I’ve never been much of a drinker, so the previous evening’s excursions had hit me hard. I woke up with a dry mouth and a sore head, shuffled out of the bedroom to the nearby bathroom where I filled my glass with water, drank it straight away with a few gulps, then filled it again and returned to the bedroom, placed the glass on the floor within reaching distance and then covered myself with the duvet and began to slumber.

 

I was stirred initially by what sounded like an innocuous rattling outside - the wooden fence in the wind, I presumed - but I was snapped awake by the sound of a thud outside on the patio and the frantic flapping of wings as pigeons scattered, right underneath the window of my room. I wondered to myself if it might be Richie’s father, up early to tidy the back garden his wife had been on to him about for the last couple of weeks. I reached for my watch on the tiny side table next to the bed and checked the time. It was only 6.20am, so I figured it couldn’t be him. I didn’t want to look outside, just in case it was him and I was forced to interact. A peek through the curtains would also be awkward if I was spotted. I remained in bed and sat upright. Just then I heard what sounded like a scratch at the window and then as if a burst of hailstones had suddenly hit the window pane. I quickly moved to the window and pulled back the curtain to see what seemed like hundreds of tiny flies zoom towards the pane and connect with a crackling sound. I was momentarily startled, but instantly realised that these were no flies, but tiny stones - pieces of gravel - just as another cluster approached, scattering a cloud of dust as it made contact with the window. This time I traced back its trajectory to a gnome-like figure in the middle of the patio staring skywards. I adjusted my focus down to the ground. For a moment, all I could see were its hands in the air, manically waving so as to look almost like mini helicopter propellers. Then the gnome’s hands dropped and I saw that it was Richie wearing one of those droopy beanie hats. How strange he looked from this angle! And what was he doing here?

 

He started frantically pointing forward with one hand, his other raised to his face, his finger covering his lip. At first, in the haze of not being fully awake, I thought he was signing something to me in semaphore as a joke, but eventually realised that he wanted me to let him in quietly through the back door.

 

I tiptoed down the stairs, went into the kitchen and carefully unlocked the back door so that no sound would be heard. There was Richie, a huge grin on his face and his finger still over his lips as he climbed up the step, through the door and past me. 

 

“Are they asleep?” he said in a whisper

 

“I hope so!” I whispered back with a chuckle.

 

He took my hand and moved towards the stairs, creeping quickly but quietly to the top and then straight into the bedroom and began kissing me. I was initially stunned, then consumed with the realisation that he was back and this was happening and that something must have changed his mind and he was back. He was back!

 

I lost myself in the moment as we rolled onto the bed and oh-so-quietly quietly consummated Richie’s return.

 

*

 

“I love you” I told him as we lay next to each other, staring upwards.

 

“Why is your phone going straight to voicemail? I was trying to call for ages last night. I thought you’d gone off with someone!”

 

“My phone? I didn’t hear it ring! Ah, my phone! Isabella still has it! Shit!”

 

“Why has she got it?”

 

“Haha!” I chortled. “She didn’t want us being disturbed. She wanted to party without interruption, so she confiscated it from me!”

 

“So I’m just a disturbance, am I? Thanks.”

 

“No, of course not! She just wanted it to be about us having a good time and to forget the rest of the world for a few hours”

 

“Yeah, you and the guys from your work. Did anything happen?”

 

“Like what?”

 

“I don’t know, you didn’t answer your phone or the messages. You must have been up to something.”

 

“No, look, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise you were trying to get through and Isabella had my phone in her bag, switched off. Hopefully it’s still there. I didn’t know you were calling. Did something happen?”

 

“No, I just wanted to talk to you. Is that not OK?”

 

“Of course it is, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise”

 

“How can you say you didn’t realise? You told me on the phone you’d call on the way back. You promised. So, do I take it your promises don’t mean anything, yeah?”

 

“”It wasn’t like that, I didn’t have my phone”

 

“I’ve been getting myself all sorts of grief with the other one, talking to you and texting you all the time and then you go out all night with your new mates and a couple of other blokes and totally blank me! What am I supposed to think?”

 

Suddenly, the sound of the parents’ bedroom door opening and someone crossing the landing to use the bathroom brought us back to the reality of the situation. We stopped talking and Richie slid down the bed, covering himself entirely with the duvet.

 

“I need to go,” he whispered from beneath the covers. “When they’re back safely in the room,” he continued, “you step out and then go down and don’t make a sound. I’ll follow. That way, they’ll think it’s just you and then I’ll go out the back.”

 

We waited in silence for the signal, then I did as instructed and within a few short minutes he was gone.