Page 40 of The F*cking Fabulous Forties Club

My heart is threatening to beat right out of my chest as I keep walking until I’m almost back at the car park and there is still no sign my lovely wee dog and my God, I cannot stand the thought that I might lose him.

It’s then that I see a figure emerge from behind some trees, his dark coat buffeted by the wind, his hand pulled down over his head, his arms cradling a rather muddy but definitely very much alive Daniel.

At his feet a small black dog bounds along happily on the end of a leash.

‘Did you lose something?’ I hear the man ask, as I fight the urge to grab Daniel from his arms and hug him like never before.

‘I did,’ I say. ‘He picked up a trail and off he ran, and then the wind and the rain and God knows…’

Daniel, who looks absolutely delighted with himself, wriggles and jumps free from the man’s arms and I crouch to stroke him, not caring if I too end up mucked to the eyeballs. I can barely speak, I’m so filled with emotion.

‘I think he might need a bath but apart from that he seems unhurt,’ the man says. ‘We found him wandering about like a lost soul near the bridge. I thought it’d be best if I brought him back here or maybe to the vet to see if he was microchipped.’

‘Thank you,’ I say, my voice shaking, glancing up only long enough not to be rude and then focusing my attention back on Daniel to make sure he isn’t hurt. ‘You’re such a rascal for making me so scared, Daniel!’ I scold him.

‘Erm… Becki?’ the man asks. ‘Is that you?’

Becki.

Hang on.

I look up, blinking in the fading light, and see that, as luck would have it, the man who has found Daniel, and who has since found me, semi-hysterical, dressed like the Michelin man and now covered in mud, is in fact Conal.

Yes, just like waiting for a bus, there has been no sighting of him for years and then it’s Conal everywhere I look. Not that I’m not incredibly grateful for him in this very moment.

Having clipped Daniel back on his lead, I stand up and try to muster whatever dignity I can to thank him. The adrenaline currently coursing through my blood stream makes me want to grab him and hug him but I won’t. I hold myself back. Instead, I mutter his name, and not in a sexy romantic heroine way. My voice is so thick with emotion that I sound just like the boys did when they were fourteen and their voices started breaking.

‘I didn’t recognise you,’ I manage to stutter afterwards.

‘To be fair, we’re both so wrapped up it would be hard for anyone to recognise us. It’s only when you spoke to the dog that I clicked. There can’t be too many dogs called Daniel in Derry.’

I explain to him how the boys thought it was hilarious to call him Daniel The Spaniel and he laughs.

‘That’s brilliant,’ he says.

‘What’s your dog called?’ I ask.

‘Oh him? He’s Lazlo. After one of the vampires in What We Do in the Shadows.’

‘I love that show!’ I say. ‘I’m a big Nadja fan myself.’

He smiles as Lazlo sniffs around my feet, the rain gets heavier and the daylight really starts to slip away.

‘Well,’ I say. ‘I think we should probably get home before this weather gets any worse.’ I want to say more. I want to ask him more. I want to invite him home with me just to see if it feels as weird as I’m afraid it might to have Conal O’Hagan in my own house. But I don’t. Because deep inside of me, there really is just a little too much left of timid and shy Becki Burnside.

‘I think you’re right,’ he says. ‘But it was nice seeing you, Becki,’ he says.

Like an absolute dick, instead of telling him it’s nice to see him too or complimenting him on his rugged good looks, or thanking him for saving my dog, I correct him.

‘Actually, it’s Becca these days,’ I say.

‘Sorry. It was nice seeing you, Becca,’ he says, before tilting his head and walking off, Lazlo nipping at his heels as they go.

‘Well, you fucked that one up,’ I say out loud, addressing both myself and Daniel.

Back home, I try to warm myself up with a cup of tea while Daniel scents all my soft furnishings with Eau De Freshly Washed Wet Dog. I try not to continue picking apart every last moment of my interaction with Conal, wondering if that would make for a good ‘Ten Ways’ column for my pitch. ‘Ten Ways to Still Behave Like an Awkward Teenager in Your Forties’ perhaps? It could work.

Niamh still hasn’t been in touch so inevitably I start to worry about her again, my interlude with Conal clearly only being an interlude before the main event of having a full breakdown about my longest standing and very best friend.