Million Love Songs(63)

We have also managed a few real dates in that time. We snatched breakfast one morning after the school run and before we both had to start our shifts. That’s quite civilised, I think you’ll agree. We tried one more scuba-diving lesson with Joe as my instructor again, but our hands were straying to places that they shouldn’t at the bottom of the swimming pool and my mind wasn’t fully on my demand valve. Good job Bob didn’t try that or I’d have blocked his snorkel. Not a euphemism.

Joe and I haven’t had an opportunity to take our relationship onto a more … ahem … physical plane simply due to the fact that I can’t go to Joe’s house as he doesn’t yet want me to be ‘formally’ introduced to the kids and he can’t stay at my place as he has to be at home for the kids. Yet that’s no bad thing is it? Is it better to wait and enjoy the slow build-up to consummation or to hop into bed with someone you’ve met at a night club – someone who you don’t know a thing about and who couldn’t care less whether you have a good time or not? That said, I wouldn’t be adverse to it happening sooner rather than later. My nipples are permanently on red alert.

Anyway, that’s why you find me today on another outing with the good folk of the Costa del Keynes dive club. We’re out in force today as about a dozen members have come along. I’m still not safe enough to be let out in open water myself and, to be honest, I’m not in the slightest bit bothered. I’m not proving to be a natural diver. I’m not all that keen on getting wet or going into water where I don’t know what else might be in there. A bit of a drawback for a diver, I think you’ll agree. I maybe should have gone for photography instead or taken a course in Thai Massage.

So I’m sitting in the sunshine overlooking Quarry Hill Cove gravel pit in deepest, darkest Birminghamshire or somewhere, on one of those deckchairs you buy in service stations for a tenner, my thoughts as warm as the summer’s day. Joe has completed one dive and is currently on the jetty shrugging off his air tanks and kicking off his fins. I’m very happy just to take in the view. Sigh.

I’m content for the first time in a long time. Sometimes we hurtle through life, don’t we? I’m rushing off to work or racing round the supermarket, doing a dozen other things that I really don’t want to be doing and it’s easy not to stop and simply take a breath. That’s what Joe has done for me, he’s brought an enrichment to my life which is, in turn, creating a feeling of settling deep in my core. No, I’ve not been reading self-help books, but it’s how I feel. Can’t help it.

Then I realise that this is a lot like love feels. That sends a jolt through me. I look at Joe as he chats to the other members of the dive club and feel my heart swell. There was no thunderbolt moment when we met, but over the weeks that I’ve known him there’s increasingly been a quiet knowing and a certainty that he is a good man.

He comes towards me, rubbing a towel over his hair. His wetsuit is unzipped and peeled down to his waist. I shield my eyes against the sun to better look at him.

‘What are you grinning at like a Cheshire cat?’

‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘Everything.’

‘You’re not bored?’ He flops down on the grass beside me.

‘Far from it. It’s nice to be able to spend time together.’

‘Yeah.’ He runs a finger gently along my arm and makes me shiver with delight.

His phone rings and I pass it to him. On the screensaver, I can see it’s Daisy calling.

‘Hi, sweetheart,’ he says. ‘What are you up to?’

I zone out so that he can carry on his conversation with his daughter in private. I know that she’s with her mum today and that the plan was for them to go shopping. I get a little pang of envy. Things are going so well with Joe and me, but I feel that he’s still holding me at arm’s length. I think it’s time for me to meet his children properly. So far, we’ve still only exchanged a brief, disinterested hello.

Joe hangs up. ‘Daisy has new shoes. All is well in her world.’

I laugh at that and then think that this is probably as good a time as any to bite the bullet. ‘I’d like to be more involved with your life,’ I say, tentatively. ‘If I met your kids then we could spend more time together and do stuff with them too. They’re part of you and I’d really love to get to know them. Maybe we could all have a day out together.’

Joe frowns. ‘It’s a great idea …’

His tone doesn’t match the words.

‘But?’

‘They’re at a difficult age,’ he says. ‘It’s easier, I’m sure, with younger kids who are more malleable, but teenagers are strange and fragile creatures for all they pretend not to be. They’re both toughing it out, but I know inside that they’re still hurting. What happens if I bring you into our lives and they’re happy to accept you, then in a few months, we break up?’

‘Isn’t that a risk worth taking?’

‘I don’t know, Ruby. I can understand where you’re coming from but, for me, it’s a big step. If you decide you don’t want to be with a family man and put up with all that entails, you can just walk away without looking back. I’m the one who’ll be left picking up the pieces again.’

‘We could take it really slowly,’ I say.