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time. Maybe I should say it again?

      ‘I said I love you, Charlie.’

      He blinked. ‘You’re not serious, are you?’

      ‘Yes.’ I could feel a deathly dragging sensation pulling my hope to oblivion.

      Gone was the trademark Charlie grin that had been so firmly in place only moments before. In its place was a look I didn’t recognise, but I knew it wasn’t a good alternative.

      ‘H-how long have you …?’

      I dropped my gaze to the potted plant beside our table. ‘Um – a long time, actually.’ Maybe I should have worn something a bit more ‘potential girlfriend material’ today? But then this morning when I pulled on my trusty jeans and purple sweater dress I wasn’t expecting to have this conversation. And judging by the look of sheer horror on Charlie’s face, it wouldn’t have made a difference if I had been sitting opposite him in a designer gown and diamonds. This was such a mistake …

      ‘But … we’re mates, Rom.’

      ‘Yeah, of course we are. Look, forget I said anything, OK?’

      He was staring at his latte like it had just insulted him. ‘I don’t know how you expect me to do that. You’ve said it now, haven’t you? I mean it’s – it’s out there.’

      I looked around the busy coffee shop. It was overcrowded with disgruntled Christmas shoppers huddled ungratefully around too-small tables on chairs greedily snatched from unsuspecting single customers. ‘I think it’s safe to assume that none of that lot heard anything.’

      As attempts at humour go, it wasn’t my finest. I took a large gulp of coffee and wished myself dead.

      Charlie shook his head. ‘That doesn’t matter. I heard it. Oh, Rom – why did you say that? Why couldn’t you just have …?’

      I stared at him. ‘Just have what?’

      ‘Just not said anything? I mean, why me? Why put this on me now?’

      I hated the look of sheer panic in his eyes. He’d never looked at me that way before … In my perennial daydream about this moment it had been so very different:

      Oh Romily – I’ve loved you forever, too. If you hadn’t told me we could have missed each other completely …

      ‘We’re fine as we are, aren’t we? I mean, if it’s good then why change it? I can’t believe you actually thought this would be a good idea.’

      Well, excuse me, but I did. Somewhere between my ridiculous, obviously deluded heart and my big stupid mouth, my brain got pushed out of the picture and I – crazy, deranged loon that I am – found myself persuaded that I might be the answer to his dreams. That maybe the reason for the many hours we’d spent together – cheeky laughter-filled days and late night heart-to-hearts – was that we were destined to be more than friends. Everyone else noticed it: it had been a running joke among our friends that Charlie and I were like an old married couple. The ‘Old Folks’ – that’s what they called us. We’d lost count of the number of times complete strangers mistook us for partners. So if it was this blindingly obvious to the world, how come Charlie couldn’t see it?

      Of course, I couldn’t say any of this to him. Sheer embarrassment stole the clever arguments from my mind so that then and there, in the crowded café packed with people who couldn’t care less about what I was saying, I found that all I could say was:

      ‘I’m sorry.’

      Charlie shook his head. ‘I did not see this coming. I thought we were friends, that’s all. But this – this is just weird …’

      ‘Thanks for the vote of confidence, Charlie.’

      He stared at me, confusion claiming his eyes. ‘I-I didn’t mean … Heck, Rom, I’m sorry – you’ve just got to give me a moment to get my head round this.’

      I looked away and focused on a particularly harassed-looking couple talking heatedly at the next table over enormous mugs of cream-topped festive coffees. ‘You don’t appreciate me,’ the woman was saying. Right now, I knew exactly how she felt.

      ‘The thing is,’ Charlie said, ‘you’ve always been just Rom – one of the guys, you know? You’re a laugh, someone I can hang out with. But now …’ He was digging an impossible hole for himself and he knew it. He gave a massive sigh. ‘I’m sorry. I’m really not sure how to deal with this.’

      This was awful – I’d heard enough. I rose to my feet, intense pain and crushing embarrassment pushing my body up off the chair. I opened my mouth to deal a devastating parting shot, but nothing appeared. Instead, I turned and fled, stubbing my toe on a neighbouring customer’s chair and tripping over various overstuffed shopping bags, almost taking a packed pushchair with me as I beat an ungraceful retreat from the coffee shop and out into the bustling street beyond.

      Outside, Birmingham’s famous Christmas Market was in full flow, packed with shoppers grabbing last-minute Christmas shopping and crowding around the wooden beer stalls. The coloured lights strung overhead glowed brightly against the greyness of the December afternoon sky and Christmas music blared relentlessly from speakers along the length of New Street.

      ‘Rom! Where are you going? I’m sorry – please come back! Rom!’ Behind me, Charlie’s shouts blended into the blur of crowd noise and Christmas hits of yesteryear. I picked up my pace, making my way blindly against the tidal flow of bodies, their countless faces looming up before me, unsmiling and uncaring. I had humiliated myself enough already: the last thing I needed was for Charlie to come back for Round Two …

      As I passed each shop front the sale signs began morphing into condemnatory judgements of my actions, screaming at me from every lit window:

      Insane!

      Stupid idiot!

      What were you thinking?

      As the jostling crowd propelled me involuntarily towards the marble pillars of the Town Hall, Paul McCartney was singing ‘Wonderful Christmastime’ like it should have an ironic question mark at the end. Unable to wriggle free, I found myself moving along with the throng. But I felt nothing; my senses were numbed by the faceless bodies hemming me in, and my heart too beset by ceaseless echoes of Charlie’s words to care any more. At a loss to make sense of the total catastrophe I’d just caused, I surrendered to the irresistible force of the crowd and, quite literally, went with the flow.

      What was I thinking telling my best friend in the whole world that I loved him? I hadn’t even planned to say it at all – and now I couldn’t quite believe I had blurted out my biggest secret seemingly on a whim. One minute we were laughing about last week’s gig, his smile so warm and his eyes lit up in the way they always do when he’s talking about music; the next I was confessing the feelings for him I’ve been carrying for three years. What on earth made me think that was a good idea?

      Maybe it was the impending arrival of the ‘Most Wonderful Time of the Year’ (thanks for nothing, Andy Williams) or the deliciously festive atmosphere filling the city today that had caused me to reveal my feelings to Charlie like that. Perhaps it was the influence of watching too many chick-flick Christmas scenes that had tipped my sanity over the edge and made the whole thing seem like such a great idea (Richard Curtis, Nora Ephron, guilty as charged).

      Dumped unceremoniously by the crowd at the base of the grand stone staircase in Victoria Square, I managed to squeeze through a gap in the tightly-packed, slow-moving shoppers and emerged breathless into a small pocket of pine-scented air by the barriers around the base of the huge Swedish Christmas tree. Tears stung my eyes and I swallowed angrily in a vain attempt to keep them at bay. What was the matter with me? How did I get it so devastatingly wrong?

      All the signs had been there, or so I had thought: hugs that lingered a moment too long; snatched glances and shy smiles during nights out with our friends; moments of unspoken understanding during conversations begun in the early evening and ending as birdsong heralded a new day. Then there

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