At half past twelve Leah sent Owen a message from outside the bank.
One walk. Meet me by the park gates. I'm not going back to the flat.
She watched him read it. His reply came at once.
I'll be there in ten minutes.
She could have gone back to Anna's. She could have called Mira and said she needed someone to stop her doing this. Neither would have made her stop wanting to see him.
It felt important to know what happened when they were alone and nobody had to explain a theft.
Owen arrived a little out of breath. He had taken off his jacket and was carrying it over one arm.
‘Where do you want to go?’ he asked.
‘Along the path. Not far.’
He nodded and fell into step beside her.
For several minutes they walked without speaking. Leah could feel him noticing the space between their hands. She noticed it too. Once, when the path narrowed, he put a hand at the small of her back to let a pram pass. It was their ordinary way of moving together.
He took his hand away quickly.
‘Sorry.’
‘I know why you did it.’
They reached the ornamental lake. A remote-controlled boat was moving across it with a small paper flag on its mast. The man controlling it stood very straight, as if the boat's reputation mattered to him.
Owen glanced at Leah. She knew the look.
‘Don't,’ she said.
He turned towards the lake. ‘I haven't said anything.’
‘I know the voice you're about to use.’
The boat began to turn, very slowly. Owen lowered his head towards hers.
‘Welcome back, listeners. A difficult afternoon for the captain, whose entire crew has gone home.’
Leah tried not to smile.
‘The crew is very small,’ she said.
‘We understand they were last seen in a biscuit tin.’
She laughed. She could not help it. Owen's face lit up with such open relief that she wished he had been less happy to succeed.
They had invented the radio programme on a day trip when they missed their bus and had to walk four miles. He had narrated every field as if they were reporting an important event. She had been miserable for the first mile and helpless with laughter by the second. Since then, anyone holding something unusually serious could become a correspondent.
The boat hit the side of the lake with a little bump.
‘An incident at the harbour,’ Leah said.
‘We advise passengers to remain calm.’
‘There are no passengers.’
‘Excellent news from the harbour.’
She laughed again, then stopped. Owen stopped too.
The man picked up his boat. Across the water two people were trying to photograph a child who would not face the camera.
‘I missed that,’ Owen said.
‘So did I.’
It was honest. She had missed being understood halfway through a ridiculous sentence. It was not something she could get back by explaining the joke to anyone else.
They walked to the far end of the lake. The breeze lifted her hair across her face. Owen reached to brush it back, then checked himself.
This time Leah took his wrist and moved his hand towards her cheek.
He looked at her. She did not look away.
His fingers rested beside her ear. He touched her as gently as he had when they first became lovers, before either of them knew how readily she would move towards him.
Leah kissed him.
For a moment there was no effort in it. His arm went round her. She knew where to put her hand, how to tilt her head, the small sound he made when she pressed closer. She had wanted that sound during long nights when all she had was the message on her phone.
When they drew apart, he kept his forehead near hers.
‘I love you,’ he said.
Leah closed her eyes. Her hand was still holding his shirt at the back.
‘I know you do.’
That was not a decision either. She let go and stepped away.
Owen stood beside the bench, his lips parted. He looked less prepared now than he had at the dining table.
‘Could we sit?’ he asked.
She sat at one end. He left space between them.
The lake reflected a thin strip of sky. Leah watched a leaf travel across it while her breathing slowed.
‘I could cancel the things we can't change,’ Owen said. ‘Then we could choose a new date, smaller, without everyone involved. We wouldn't have to lose the whole—’
‘Stop.’
He stopped.
‘I kissed you. I didn't postpone the wedding.’
He looked down at his hands. ‘I got ahead of myself.’
‘You started making a future before I'd finished sitting down.’
‘That's what I want with you.’
‘I wanted it too.’
His head came up at the past tense. She had not chosen it carefully. It had simply come out.
‘Leah, we can still—’
‘I'm trying to find out what I want now. You have to let me.’
He nodded. A child shouted on the other side of the lake. Somewhere behind them a bicycle bell rang.
‘We were good,’ he said after a while.
‘Yes.’
‘That wasn't a lie.’
‘I know.’ She looked at him. ‘I don't need to hate every day we had.’
It seemed to give him hope. Perhaps there was no sentence she could say kindly that he would not turn into a way back.
‘You kept something big from me,’ she said. ‘Then when someone told you I knew, you chose not to find out whether I did. You knew I would talk to you. You used that to avoid me.’
He pressed his thumbs together. ‘I didn't want you looking at me the way you did this morning.’
Leah remembered his open palm on the table. ‘Neither did I.’
He made a small movement towards her, then stopped. She was glad he could learn that much. She did not want to have to thank him for it.
They sat until the boat owner packed his things away. Leah could feel the afternoon passing. At the house, Anna had a costume to finish. Daniel might be drawing something. Her mother would be alone in her flat, probably convinced this walk was a mistake.
Leah did not want to choose a man simply to prove Ruth wrong.
‘I need to go,’ she said.
Owen stood with her. ‘Can I walk you back?’
‘To the gates.’
They retraced the path. Near the exit, an elderly couple were disagreeing about which turning led to the car park. The woman pointed confidently towards the lake. The man looked at the map upside down.
Owen looked towards Leah again. She shook her head, smiling despite herself.
‘Not now.’
‘All right.’
At the gates he took a breath.
‘I'll be here tomorrow. In town, I mean. If you want to talk.’
‘I know.’
She did not kiss him goodbye. She had kissed him because she wanted to, and she could still stop.
On the way home she passed the florist's window. The word she had painted was visible through the glass, tidy and clear. She stood for a moment to look at it. Then she kept walking.