Mirrorball (Jamie Tartt)

I had a feeling so peculiar

If someone had told Thea that one day, she would be waking up at the crack of dawn on Boxing Day to go and watch football, she 'd have laughed in their face.

The only consolation is that she doesn't have to get up as early as Jamie does. She's still half asleep when he comes back into the bedroom after showering and presses a kiss to her forehead, damp hair leaving droplets of water on her skin.

"See you later, yeah?"

"Of course," she whispers. "Wouldn't miss it."

He kisses her again then says, "Look after my mum."

"With my life," she says, half in a yawn.

They had planned to go back to sleep after he left, but the bed felt too empty without him.

She'd told him it was a bad idea to buy a super king-sized bed. No one on planet Earth needs a bed this big. She would have said the rest of the universe, but she still isn't sure where she lands on the whole alien debate, so better not to say anything definitive.

Letting out an annoyed huff, she rolls over to his side of the bed and savours the warmth that's left. She tries not to think about how it's going to feel next week when she's back at the flat and the two of them are back to being an arm's length apart.

Two weeks ago, she wouldn't have been able to imagine spending Christmas with other people. Two more and she would have died on the hill that she was nowhere near ready to tell ANYONE that she and Jamie were together. But she'd done both of those things so easily.

Which left one gnawing question at the front of her mind.

Wouldn't the rest of it be just as easy?

Thea pulls the duvet tightly around her and stares at the ceiling.

All these years of forcing herself to be alone because of fear. Leaving Theodora Wallis behind had made sense in the moment, but did she really have to leave the rest behind as well? She'd been so certain that she was incapable of being happy. That, intentionally or not, she ruined every relationship she ever had. That everyone, her family, her friends, the people she loved, would be better off at a distance.

So much of what Thea does is built on the assumption that she is being watched. That every misstep would be played out over and over again. Her body. Her mind. Everything about her was moments away from being dissected for clicks and views.

But she'd fallen in love with Jamie and no one seemed to notice. She goes to football matches and is friends with the players. She'd sung at their fucking charity event with her model best friend as one of her dates. And what? The world carried on spinning.

All the secrecy had done was make things harder for her.

"Fuck."

It's only a whisper, but it's a loud as an entire crowd singing back to her. A thousand voices echoing the realisation back to her. Their voices thick with the truth.

Nestled beside the guilt that has eaten her alive over the past five years is longing. For her family, whom she missed every single day; for her life, that she'd never quite gotten back; for a thousand carefree moments that she'd never get to experience. She hadn't realised quite how much it weighed her down before. She'd just assumed it was necessary.

It wouldn't be easy, she knew that, but she couldn't keep living like that.

She needed to call her parents and tell them that she was sorry. To tell Casey everything and hope that she could forgive her. To fix things with Colin. To prove to Jamie that there was nothing she wanted more than to be with him.