IN THE HOURS BETWEEN • TC

7. Fool's Gold

The next morning, Una does everything alone. It’s easier that way, easier to avoid Timothée. She wishes she would have waited to speak to him. Wishes she could have chosen her words more carefully, not been so...she doesn’t know. But she definitely went the wrong way about it, ambushing him in the corridor. 

She makes a smoothie and takes it out into the garden, so she can drink it on the bench under her favourite tree. She inspects the tomatoes along the way, but most of them are still looking a sickly green. 

Someone is pottering about in the kitchen, but the slope of the garden makes it hard to look in through the window, hard to tell who. She finishes the last of her smoothie and extends a few pinched fingers for Marlon to come and nuzzle. She rubs her thumb against her fingers, hisses through puckered lips, but he stops suddenly in the grass, then changes direction. Leaps up onto the fence in the direction of a squirrel.

Una stands up and walks back into the house. She rinses her glass under the tap and puts it in the dishwasher. The Cheerios are sitting open on the counter and there is a ring of milk sitting next to them. Una puts them away. Wipes up the milk. Timothée’s never very good at clearing up after himself.

Once she’s had a shower and got dressed, she slides the envelope from her desk and walks downstairs with it. Una puts on her shoes, yells out that she’s going to the postbox, and shuts the front door behind her with a thud. There is a figure squatting down by the gate, and when she gets there, Timothée is playing with next door’s dog through a double gap in the fence posts.

Both of them look ecstatic; the dog is panting and wagging its tail, and Timothée looks like he would also be wagging his tail if he had one. 

He looks up for a moment, sees Una, and looks back down towards Milo, who turns in a creaky circle and sits on his hind legs as Timothée begins to scratch his rump. Una is ready to walk past without saying a word, but Timothée speaks up. His voice is too friendly, and it doesn’t match his facial expression. He’s frowning. 

“Where are you going?” he asks, the first two words blending into one smooth noise. She stops just before she goes through the gate, and leans over into next door’s front garden to stroke Milo’s head. The dog seems delighted at this development, his tail thumping on the grass.

“Postbox,” she replies, holding up the envelope between them. Timmy nods. 

“I’ve never used this in England yet,” he says. Una gives him something that is halfway to a smile, because she doesn’t really know what else to do. “I would like to come with you,” he says plainly. Milo rolls over onto his back and Timothée begins to scratch the dog’s belly.

And does that mean they’re on even terms? Or is it just a formality?

“O-okay,” she replies. Stands back up to her full height, stretching out her back and unlatching the front gate to walk onto the pavement, where Timothée is standing up himself, picking up a cereal bowl from beside him.

“I need to wear my shoes,” he says, and both of them look down at his socked feet on the warm concrete. 

“Hold this,” Una says, giving him the envelope. “I’ll get them for you.” She takes his bowl from a very confused and slightly reluctant grip, and goes back into the house. She’s the one with a key, after all. 

Una deposits Timothée’s bowl in the sink and finds his trainers. They look fairly new. Chunky. Alarmingly white, and she supposes they were bought especially for the trip. That shouldn’t make any difference, but somehow it does.

Una unties the laces as she brings them over to Timothée, and he rolls his eyes.

“Qu’est-ce que tu fais?” he mutters, taking the trainers from Una’s hands and placing her letter on the floor beside him. She doesn’t say anything, but looks uncomfortably at the labour of her love, chucked on the floor like it’s nothing. Timothée shoves his shoes on each foot and pinches one of the laces between his fingers.