Page 28 of When We Are Old

“Hardly a blended family. I’ve met his children once, and he hasn’t met Hannah at all apart from for three minutes last week. Or my mum for that matter.”

Ma had been absent this morning. I think I could count the times I’d clattered down the stairs late for work and she hadn’t been at the kitchen table. Twice maybe.

“Blended families are all the rage, Ron. I think you are hitting a trend.”

I shook my head and raised a practiced eyebrow at her long, diamond-patterned legs which hung off the side of my desk. “It’s not a fashion statement, Natalie.”

“He is very hot though. You do know you are going to be fighting women off your entire life? Like until the day you die, you will be waving a stick at all the women who want to take your place.”

“Oh my god. That’s enough. Right, do some work.”

“Can’t, there isn’t anything to do.”

“Didn't Fred give you new designs to load onto the website?”

“Fred is sulking.”

“What? Why?”

“Do I have to spell it out?” Natalie puckered her ruby red lips at me and rolled her eyes behind her sexy secretary style glasses.

My own glasses hung around my neck on a rope attached to the arms, like a librarian waiting out retirement.

“Oh shush... okay go and cold call.”

“Who?”

“Anyone. The Queen? I don’t care. Just leave my office.”

She peeled herself off my desk and walked for the door. “Are you always going to be this moody after a night away? I’ll order in some extra strong coffee or Valium.”

“Sod off.”

After she’d gone, I sat back in my Big Boss Chair as Fred called it. He wasn’t really sulking, was he?

I thought back over the three years we’d worked together, scanning my memory for any indication I might have ever given him that I would be interested in him in anyway other than employer/employee.

He was a good guy though, and I hadn’t been exaggerating when I’d sung his praises to Matthew.

Mm Matthew.

On a distracted mission of little sense, I clicked on Facebook only to find that in all the thousands of Matthew Carlings listed, mine no longer existed.

For a crushing moment it was as though the last week-and-a-half hadn’t happened.

No, it had. My thighs ached when I pushed them together, a good ache, nice; a little bit naughty.

Sliding my phone across my desk, I went to type him a message on Messenger before realising that he wouldn’t be on there either.

Oh.

My chest tightened and I breathed deep: one, two, three.

I had no way to contact him. What if I lost him again?

What if he'd taken his kids to school this morning, seen Julie and decided he preferred his old life without the need to blend families?

On automatic pilot, I went to ring Ange, but I stopped myself before I hit call. I couldn’t be sure her advice was solid anymore.