Kitabı oku: «The Single Girl’s To-Do List», sayfa 3
CHAPTER THREE
By the time the cab dropped me off at home, I’d replayed our conversation over in my head so many times, it felt like something that had happened to someone else, or that I’d seen on TV. The exact words used were hazy, each gesture exaggerated or traded in for something that didn’t happen, but the end result was always the same, no matter how many times I ran through it. I’m not the one. He doesn’t love me. He doesn’t want me.
It took me far too long to get my keys in the door, and when I finally managed to force my way in, I flipped on the lights only to illuminate five years of happy memories lining our hallway. Holiday snaps, concert tickets, napkins from restaurants, postcards from holidays, everything we’d collected over the duration of our relationship, mounted, framed, hung, down to the receipt for the drinks on our first date. He’d kept that and given it to me the day we’d moved in together. There was no way this was actually happening.
Exhausted, I turned the light out and turned into the bedroom, kicking off my shoes and scrambling out of my vest and jeans as I went. I’d made the bed before I left, hoping to be falling into it with Simon and not tearstains and a scraped knee. Despite the fact that I’d been sleeping on my own for a few weeks, this was the first night since ‘the break’ that I’d felt lonely. This was the first time I was alone. I swapped my uncomfortable underwear for an old T-shirt of Simon’s that I kept hidden inside my pillowcase along with a dodgy old pair of boxer shorts that had no elastic left. I lay on my back and stared at the ceiling, Simon’s words buzzing through my brain as if I’d left the TV on. Sleep wasn’t coming but the most ridiculous things kept popping into my mind. My credit card payment was due. I still had two episodes of Glee to watch on Sky Plus and it was running out of memory. Tonight would be the first night I hadn’t washed my face in over four years. This was why I had to write lists. Regardless of my relationship status, no one wanted to work with a spotty make-up artist. I slid off the bed, hitching up the baggy boxers as I went.
In the hallway, I reached out to touch my favourite photo of us, taken at Emelie’s birthday the year before. Simon was laughing at something Matthew had said and I had my arms linked around his neck, my face leaning into his shoulder. He looked handsome, I didn’t look fat and we were happy. The perfect picture. I could feel the sobs building in my chest when I heard scuffling at the front door. Turning on the lights, I peered through the glass. It was Simon. I waited a couple of seconds, my mind completely empty, before I flipped the lock and swung the door open.
His left eye was already turning purple and, although someone had tried to clean him up, his nose was bloody and his lip was bust. Between his messed-up face and my seductive ensemble, this was so far removed from the perfect picture, I could have smiled. Could have.
‘The lock needs some WD-40 or something,’ I muttered, one hand holding up my shorts.
‘I’m sorry,’ Simon was still hovering outside the door.
‘Not your fault,’ I shrugged. ‘It’s been sticky for ages.’
‘No, I’m sorry,’ he said again.
I moved away from the door to let him in, my back pressed against the wall of photos. He paused right in front of me and opened his mouth to say something before changing his mind.
‘Simon?’
He stopped, turned around and looked me up and down.
‘Is that my T-shirt?’ he asked.
‘Yeah,’ I pulled at the frayed hem. ‘It’s comfy to sleep in.’
‘I thought you’d thrown it out,’ he replied.
Feeling my bottom lip start to tremble, I shook my head. I squeezed my toes and feigned a yawn so I could push back the tears.
‘Right,’ he said, his hands deep in his pockets.
I nodded. He just stood there, battered, bruised, miserable and staring at the shoes I’d never seen before. I knew I had to say something and say it now. By the morning, it would be over. Relationships like ours always died quietly in the night; we weren’t ones for violent, bloody deaths played out in public. Far too English for that. But my tongue was tied up with too many questions and my heart was already playing dead. Swallowing hard, I opened my mouth, no idea what was going to come out.
‘New shoes?’
For a moment, I really didn’t know what was happening, I was still staring at Simon’s shoes as they came over and then his arms were around me, his hot, damp face on mine. It wasn’t until I felt a picture frame digging into my shoulder blade that I realized we were kissing, that his hands were running up and down my back and then tangling themselves in my hair and back down again.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said into my hair. ‘I’m so sorry.’
Instinctively, my arms went up around his neck and my lips took his kisses on autopilot, but the sharp corner of the photo was still cutting into my back. It was only when he moved the kisses from my mouth down to my throat that I realized my eyes were open and my mind was completely quiet. What was wrong? This was the plan. Simon paused and looked up at me with a new expression on his face, half confused and half desperate to get his end away. I’d seen them both independently of each other enough times over the last five years but this was a new combo.
‘Rach?’ he panted. His concern was reasonable: firstly, kissing my neck was the surefire way to get into my pants, as he well knew; and secondly, I’d wanted this so badly for so long, I ought to be responding at least. Something was just off. ‘Rach, honest, I’m sorry.’
‘Stop. You can stop saying that,’ said a voice that sounded like mine. If he apologized, that meant he had something to apologize for and I couldn’t deal with that right now.
‘OK.’ He reached around my neck and scooped my hair over one shoulder, a gesture so familiar my stomach dropped through the floor. ‘OK.’
I nodded and closed my eyes when he leaned in to kiss me again. I kissed him back, trying not to hurt his split lip. But he didn’t care about his split lip. For the first time in a month, he wanted me, so I let him turn me towards the bedroom door, push me onto the bed and I felt the comfortable weight of his body on top of me. I didn’t need to think, I didn’t need to act, his hands started on their regular route around my body, lips making their way across my collarbone, my left leg curling up around his waist. I’d missed this so much. I’d missed him so much. My body should be screaming for him, not just reacting. It was just weird because it had been so long, that was all. And so I ignored the little voice in my head, intent on chanting ‘not the one, not the one, not the one’ over and over and over. Instead I closed my eyes and began playing my part. I had him back. And that was what I wanted. He was what I wanted. And he was mine again.
The next morning came like any other, the sun streaming in through the too-sheer curtains on the bedroom window that I never bought blackout curtains for, because Simon liked to wake up to natural light. And, as though he’d never been away, there he was beside me, that natural light illuminating his dark blond hair until it was almost golden. I lay on my side, a few inches away from him, just watching him sleep. Last night had been strange, I hadn’t been able to quite shake off the feeling that we should have talked before Simon jumped back into my bed, but this morning everything felt right. We were back on track. Whatever madness he’d been suffering, he was over it.
I turned onto my back, trying not to wake him and smiled to myself while I thought about my daily chores. Perhaps I could let myself off the list today: the post could wait at the post office until Monday and I’d get Matthew’s birthday card tomorrow. But I did need to go to the supermarket – we were out of everything. I slid off the bed, not budging the mattress, and grabbed last night’s jeans and tank top that were still lying in a sad puddle on the floor. I got dressed in the hallway, grabbing my phone, cash card, keys and a cardigan on my way out through the door, pausing just for a second to straighten the frame we’d dislodged the night before. Nothing was really aligned, but to see it there, cockeyed and nudging the next photo, made me come over all OCD. I put it back where it had been before but it still didn’t look right. Instead of fannying around and making too much noise, I took it down and propped it against the wall, making a mental note in my temporary to-do list to put it back up later on. After breakfast. After whatever Simon wanted to do today. I’d rewrite the list for tomorrow. OCD assuaged.
It was super-early for a Saturday and London was mostly still asleep, but buses bustled by and weekend workers walked on, heads down, earphones in. I dabbed on lip balm, tenderly touched my chafed chin and wrapped my hair around itself into a relatively controlled knot on the back of my head as I wandered down the street. I really had to get it cut; I really had far too much hair for just one person. But Simon liked it long. And I was used to it. Even if Dan did call me Cousin It whenever I wore it down on set.
I couldn’t believe Paul had punched Simon. It was the nicest thing he’d ever done for me. Totally made up for the time he’d cut the hair of every single one of my My Little Ponies. Well, maybe not all of them. I should call him and let him know we’d worked things out, otherwise it was going to be incredibly awkward at my dad’s wedding in a couple of weeks. Right now, I needed to think about getting pastries, coffee and cream. And probably some stain remover to try and get the blood out of Simon’s shirt. And they say romance is dead.
The supermarket seemed strangely busy, full of people on their way to work, buying tuna sandwiches for their lunch break, early risers doing their shopping, and more than one creased-looking gentleman with a terribly self-satisfied expression on his face.
‘All right?’ Something reeking of YSL Kouros nodded at me over the croissants. ‘Heavy night?’
‘Something like that,’ I said, without eye contact. Didn’t he realize he was in London? We didn’t talk to strangers. We didn’t even talk to our neighbours for the first five years unless it was to complain about the noise or errant pet shitting in our garden.
‘Yeah, trick is to get out before the ‘wake-up,’ he said, filling up a plastic bag with cinnamon Danishes. ‘But I always leave a note. You’ve got to leave a note. Just out of order not to.’
‘Right,’ I gave him a tight smile and backed away slowly towards the queue for the till.
And he followed.
‘Always felt bad for girls,’ he went on. ‘You know, you see a bloke on the walk of shame and everyone thinks, “Get in there, son!” but you see a girl walking down the street at six a.m. on a Saturday in last night’s clothes and everyone just thinks “slag”.’
‘Yeah,’ I said, flicking through the items in my basket for a moment before I realized what he’d said. ‘Sorry, what?’
‘Not me though,’ Kouros Man flung out his hands, spilling his already opened can of Red Bull. ‘I do not judge. And it’s not like you’ve got your skirt up your arse and tits hanging out like some of them, is it? Good outfit.’
Brilliant. Not only was this charmer still drunk, he thought we were one-night-stand kindred spirits.
‘You should probably give me your number, you know, in case you ever need company.’ The stale stench of whatever he’d been drinking/spilling down himself last night combined with the overabundance of intense aftershave came closer, making me gag.
‘I have a boyfriend,’ I said quickly, holding the basket between us. ‘So no.’
‘Right, course you do,’ he replied, fingering a packet of Durex for a moment before adding it to his booty. Double gag. I turned my back, hoping he would just go away, but I could still smell him. I had a feeling it would be a lingering odour. Thank god Simon had come to his senses. That was the first man in five years to ask for my number and I really didn’t feel like he was a keeper.
I paid for my breakfast bounty and vamoosed back out onto the street, so enthralled by my iPhone that I couldn’t even hear Kouros Man muttering loudly after me. Muttering something that sounded suspiciously like ‘bitch’. No, he didn’t judge.
August never guaranteed good weather in London, but that morning was beautiful. Bright, cool sunshine and a clear blue sky. I bounced back along Upper Street, scanning text messages from Matthew and Em. They wouldn’t appreciate a blow-by-blow phone call pre-seven a.m., so I tapped out an ‘everything’s fine’ text, deleted the torrent of abuse aimed at Simon, and kept the effusive messages of love. Never hurt to have them around.
I locked my phone and slipped it into my back pocket. I wasn’t particularly good at expressing emotion and I had never been particularly free and easy with the ‘L’ word. I loved my parents, I loved my brother, I loved Matthew, Emelie, Simon, Galaxy chocolate, Alexander Skarsgard and Topshop Baxter Jeans. And I really, really loved my flat. I’d lived in a wild assortment of shitty bedsits and tolerable house-shares since university but this, our beautiful two-bedroom first-floor flat, snagged for a song in the middle of the recession, was my home. The last eighteen months had been spent feathering our nest. Mostly with piles of clothes I never got around to ironing, but still. Home. I climbed the five steps up to the royal blue door and paused for a moment. I was nervous. What if Simon was awake? Maybe I should have attempted to make myself look half decent before I left. What was I going to say to him? Maybe we could just pretend last night never happened.
‘At least he won’t be wearing Kouros,’ I said to myself, and sort of to a passing dog walker, as I stuck my keys in the lock.
The flat was still quiet when I passed through the door and I slipped off my shoes so as not to wake Simon. OK, I would brush my teeth, make coffee and then whatever would happen, would happen. Setting breakfast down on the kitchen countertop, I made a beeline for the bathroom. Whatever would happen would happen. And so what? I thought as I splashed my face with cold water. One awkward conversation and then back on the road to marriage, babies and bliss. Everyone had bumps in the road; everyone had their little moments of madness. What relationship was perfect? I grabbed my toothbrush and reminded myself that the happily-ever-after myth was just that. A myth. Hmm, no toothpaste. Automatically, I reached into the cabinet beside the sink for a new tube. Real relationships were difficult and required work. They needed understanding and compromise. You couldn’t just run away when things got tough, you had to …
The toothpaste.
There wasn’t a new tube of toothpaste in the cabinet beside the sink because I’d started a new tube of toothpaste the day before. But it wasn’t in its holder. And neither was Simon’s toothbrush. And his razor was gone. Still clutching my toothbrush, I padded back through to the hallway and stopped outside the bedroom door. Even though I already knew what I was going to find, I just couldn’t open it. I felt sick. And angry. And stupid. I pushed the door open with my big toe and peered inside. At the empty bed. I stepped backwards and felt something hard and cold under my foot, followed by something sharp, stinging and hot. The photo from Emelie’s birthday. Simon must have knocked it over on his way out. In his rush.
Toothbrush in one hand, phone in the other, I slid down the wall, knocking every other photo onto the floor on my way down, and watching my blood trickle out onto the laminate flooring Simon had so lovingly laid, the day after last year’s FA Cup final. Simon always said there was no DIY during football season.
I slid the lock off my phone and pressed the last call button.
‘Matthew?’ I said quietly, trying not to flex my toes. ‘He took my toothpaste.’
CHAPTER FOUR
‘I’m going to kill him,’
I nodded.
‘I mean, I’m going to destroy him. Hold him down, punch him in the face and then rip off each limb before beating his face in with the soggy ends.’
‘’K,’ I agreed.
‘And then I’m going to—’
‘Emelie,’ Matthew interrupted, reaching down to scoop me up from the floor. ‘You’re not helping.’
I leaned into my friend and squeezed my toothbrush in one hand, my phone in the other.
‘Want to give me that now?’ he asked, holding out his hand. I gave him my phone.
‘And the toothbrush?’
I reluctantly passed it over.
Matthew and Emelie had crossed London in record time and made it to my door before I’d even moved. I had called Matthew, he had called Emelie and she had called Domino’s but they weren’t delivering yet. But the thought was there. I’d given them the abridged version of what had happened since I’d got in the cab, punctuated by sniffling, sobbing and general self-pity and, in turn, they’d filled me in on what had happened at their end which basically consisted of Paul knocking Simon on his arse, Matthew watching with admiration and Emelie landing a kick to the crotch while calling him something terrible in French that didn’t really translate. When the police were called, my three musketeers had scarpered to the nearest McDonald’s and Simon had crawled into a cab. Which was where my story took over.
‘It never occurred to me that he would come here,’ Matthew said, stroking my hair as I sat on the sofa. ‘We were going to come over but you didn’t answer the phone so I assumed you were asleep. You always reply if you’re not asleep.’
‘I did sleep,’ I said. ‘I’ll be all right.’
‘I know you will,’ he said. ‘Of course you will be. You’re well rid of that arsehole.’
Was I rid of him? Surely he was the one who had got rid of me? And I wasn’t an arsehole. I didn’t think.
‘You’re so going to be all right.’ Em was brewing enough tea to quench the thirst of Bristol. ‘How about a bath? A bath might feel good.’
‘I don’t know.’ How did someone not know whether or not they wanted a bath? Oh good, I’d gone mad.
‘Well, whatever you want to do, just tell us.’ Matthew kissed the top of my head and looked at me expectantly. ‘Or, you know, sit there in silence and we’ll just talk at you. Either way.’
The clock on the DVD player said it was 10.00 a.m. The Mad Men DVD has gone from the top of the DVD player. How could it only be 10.00 a.m.? Your life wasn’t allowed to go down the shitter before noon on a Saturday, surely. Simon must have taken the Mad Men DVD. I should get changed. I actually should have a bath. But a bath would make my foot hurt. I cut my foot. And what was I going to get changed into? Pyjamas would be too pathetic; clothes seemed too optimistic. Maybe I could go back to sleep. It was still early. If this was a normal Saturday and I hadn’t just been completely screwed over by the person I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with, I’d probably still be in bed.
‘Rachel, are you thinking things and not saying them out loud?’ Matthew asked.
Oh, I was.
‘He’s taken the Mad Men DVDs,’ I said eventually. My voice sounded thick and tragic.
‘Had you finished watching them?’ he asked.
I shook my head.
‘Fils de pute,’ Emelie breathed. ‘It’s one thing to take a girl’s toothpaste, it’s another to take her Don Draper—’
‘Right, bath first,’ he said, giving Emelie the nod. She immediately stopped refilling the kettle and hotfooted it into the bathroom. Taps turning, water running, Emelie swearing when she scalded herself on our hot tap just as she always did. ‘OK?’
I really couldn’t do much more than nod. It was like I was asleep with my eyes open. Somewhere between two and twenty minutes passed before Emelie called that the bath was ready. Matthew helped me up and gave me a gentle push towards the bathroom.
‘You’ll feel better, really.’ He shut the door before I could start stripping off. Amazing best friend though he was, Matthew was wildly uncomfortable around female nudity. He had been very clear from the outset that he had no interest in seeing so much as a boob from either of us. Emelie had, of course, flashed him within three weeks of living together, but I’d managed to retain my modesty. ‘Amazing what a bath can do.’
‘It’s ready.’ Em manoeuvred her way behind me in my tiny bathroom and pulled as much as my hair as she could into a ponytail on the top of my head. ‘Do you need anything?’
‘I’m good.’ I peeled off my vest and dropped it on the bathroom floor. Five more minutes and it probably would have crawled off my back itself. The skinny jeans were more committed to sticking with me. It took me a good couple of attempts to wrestle my way out of them before Em stepped in with one good hard tug and yanked them down over my knees. Hanging onto the sink, I watched her scoop them up, flash me a grin and then shut the bathroom door behind her. Standing in front of the mirror in my bra and pants, hair piled in a giant pineapple on top of my head, crying, with a bottom lip so low you could hang coat hangers off it, didn’t make me feel pathetic at all. Have a bath, Rachel. You’ll feel better, Rachel.
Tearing my eyes away from the sex bomb in the mirror, the actual bath itself looked amazing. It was full and overloaded with bubbles, and the steam scented the room with a relaxing, clean smell – lavender and something. All I had to do was get in. One foot, then the other and, soon, I’d smell clean and fresh too. My skin would be pink and soft, the bubbles would tickle the back of my neck and, whether I liked it or not, my muscles would relax and I probably would feel a bit better. Only, I didn’t want to feel better. I wanted to wallow and mope and run the events of the last twelve hours over and over in my mind. I didn’t want tea; I didn’t want baths; I didn’t want sympathetic friends. I wanted my boyfriend back. But if I didn’t get in the bath, a) Matthew and Emelie would know and b) I would smell. Couldn’t hurt to show willing. That was, of course, unless the bath was scorching red hot and took the skin off my foot.
Outside the bathroom, I could hear my friends’ emergency summit. The joys of cheap Nineties renovations: the walls in this place were paper thin.
‘Right, I’ll strip the bed and you take the photos of him down,’ I heard Matthew directing. ‘I’ll bloody boil-wash the bedding. I want every trace of that shit out of this flat before she gets out the bath.’
‘Done and done,’ Em replied. ‘I can’t believe he’s done this.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I really thought this one was going all the way.’
Me and you both, I thought. Me and you both.
‘Then thank god he’s done it now. Imagine if they’d actually got married.’
‘I know, I mean, how do you pretend you’re happy for someone marrying a knob-head?’
I sank back into the bath. My friends thought Simon was a knob-head? But we’d been together for five years and they’d never said anything. I knew I was never at risk of either of them trying it on with him – aside from the fact he had a penis, he really wasn’t either of their types, but still. They hated him so much they were pleased we’d broken up?
I held a bright pink foot out of the water and checked my toenail polish. It needed changing. Theme of the day. Turning on the cold tap with my toes, I tried to come up with reasons as to why Em and Matthew would dislike Simon so much. Admittedly, they didn’t have that much in common. Simon was pretty much a full-time bloke. He watched football, played video games, enjoyed the work of Will Ferrell, the body of Megan Fox and the music of Coldplay. That didn’t make him a bad person, just a straight 29-year-old man. Maybe he hadn’t always been completely comfortable around Matthew in the early days, but that was just because he didn’t have that many gay friends. And maybe he’d been a little too comfortable around Emelie on occasion, but she could hardly pretend she wasn’t flattered by his clumsy flirting. And he was a good boyfriend. He cooked, mostly because I couldn’t. He did all the man jobs, brought me flowers when he’d worked late, always remembered my birthday, never cancelled on plans, came to every last wedding, birthday and christening I dragged him to without complaint. He wasn’t selfish or greedy, he didn’t cheat or lie; he was a good man. We were happy. We had a routine. And apparently I wasn’t alone in thinking this was going to end in a ring and a white dress and a rousing rendition of ‘Oops Upside Your Head’ on the floor of a nice hotel somewhere in Surrey.
But no. No ring. No white dress. No group dance number. No explanation. Maybe if I spoke to him. Maybe if I got a real explanation, we could still talk this through. I could still get him back.
After what I hoped was a decent amount of time, I heaved myself out of the still-hot water and towelled down. Matthew wouldn’t appreciate the show of skin but, as my dressing gown was in the bedroom, this was the best I could do. I just wanted to put on some clothes, pick up the phone and get this sorted. Matthew and Emelie were standing in the living room, my bedding dumped on the floor between them.
‘What now?’ I asked, feeling all my newly acquired get-up-and-go get up and go. ‘What happened?’
‘Nothing.’ Emelie looked up, panicked. ‘Wow, you look better. Why don’t you go and get dressed?’
‘I look like shit,’ I said, tightening my towel around me. ‘What’s going on? Did something happen? Did Simon call?’
‘No,’ she said. Matthew slipped something into his back pocket and stepped behind Em. ‘Get dressed then we’ll go and get something to eat. You must be starving.’
They were the worst liars ever.
‘What did you just put in your pocket?’ I asked Matthew.
‘Nothing.’ His voice was higher than mine.
‘OK, give it here.’ I held out my hand. ‘Whatever it is, give it.’
Matthew and Emelie looked at each other. Giving him her best Care Bear stare, Em shook her head but he just nodded and pulled a piece of paper out of his back pocket and bit his lip.
‘Matthew,’ Em put her hand on my shoulder, holding me back, ‘don’t.’
‘Why don’t you get dressed first …’ he started, but I was too fast. Pushing Emelie onto the sofa, I narrowed my eyes, tightened my ponytail and checked the towel. Before jumping onto the sofa and leaping onto Matthew’s back. With one arm around his neck, I grabbed at the piece of paper in his hand while he ran around in circles, squealing like a woman.
‘Get her off!’ he shrieked, lapping the room like a headless chicken.
Emelie rolled back on the sofa, tucking her legs underneath her, hands pressed against her face. I wasn’t sure if she was laughing or crying and I really didn’t care. All I knew was that I was getting that bloody piece of paper. Matthew was on his fourth lap of the living room when I finally managed to snatch it out of his hand. At the exact same time as I lost my towel. Ignoring the fact that at least three of my neighbours were watching me take a naked piggyback ride around my living room on a six foot four gay man, I slid to the floor and quickly scanned the note.
Matthew came to a standstill, panting far too heavily for a man who worked out as often as he did. ‘Jesus H Christ,’ he wheezed, eyes wide and a look of complete horror on his face. Em composed herself quickly and wrapped my towel around me. But I wasn’t too worried about being naked at that moment. I was far more concerned with the contents of the note.
It was pale and blue and lined with raw, torn edges down one side where it had been ripped from a notebook. My notebook. Someone had been in my bag, ripped a page out of my notebook and left me a very brief message.
Rachel,
I’m sorry. It’s not going to work. I’m away with work this week and then I’m moving out.
Sorry.
Simon
I read it three more times before looking up at my friends. Matthew’s expression was somewhere between traumatized and apologetic. Emelie just looked so incredibly sad. I opened my mouth to say something, anything to break the tension, but all I could manage was a sharp intake of breath. This was it? This was all I got? The note scrunched up too easily, until it was just a few sharp corners in my palm, and when I opened up my fist, it sat there like a tiny ball of nothing. When I opened my eyes, it was still there. A tiny, innocuous piece of paper that had just completely broken my heart.
‘What time is it?’ I asked.
‘Half eleven?’ Matthew guessed.
‘Is the pub open?’
‘It’s London,’ Em picked up her handbag. ‘There’s always a pub open somewhere.’
I nodded and clutched my towel closed around me. ‘I’ll get dressed then.’
Happily, we didn’t have to search for long. Within the hour we were safely stashed away in a dark corner of a dark pub up the road from my flat. With a bottle of white wine on the table and three orders of posh fish fingers on their way, we were set up for the afternoon.
‘So your options are, we can get drunk, slag him off and stagger home with a kebab.’ Matthew ticked off the options on his fingers. ‘Or we can get drunk, you can cry and embarrass yourself horribly, then we stagger home with a kebab.’
‘Tell me there’s an option three.’ I tried to stop myself from poking my finger through the hole in my leggings. I’d blame my shoddy ensemble on the speed with which I’d got dressed, but really, most of my clothes were either entirely too much or just a bit shit. No one cared what the make-up artist was wearing on set and I’d developed something of a black leggings, white T-shirt uniform over the last couple of years. Didn’t take too much thinking about when you were rummaging in the drawers at five a.m.
‘Option three, we get drunk and plan your fabulous new life and then stagger home with a kebab,’ Matthew finished.
