Just As You Are

by Kate Mathieson

  When I returned from the bathroom there was Peter standing up again, then offering the cheese knife so I could sample the brie. That was very sweet of him, and I decided maybe it was just first date nerves, and I needed to give this another chance.

  ‘What’s your favourite holiday destination?’ I asked him with a smile, armed with my new conversation topics.

  ‘Oh, fishing in a little spot off the coast. Do you like fishing?’

  ‘No.’ I really hated the idea of catching some poor little fish with a metal hook in its mouth and neck. ‘It’s just never hooked me.’

  He seemed to miss the pun; instead he smiled at me pleasantly. When he didn’t ask me what my favourite destination was, I decided to tell him. ‘I loved Peru. The mountains and landscape there are breathtaking. Have you been?’

  ‘No, I haven’t been to South America. Or America. I went to Hong Kong once to watch car races and rallies.’

  ‘Oh.’

  He smiled at me. ‘I much prefer camping locally.’

  I took a sip of wine. ‘I don’t particularly like camping at all really. It makes me itchy.’

  He nodded and we sat there in silence. Again.

  I didn’t know what else to say, but there was still half a bottle of wine on the table, and some nibbles of cheese, so I had to stick around, didn’t I? I didn’t remember dates being as painful as a visit to the dentist, and this one felt like having a tooth pulled, except without the happy gas high.

  While I sat there pretending to listen to Peter talk about the best camping spots, I started thinking about Nick, and what he would say if he were here. We’d be talking about living in a country cottage. Or penguin training as a career. Or he’d be trying to teach me about Sirius or some other star cluster, and I’d be telling him he was just a big old nerd.

  Peter excused himself to the bathroom, and, because I was slightly tipsy, it was making me reminisce about how Nick and I connected in Fiji. I kept thinking of calling him, or texting him, but what would I say? Then I had another thought – were we even friends? I wasn’t sure. I thought we were colleagues, and that was about it. And sending a slightly tipsy text to your boss about a date was not professional at all. I put my phone away quickly.

  Peter was suddenly back on the stool in front of me. ‘So, this was fun, should we do it again?’

  I opened my mouth, and realised I was about to say – sure. Because isn’t that what you say on dates, and then you never call them again, and you avoid their calls and you hope that they get the picture. But ghosting wasn’t that kind was it? Wasn’t it better to tell the truth?

  ‘You know Peter, you’re lovely, but I’m just not feeling it, really.’ I swallowed hard, feeling bad, really bad.

  ‘Oh yeah, yeah, me too actually. Yeah I’ve got another date later anyway, later this week.’ We both knew he was lying.

  ‘Oh that’s great Peter.’ I tried to nod enthusiastically.

  He stood then and said ‘I don’t think we had that much but this should cover the wine.’ He opened his wallet and left a fifty-dollar note on the table. ‘Bye Emma, thanks for a good evening.’

  And then I watched him walk slowly out of the bar. God, I felt awful. You tell a lie – you feel bad. You tell the truth – you feel bad. How could anyone win?

  Chapter 17

  ‘I hate it.’

  ‘Y- you hate it?’ I stammered.

  ‘Hate it,’ Glenn repeated after Nick and I had just revealed our Hades and the Underworld theme. I’d spent the entire weekend feeling great about the fact we had an event theme all planned, even to the point that I wasn’t that perturbed by the fact that I’d not really done anything beyond my date but catch up on sleep and vacuumed my apartment. All two metres of it.

  I’d gone out once to get the paper, just to the mailbox, but the fresh air I’d had for those twenty seconds had been nice. Other than that, I’d spent a few idle hours watching YouTube videos on Gods and Goddesses. I’d felt so positive coming into this presentation, Nick had given me a thumbs up in the meeting room when he’d come in, and I’d been sure Glenn would love it.

  Apparently, he didn’t.

  ‘It’s almost exactly the same theme that Hive did for the Warners account. Some Mount Olympus shit with Gods and Goddesses, and a whole room dedicated to the underworld.’

  Hive were our prime competitors, and there was a massive rivalry going on, always had been. A bit like deciding if you were Team Jacob or Team Edward, or Team Aidan or Team Big, Hive and Maker had a rivalry so long, no one could point out when it actually began. The way it had been discussed in the office, playing hard and playing dirty was expected between the companies. Even stealing accounts from each other. Trying to hack into emails to get juicy gossip. Nothing was off limits. Thankfully, Maker had taken the high road lately and seemed to be winning accounts without getting all guerrilla warfare, but apparently we’d failed to nab the Warners account.

  Nick nodded and his lip quivered the way it seemed to when he was concentrating. ‘Yes, they did, you’re right. I remember now hearing about it last year, and about Maker’s top-level pitch.’

  ‘That we didn’t win,’ Glenn said, sounding bitter. He checked his mobile and, while scrolling through emails, he said, ‘So, second options?’

  I shot a panicked look at Nick, who faltered, before he quickly said, ‘We’ve got something else, but how about we present that to you later this week? We just need to clarify a few things.’

  ‘Get Kerry to book you in,’ he said, standing up and leaving without looking at us.

  For the rest of the day, everyone wanted to know what was happening with Macabre. Who was the entertainment? What colour theme had we chosen?

  In meetings, Nick took charge, saying, ‘Guys, it’s top secret, and hush-hush, so we have a small party of need-to-know people only.’

  And when Nick wasn’t there, I smiled secretively and put a finger to my lips, as if to say, I’m sworn to silence.

  Which just made people want to know more about it. By lunchtime, there was a rumour going around that Macabre was the event of the year. By mid-afternoon it had spread like wildfire to our clients, and I got a steady stream of calls, people throwing around their titles, as if that would make me give up the secret.

  ‘Well, the hush-hush thing has worked,’ I said to Nick when I saw him in the corridor. ‘I suppose that’s the best lesson to learn in PR. Mystery sells.’

  He stepped in closer to say something, and I found it extremely hard not to look at his eyes, his warm melted-chocolate-pool eyes. Distraction! God, this was not a good idea.

  In fact, it was a very bad idea, because standing this close to a hot guy, a very hot guy, for whom I might have been harbouring feelings, very small feelings, but feelings nonetheless, meant my willpower was at a level zero and falling.

  This could only end in disaster. Like me trying to inhale his aftershave. Or losing all word control and just gummily smiling and drooling at him. Or, even worse, asking if we might find an office closet and get down to some frisky Fiji business. I stepped back and tried not to flinch at my uncontrollable thoughts, but I saw him register the look on my face. And he must have misread it for me not hearing him properly, because he leaned closer. Closer!

  And then … Too late. I’d smelt the lingering of his aftershave. His mint toothpaste. Saw the strong muscles at the back of his neck. His lips. And my imagination immediately propelled us into the future, and I was seeing us in his Fiji timeshare, a small beach wedding, hibiscus flowers. Bright pink. Damn it. I shook my head and focused, very hard, on listening to what he was saying.

  ‘We can’t keep this up with Glenn or the other execs for long. They’re going to want to be let in on the secret.’

  ‘Yes, I can’t keep this up,’ I agreed, wondering if we had enough money to get a Balinese timeshare too.

  ‘When you think about death, what do you think of?’ he asked, clicking his fingers.

  Thankfully, this jarred me out of my made
-up couple bubble. ‘Cemeteries,’ I said quickly, thinking of zombies and horror movies – which scared the bejesus out of me. All horror movies. Even the slightly silly ones where the guy had an axe – or was it a chainsaw – and wore an ice hockey mask.

  ‘OK, why don’t we take a walk in a local cemetery then? Maybe that will help jog our memories. Get outside,’ Nick suggested.

  ‘OK, that’s a bit creepy,’ I said slowly, waiting for him to come up with an idea that didn’t include me and him walking together again. But he was looking at me expectantly. I swallowed hard. ‘Oh, you’re not joking?’

  ‘Right now, I’d happily perform a sacrifice to get an idea for a theme.’

  ‘Slow down, Satan worshipper, no need to go that far,’ I admonished him, and stepped back again, to give us at least a metre distance in between. We stared at each other, helpless, no ideas coming in.

  ‘OK, the cemetery.’ I was regretting it immediately. ‘But not at night time. I’ll have nightmares forever.’

  ‘How about sunset?’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Tonight? We need to get this sorted soon.’

  ‘As long as you don’t want me to visit a crypt or anything scary. And I put my foot down to visiting the crematorium.’ I imagined terrible flames and burning bodies.

  Nick looked horrified at the thought. ‘Never. I don’t want to breathe in ashy people air.’

  ‘Ew!’ I said, laughing. ‘I never thought of that until now.’ This topic seemed very safe, talking about dead bodies; it wasn’t romantic in the slightest, so I was silently grateful for that.

  Phil came around the corner, so Nick whispered, ‘Cemetery tonight?’

  I nodded and he walked down the hallway, saying hello to Phil on the way.

  Phil caught up with me and we walked back to our desks.

  ‘Did I just hear the word cemetery?’ He squealed a little. ‘I knew it, you’re doing a take on Michael Jackson’s Thriller.’

  ‘Ironic,’ we both said in unison.

  ‘But wrong.’ I winked at him.

  Over the next few hours Phil popped his head above my computer, with a series of guesses.

  ‘Fright Night? Return of the Dead? Halloween?’

  ‘No. No. No.’ I shook my head at each of them.

  At one stage, Nick was coming back to his office and overheard Phil say, ‘A take on Pet Sematary?’ and shot me a look of apology, then shrugged. We both knew there was nothing either of us could say to stop people from guessing about the event theme we didn’t have.

  ‘Why the secrecy?’ Phil asked me as I was packing up my desk for the day.

  ‘Because of big mouths like you,’ I teased him. ‘We can’t risk it getting out.’

  Phil eyed me up and down. ‘You don’t have a theme, do you?’

  I hesitated. ‘Of course, we do,’ I said hotly, trying to pack up as quickly as I could and shut down my laptop. He had a keen sense of figuring people out, and now the Phil spotlight was directed towards me, I needed to get out of the office, like now.

  I considered, for a second, telling Phil everything. It would be nice to confide in someone, especially Phil, who knew me so well already. And who knew Nick too. But once you told one person, you could never guarantee that it wouldn’t just get out. These things might just pop out in conversation. No, I couldn’t risk it.

  ‘Then what’s got into you? You’re more ansty than normal.’ Phil narrowed his eyes and leaned forward, placing his chin in his hands. ‘What’s going on that I don’t know about? I can sniff something different about you.’

  ‘Firstly, that’s disgusting. Stop, er … smelling me,’ I said, horrified. ‘Secondly, we do have a theme, it’s just top secret.’ I prayed he would buy it.

  ‘I know what it is!’ He snapped his fingers.

  ‘You do?’ I looked at him nervously.

  ‘You’re dating someone,’ Phil declared.

  I thought about Nick, his broad shoulders, his chocolate eyes and how they unravelled me. Had I been acting strange around the office? ‘I’m dating someone.’ I meant it to sound like a question, but it sounded more like I was making a grand admission.

  ‘I knew it!’ Phil looked happy with himself. ‘You’re seeing someone! What’s he like?’

  Nick was inside his office, but had left the door open. I made a motion to Phil to shut up, otherwise we’d be told off for gossiping instead of working.

  ‘I don’t do sign language.’ Phil looked at me weirdly.

  I tried again to silence him by putting a finger on my lips, but he ignored me.

  I just needed to get out of there before I had to pretend I was dating someone. ‘Chat about this later,’ I called out over my shoulder, moving quickly to the lift and hitting the button five times.

  Chapter 18

  Waverley Cemetery at sunrise was always beautiful. It overlooked the eastern beaches of Sydney, and was perfectly positioned on a rounded grassy hill, with a view straight out to sea. A few years back developers were going to take it over and start building high-rise buildings atop, well, dead bodies. Which was strange and creepy and absolutely guaranteed whatever would be built there would be thoroughly haunted. Luckily, the court ruled against development, and now the dead could enjoy their view in peace.

  But at sunset, Waverley Cemetery was extremely spooky. The tombstones held a ghoulish red glow in the evening sun. I felt as if I were walking onto a horror film set. Whose silly idea was this? The sun would be setting shortly, and then Nick and I would be here in the dark, like a pair of idiots.

  I was waiting by the statue of Mary, as planned, at 6.30 p.m., wearing a long blue maxi dress, a white cardigan and red converse. The wind was cool, but the earth still felt warm, after being baked from the hot summer months. I realised it had been a long time since I’d just gone for a walk or been outside other than shuttling back and forth between work and my flat. I looked at the ocean, and tried to take a deep breath and forget I was in a cemetery, but my eye caught the glint of sunlight reflecting off a large cross, and I suddenly felt as if Dracula were going to fly down, transition from bat form, and fang me.

  Nick called out, ‘Emma,’ from the bottom of the cemetery, waving hello. He was wearing cargo shorts and a navy-blue jumper and his legs looked still summer-tanned and slim. By the time he made it up the hill, the ocean horizon glowed as if on fire.

  ‘Who in their right mind does this?’ I hissed. ‘A cemetery. At night.’

  ‘Mrgherhewh brains,’ Nick said in a zombie voice.

  Being out of the office, he felt like less like my boss, and more like my friend, and before I could think better of it I playfully hit his arm with the palm of my hand. ‘Seriously, don’t start with me. I’m going to lose it.’

  ‘Hitting your boss now?’ He clutched at his arm, overreacting and stepping backwards. ‘I believe that’s a case of harassment.’

  ‘Let’s get this over with quick.’ I pulled a large flashlight out of my bag.

  ‘Oh, folks, she’s armed and dangerous, watch out. Or she’ll get you with … dum dum dahhhh the light!’

  ‘I’m about to clock you with this if you don’t shut up.’

  ‘Challenge accepted.’ Nick looked around the cemetery. ‘So, what’s the plan?’

  ‘I was about to ask you the same question.’

  ‘Well, let’s walk and see what happens. Death-wise.’

  I shuddered. ‘That sounds like one of us is going to die.’

  Nick started walking ahead, and I stepped in behind, single file, between the burial plots. It felt extremely eerie and strange. Due to seeing too many horror films when I was younger, I half expected a hand to stick out of the dirt and try and grab at my leg. So, I kept watching the grounds, and because I wasn’t looking where I was going, I kept bumping into things – my hip went into a tombstone, I nearly tripped over a small concrete plaque and finally I made a quick save when I nearly fell over nothing at all.

  Nick led the way into a darker patch of the cem
etery, with large trees that shrouded us in shadow.

  ‘What was that?’ I said, jumpy, sure something had just touched my neck.

  ‘What was what?’ Nick said.

  ‘It feels like a cold patch of, um, air, which they say reveals …’ I couldn’t finish the sentence.

  ‘Reveals what?’ Nick turned and looked back at me, lifting his arm to block out the flashlight’s strong glow. ‘God, Emma, if you’re about to say ghosts.’

  I was shivering a little from the adrenaline pumping through my body, because, yes, that was exactly what I was thinking. We were, after all, disturbing their final resting places.

  ‘Because do you know what else it means?’ Nick asked.

  ‘No.’ I shook my head and put down the light, spilling it out across my feet. ‘What?’ I asked, intrigued.

  ‘Cold air in a cemetery often means,’ Nick whispered, leaning towards me so close I could smell his woodsy scent, ‘that it’s night.’

  ‘Ugh.’ I flashed the light straight into his chocolate eyes.

  ‘Ouch! You’re blinding me.’ Nick threw his hand up towards the light.

  ‘Continue on, blind one!’ I told him, laughing. ‘And don’t say you didn’t deserve that.’

  He turned around and blindly stumbled for a few seconds, before his eyes adjusted. We walked for another few minutes between smaller tombstones, and a few more plaques and crosses.

  ‘So, is this working?’ Nick called out over his shoulder.

  ‘I feel we have to be quiet and respectful,’ I whispered.

  ‘I don’t think they can hear us,’ he whispered, then said in a normal voice, ‘Do you think it’s working?’

  ‘I don’t think so. All I keep thinking about are zombies and ghosts and wondering who is trying to clutch my ankle.’

  ‘Your ankle?’

  ‘Never mind.’ I paused to readjust my flashlight, which seemed dimmer than when we’d started. ‘It looks like it’s dying a bit – does it to you?’

  Nick grabbed the light, switching it on and off. ‘Maybe.’ Then he switched it off, and we were standing in total darkness.