The bar seemed very low. So low that it was touching the ground. ‘That doesn’t seem so hard to find.’
‘Are you fucking kidding me?’ Margot snorted and came to a halt, her hands on her hips. Will shifted Blossom in his arms so her face wasn’t buried in his neck and she was no longer able to enthusiastically lick him, and stopped too. ‘Needle meet haystack.’
Will had always had a type when it came to women and that was women who weren’t looking for anything serious either. He’d had several long-term relationships; three years with Sofie in Berlin, eighteen months with Charlotte in Paris, two years with Naomi in New York. Nothing serious didn’t preclude staying the night or weekend breaks, but it also didn’t include having to meet each other’s families or long, torturous conversations about where things were heading. He’d been happy with that. Or the man he’d been then had been happy with that. The man he was now still wasn’t ready – no, wasn’t able – to commit emotionally, but Margot could. Would. Should.
‘You’ve destroyed my belief system. I had you down as a hopeless romantic,’ he said, which earned him another snort, this time with added eyeroll.
‘Hopeless is right,’ Margot muttered and started to walk again. ‘I’m not a romantic, not anymore. What I am is pragmatic. And also thirty-six. When you’re past thirty-five, if you want to settle down, then you have to settle. So, love is all very well, Will, but if I have to factor that in too, I’ll still be single and heading straight towards my seventies.’
If someone like Margot had given up on love, then what did that say about the world? ‘Any man would be lucky to have you,’ Will said, his face reddening. He couldn’t blame it on the morning’s exertions. He was blushing because it was probably the most emotionally intimate thing he’d ever said to a woman, but it was important that Margot knew that she was deserving of love and she didn’t need to settle for anything less. ‘There’s someone out there who is going to fall head over heels in love with you.’
Margot shook her head, the movement so small that it was almost imperceptible. ‘Doubtful,’ she decided. ‘And if he is out there, then he’s taking his own sweet time.’
By now they’d reached the Grove and the avenue of trees that took them to the top of Muswell Hill.
From a distance, it looked like a gentle slope, but Will knew from bitter experience that there was nothing gentle about the incline. It was harder and more strenuous to walk up than to tackle some of the steepest hills that North London had to offer. And Will knew about hills. In his former life, he’d run the notoriously hilly Blue Ridge Marathon in Roanoke, Virginia. He would have liked to challenge Margot further, though he couldn’t bear to hear about the recent dates that she’d been on, but he needed every breath in his body for the ordeal ahead. As it was, he was already panting like he’d just reached mile twenty.
‘Maybe you should put her down,’ Margot said, eyeing Will and his canine cargo. ‘Do you always carry her like that?’
Usually Will hoisted Blossom up so he could wedge an arm under her rear and she would wrap her front paws round his neck and rest her chin on his shoulder, but today he was cradling her in his arms like a baby. ‘No, this is a first.’ He peered down at Blossom. ‘Am I jiggling her? Is she in pain?’
Margot shot Blossom a suspicious glance. ‘She’s looking kind of smug,’ she said. ‘Like she’s absolutely milking it.’
Will gratefully came to another stop so he could get a good look at Blossom. She did seem to have a roguish glint in her eye. ‘Are you faking it, Bloss?’
She waggled her front paws by way of a reply.
‘Totally faking it,’ Margot confirmed.
‘So disappointed in you, Blossom,’ Will said, as he lowered her to the ground. ‘No telly privileges for the rest of the week.’
Blossom sat down and held up a paw in protest.
‘You’ve been rumbled,’ Margot told her, bending down to tickle her ribs. ‘Go on, off you go!’
Blossom shot off as if she’d been scalded. As usually happened when she got told off, her ears were pinned back, her bottom going in one direction, her tail going in the other, as she indulged in an almighty flounce that said very plainly, ‘You’re not my real parents and you can’t tell me what to do!’
Then, flounce over, she did two complete circuits around the fence that encircled a veteran oak tree then zigzagged from one side of the path to the other.
‘Why couldn’t we have got a normal dog?’ Will asked Margot as they went off-road onto the grass where Blossom was sprawled on her back with her legs in the air.
‘If she’s rolling in fox poo then you’re cleaning it up. She’s not officially mine for another twenty-four hours,’ Margot said. Will grinned at her and it would have been the easiest thing, the most natural thing in the world, to take her hand and walk home like that.
But there was nothing easy about them. Especially not their dog, who came trotting over to lay down again. Her meaning was unmistakable: ‘You seem to be cross about something. Maybe stroking my belly would make you feel better. Got to be worth a try, right?’
Margot obligingly bent down, groaning as her muscles protested, to rub a hand along Blossom’s taut tummy, which was made from the softest substance in the world.
But Will got there first. Their hands collided for one blissful moment, then they separated. Will taking the top, Margot taking the bottom, as Blossom got the best belly rub of her life, so that she was panting and wriggling and unsure of whether to make them stop because it was too much, or to carry on because it wasn’t enough.
‘Is she . . . is she laughing?’ Margot wondered aloud, anthropomorphising Blossom yet again. Though to be fair Blossom was the most human dog Will had ever met.
‘It’s because she’s panting,’ Will said, crushing Margot’s dreams. He must stop doing that. ‘Panting because having your belly rubbed is very strenuous, isn’t it, Blossom?’ and he redoubled his effort with the belly rubbing until Blossom really did push them away.
They started for home again. Blossom back on all four paws, walking between Margot and Will as they trudged up the avenue of lime trees. But every time one of them looked down at her, Blossom would look up, her eyes adoring, her mouth wide open in an unmistakable, irrepressible grin.
By the time they reached the Broadway, Margot said she was ready to drop. ‘Just to be clear, we’re not doing our usual Heath walk today, are we?’ she clarified. ‘My legs are screaming at the thought of any more walking.’
‘Oh God, please no. I never ever want to walk anywhere ever again,’ Will confirmed. ‘Also, just to be clear, my mother doesn’t need to know what happened with Blossom, right? She’d be beside herself.’
‘I’ll take it to my grave.’ They came to a stop outside the florist, there was a small queue winding through the buckets of flowers on display as Sage served customers and Ian took their money. Margot tore her eyes away from a galvanised steel bucket full of brightly coloured tulips so she could look at Will. ‘So . . . I guess I’ll see you . . .’
‘We should have tea.’ Will was nowhere near ready to say goodbye and not see Margot until their handover tomorrow. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’