Just Saying: An absolutely perfect and feel-good romantic comedy

by Sophie Ranald

  So the garden, in the middle of autumn, was anything but a shady bower of bliss. The patch of lawn was mostly bare earth, carpeted with leaves that had fallen from the neighbour’s huge birch tree. The wooden picnic table we’d bought at Argos, assembled hastily and never got around to varnishing, was bleached grey by the sun and jagged with splinters.

  And now, at that table, saucepan of mulled wine and two glasses between them, were Zoë and my brother Drew. Oh, and Frazzle, who was lazing in the centre of the table, paws in the air, his belly stretched out towards the glowing heat of the fire they’d lit in our barbecue.

  ‘Alice!’ Drew swung his long legs out from under the table, stood up, stretched and came over to hug me. ‘Sorry to barge in. I tried calling you, and when you didn’t answer I rang Joe, but that went to voicemail too, so I dropped in at the Nag’s Head and Zoë took pity on me and brought me back here.’

  He turned and gave Zoë the benefit of his megawatt smile.

  ‘We were thinking we might roast some potatoes in the coals,’ she said. ‘Or maybe just order in a curry.’

  ‘Let me get you a glass,’ Drew said. ‘Oh, wait, you’ve got one already.’

  I realised I was still holding the tumbler I’d picked up from the rack by the sink and not got around to filling with water. Hesitantly, feeling almost as if I was intruding, I took a seat on the side of the table where Drew had been, and Zoë filled my glass with ruby-coloured liquid, fragrant with orange and cinnamon.

  ‘I’ll stick it back on the stove to warm up a bit,’ she said, reaching for the pan. ‘Drew brought a couple of bottles of red and I had some cider brandy hanging around so we added some of that too. I’m two glasses down and I’m already shitfaced.’

  She headed, slightly unsteadily, back inside.

  ‘So what…?’ I began.

  ‘What the hell am I doing here?’ Drew grinned, lighting a cigarette. ‘I thought I’d drop in, since it was so successful when I did that on your birthday. And since we’re going to be neighbours for a while, you’re going to have to get used it.’

  ‘Neighbours?’

  ‘Didn’t Mum and Dad tell you?’

  It was typical of my brother that, rather than communicating his news to me himself or sharing it on social media like everyone else, he expected our parents to provide me with regular bulletins about his life.

  I shook my head.

  ‘So my mate Lauren – you know, I met her in Vietnam a couple of years back – just got offered a part in a movie, and she flew out to LA yesterday. It’s not a starring role or anything like that but she’s pretty excited, and it’s not like she needs the money; her family’s minted. Anyway, her parents just bought her a flat in that new development up the road – you know, the one with the studio apartments and the communal living space that’s run by that start-up guy?’

  ‘That used to be our local pub.’

  ‘Did it? It’s a bit of a shithole if I’m honest. It’s been thrown up in a massive hurry. The heating’s dodgy as fuck, the walls are so thin I swear I can hear when the neighbour’s on Pornhub – which I guess could be a selling point, if you were skint enough for an audio-only wank – and there’s not enough space to swing this dude.’ He stroked Frazzle’s tummy and the cat writhed with pleasure. ‘Anyway, Lauren’s seriously into bonsai and she’s got all these trees that needed looking after. So that’s where I came in.’

  If I was seriously into bonsai, I thought, Drew would be the last person I’d entrust with my precious plants. By the time Lauren got back from California, I was willing to bet all her trees would either be dead or have taken over the tiny apartment, like some kind of urban rainforest.

  ‘And to be honest,’ Drew carried on, ‘I needed a place to live, because I’ve been driving Mum and Dad spare. I was going to ask if I could stay with you guys for a bit, but now I won’t have to, which is just as well because it looks like there’d be no room at the inn.’

  He gave a sidelong glance at Zoë, who’d reappeared with the full pan of mulled wine. There was no chance to explain to him how she’d come to be living with us – or confide in him about my deep misgivings about the situation.

  ‘I was just telling Drew about the pub,’ Zoë said. ‘And how you’re basically running it at the moment, while Shirley’s off.’

  ‘It sounds dead cool,’ Drew was saying, taking a deep draught of wine; although when I tasted mine it was so strong I almost choked. ‘Place like that, there’s so much potential. You could have games nights and live music and life drawing and bingo and all sorts.’

  ‘Bingo? Have we entered a time warp and ended up in Blackpool in the 1960s?’

  ‘On the contrary,’ Drew said. ‘Bingo’s enjoying a massive resurgence among young people. It’s one of the most popular online games, and now it’s become massively on trend in bricks and mortar venues too.’

  ‘I should be taking notes,’ I replied, hoping I didn’t sound as dull as I suspected. It occurred to me – not for the first time – that there could hardly be a person in the entire world with their finger less on the pulse of what was on trend than me. Hell, up until a few weeks ago my idea of a happening night out had been a few glasses of rosé with a group of my suited and high-heeled colleagues in a City bar.

  ‘You don’t need notes,’ Drew said. ‘You need me. Haven’t I worked in bars all over the world? Haven’t I slung out drunk sheep farmers at closing time in the Outback? Didn’t I persuade a bunch of Hells Angels in Stockholm that three in the morning was about time for them to go home to their wives for a nice cup of tea?’

  ‘Obviously you’re the Gandhi of the pub world,’ I said. ‘But we don’t need big ideas like that right now. We just need to keep the place ticking over and hope the rats in the cellar don’t take over.’

  ‘Frazzle would sort them right out, wouldn’t you, my little furry psychopath?’ Zoë scratched her cat behind the ears and he purred thunderously, looking about as unlike a cold-blooded killer as you could possibly get.

  ‘But I can help with that, too,’ Drew insisted. ‘Not the rats, obviously, but keeping it ticking over. Go on, admit it – you could do with some extra help. I can build a website for the place, promote it a bit, work behind the bar and carry heavy things. I’ve worked in a lot of bars, and there hasn’t been a single one that couldn’t do with extra help. And I’ll do it for free – I’m between gigs at the moment. I’ve got a place to live – I don’t need anything else. Just a project. It’ll be fun.’

  I looked at my big brother, leaning back on the shabby wooden bench, his hands behind his head. The fading light cast his perfect bone structure into sharp relief, and I could see the muscles of his chest and abs beneath his grey sweatshirt. He was infuriating, and I loved him to pieces. I often worried whether he felt bored and frustrated by his aimless life – even though he seemed to have acquired so many useful skills during it.

  But then another thought struck me. Drew was Drew. Drew was irresistible to women. Zoë was single. If the two of them spent some time together – and it would be loads of time, if they were both working in the pub – wouldn’t Drew be the perfect person to help Zoë get over Joe?

  ‘You know, you might be on to something there,’ I said.

  Sixteen

  Drew was as good as his word. Next morning, shortly after I opened the doors of the Nag’s Head, I saw him strolling across the road from the former Star and Garter, which had now been snazzily rebranded Garter Apartments. He spent the whole morning in a whirlwind of activity: taking out the heavy bags of bottles to the recycling bin, hoovering the carpet, mopping the floors in the bathrooms, even helping Zoë change the grease filter in the kitchen extractor.

  But I knew my brother, and I knew he’d get bored with the heavy lifting before long and move on to bigger ideas. Sure enough, by lunchtime, he was sitting at a table with his laptop, beginning the design of a new website for the Nag’s Head. Then he created a slew of social-media accounts for the pub. Then he went out for a
fag. Then he suggested that he and Zoë head off on a fact-finding mission to Borough Market, to check out street-food ideas for the new menu.

  And the next day, he came to work bearing an armful of brightly coloured boxes.

  ‘Board games. I picked them up at a charity shop – twenty quid for the lot. And they’re almost new. Bang on trend right now – you watch, the punters will love them.’

  He spread them out on a table for us to admire. There were some I recognised, like Monopoly, Cluedo and Risk, but loads of others I’d never heard of – Cosmic Encounter, Photosynthesis and, in a box so old it was practically falling apart, a pirate-themed game called Buccaneer. And then Drew spent the rest of the morning huddled over them trying to figure out the rules.

  ‘If I’m going to compère the Nag’s Head’s inaugural games marathon, I have to know my stuff,’ he said.

  ‘Games marathon? It’s the first I’ve heard of it.’

  ‘You should follow your own pub on Instagram then, Alice. It’s two weeks this Saturday.’

  ‘Hey, is that Dungeons & Dragons you’ve got there?’ Zoë asked, hovering over his shoulder. ‘I’ve been wanting to play ever since I watched Stranger Things, but I can’t find anyone who’s interested.’

  ‘It almost needs a separate event of its own, I reckon,’ Drew said. ‘It’s well complicated. Look at all the cool dice.’

  ‘Wow.’ Zoë picked up a multi-sided translucent blue shape and examined it. ‘What does this do then?’

  ‘You use them for combat situations, I think. And to figure out your character’s attributes. But we really need someone who knows what they’re doing to be our Dungeon Master.’

  ‘Project for another day, maybe?’ I said from behind the bar, where I was serving a group of guys who were gasping for refreshment and sandwiches between their morning workout and going home to get some sleep before their night shift.

  ‘What? Oh, yeah, maybe.’ Taking the hint, my brother came over to help me behind the bar, where he managed to remain for most of the rest of the day, only occasionally drifting over to his laptop or to look longingly at the shelf of board games.

  There was no doubt he was an asset, when he could manage to avoid distraction. Having someone I could chat to and confide in was a massive relief. And the customers absolutely adored him. The group of mums and babies had swelled to around a dozen; the mothers became positively skittish when Drew brought over their cappuccinos and smoothies, even the babies going into fits of gurgles and giggles when he blew raspberries at them.

  And, crucially, the next Friday, his presence meant that I could take a much-needed evening off, leaving him and Kelly in charge. Not that I’d planned to. I was out of sight behind the bar, kneeling to check the stock of cold drinks in the fridges, when I heard him call out, ‘Gentleman here to see you, Alice.’

  I stood up, wondering who on earth could have rocked up here to see me at six on a Friday evening. Then I saw Joe and felt my face break into an enormous grin. It had been at least three days, I realised, since we’d actually seen each other properly. Sure, we’d slept together – but only slept, since most nights I’d already been in bed when he’d got in from the office at gone ten – and we’d dodged around each other and Zoë in the mornings while he got ready for work. We hadn’t had a chance to talk properly, to connect.

  And now here he was. And he’d brought me shoes.

  Now, let me explain. I’m not some Paris-Hilton-style diva with a pair of Manolos for every day of the year (although don’t get me wrong, a girl can dream). But it had become a thing with Joe and me. Kind of an ironic, joke thing, but lovely too. It started on that awful morning two years ago, six weeks into my training contract at Billings Pitt Furzedown, when I’d come into the office so broken by my hangover and the Fear that I’d put on shoes that didn’t match. In the lift on the way up to our respective floors, I saw Joe look at me, give a half-smile, then look down at my feet. When I got out at my floor, he got out too and pulled me aside.

  ‘Hey, Joe.’ I’d been able to remember his name, but only just. That morning, I could barely remember my own.

  ‘It’s Alice, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s me.’

  ‘Sorry to bother you, but I couldn’t help noticing… It might be a fashion thing, or something, but do you know you’re wearing odd shoes?’

  ‘What’s odd about them?’ I asked crossly. Normally, of course, I wouldn’t have snapped at a colleague, especially one I hardly knew, especially only weeks into a new job. But that morning, I wasn’t exactly myself.

  ‘Nothing. I mean, not on their own. But…’ Joe looked pointedly down at my feet, and I looked too.

  ‘Oh fuck.’

  ‘I thought it might just have been the light in the elevator, but it’s not, is it?’

  ‘No. Shit. One’s black and one’s navy and the toes aren’t even the same shape. I wondered why I was walking with a limp, but I thought it was just…’

  ‘One of those mornings?’

  ‘Something like that. I had a bit of a heavy night.’ I felt a huge rush of blood to my face and a corresponding rush of sickness in my stomach, and I wished, not for the first time that morning, that I could run away from Billings Pitt Furzedown and never come back.

  He winced sympathetically. ‘Ouch. Have you got a busy morning?’

  I shook my head. It was only the knowledge that Gordon would be out until almost lunchtime, and my earliest meeting was at eleven, that had stopped me chucking a career-limiting sickie.

  ‘Okay. Go to your desk and lie low. If anyone asks you to make coffee, say you’re about to go into a conference call. I’ve got this.’

  He turned back towards the lift, then glanced back at me over his shoulder.

  ‘Size?’

  ‘Five. Thank you!’

  Having clear instructions made me feel a whole lot better. I pushed open the door to the IP office and strolled as naturally as I could towards my place, which, fortunately, was in the first bank of desks. Getting my feet under my desk and out of sight was the best thing that had happened to me that morning.

  I switched on my computer and turned my burning eyes to the document I’d been reading the previous evening, trying to make sense of the words, wishing my head would stop throbbing. Would Joe call my extension, forcing me to go all the way back to the lobby, or – worse still – up to the floor where he worked, before doing another humiliating walk of shame back to somewhere I could do my shoe-swap discreetly?

  But I needn’t have worried.

  Less than half an hour later, Joe strolled in, as relaxed as if he was walking from his kitchen to his sofa with a cup of tea. He was carrying a photocopier-paper box with a lever-arch file perched precariously on top.

  ‘Reception asked me to bring these up,’ he said. ‘They’re for Gordon, apparently. Do you mind looking after them?’

  It was such a normal, innocuous request that even Rupert barely glanced up from his screen.

  ‘Sure,’ I said, trying to sound normal too.

  ‘I’ll just…’ Joe squatted down, and I inched my chair aside while he slipped the box under my desk.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said.

  ‘Any time.’

  Once I was sure my colleagues had lost whatever interest they’d had in this temporary diversion, I pushed my chair back again and investigated the box. The file was empty. Beneath it was a pair of beige suede court shoes, their tags still attached, a sausage and egg McMuffin, a can of Coke and a box of paracetamol.

  I reached for the tablets first, and noticed that there was writing on the box – a hasty Biro scrawl.

  If you ever want to drink again, any chance of a sneaky pint with me? Joe x

  That was how it all started, him and me.

  Since then, on any occasion when another boyfriend might buy flowers – our anniversary, my birthday, the day I got the job offer from Gordon – Joe bought me shoes. Not fancy ones; after the first time we slept together, for instance, he’d given
me a pair of fluffy slippers with little sheep’s faces on them, which I’d worn until they literally fell apart. But it was our thing.

  And now, here he was, holding a Nike box out to me like it was a bunch of roses.

  ‘I’ve come to take you out for dinner,’ he said. ‘I knocked off work early.’

  I flung my arms around him, pulling him into a hug so tight the hard corners of the box dug painfully into my breasts.

  ‘Oh my God, this is just the best surprise.’

  ‘You haven’t even looked at them yet.’

  ‘Not the trainers, doofus! You. I just wish I was…’

  I looked down at my navy and white Breton top and faded jeans. I wasn’t exactly scruffy – the pub was a workplace, after all – but I wasn’t date-ready, either.

  ‘I’ve booked that new place down the road for seven thirty,’ Joe said, as if he’d read my mind. ‘What’s it called? Fire and Knives. So there’s time for you to go home and shower and change, if you like.’

  I dithered for a second. ‘I don’t know… I really ought to…’

  ‘Alice!’ Drew called over from behind the bar. ‘Get out of here! Enjoy your night off! Kelly and I have everything under control.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Course I’m sure. Now get your skates on, before we change our minds.’

  I didn’t need telling again. Ten minutes later, Joe and I were back in the flat, alone together for the first time in what felt like ages – probably because it was the first time in ages.

  Even Joe’s birthday, two weeks before, which I’d prepared for by putting on my best lacy underwear, cooking a beef Wellington for the first (and probably only) time in my life, and laying the table with champagne and candles, had been interrupted by Zoë. Just as we’d been sitting down to eat, she’d turned up with a cake she’d baked in the pub kitchen, complete with twenty-seven candles, and a gift for Joe of Red Dead Redemption 2, and I’d had to pretend that I didn’t mind at all if she joined our dinner, although she fed all her beef to Frazzle. And then afterwards Joe had said he’d just check out the game quickly, Zoë had joined him on the sofa and I’d gone to bed alone in my sexy underwear, falling asleep long before Joe joined me.