the sunlight, so I sneak a chance to look at him. He’s a little scruffy, in a worn grey T-shirt with a cord necklace around his neck that has the look of something he hardly ever takes off. I wonder what its significance is. Leon doesn’t strike me as the type to wear accessories for anything other than sentimental reasons.

He catches me looking and meets my gaze. My stomach flutters. Suddenly the silence feels different.

‘How’s Mr Prior?’ I blurt.

Leon looks startled. ‘Mr Prior?’

‘Yeah. My life-saving knitter. The last time I spoke to him was at the hospice.’ I give him a wry smile. ‘When you were busy avoiding me.’

‘Ah.’ He rubs the back of his neck, looking down, then shoots me a little lopsided grin. It’s so quick I almost miss it. ‘Wasn’t my finest moment.’

‘Mmm.’ I pull a mock stern face. ‘Do I scare you, is that it?’

‘A bit.’

‘A bit! Why?’

He swallows, Adam’s apple bobbing, and pushes his hair back from his face. I think he’s nervous-fidgeting. It’s absolutely adorable.

‘You’re very . . .’ He waves a hand.

‘Loud? Brash? Larger than life?’

He winces. ‘No,’ he says. ‘No, not that.’

I wait.

‘Look,’ he says, ‘have you ever looked forward to reading a book so much you can’t actually start it?’

‘Oh, totally. All the time – if I had a grain of self-restraint I never would’ve been able to read the last Harry Potter book. The anticipation was painful. You know, like, what if it doesn’t live up to the last ones? What if it’s not what I hope it’ll be?’

‘Right, well.’ He waves a hand at me. ‘I think it might have been . . . like that.’

‘But with me?’

‘Yeah. With you.’

I look down at my hands in my lap, trying very hard not to smile.

‘As for Mr Prior . . .’ Leon’s talking out of the window now. ‘I’m sorry. Can’t really talk about a patient.’

‘Oh, of course. Well, I hope we find his Johnny White. Mr Prior is lovely. He deserves a happy ending.’

As we rumble on, slipping in and out of comfortable conversation, I sneak more discreet little looks at Leon across the table. At one point our eyes meet in the window’s glass, and we both look away fast, like we’ve seen something we shouldn’t have.

I’m just about feeling that all awkwardness has departed when we arrive at Brighton, but then he gets up to grab his rucksack from the overhead space and he’s suddenly standing, with his T-shirt riding up to show the dark band of his Calvin Klein boxers above his jeans, and I’m back to not knowing what to do with myself. I attempt to find the table very interesting.

When we reach Brighton there’s a weak September sun shining; it’s not quite autumn yet. From outside the station I can see streets of white town houses stretching out ahead of us, dotted with the sorts of pubs and cafés that everyone in London would overpay to have on their street corner.