Isla was watching the two of us. ‘Is this my life now? Stuck between two siblings forever?’
‘Yes,’ we said at the same time, to an outbreak of laughter.
‘You know, I didn’t actually think the penny would drop.’ Rory murmured it so that only I could hear. ‘I’d resigned myself to a life of subpar love.’
My heartbeat skyrocketed.
‘I’m not going to say it, don’t worry.’ Rory tilted his head, watching me. ‘At least not yet. I know who I’m dealing with, remember?’
And just like that, a wave of calm blanketed me. Of course he knew who he was dealing with.
‘You know, there are lots of things I have yet to teach you about me.’
He grinned, moving his hand an inch higher again. ‘I’m looking forward to discovering them. I have a feeling you might need to teach them to me a few times tonight, just to make sure I get it.’
‘Oh, I plan on it.’ I watched our friends laughing with each other, experiencing the kind of deliriousness that only a wedding could bring.
‘You know’ – I planted a kiss on his jawline – ‘today has turned out nothing like I thought it would.’
He smiled. ‘Better or worse?’
This was a game we’d played throughout our degree and into our career. Whenever we hit a crossroads with one of our decisions – whether the interviewee for director had been the right fit for our company, whether the tweak in our dating equation was a good one – we’d ask each other a simple question. Better, or worse?
‘Definitely better.’ I leaned my head on his shoulder. ‘And guess what?’
Rory kissed my forehead. ‘What?’
‘I know exactly what I want to do with Level.’
Epilogue
Dexter came back to the table carrying five pints, wobbling slightly as he set them down.
‘As impressive as that was’ – Ella took one, nudging the others in our direction – ‘would it not have been less risky to make another trip to the bar?’
Maeve arrived with the other three – one of them a cider and black, for Harriet – balancing them on the table. ‘Just for the record, I did also say that.’
Dexter dismissed them both with a scoff. ‘This is Level. Taking risks is what we do.’
‘I’ll cheers to that.’ Harriet held up her glass, gesturing for us all to do the same. She was liberated by the fact that she was child-free for the first Friday night in a month, and I was pretty sure she’d just been waiting to start drinking all day.
I shook my head. ‘We have to wait for Rory.’
Everyone groaned.
‘We get it. You two are attached at the hip now. But I draw the line at not being able to start my pint until the man arrives.’ Dexter pulled a face at me, and I pulled one right back.
‘He has a point.’ Ella took a sip. ‘There, I’ve broken the first rule of cheers. Start drinking, we’ll wait until he’s here to raise the toast.’
‘And this is why you’re director. No one makes a decision like you do.’
Harriet had her phone out, checking Twitter. ‘It’s going down well. Better than well, actually.’
I let myself relax, laughing when Maeve bumped my shoulder against hers. She’d taken a half day to be here, so that she could celebrate the new direction of Level. It had taken us a full two months after the wedding to storyboard and implement the changes we wanted to make to how we marketed our app, but we got there. And the real thing had just launched into the world.
‘It feels like yesterday that we were all in this pub, celebrating the launch of Level in the first place.’ Ella had her phone out now, scrolling through the comments and shares. ‘Time flies when you’re having fun.’
I wasn’t quite sure that the last six months had been what I’d describe as fun. Well, except for the last two. They’d been pretty special.
‘Here he is!’ Dexter hollered towards the door, where Rory had finally entered the pub. He’d stayed a bit later than everyone else, insisting that he wanted to check that everything was perfect. He knew how important this was to me, and so from the moment I’d floated the idea, he’d made it just as important to him. I watched him look for us, eyes lighting up when he clocked me. It had been two months, but the butterflies were eight years in the making.
‘Hey you.’ He squeezed into our booth, kissing me.
‘What about the rest of us?’ Maeve recoiled when he leaned forward. ‘Definitely a joke, Ror. Definitely a joke.’
In most groups of friends, this shift of gravity might have been a problem. Not with Maeve. She was happy to be our third wheel, and I was determined to never, ever make her actually feel like one. We’d always been three, and we always would be.
‘How did everything go at the office?’ I squeezed his leg under the table.
‘Everything according to plan. Operation “make Level the first dating app to actively not push people towards the perfect match”, complete.’ He held up his glass. ‘Are we doing a cheers?’
Dexter pushed his glasses up his nose. ‘Oh, so now the king is here …’
Ella thumped him, raising her glass to match everyone else’s. ‘To Level. And to an app that continues to evolve, into whatever we feel it needs to be.’
We all cheered, and I felt my cheeks warm – partially from the alcohol, but mostly because my team had backed me all the way. They’d heard me when I said I was worried about the pressure our messaging – and the messaging of every other app under the sun – was putting on people. They’d responded when I’d suggested a more relaxed marketing plan, which encouraged people to have fun, and to get out there (and get home) safely, with a three-pronged partnership with GetThere and SafeTI. Level now encouraged people to fall in love, but didn’t make huge promises about what we could deliver. Our app made dating feel fun, rather than a race to find anyone who fit the bill. As soon as we’d pitched our change in campaign to various lifestyle brands, offers for investment had slowly trickled in, meaning that we didn’t need to consider Link’s offer to survive. Yes, we’d passed up a lot of money. But taking risks and building concepts from the ground up was kind of our thing.
‘I’m proud of you guys.’ Maeve fiddled with her boob earrings, which she’d worn tonight as a salute to the original launch party. ‘For a lot of things. But mostly for this’ – she held up her phone, where our new campaign design was all over her Twitter feed – ‘it’s really cool. I have a feeling you two are only just getting started.’
