Excerpt of Is This Love? by Sue Moorcroft

Tamara breezed in through the front door of her childhood
home, Max in tow, and on into the sitting room, fending
off an exuberant doggie welcome from Jabber.

‘Hel— Oh!’ She stopped short at the sight of the man
talking to her parents and Lyddie, her sister.

A jolt of recognition. Jed. Jed Cassius.

The last time Tamara had seen Jed, he and Lyddie had been
thirteen, a huge three years older than Tamara. Her heart
twisted to remember how Lyddie had been ‘seeing’ fun,
good-looking Jed Cassius, writing his name on her books
at school and being told off at home for hanging out with
him, instead of getting her homework done. Now, there
wasn’t even recognition in Lyddie’s eyes as she treated
him to her usual open and guileless smile.

‘Um, hello,’ Tamara began. When Jed Cassius only stared
in response, she glanced at her parents for clues to the
mood. Her father, Sean, wore his usual genial expression.
But Cheryl, her mother, looked wary.

Lyddie stumped across the room, flinging herself on
Tamara with a big hot hug and a wet kiss. ‘Hey, ’Mara!
Way to go!’ Way to go was Lyddie’s latest phrase. She
latched onto certain combinations of words and used them
over and over. Beaming, she hauled Tamara forwards,
almost into Jed Cassius. ‘This is my sister, ’Mara, and
her boyfriend, Max.’

Gently, Sean took Lyddie’s arm, a signal that she needed
to calm down. ‘Yes – remember Jed, Tamara? We used to be
friendly with his family.’

Jed’s eyes were the green side of hazel. They hadn’t
changed. But the gangling, laughing teen of Tamara’s
memory had been overlaid with a self-possessed, assured
man; taller, built from muscle, jaw like a blade, his
hair darker. She swallowed. ‘Yes, I remember you. You
lived right down Main Road, not far from Gabe Piercy’s
place.’

He smiled faintly. ‘I remember you being around but I
wouldn’t have recognised you.’

Lyddie was fixed firmly in chatter mode. ‘Isn’t ’Mara’s
dress pretty? I like the way it shows the tops of her
boobs.’

Jed Cassius was surprised into letting his eyes flicker
to Tamara’s neckline and, though well used to Lyddie’s
lack of inhibition, Tamara felt the beginnings of a
blush.

‘Max,’ Lyddie beamed. ‘Do you like the way—?’

‘Oh, yes, Saucepan Lid.’ Max gave Lyddie’s long hair a
friendly tug.

Lyddie, eyes bright, roared with laughter at the familiar
joke. ‘My name’s Lyddie, not Lid! I can’t fit on a
saucepan. Maxie-Max, did you buy a house?’

‘I’ve seen one I like. But it’s not in the village—’

‘Let’s talk about that later.’ Tamara shot Max a warning
frown. She turned back to Jed. ‘We used to call your
parents Uncle Don and Auntie Fiona. Your family moved
away not long after Lyddie’s accident.’

Their departure had been only a spark of sadness in a
furnace of grief, as Tamara had been forced to watch
Lyddie struggling to talk in her new laborious voice and
to grind through physio with her new awkward body.

Jed nodded. ‘That was us.’

Cheryl slid a brisk arm around Lyddie. ‘Come on, darling,
it’s nine thirty, let’s get you ready for bed.’

If Lyddie didn’t get enough sleep she turned grouchy and
difficult. But challenging behaviour had to be accepted
from someone who was thirty-three-going-on-eleven, who
had bits of her brain that seemed to have set like the
tarmac her head had crashed onto when a speeding car had
knocked her old life right out of her.

Lyddie’s mouth turned down. ‘I don’t want to go to bed.
Tamara’s not going to bed.’

‘But you need your sleep, darling.’ Cheryl took her hand.

Reluctantly, Lyddie allowed herself to be guided towards
the stairs. ‘Can Jabber sleep with me tonight, Mum? Just
tonight? Just once? Just once? He’ll be good, he’s a good
dog, Jabber is.’

She was wasting her breath. Cheryl never allowed Jabber
to sleep upstairs and he always seemed perfectly content
with his green beanbag and leopard-print fur fabric throw
in the kitchen.

Sean sent Tamara a smile. ‘Jed’s come to talk to us about
something.’

Jed had been watching Lyddie’s exit with eyes that were
dull with shocked compassion. He switched his attention
back to Sean. ‘I’d like to wait till Cheryl’s back
downstairs.’

So this was no impetuous visit. Tamara’s neck prickled.
‘Would you like coffee?’

‘Thanks.’ Jed’s hair was the bronze brown of a new
chestnut, straight and silky, falling into his eyes. He
had the look of someone who wanted to be somewhere else:
stiff, watchful.

Max followed Tamara into the kitchen. ‘I thought we were
only popping in for a minute so that you could say
goodnight to Lyddie? I want to talk about the house.’

She shrugged a half-apology. ‘But I want to know why
Jed’s here. And it’s your house, Max. I’ve already got
one, here in Middledip.’

He reached round her for the sugar canister, trapping her
against the cupboards as he spooned sugar into mugs. ‘But
mine will be big enough for both of us. And it’s the
right side of Peterborough, so you wouldn’t be that far
from your precious Middledip.’

From upstairs, Lyddie yodelled, ‘Goodnight ev-er-y-
bodeeee.’

‘Goodnight, Lyddieeee,’ they all yelled back. Her bedroom
door clacked shut.

Tamara bumped Max out of the way with her bum, and picked
up the tray. ‘Mum will be down in a minute. Let’s get
this into the sitting room.’

Cheryl trod down the stairs to rejoin them, took her
coffee with a nod of thanks, and perched on the edge of
an armchair. ‘Well, Jed?’

Jed accepted the cue, looking from Sean to Cheryl and
then to Tamara, cradling his coffee mug. ‘My dad died
recently, from cancer.’ He lifted his voice to override
the murmurs of sympathy and dismay. ‘And in his last days
of coherence he told me something that he made me promise
to come and tell you.’

The room went still.