‘Do they still use that phrase, Grandpa?’ I said, giving my old friend an affectionate squeeze.
‘Fuck knows,’ he replied with a grin. ‘Although if you were looking for someone to help you out with the business, I’m a little hurt you didn’t ask me.’
Jackson had mentioned weeks ago that when he and Lars sold their respective flats and bought their first home together, he’d like to invest some of his money and time in a growing business. I just hadn’t realised he’d been serious.
‘Can you imagine you and I working together?’ I said, covering up my guilt with a nervous laugh.
‘Very easily, actually.’
It wasn’t the answer I’d expected, and it had stuck in my head for days.
I carefully checked the weather forecast, the way I always did now, before leaving my flat. Rain was predicted for late afternoon, but for now the sun was still valiantly trying to prove the meteorologists wrong.
‘Here. Let me take that,’ Rhys said, reaching for my bag of gardening tools. I passed him the jute carrier, which he slipped over his shoulder before placing a guiding hand at my back as we walked to his car.
His offer to accompany me to the cemetery had been a surprise. ‘Two pairs of eyes are better than one,’ he reasoned. ‘And you got me intrigued with all that cyber sleuthing the other day.’
He blipped open the car and the boot obediently rose. He stowed my bag in the back beside another bunch of flowers. The roses I’d bought for Bee looked quintessentially British; beautiful but refined. The other bouquet was all exotic tropical blooms in a riot of colours.
‘I thought it was only right to bring your mum some flowers the first time I meet her,’ Rhys said.
I didn’t think it was possible to keep falling in love with the same person over and over again, and yet somehow that was what kept happening to me.
‘She’ll adore them,’ I said softly.
I could feel Rhys’s eyes watching me carefully on the walk from the cemetery car park to my mother’s plot. It didn’t matter how many times I visited – I knew my demeanour changed during my time here. My stride was slower, my eyes more thoughtful, and my smile a little harder to locate.
Rhys held out his hand and as I felt his fingers curl around mine, some of the usual tension began to fade. His own parents were happily still alive, but he was so in tune with me he appeared to know – without me having to say a word – that this bit, before I reached her, was always the hardest.
‘Are you okay?’
I gave him a quick nod and a smile that couldn’t find my eyes if it was given a map. He took our joined hands and lifted them to his lips, grazing my knuckles with a kiss.
‘Thank you for coming today,’ I said in a voice that wasn’t entirely steady. ‘It’s been a long time since I introduced a boyfriend to my mum.’
His smile eased the knot in my chest. ‘Boyfriend. I don’t think I’ve heard you call me that before.’
For a moment I wondered if I’d taken a huge misstep, crossed a line I hadn’t seen, and made him uncomfortable. But then I saw the way his eyes were crinkling at the edges.
‘Do you mind?’ I asked, feeling tentative.
Another kiss, this one brief and firm on my lips. ‘Not at all. Boyfriend is fine for now, until we decide to find another title.’
That one was going to be stuck in my head for the rest of the day, but thinking about its implications would have to wait until later, for we were already at my mother’s grave.
I released my hand from Rhys’s, and he stayed back as I crossed the grass to bend down beside the granite headstone.
‘Hi, Mum,’ I said, running my fingertips over the engraving of her name, the way I often did when talking to her. ‘I’ve brought someone with me today. They wanted to meet you.’
I looked back over my shoulder at Rhys, who was waiting patiently to one side, holding the flowers he’d brought for a woman who could no longer smell their exquisite fragrance.
I hadn’t really thought through what this moment would be like, but what I hadn’t anticipated was how natural and right it felt to introduce the man I loved to the only family I’d ever had.
‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs Harker,’ Rhys said, not sounding the least bit embarrassed or self-conscious to be having a conversation with a slab of granite.
How did I ever get so lucky to find a man like this? I glanced back at my mother’s headstone. She would have loved him in real life, I knew that instinctively.
Rhys bent down beside me, and still sounding completely natural, he laid the flowers he’d brought at the base of Mum’s headstone. ‘These are for you, Mrs Harker.’