Love at First Fight

by Mary Jayne Baker

  Ben continued glowering at Cal, then blinked and turned to frown at her instead. ‘Sorry, what do you mean, as friends?’

  ‘I… well, I mean, they made the whole thing up, didn’t they? That is how you felt about me before they started manipulating us, right? Just good friends?’

  He stared at her for a moment, and if there was anything like hopeful appeal in her eyes he evidently couldn’t see it.

  ‘All right, fine,’ he muttered. ‘Yeah, if you like. Just good friends then.’

  ‘So when you told me…’

  ‘Listen, love, Cal and Pete swore blind you were eating your sweet little heart out for me. I had to do something about it, didn’t I? Only gentlemanly.’

  She snorted. ‘Gentlemanly? You? Please.’

  ‘Why, was it true what they said? Did you love me?’

  She shrugged. ‘Yeah, I mean, naturally I loved you a bit. As a mate, obviously. If that lot hadn’t made me believe you were half dead with grief brought on by unrequited love…’

  He scoffed. ‘Unrequited love? Do us a lemon, darling.’

  She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘Hang on. You weren’t in on this too, were you?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Well, this isn’t the first time you’ve tricked me into something like this, is it? It definitely isn’t the first time you’ve lied to me. The kiss at the party? The leavers’ ball?’

  ‘Christ, are you ever going to let that bloody leavers’ ball go?’

  ‘No,’ Bridie snapped. ‘Ben, I swear, if this was all a scam to get in my knickers then I just hope you’re proud of yourself, that’s all.’

  ‘All right, well how do I know you weren’t in on it if it comes to that?’ he demanded, crossing his arms to match her stance. ‘I bet this whole thing was an attempt to teach me a lesson, wasn’t it? Get your own back for what happened at school?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’ve always said the thing I needed most to puncture my ego was to have some woman I’d shagged make me look a tit in front of everyone. Well, congratulations, Bridie. You are that woman, and I feel totally and utterly humiliated right now. You win.’ He gave her a sarcastic round of applause.

  ‘I promise neither of you were in on it,’ Hattie said, but they were deaf to anyone except each other and the paranoid voices in their heads.

  Bridie turned away from Ben, scowling blackly. ‘Fine. I wasn’t in on it, for the record, but you can believe that if it makes you happy.’

  ‘Fine. Neither was I, but if you really have such a low opinion of me that you think I get off on tricking girls into bed under false pretences, you just go right ahead and keep on thinking it.’ Ben’s gaze fell on a woman sitting by herself at the bar. ‘Right. I’m off to do one of these fucking dares. What was the last one on the list: serenade somebody? That lass on her own there looks like she might have lost that lovin’ feeling.’

  ‘Oh, so that’s how it’s going to be, is it?’ Bridie scanned the room until she clocked a man having a quiet pint by himself. ‘Well if it comes to it, I reckon there’s a bloke there who definitely wants to buy me a drink.’

  ‘Enjoy yourself then. Hope he doesn’t have genital warts.’

  ‘You too. Hope she’s not a serial killer with a fetish for twats.’

  ‘You know, Bride, I’m glad you’re not really in love with me,’ Ben snapped. ‘It was bound to end with me turning into one of those men who practically lives in his garden shed to avoid his constantly nagging missus.’

  ‘I’m definitely glad you don’t really love me. It’ll save me a world of pain when you inevitably ditch me for some Botoxed airhead during the hugely pathetic mid-life crisis you plunge into after your hair starts to go.’

  ‘Good. I’m glad we agree.’

  ‘I’m glad we do too.’

  They glared at each other for a moment before stomping off in opposite directions to their respective chat-up prospects.

  ‘Oh well, isn’t this just great?’ Cal muttered to Hattie. ‘Straight back into denial, the pair of them, just when they’d actually started to be happy. Now what the hell are we supposed to do?’

  Bridie strode over to the man scrolling through his phone while he enjoyed his pint and pulled up a chair next to him.

  ‘Hi,’ she said, summoning a smile that was as sweet and beguiling as she could make it – so not very, probably. ‘This is going to sound very forward, but I don’t suppose you fancy buying me a drink?’

  He blinked. ‘Um, I was actually just waiting here for my friend.’

  ‘Yeah, sorry, I know I’m being mega rude. It’s just, I’m on a hen do and we’re supposed to tick off this list of dares. I have to get a stranger to buy a drink for me.’ She rolled her eyes to hopefully convey she found the whole business as tedious as he did. ‘Huge cliché, I know, but my best friend’s the bride so I have to go along with it. I mean, just a tap water or something is fine.’

  ‘Um, well, I guess that’s OK,’ the man said doubtfully.

  ‘Thank you.’ She cast a glance over at Ben, who was watching her from the corner of his eye while he chatted to the woman at the bar, and smiled as seductively as she could for her new friend. ‘That’s ever so sweet of you. It’s Bridie, by the way.’

  ‘Ely.’

  ‘Pleasure to meet you, Ely.’ She shook his hand, letting her fingers trail his as she dropped it, and he smiled uncertainly before going to the bar for her drink.

  She took another sneaky look at Ben. He seemed to be doing well for himself. The woman was already simpering at him, resting her fingers on his hand while they talked. He had his on-the-pull smile screwed in place, dripping charm. He was giving the woman all his usual lines, no doubt: his chat-up technique didn’t seem to have suffered at all during the four brief weeks he’d managed to remain in a committed relationship. Maybe he was pretending he was in love with her too, the poor cow. Maybe he did it to all of them.

  Had he been in on it? Probably not – Hattie would surely have refused to be involved in anything she thought would really hurt her friend – but he hadn’t leaped in to reassure Bridie how he felt about her just now either, despite her giving him plenty of prompts. When she’d suggested his feelings were no more than friendly, he’d just shrugged and gone along with it. As if he didn’t care… as if she hadn’t meant a thing to him.

  To think she’d believed there was more to him than she’d previously thought; that he might actually have had deeper feelings for her behind all the quips and the teasing. Ugh, the whole thing was just so humiliating! How could Hattie have done this to her? And how could Ben… Bridie had really believed him when he’d told her he loved her. God, she’d been so happy these past weeks, and now…

  Her eye was caught by the gemstone on the cheap ring he’d won for her earlier, sparkling on her wedding finger where he’d slid it on. It was blood-red now, although it had been purple when he gave it to her. Must be some sort of mood ring. What did red signify, she wondered? Disappointment? Anger? Hurt? Betrayal?

  ‘Here you go,’ Ely said, putting a glass of white wine down in front of her. ‘That man at the bar told me this was your favourite drink.’

  She scowled at Ben. ‘Pay no attention to him. He’s got no idea what my favourite things are. He knows nothing about me at all actually.’

  Ely blinked. ‘All right. Ex-boyfriend, is he?’

  ‘No. Just some knobhead I’m unfortunate enough to know.’

  He glanced at her ring as she lifted her wine to take a sip. ‘That’s, um, stylish. Christmas cracker prize?’

  ‘Fairground rifle range.’ She slipped it off and chucked it into her handbag before summoning a smile. ‘So, Ely, tell me about you. I want to know absolutely everything there is to know.’

  Ben tried not to stare too obviously at Bridie and the man she was talking to. She was leaning forward flirtatiously while they chatted, giving the bloke a great view of her boobs in her skinny-fit pink hen T-shirt. Jesus, she had amazing boobs.

  Huh! T
hat Brylcreemed bastard was looking straight at them as well. Not even trying to hide it. What a prick. As if Bridie could ever be interested in someone like him. Ben had a good mind to march right over there and give him a piece of his—

  ‘Ben?’ Mia, the woman he’d come over to talk to, rested her fingers on his hand to claim his attention.

  ‘Oh. Sorry.’ He turned back to smile at her. ‘So you’re a swimming teacher, are you? I’m in a similar field myself.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Yes, I’m an instructor for this outdoor pursuits company. Trekking, canoeing, climbing, that sort of thing.’

  ‘I thought you were too classically rugged to be an accountant,’ she said, flashing him a seductive smile that he returned with interest.

  This was going great. It was good to know he hadn’t forgotten how to do it while he and Bridie had been… whatever he and Bridie had been.

  God, it was refreshing to be single again: no girlfriend to clip his wings, just the freedom to do what he liked when he liked, with whoever he wanted to do it with. Yeah, that was the only way to live: free, unfettered and up to his ears in beautiful, sexy, willing women all desperate to go to bed with him. He was living every man’s dream here. What had he been thinking with all that settling-down bollocks? That wasn’t for him; he’d been saying so for years. Thank Christ things were back to how they should be. Thank Christ all was right with the world again, and now he could go back to… back to…

  He suppressed a sigh as his inner monologue finally gave up, failing to convince even the most blokeish, obtuse, randy parts of his psyche that he really meant it. Who the hell did he think he was he kidding?

  From the corner of his eye, he saw Bridie remove the ring he’d won for her and slip it into her handbag. Ben felt a pang that was a lot more painful than he’d have expected at seeing her take it off.

  She was obviously trying to make him jealous. That had to be it – she couldn’t really be interested in that guy. Well, two could play at that game. He turned his flirtatious smile up a notch.

  ‘So according to this list of dares I’ve got, I’m supposed to serenade you,’ he told Mia.

  She laughed. ‘Suits me. I’ve always wanted to have a handsome man singing to me in public. Do you take requests?’

  ‘I do, but unfortunately they all come out sounding like Nirvana.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I can never remember the words or the tune to anything. Apparently what that gives you is Nirvana, every single time.’

  She smiled. ‘You’re funny.’

  ‘Thanks.’ He glanced at Bridie again and grinned. ‘Ha!’

  Another man, evidently the boyfriend of the lad she’d been chatting up, had approached and was leaning across Bridie to give her date a big sloppy kiss. Ben shot her a thumbs-up, and she flicked him a V-sign in exchange.

  ‘What?’ Mia said.

  ‘Nothing. Just watching a mate of mine getting shot down in flames over there.’ He smiled at her. ‘All right, let’s see if I can get myself into your good books with a few bars of something that isn’t but will inevitably sound like “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. Hold on to your eardrums, Mia.’

  Twenty-Eight

  ‘Oh,’ Hattie said when she got back to the hotel room she was sharing with Bridie at around midnight. ‘Here you are, Bride. Everyone was wondering where you’d got to.’

  Bridie was in bed in her pyjamas. She turned away when her best friend – former best friend – came in, sticking her nose in the air to make it clear this was a solid blanking.

  ‘You missed the meal,’ Hattie said. ‘Aren’t you hungry?’

  Bridie gave a small grunt. If Hattie thought she was going to get any more than that out of her, she could think again.

  ‘Some of the gang went on to a nightclub, but I made an excuse. I don’t think clubbing’s the best idea for someone in my condition, is it?’

  She paused for Bridie to reply, but there was no response except her head disappearing under the duvet.

  ‘Come on, Aunty Bridie, don’t be that way,’ she said gently, sitting down on the end of her friend’s bed. ‘You were all happy and excited earlier. I hate seeing you like this.’

  She patted Bridie’s leg, and Bridie immediately drew her knees up to get them out of her way.

  ‘We were only trying to help you, you know,’ Hattie said. ‘You’re completely, one hundred per cent in love with Ben Kemp and you have been for at least the four years I’ve known you – probably a lot longer. And he feels just as strongly about you, trust me. I know it, Cal knows it, Pete knows it, the girls know it – the whole of Messington probably knows it, with the two sole exceptions of you and Ben. You think I wanted to watch you being miserably single the rest of your life when I could see the opportunity for love and happiness sitting right under your stupid stubborn nose?’

  ‘Wasn’t your choice to make,’ Bridie muttered sulkily from under the duvet she’d pulled over her head.

  ‘Perhaps not, but you weren’t going to do anything about it, were you? Nor was Ben: you were both too firmly wrapped up in denial. Somebody had to bite the bullet.’ She yanked the duvet down and leaned round to look into Bridie’s tear-stained face. ‘Admit it. You’ve been bloody happy this last month.’

  ‘Haven’t.’

  ‘Yes you have. Happy and in love, two things I don’t think you’ve been at the same time in your life before. So stop being a stubborn cow and go make it up with him, why don’t you?’

  Bridie yanked the duvet over her head again. ‘Don’t want to. He hates me anyway.’

  ‘He loves you, probably about as much as you love him. Are you seriously going to chuck that away just because you’re both too proud to be the first one to admit it?’

  ‘Yep.’

  Hattie shrugged and stood up. ‘Fine then. Die miserable. Just never say I didn’t do my best for you.’

  There was a knock at the door.

  ‘Come in!’ Hattie called.

  Bridie’s stomach jumped. Ben! Had he come to apologise finally? Not before bloody time either. But when she peeped from under the duvet she saw that it was just Cal, his pyjamas under one arm and washbag dangling from his fist.

  ‘Sorry, girls. I know it’s against the rules, but can I kip on your floor tonight?’ he asked. ‘There ought to be some spare pillows and a duvet on top of the cupboard I can use, if your room’s the same as ours.’

  ‘Why, what’s wrong with your room?’ Bridie’s muffled voice demanded from under her duvet. ‘Did they put a sign on the door saying “No devious lying gits”? Because we’re already over our quota in here.’

  ‘No, our Ben’s gone and pulled, typically. He just rolled in with that lass he was caterwauling to at the bar earlier. I’m not staying in there listening to my brother getting laid in a single bed; it’ll put me off sex for life.’

  Bridie threw off the duvet and jerked up straight. ‘What?’

  ‘What’s up, Bridie?’ Hattie asked innocently. ‘No skin off your nose who Ben shags, is it? I mean, since you’ve got absolutely no feelings for him of any kind.’

  ‘That… bastard!’ Bridie jumped out of bed and grabbed her handbag. ‘Right.’

  ‘Where are you going, Bride?’ Cal asked as she marched to the door in her pyjamas and bare feet.

  ‘To shove something up your brother’s tight little arse!’

  She flung open the door, strode down the corridor and banged on Cal and Ben’s room. Ben answered in his boxers, a toothbrush sticking out of his mouth.

  ‘Bruhdff,’ he mumbled. ‘Mmm-mmfmf?’

  ‘What?’

  He beckoned her in and went to spit out his mouthful of toothpaste in the en suite. ‘What do you want, Bride? Come to apologise?’

  ‘No. I came to give you this back.’ She took the ring he’d won her earlier from her handbag and threw it at his face with force. He shielded his eyes as it glanced off his left temple.

  ‘I don’t want it back,’ he said. ‘Es
pecially not if it’s going to give me bruises. I won it for you.’

  ‘Yeah, well I don’t want it any more. So, where is she then?’

  He blinked. ‘Who?’

  ‘Whatever tonight’s unlucky recipient of your yo-yo-boxered charm happens to be called.’

  ‘Eh?’

  Bridie’s phone buzzed in her bag. On the desk, Ben’s did the same.

  ‘Hang on,’ Bridie said.

  She fished it out and glanced at the screen. It was a WhatsApp message from Cal.

  Sorry, guys. We did it again :-D #TeamCupid

  Attached was a photo of a very creased sheet of notepaper covered in Ben’s handwriting.

  ‘What’s this?’ she said, holding it up to him.

  He looked at it, and his eyes widened. ‘Shit! Bridie, don’t read that.’

  ‘“I don’t even mind your sticky-out ears”?’ she read, glaring at him.

  ‘Well, I don’t. They’re cute.’

  ‘“Your arse is fucking amazing”?’

  ‘Hey, that’s a beautiful, romantic compliment.’ He shook his head. ‘Bloody Cal, I’ll murder him. Creeping about going through other people’s wastepaper bins.’ He glanced at the message that had just come through on his phone and grinned. ‘Oho! What’s this, Bride?’

  He held it up so she could see. On the screen was a message from Hattie, showing the passport picture of Ben and Bridie as teens that Bridie had snuck out of her photo album. It was tucked into the clear plastic pocket of someone’s purse.

  ‘That’s… nothing,’ Bridie said, flushing. ‘Just an old photo from sixth form I found under the bed when I was cleaning up. Hattie had no right to sneak a photo of it.’

  ‘And where do you keep it?’

  ‘I told you. Under the bed. It’s just waiting there until Bonfire Night with the other scrap paper.’

  ‘Right. Show us inside your purse then.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not? If you’ve got nothing to hide then you’ve got nothing to fear.’

  ‘I can’t. It’s… at the purse-mender’s.’ She looked at his letter again and smiled. ‘“I actually don’t think I love anything in the world as much as you.” Aww. Did you really write that?’