Page 27 of I Know How This Ends

“Margot? Margot, wake up.”

“Nope.”

A short laugh. “I mean it, Margot. You have to go.”

“Already?” With gritty eyes, I roll backward and smile at Henry over my shoulder. “For a wannabe doctor, your bedside manner

is terrible.”

Henry grins and kisses my shoulder blade, his silver fringe tufting upward at the front like a cute duck. All I’ll say is

that last night was exactly the kind of sex I’d hope for with a man I’m planning on potentially spending the rest of my life

with. Sex that is statistically only going to get better, which at this point seems physically impossible, but I’m very much

looking forward to giving it a go anyway.

“What time is it?” I rub my eyes. “Have we slept until evening?”

“It’s seven a.m.,” Henry says, grabbing a sock and hopping round the room, trying to pull it on. I watch his lovely back with

a slightly smug cat smile on my face, staring at the star-constellation moles on his back. I am much more familiar with them now. “My mum just texted. She’s on her way with Winter.”

All smugness and any remaining sleepiness evaporate immediately.

“Wait—what? Now? ”

“Now.” Henry’s clearly panicking too. “Winnie had a bad night and she insisted on coming home first thing. It’s Sod’s Law—she normally angles to stay over there as long as possible. Where’s your bloody jacket gone?”

“Winter’s coming now ?” I repeat, frozen to the spot.

“I know ,” he says desperately, spinning in a circle around the bedroom. “No offense, but it’s way too early for you to meet her.”

Absolutely no offense taken. It’s way too early. I need to prepare properly before I meet the tiny human who’s potentially going to play such a huge part in my

life. I have a rather nasty habit of trying to shake the hands of children before desperately handing them loose change from

my pocket.

Henry’s phone beeps and he glances at it with wild eyes. “Five minutes!”

“Oh crap ,” I say, snapping into action. “I need to go .”

Panic spreading, I grab my jacket from behind a curtain and we both run like chickens around his apartment looking for my

handbag. It has apparently evaporated, much like any of the residual sexiness from last night. Nothing punctures giddiness

quite like two people screaming shiiiiiiittt while looking under the sofa.

Henry looks up hopefully. “Can you go without it?”

I stare at him for a few seconds. “Not unless I want to be homeless, penniless and uncontactable for the foreseeable future,

no.”

“Sorry.” He grimaces. “Got a bit carried away there.”

“The fridge!” I shout, standing up and running into the kitchen. “I put it on top of the fridge! Got it!” With a cry of triumph,

I grab my handbag and hold it aloft as if I’ve just won an Olympic medal. “Score!”

“Oh, thank God.” Henry breathes out. “Right. To be clear, I had every plan of making you a coffee and then taking you out

for an elaborate brunch, but we’re going to have to put a pin in that because I do not want to explain to my six-year-old

why a stranger is in her house for the first time ever at sevena.m. on a Saturday.”

“Really?” I glow at him. “The first time ever?”

“Focus, Megalodon,” he laughs, grabbing me and giving me a very quick kiss.

I feel myself instinctively lean in for another one.

He goes with it for a few seconds, then sighs and breaks away.

“And when I see you next, I’ll tell you what an amazing evening I had and how great I think you are. But right now you have to go .”

“I’m gone,” I say quickly, giving him a third kiss. “I’ll look forward to a full evaluation of our time together when I see

you next. With a grade, ideally.”

“It’s a solid A-minus,” Henry grins. “This has brought us down from an A-plus.”

He gives me another quick peck, as if we’re magnets and can’t seem to stop touching each other, and a wave of warmth pulses

through my face: I’ve never been so happy to be unceremoniously booted out of someone’s home.

“Shoes!” Henry shouts as I open the front door.

“Got them!” I grab them from the welcome mat and take a few steps backward, barefoot. “I’ll text you when I get—”

There’s a small noise behind me and I freeze.

Fuckity fucking fuck—

Slowly, I turn round. Winter is standing directly behind me, at the top of the iron staircase that leads up to Henry’s flat.

Her hair is in the wonky plaits traditionally given by grandparents. This may be my first real-life sighting of her, but she

looks—and by this point, there’s no surprise at all—exactly as I knew she would: just slightly smaller, and with a missing

front tooth. Behind her, a lady who looks astonishingly like Henry is staring at me in bemusement: silver hair, same brown

eyes, same strong albeit unbroken nose.

One more minute: that’s all I needed to get away unseen.

One minute, and I spent it kissing Henry four times. Can’t say I regret it, if I’m being fully honest.

“Who are you?” Winter’s voice is high-pitched but sweet, a little bird singing. “And why aren’t you wearing your shoes?”

Henry’s mother looks me up and down, seeing everything: just like her son.

I turn to where the front door is opening again and Henry is now standing with a shell-shocked expression on his face.

“Um,” Henry says, rubbing a hand on top of his head. “So, this is—”

“I’m your new cleaner,” I improvise quickly. “I like to clean very early in the morning. You know, before everyone wakes up.”

I look down with a wave of inspiration. “And I take my shoes off so I don’t muddy up the floor! Saves time.”

Henry’s mother isn’t buying it, and neither—sadly—is Winter. The little girl glowers at me suspiciously, and I have to bite

back a smile: she has the exact same expression as her dad when he’s concentrating.

“So if you just got here, why were you leaving? And where’s all your cleaning stuff?”

I thought children were supposed to be easy to lie to: the entire industry of Christmas is kind of based on this premise.

That, and bribery.

“I’m, uh, just cleaning the welcome mat first.” I quickly bend down and pick a bit of mud off it, then randomly toss it into

their neighbor’s garden. “Done! And I’m going to use your cleaning equipment. So it smells the same.”

I glance back at Henry and see he’s trying very hard not to laugh.

Thanks for the support, buddy.

“OK...” Winter’s face relaxes slightly. “But you mustn’t touch my teddies. They’re arranged in the exact right order.”

“Noted,” I say with a small wave of warmth for her. “No teddy touching.”

“Well.” Henry’s mother is still studying me intensely. “It’s very nice to meet you...”

“Margot,” I say quickly, apologizing to her with my eyes.

“Margot.” She nods with a small smile. “Henry, Winnie will tell you what happened. Let’s just say the puppy peed somewhere

he should not have peed.”

“On my bed ,” Winter says fiercely, still clearly outraged. “Daddy, he peed on my bed . It got on my dinosaur pajamas .”

“What a rotter,” Henry says, amused. “No more water for him. Thanks, Mum. You’re a lifesaver, as always. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

He ushers Winter through the door and then mouths thank you at me.

“So are you coming in, then?” Winter turns around and looks at me expectantly with her strangely direct hazel eyes. “You can

clean the kitchen first. Daddy is really, really messy when he cooks.”

Henry flinches slightly. “Cheers, dude.”

I stare at both of them for a few seconds, unsure how to get out of this. Suffice to say, I did not think this impulsive lie

through properly, because it now looks like I’m going to have to go back in and clean .

“Great,” I say, giving up. “I’ll start with the kitchen.”

OK, there’s no way my visions of my future with Henry are accurate, because at this rate I’ll have murdered him by lunchtime.

“Here’s the antibacterial spray,” he says, plonking it on the worktop. “Some cloths. A nice scouring pad. Do you clean ovens,

perchance?”

Then he stares at me, shaking slightly with suppressed laughter.

“No,” I say through gritted teeth. “I do not clean bloody ovens .”

“Blood doesn’t actually get in our oven,” Winter chirps up from where she’s standing next to him, still watching me carefully.

“We’re vegetarian in this house, aren’t we, Daddy? We don’t murder animals.”

“We don’t,” Henry agrees. “Unless they pee on our beds.”

Winter shoots him a horrified glance. “ Dad. ”

“ Joking ,” he adds with a laugh, pushing her slightly with his hand. “Come on, Winnie. We’ve talked about jokes.”

“Jokes are supposed to be funny,” she informs him imperiously.

“Yes,” I say pointedly. “They are.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be cleaning?” Henry grins back at me, clearly enjoying himself way too much. “Underneath the fridge

could do with a good sweep.”

“I’ll sweep you ,” I mumble under my breath, picking up the cloth and tentatively spraying the worktop. “I’ll sweep you right into next week.”

“I’ll go get the vacuum then,” he says cheerfully. “Speed things up.”

Henry leaves the room with a small chuckle and I feel my nostrils flare slightly: I will find a way to avenge myself, even

if it takes years.

I start half-heartedly scrubbing the kitchen tap.

“Are you named after Margot Fountain?” Winter is following me around like a little shadow, watching everything I do. “And

have you always wanted to be a cleaner? I want to be a vet so I can save animals, but I don’t want to make them sleep forever,

so Daddy says I have to be really good at it.”

I pause from where I’m uselessly wiping a cabinet. “Fountain?”

“Margot Fountain,” Winter explains patiently. “The ballerina. I’ve seen videos of her. I like ballet. I think I might be a

vet during the day, and a ballerina at night. Daddy says like Superman but with a tutu.”

“Margot Fonteyn .” I look at the little girl in surprise: the famous prima ballerina retired from dancing before I was born, let alone before Winter was. “I am, actually. Yes. My mother had high hopes that I’d be a dancer too.”

“Not a cleaner?” Winter asks innocently. “That’s sad.”