The Night Watch ✓

14 / the morning after

Gaia was still away when Bree woke up on Sunday to a silent flat and as she stretched out her arms, her hand fell on her phone. She unplugged it from the charger and held it over her face and when she turned it on the first thing she saw was a notification from Kit. He had a talent for messaging her when she was asleep, and she wondered if that was intentional. Before she read the message, she glanced over at his window but his light was off, and the room was empty, and she chastised herself for even checking when she knew his shift had started three hours ago. The text's timestamp read five forty, and she winced at the thought of getting up so early.

Kit: I really enjoyed last night :) maybe we could do it again sometime soon?

Bree was out of her depth with the whole dating world, one she had so little experience in that she had been thrust into much sooner than she had expected. Little more than two months had passed since she had broken up with Melody, and part of her said it was too soon to move on. After all, she had thrown everything into that relationship and when it had ended, she had felt as though a part of herself that she as growing used to had gone with Melody.

But that was over now. She was moving on, and Melody probably had too. As soon as she realised that she didn't want to say no to Kit, she stifled a morning yawn and sent him a reply.

Bree: me too, and that would be nice :)

He would be at work for a while longer, she imagined, and she didn't expect another message in response to hers. Not for several hours, anyway. Maybe by then she would have figured out what they were doing, though that was hopeful. When it came to matters of the heart, Bree's brain tended to go into overdrive and prevent her from getting a logical look at anything. She had cut ties with her old self, and it was growing clear that in doing so, she had weakened the walls she had spent so long building up.

The sun was out in full force today, streaming through the window and highlighting every particle of dust that floated through the air with no agenda. The rays cast over Bree, illuminating her body under the rumpled sheets like a beached whale lying helpless. For a while, she just lay there soaking in the warmth that speckled her cheeks and the natural light that lifted her spirits, and she glanced around her room.

It was a mess. There was a half drunk cup of coffee on the bedside table from a week or more ago, a layer of mould beginning to grow on the cold surface. Bree had a bad habit of leaving her mugs around the place, with just a little liquid left inside, and she would inevitably find them at a later date with whole new colonies living in the cups. A few months ago, Melody had moved a stack of books and discovered an orange so mouldy that it practically crumbled when she picked it up, and Bree had laughed though she cursed herself for being so slovenly.

Gaia was the opposite. Her bedroom was always perfect. At the end of every day, her clean clothes were returned to her cupboard and anything dirty went straight into her laundry bag. Every single Wednesday afternoon, she put a load in the washer, and every evening she emptied her room of any rubbish or crockery. Not that there ever was much. Rarely did she eat in her room, or make any kind of mess other than the mug of tea she took to bed with her, and it came straight back to the kitchen each morning. The two of them were chalk and cheese in so many ways, whether that was in their habits or looks, and Bree couldn't help but be intrigued by that.

Before 2014, she'd had no idea where Farnleigh was, and she had never come across Gaia McFee. In fact, she had never even heard of the name Gaia before, let alone someone called that, until she had come across a newspaper ad looking for a flatmate. One day, driving home after a party in Manchester, Bree had stopped in Farnleigh to fill up on petrol and while idly flicking through the local newsletter as she waited to pay, the ad had stuck out. At the time, all it had said was that there was a room to rent in Reback Court for seventy pounds a week, with Gaia's first name and her phone number. It was the name that had caught her eye, and a quick Facebook search had revealed the only person with that name who lived in Farnleigh.