1 year and 3 months later.

 Summer was gone, vanished in a blur of scorched grass, lazy days, and beachside living. Winter had replaced it, darkness, fairy lights, and frosty mornings sweeping in. It was the first time I'd been home since I started university. The endless tumble of new faces and nights out had come to an abrupt halt. When I dropped my bags in the hallway of my house, I felt strange. The off-white walls, the painting of a Greek villa Mum had never visited, the burning force of the central heating hitting me as soon as I stepped through the door. Everything was as it should be, but something had changed.

Dorothy rushed downstairs to greet me as soon as she heard the front door click behind me. She threw herself into me, almost knocking me off my feet as she held me in a tight hug. I laughed, trying to peel her off.

"Pleased to see me?"

"Yes. Just don't tell my friends I did that," she said, letting me go. The sincerity on her face made me laugh harder.

"Your secret's safe. As always."

"Good. Don't forget I've got yours saved up too."

I ruffled her hair, trying to ignore the extra inch she'd grown since I last saw her. Mum appeared in the doorway behind her, blocking the entrance to the living room. She wrapped in a cashmere sweater, the lines of her eyes deepening with the effort of smiling.

"Welcome home," she said. I could tell by her face that she'd been doing overtime again. She'd lost a lot of colour. Me being home to help with Dorothy was a massive relief, but she was trying not to show it.

I gave her a hug, the smell of Chanel perfume assaulting me with childhood memories. It wasn't our usual way, but since I'd moved out, everything at home seemed smaller. Less consuming. The awkwardness that had chafed between us didn't matter anymore. I held on tight, greeting her the way a daughter should.

She was stiff at first. Unsure. Then her arms wrapped around me, reciprocating the embrace. We stayed like that for a few seconds, then parted, avoiding each other's eyes.

"I expect you want to get yourself sorted before we bombard you with questions," she said "I'll put the kettle on. You take your bags upstairs."

I nodded as she hurried into the kitchen, Dotty following at her heels. I was still. Their chatter was far away. The hiss of the kettle was distant. The cars on the road outside hummed from another world.

My eyes flashed to the stairs, their steep curve beckoning me.

I felt as though I was seeing them with fresh eyes. A visitor to the house, longing to explore.

I trudged up the stairs and dropped my bags on the floor of my old bedroom; a hollow space where my life had once been. The net curtains were still, the window closed, but if I concentrated, I could see them blowing in and out, me lying on the bed, Scott and Cara's voices filling the room, and someone else's too. Someone I'd promised myself I wouldn't think about.

It had been a year.

And yet his name had come screaming back to me as soon as my train pulled up at the station. Home. He was it.

I tried to shake him away, but he was there in every passing car and in the face of every stranger. He was in the pages of my favourite book, lying abandoned on my bedside table. He was in my perfume and in the dresses that peeped out from the wardrobe. He was in the pyjamas rolled up under the duvet. He was in my skin, in the threads of my hair. He was all over me.

It had never gone away. His skin, his smile. The way he looked at me. The way he laughed.

I couldn't drink him away. I couldn't purge him with other people's bodies. I couldn't dance him out or exhale him in smoke.

He was there. The old was fading, but he did not.

And I realised that part of me had always believed I'd see him again, standing on the dock, his shirt undone, his eyes turning grey in the dark.

But I couldn't find him. He was gone. Unreachable. And all I had done was hidden from the truth. Packed it away and stored it in a place where it wouldn't hurt me every day. And now, I was blowing off the dust. Confronting it.

I hid the truth behind my eyes, but Dotty could see it. I suspected Mum could see it too.. They let me pretend. They let me talk about fancy dress nights and 9 a.m. lectures and drinking games in the Irish pub. They let me talk about the beaches in winter, about playing sardines and laughing until the sun came up. They nodded along, enabling me. They didn't press me about the boys. The romance. If they had, I might have been forced to admit that no one could compare. No one had come close. That I couldn't let anyone else in.

The past tapped me on the shoulder. It had been waiting a long time for my attention.

A week after I got home, I decided to throw a reunion.

I knew Joe wouldn't come. He was still abroad. I'd heard through friends of friends that he was staying out in Greece to help with his father's business. He'd put Uni off for another year. And why wouldn't he? The world was his already. He had no need to work for it. No need to do anything other than stay where he was and wait for it to be handed to him.

I accepted that he wouldn't be there. That maybe he'd never be there again. But I wanted to see Logan. I wanted to find some connection to him. Understand his side. My best chance of that was Logan. He was my only chance. And so I orchestrated the plan.

Cara was quiet when I told her. She sat in my conservatory sipping on ice-cold Coke despite the freezing weather outside.

"A reunion sounds fun," she said after a while. "Scott can bring his new girl. He's brought her home to meet the family already. Can you imagine?"

"It's very Scott," I said. I was sitting on the floor cross-legged, looking up at Cara as she lounged across the sofa. Both of us were in fluffy socks, pyjama bottoms and hoodies. Cara's belonged to Marianne, a girl who made her blush to speak about. Mine belonged to someone whose name I barely remembered, a casualty of their hasty early-morning exit from my room.

"So, who are you going to invite to this reunion? I'm sure me and Scott were the only two people you actually liked at school."

"That's not true. I liked Tom..."

Cara raised her eyebrows.

"And Logan."

She choked on her drink.

"You did not like Logan."

"For your information, he really started to grow on me towards the end."

"Okay," Cara smirked. "Invite who you want. I'll be there."

She could have asked questions. Could have pushed me to admit the truth. But instead, she told me about the philosophers she was studying for her degree. Mary Wollstonecraft and Jean Jacques Rosseau.

"We're all stuck, aren't we?" she said pensively. "Wanting to do what feels good but knowing we should do what's right."

I looked past her shoulder, watching the tyre swing moving back and forth in the breeze.

"Yeah..." I said. "Something like that..."

Later that night, I found myself with phone-in-hand, messaging Logan.

He was home.

"I'd love to see you guys," he wrote. "Who else is coming?"

"Just me, Cara, and Scott. Exclusive reunion!" I responded.

"Great. Send me the details."

So I did.

The old social constructs didn't apply now we'd been blown across different parts of the country. We clung to each other, united by the realisation of how small our home was. How big the world outside could be.

On the night of the reunion, I sat in my local pub, absorbing the Christmas lights, listening to the music, breathing in the smell of spiced cider and wine. The fire crackled in the hearth sending waves of warmth over our table. I kept my hand on my glass. Vodka and lemonade with ice. Cold and satisfying. Sharp, like the winter chill outside.

I tried not to stare at the door. I tried not to jump every time I heard it open, but even if I didn't look or listen, the rush of freezing air demanded my attention every time. I faced forward. I tried with everything I had not to look for him. A familiar figure with a familiar walk. It was impossible that he was coming. He was gone.

Joe was a comet. He burst into my life and lit it up. He showed what it means to connect. Just for a second, I wasn't alone. Just for a second, I wasn't a warrior. I could hold someone's hand instead.

Those days by the water would always be ours. Once in a lifetime. The collision that changed it all.

And maybe that was enough.

Scott's girlfriend, Anika, caught me looking at the door. She smiled with understanding. Scott must have told her. She was a complete stranger, and yet she was the only one who saw. Scott was busy talking about his American Politics module. Cara was clicking away on her phone, messaging one of her new university friends. But Anika saw. Her bright eyes looked into mine just as the door opened again. The bell jangled. The air rushed in. And then came a voice. The voice of a ghost. A voice that sent my heart racing under my velvet blouse.

"Hey!"

I turned to see Logan walking towards us, his hand raised in enthusiasm. He wore a grey herringbone coat with a black collared shirt underneath and fitted, skinny, black jeans. He looked older. Different. Just like everything else at home, he had changed and yet was the same. The slant of his smile took me back to warm summer afternoons and for a second, the chill of the open door was gone. I tried to focus on the boy standing next to him, brushing off the hands of the past as they tried to pull me.

The boy was around our age, his hands slung in the pockets of a military jacket. Together, he and Logan looked as if they'd stepped out from another time. There was a familiarity between them that was obvious as soon as they approached the table.

Logan smiled, surveying our little group.

"You weren't lying about exclusive," he said, his eyes falling on Anika.

I got up out of my seat, taking responsibility for the event.

"Logan," I said. I'd meant it as a casual greeting but was surprised by the amount of feeling his name produced. He opened his arms and I hugged him, shutting my eyes as I leant against his shoulder. He held me for a few seconds, the two of us united in our silent, unspoken grief.

When he released me, he turned to the boy next to him.

"This is Dillon."

Logan slipped an arm around his waist. Then I understood.

We both loved him. We both loved him the same way.

"Dillon." I extended my hand. "I'm Billie. Nice to meet you."

Logan looked at me, mouthing 'thank you' when the others couldn't see.

I nodded. We'd finally met.

As the others started talking, introducing Anika and swamping Dillon with enthusiastic questions, Logan moved closer, addressing me so the others couldn't hear.

"Thanks for this. I really needed it..."

He looked over at Dillon, watching as he slid into a seat around the table. When his gaze fell back on me, I realised we had the same ghost in our eyes, connected, all this time, by the same invisible pain.

"I did tell him," Logan said. "I know he's not here, but I told him. Just in case..."

"Thanks, Logan." It was all I could say. He bowed his head, understanding. As he went to sit down beside Dillon, I saw his eyes flicker towards the door where they lingered for a second too long.

"I'm going to get a drink," I said, desperate for something to do. "Anyone want anything?"

"Rum and coke," Logan said. "Dillon will have a cider."

I nodded and made a beeline towards the bar.

As I ordered the drinks, I glanced over my shoulder, watching my friends without them knowing. I watched Scott throwing his head back, laughing at a joke made by Logan. Cara, peeled her eyes away from her phone, her shoulders shaking as struggled to suppress her amusement. Anika watched like a happy spectator, her eyes brightening when she looked at Scott, her whole face illuminated by the sight of him. In the middle of speaking, Logan rested his hand on Dillon's and squeezed, the gesture beautifully unnoticed by the rest of the group.

It stirred something inside me. Something quiet and warm. Something that spread from my chest to the rest of my body. Something that made me smile, even though it hurt. Something that made me feel like I was going to be okay.

I caught sight of myself in the mirror that hung behind the bar. My eyes were dark and vacant. They hid so much of what I thought, what I remembered. They hid the entire story. No one looking at me would know what I'd felt. What I'd lost. To them, I was just a girl. A blank space. There were no scars. No damage. Nothing visible on the surface.

It fascinated me.

Maybe that's all we are. Pretty packages that hide the true story. Something neat to look at. Something with edges. Something to contain the complexity and the pain, the messiness. The joy. Everyone I'd loved or hated, talked to, or admired, they were all wrapped up inside me. A piece of them stuck, altering me forever. But the outside stayed the same.

And maybe that was it. Maybe that was everything, all along.

As long as I had the girl looking back at me from behind the bar, I had everything. It was all in me.

When the door opened again, I didn't look up. I ignored the jingle of the bell and the rush of cold air.

As long as I have her, I have it all.

I ignored the figure that stepped in, dusting off their coat. I watched the bartender drop chunks of ice into my drink, filling the glass with Coke from the tap. I listened to the music playing. The hum of voices.

I have her and she will never leave. She will never change her mind or tire of me. She will never let go of my hand. She will stay

Somewhere in the distance, someone started to sing, the slur of their voice weaving around the melody.

No one else could see the magnitude of that moment. The invisible epiphany. The underlined conclusion. The shutting of a book left open for far too long.

An ending was happening at the bar. In plain sight, in front of everyone. The ending of something that had held me in its grip for precisely one year and three months. I had untied the chain. I was free.

And it was over.

But that's the thing about endings. Sometimes they are a trick. Doors open again. Bells jangle. The cold rushes in, and with it, a strange certainty, like the approach of a familiar figure in the corner of your eye. That certainty can sound like a word. Like the first word you ever hear. A word that meant you weren't alone. Not really. Not ever. It's a word you hear a thousand times a day, but, sometimes, when it's spoken at the right time and in the right voice, it's a word that changes everything. A collision. Once in a lifetime...

"Billie?"

I looked up.