Nothing New for Sophie Drew: a heart-warming romantic comedy, Katey Lovell [booksvooks .txt] 📗

own Gina-induced fears. “And it explains why you were so wary about texting me when I was on Tawna’s hen do.”

“I didn’t want to be overbearing, and after what happened at the festival…”

I blushed with embarrassment at the memory.

“I don’t give out my number very often these days either. I guess my experience has made me wary.”

“I’m honoured you gave it to me.”

“I should have done it sooner, but better late than never. So, that’s that. Now you know. What other embarrassing stuff did Mum tell you? She didn’t dig out the photos of me in the bath as a baby, did she? Because as you know, everything has grown a lot since then.”

“Haha,” I said, poking out my tongue. We’d become increasingly intimate lately, and I certainly had no complaints. “No baby photos. Mostly she was telling me about how she used to enjoy painting.”

Max nodded. “She was really good. We were up in the loft one Christmas, getting down the box of decorations, and I saw these canvases stacked up against the wall. I’d never seen them before, because they’d never been on the wall, but they looked way too professional to be hidden out of sight. Turns out they’d been pieces Mum had done for her foundation degree.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah, made me feel a bit guilty, to be honest, that part of the reason she stopped was me. Not just me, my brothers too, but she gave up her dreams to be a mum.”

He smiled a sad smile.

“I don’t think she gave up her dreams. I think her dreams changed. You four are her world, and Dylan and Isaac. Being there tonight showed me that. You’re such a tight-knit unit.”

“You should have been around when we were kids.” Max laughed. “It was mayhem in our house. We’d be stealing each other’s CDs, or using our parents’ bed as a ring so we could play wrestling. Grant broke my arm once, pretending to be Hulk Hogan. They rushed me to the hospital and I was in tears, not because of the pain, but because they made me take off the Ultimate Warrior ribbons I’d tied to my arms so they could set the cast. There were times I hated being an Oakley, like at school when teachers would assume we had the same personality because we share the same parents. I like it now though. I never have to be alone, because one of my brothers will be there for me whenever I need them. It’s like a team.”

“Do you want a big family?”

“Definitely. At least three. Do you?”

I bit my tongue, took a breath. Darius had said my pushiness, my neediness, was unattractive. I didn’t think I’d been pushy or needy, but I wasn’t going to lie to Max about how important having a family was to me. It had been different for Darius, he’d already got Summer.

I downplayed it though, not wanting to scare him off. “Sure, one day. With the right person, at the right time.”

“That’s how I feel. I’d want everything to be right before bringing a new little person into the world. I’d want to offer my children the stable and loving home I had growing up.”

“Then they’ll be very lucky.”

When Max didn’t speak I looked up at him. He was looking at me intently, and that’s when he said it. I was so surprised I couldn’t process it properly. It just rang in my ears.

I didn’t say it back, but only because I was too stunned to speak. In my mind I was shouting it from the rooftops. I love you, I love you, I love you.

August

Chapter 29

“Look at how many people are here!” I squeaked, as a jovial librarian escorted us into a back room set up with a large projector, rows of uncomfortable-looking plastic seating and an entirely female crowd whose giddiness suggested they’d already drunk their body weight in Prosecco.

“We should have had a drink before we came,” Tawna whispered. “This lot are hammered.”

“But they won’t be able to focus on Patrick,” Eve reasoned. “I doubt the clarity is going to be IMAX standard anyway, looking at the equipment. It’s on a par with the overhead projector they used to use back in primary school.”

She wasn’t far off the mark. The projector did look like it had seen better days.

“Let’s find a seat. It’s already filling up,” Tawna said, shuffling past two tipsy-looking women with actual watermelons on their laps.

Our seats were central, and I was next to Eve. Tawna sat on her other side, looking uncomfortable in her surroundings. She wasn’t used to slumming it.

“Gummy sweet?” Eve asked, waving a packet of veggie Percy Pigs under my nose.

I reached in and grabbed a handful. She turned her back on me to offer the sweets to Tawna, who shook her head, making an excuse that she was cutting out sugar until her final wedding dress fitting, and suggesting we should be careful too, now the wedding was just two weeks away. I stuffed three Percys in my mouth in a minor act of rebellion.

The library worker – a total stereotype in large round glasses, a sensible knee-length tweed skirt and a twinset cardi and blouse – stepped up to thank us all for supporting the event and ran through a generic list of safety issues. Once she’d pointed out where the loos were, that it was a non-smoking venue and that in the event of the fire alarm going off we were to leave quickly and calmly through the door we came in through, the lights dimmed and the familiar opening of Dirty Dancing started to play, with Baby and her family arriving at Kellerman’s holiday camp as “Big Girls Don’t Cry” played out in the background.

My spirits lifted at the oh-so-familiar script, and I soon found myself mouthing along to the words. I snuck a look at my two oldest friends. Tawna caught me looking and smiled softly at me, her eyes misting over. She reached her hand