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“Was I really?” Caz asked, scooting under the covers and flopping down onto the pillow.

“Really what?” Grace asked, making her way around the bed and stripping out of her own clothes.

When no answer came, she guessed Caz was asleep again and thought nothing more of it until she slid under the duvet and Caz said quietly, “The best kiss…er you…eve…r had?”

Grace closed her eyes and remembered back to that night. There’d been too much alcohol, again, when she’d stumbled into the dark room looking for the loo and found herself in Caz’s arms with no time to speak before lips were on hers and a tongue pushed into her mouth and… ”Yeah,” she admitted, just before the loud snore reverberated around the room.

Chapter Eight

July 2024

Men in jeans, trainers, and nothing else, moved back and forth between the van and the house, carrying boxes and furniture in before returning empty-handed to grab the next item.

They’d been a bloody godsend, Caz thought, picking up all of her stuff that morning before driving over to Grace’s flat and loading up her things, and now, in the blistering, early summer heat, they were shirts-off and flying back and forth from the van to the house, unloading it all.

Another thirty minutes and they’d be done.

Caz watched from the sidelines, already instructed to keep out of their way by Grace. She felt herself being watched and turned to find a small face at the window in the house next to theirs.

Blonde ringlets and a big toothless grin looked her way. She couldn’t have been any older than three, Caz guessed.

She waved.

So Caz waved back, just as the kid’s mother appeared and gave a shy wave herself, clearly feeling embarrassed her kid was stalking the new neighbours. Caz smiled at her, but then her attention was brought back to the van, and to Grace handingout cans of Coke and offering encouragement to the men, who clearly liked what they saw.

Frowning, Caz wandered over.

“Alright, babe, one of those for me?” Caz asked, already reaching for a can and smiling at Grace in a way that definitely registered a ‘hands fucking off’. One of the men nodded and held his palms up in defeat, but gave her a ‘well done, you’ kind of look.

“Uh, yep, one for you too, babe,” Grace said, trying not to laugh and playing along. “I’ll be upstairs making the bed up.”

“Great, gonna definitely need that later,” Caz called after her. And just to be sure she’d been clear with the guys, she said to them, “Got lucky there, didn’t I?”

They went back to the job at hand and Caz walked back to where she’d been standing, wondering why all that had pissed her off so much.

It was typical, she thought—pretty girl and they’re all like dogs in heat, sniffing around to see which one could mark their territory and pee on her first. “Not on my watch, mate,” she muttered to herself.

“Excuse me,” came a voice from behind; female, quiet, polite. Caz turned and found the new neighbour waving shyly at her again, this time outside and just over the fence. “Hi, I just wanted to welcome you to the neighbourhood. I’m Felicity. My Husband is Jeff. He’s not home yet—still at work,” Felicity explained. She looked down to her left and Caz followed her gaze to where the blonde toddler waddled around her legs. “This is Gertie.”

“Cool, I’m Caz and my—” she was about to say friend, but that would be very confusing, “my partner is inside. She’s called Grace.”

“Oh, lovely,” Felicity said with a slight rise in octave, clearly not expecting lesbians on her doorstep. Caz smiled. “I’ve always been very supportive of the LGBT…and all the other letters.” She blushed. “Sorry, I can’t always remember them.”

“It’s fine, you don’t have to. All we ask is to be treated kindly and with respect, like you would with any other neighbour. No special treatment.” Caz grinned. “Unless you want to, of course. I’m always open to a bribe with cake.”

Felicity laughed nervously, unsure whether Caz was being serious or not, Caz assumed.

“I’m just kidding. Seriously, we’re good people and we just want to live a nice, quiet life like everyone else.”

“I’m sure everybody will get along just fine. It’s a nice street and everyone is friendly—the kind of place to take your parcels in, you know?”

Caz nodded. She did know. She’d had old Mrs Firth’s parcel for three weeks before she found out through the grapevine, that poor old Mrs Firth had died. She still felt bad for not raising the alarm, but Mrs Firth often went away to her daughters and Caz had just assumed that was the case then, too.

“Well, that is great to hear,” Caz answered, shaking her thoughts away.

One of the guys whistled at her, waved, and shouted, “All done.”

She gave him the thumbs up. “I guess I’d best get on with unpacking. It was nice to meet you both.”