Nell: Not Research

I spent twenty minutes choosing earrings that Kit had never previously shown any evidence of noticing.

Then I changed them.

Mum found me standing in the hall, looking at my own shoes with the suspicion usually reserved for an unexplained bank charge.

“Those are shoes,” she said helpfully.

“I'm aware.”

“Both of them.”

“Your professional eye is extraordinary.”

She held out my jacket. Not the interview one. The ordinary denim jacket I had worn so often the cuffs had become soft.

“Have a nice time.”

I took it. “That's it?”

“What were you expecting?”

“An interrogation. A meaningful look. Perhaps a reference to historic needles.”

Mum's mouth twitched. “I can provide those when you get back.”

Kit was waiting by the clock outside the station, wearing a loose tie and looking like the reason people wrote songs they later regretted. I stopped a few feet away to give myself time to become the sort of person who could walk normally towards her.

“You're early,” she said.

“So are you.”

“I didn't want to be late.”

“Same.”

There was a whole conversation underneath those four lines. Neither of us was quite brave enough to pick it up yet.

We had chosen chips and a walk because it was inexpensive, familiar and difficult to get wrong. The chip shop was closed for a family wedding.

Kit read the sign. “We should have checked.”

“We're off duty.”

“Still hungry.”

We went to the other chip shop, where the queue extended past a display of souvenir fudge. A man in front of us was explaining to his daughter that haddock and cod were different fish. She looked unconvinced by the wider concept of fish.

Kit stood beside me, close enough that our sleeves touched.

“I like the tie,” I said.

“Thank you.”

“It looks less like you're going to sell me an insurance policy than I expected.”

“Aim high.”

“I mean you look nice.”

Her ears went pink. This was new information, and I enjoyed it with an intensity I hoped did not show.

“So do you,” she said.

We took our food to the sea wall. A gull followed for half the walk, then identified a family with weaker security and changed direction.

Kit asked about the interview. I told her I was trying to prepare answers without memorising them so thoroughly that I would sound like a malfunctioning visitor attraction. She told me about Manchester: the painted kitchen, the tutor, the room with the brick-wall view. I asked questions. Not the ones that made her explain why she wanted to leave. The ones about what she would do when she got there.

She became more animated as she talked. Her hands moved. She described a lighting rig and then stopped to check whether I was bored.

“No,” I said. “Keep going.”

So she did.

After we'd eaten, we walked along the quieter stretch of promenade beyond the amusement arcade. The evening was mild. People sat on the beach in loose clusters, gathering their things slowly, reluctant to accept that a good day had an end.

I had prepared something to say. It began with a joke about the guide and became, through a series of carefully placed phrases, a statement of feeling. It was excellent. I had revised it while brushing my teeth.

When Kit looked at me, I forgot all of it.

“I like you,” I said instead.

She stopped walking.

“I know we've only just become friends again, and I don't want to make that a consolation prize, because it's not. I really missed being your friend. But I also—”

“Nell.”

“Yes?”

“I like you too.”

The sea continued being the sea. A bicycle bell rang behind us. I had expected the world to make more of an effort to acknowledge the moment, but perhaps it was leaving us some privacy.

“Oh,” I said.

Kit smiled. “Good oh?”

“Very good oh.”

She took my hand. Her palm was warm, her fingers a little rough from the shop. I looked down at our hands because I wanted to remember what they looked like without photographing them.

“Can I kiss you?” she asked.

“Yes.”

The first kiss was brief and slightly off-centre because I smiled at the wrong moment. Kit pulled back, laughing quietly, and I put my free hand against the front of her shirt.

“Again,” I said, which was not especially sophisticated but had the advantage of being clear.

This time I remembered to stop talking.

For a while afterwards, we stood with our foreheads almost touching, both smiling in a way that would have made Taz unbearable for weeks.

“I had a speech,” I admitted.

“Was it long?”

“There were sections.”

“I'm glad we avoided that.”

“It was a very good speech.”

“I believe you.”

We walked back slowly. At the busy part of the promenade, I hesitated before taking her hand again. Not because I was ashamed. Because being visible made the thing real in another way, and because the town was small enough to contain several people who had taught me fractions.

Kit noticed. “We don't have to perform anything.”

“I know.”

I took her hand.

A woman from the museum waved. I waved back. She did not fall into the sea or ring a bell. This seemed promising for the future.

Outside my house, we stopped beneath the porch light. The curtains in the front room moved in a way I chose not to investigate.

“I had a nice time,” Kit said.

“Despite the closed chip shop?”

“Eventually recovered.”

She kissed me once more. It was easier already and not less surprising.

Inside, Ollie looked up from the sofa.

“You're smiling weird again.”

“I am experiencing joy. You'll recognise it when you're older.”

“Did she kiss you?”

“Ollie.”

He grinned. “That's a yes.”

Upstairs, I took off the earrings I'd spent so long choosing. Kit hadn't mentioned them. I put them on the windowsill and sat on the edge of my bed.

My phone lit up.

Kit: Definitely not research.

I pressed it against my chest for a second, which was embarrassing behaviour even with no witnesses.

Then I wrote back: The sample size was small. Further testing may be required.