‘Not in a creepy way!’ Dev replied, his fantastic eyebrows protesting his innocence. ‘I thought you’d be on your way to Dorothy’s as well, I was trying to catch up with you. Then you took a detour.’ He squatted down in front of me, a fully-fledged grin on his face. ‘Do Bernard and Lesley know you’re here?’
The air prickled as I dropped my chin into the water and shook my head.
‘Technically, I had a key, so it’s not really breaking and entering.’ Not like the time we climbed through a window and broke into Chatsworth House I most certainlydid not say. ‘But I did see them at Dorothy’s,’ I added, an invitation in my voice. ‘They won’t be back for ages?’
‘I haven’t got my bathers with me,’ Dev replied, patting down his grey coat and his not-at-all baggy trousers.
Sod it. If ever there was a time to be present, it was now. Present, in a pool, in my pants, with Dev. For nine confusing days, he had been the bright spot in all of my misadventures, the one part I wouldn’t mind reliving over and over. Pushing away from the wall, I sculled backwards across the water, desperate for him to stay.
‘Neither have I.’
‘Gwen Baker, village rebel,’ Dev said, his decision made. He unlaced his boots and shucked off his coat, dumping it on the same sun lounger as my dress then paused as he took hold of the hem of his jumper. ‘Excuse me, are you watching me get undressed?’
‘No, of course not,’ I replied, glad to be able to dip under water before he saw me blush. When I popped back up, he was stood at the deep end in a pair of tight blue boxers, quickly rearranging himself before he dove into the pool, slicing the water in two with long, clean strokes.
This is fine, I told myself as I checked the integrity of my bra straps. It was not designed for an underwater frolic, but M&S underwear had never knowingly let me down before. Just a casual swim in the neighbour’s pool with a hot grown-up version of the boy you were in love with when you were thirteen and you’re both in your pants. What could be more Christmassy?
If nothing else, it certainly felt like a gift.
‘This is incredible,’ Dev called, swimming back towards me, the light scattering of black hair on his chest glisteningunder the low lighting. ‘New life goal, I definitely need my own pool.’
‘Darling it’s better, down where it’s wetter,’ I replied with a seductive laugh before cutting myself off with a grimace. Wait, was that actually quite rude? Thankfully, it looked as though Dev didn’t know his Disney and rolled over onto his back, sailing by without comment.
‘If this was in my back garden, I’d never leave.’ He grabbed hold of a neon pink pool noodle that was floating in the corner and wrangled it into submission. ‘I was having the worst Christmas possible until I saw you.’
‘Really?’ I replied. ‘Did you wake up to find yourself trapped in a never-ending time loop that seems to be forcing you to confront what a complete and utter disaster your life is, how you barely know the people closest to you and how you might be stuck here forever?’
He wrapped the pool noodle around his back and under his armpits, one eyebrow raised.
‘Very funny,’ he replied and I let out a silent sob. ‘OK, so not the worst Christmas possible but this was not the day to discover my parents have become a screen-free home.’
‘That actually might be worse,’ I admitted. ‘No telly? At all?’
‘No telly, no tablets, no e-readers, no laptops, no smart phones.’
‘Have they never seenThe Shining?’ I asked, horrified at the thought of Christmas with the family without the reassuring glow of the television on in the corner of the room.
Dev laughed and let his eyes settle on me with the same smile on his face I’d seen at the bottom of thegarden on that very first Christmas Day. The same smile he always had when we were together. Here was a man who was genuinely happy, simply because he happened to be in the same place at the same time on the same floating space rock. It felt impossibly good to see someone light up simply because I existed. It hadn’t happened in a long time.
I swam over to the side to select a floating device of my own. Which was better, a far-too-enthusiastic-looking unicorn or a very judgemental flamingo? I went with the flamingo. My cotton knickers ballooned with water as I swam back over to Dev and I prayed the elastic would hold up. Walking around in a top half only was all well and good for the likes of Winnie the Pooh and Donald Duck but not for the rest of us.
‘How about yours?’ Dev asked. The water lapped against the side of the pool and his voice echoed off the steamy glass ceiling. ‘Shall I take an educated guess and say it isn’t going that well?’
‘Today was lovely actually,’ I said, thinking about how happy everyone had been when I left them at Dorothy’s. ‘Knackering but nice. And extremely complicated. I’m having a bit of a crisis.’
He scooped up a handful of water and doused his thick black hair, slicking it away from his face. ‘Maybe I could help? I’m quite a good listener.’
The first thing I’d learned over the last nine days: ask for help when you need it and accept help when it is offered. I rested my forearms on my inflatable flamingo and opened my mouth to speak, not quite sure what was going to come out. There were still so many problems for me to tackle, but there was one thing that had beenon my mind ever since my drinks with Cerys and it was about time I tried to figure it out.
‘It’s my job,’ I said. ‘I always thought I knew exactly what I was doing and now I’m not so sure.’
‘You’re a lawyer, aren’t you?’ Dev asked and I nodded. ‘What is it you’re not sure about?’
‘All of it,’ I laughed. ‘Everything. If you’d asked me three months ago, I would have told you my job was everything to me. If you’d asked me two weeks ago, I would have had a nervous breakdown at the thought of losing it. But now … now I can’t stop wondering why I’m even doing it.’
‘As far as I can tell, there are only two good reasons to stay in any job.’ He blinked as a drop of condensation fell from the ceiling onto the tip of his nose and I couldn’t help but smile. ‘Because you have to or because you want to. Do either of those reasons apply here?’
Resting against my flamingo, I kicked my feet gently, sending myself up to the far end of the pool where the grapevines covered the panes of glass, casting a dark grotto-like glow over the deep water.