On Monday morning, Keira’s manager praised her for the extra effort she’d put in the previous week. There was no comment about her not working over the weekend. Not that she’d have cared if there had been. Her thoughts were with Noah, who’d be on a train on his way to the airport. Nothing bothered her more than the fact that she didn’t know when she’d see him again. She’d told him she’d fly over for a long weekend in a couple of weeks but after checking the price of flights and her bank balance she wasn’t sure that was going to happen.
She avoided having a conversation with him about it for the next week but could only put it off for so long. By the following Tuesday she knew she couldn’t fob him off any longer.
“Did you book your flight yet?” he asked when he called her that evening during his break at work.
“No.”
“How come?” His tone was sombre.
Lying back on her bed, she gathered a deep breath. “I can’t afford it.”
“Okay,” he replied slowly. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?”
“Because I knew you’d offer to pay and I don’t want you to.”
“I’m quite happy to pay for your flight. If it makes you uncomfortable you can pay me back later, whenever you have the money.”
Her chest tightened. “Every time my dad took money from me he swore he’d pay me back.”
“It’s not the same,” he insisted.
“Maybe not, but it’d feel the same to me. I don’t want to take money from you.”
“Shall I come to you then?”
“It doesn’t seem very fair.”
“I’ve already got the weekend off. It’s not a problem.”
“If I wait until I get paid, I can come over then. Since I’m no longer giving my parents money, things should be easier financially.”
“Have you spoken to your dad?” he asked, a note of sympathy in his voice.
“No,” she said matter-of-factly. “Not properly. Only that quick conversation on Sunday.” At least he wasn’t completely ignoring her calls, even if he had only answered to tell her that he was in the middle of something but would talk to her soon.
“Shall I see if I can book a flight for Friday?” Noah sounded distracted. People were talking in the background and she suspected he needed to get back to work.
“No. I’ll come to you as soon I have the money.”
“Right, so I’ll just wait indefinitely to see you?”
“Two weeks,” she said. “I can come over in two weeks.”
“I was looking forward to seeing you this weekend,” he said impatiently.
She sat up, a pang of irritation striking her. “I’m not particularly happy about the situation either, and I didn’t have a choice about this whole long-distance thing.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that you’re the one who moved away. You chose to switch our relationship to the long-distance variety. Now you’re annoyed at me. It’s not my fault.”
“I’m not annoyed with you,” he growled.
“You sound it.”
“I have to get back to work. Can we talk about this later?”
Begrudgingly, she told him that was fine and ended the call, then flopped back on to the bed until she heard Mel arrive home. She forced herself to smile as she walked into the kitchen but it clearly wasn’t very convincing given the sympathetic smile she received in reply.