Just You

by Jane Lark

  I looked up and said something about the party to Jason, but he just grunted, ignoring me and glancing at Mr. Rees’s office. The boss wasn’t in yet. Jason looked over at the door into the open plan office.

  I gave up making any effort to talk. It seemed the whole place was in a bad mood today. I focused on getting my pages done.

  At eleven-thirty, not that I was clock checking, Portia got up and headed for the toilets. She was slender, but she was slender with hips. The girl had some junk in her trunk for sure, Beyoncé style, and she had a pencil skirt on today that exaggerated the movement of her hips as she walked across the open plan room weaving between desks. The movement thrust the image of her ass in an emerald bikini into my head. My temperature soared.

  I got up, without even thinking about it–and followed.

  When I got in there, I found myself hovering outside the women’s like a pervert.

  Slipping my hands into my back pockets, I leaned against the wall. She took a couple of minutes to come out, but when she did her pretty pouted lips parted in an ‘o’ and she turned pink… tipping up her chin, and her pretty little nose, with a look that implied disgust, like I smelled bad.

  I shifted off the wall and stepped forward. “Portia, we need to talk.”

  “We’re going to talk, at lunchtime. Away from the office.” Her words were a sharp, crisp rejection; spoken in her slightly British–perfectly rounded and toned, I’m-up-here-and-you’re-down-there–accent. Then she just walked past me, her body expressing her usual demeanor that said: stay away from me, you’re worth nothing.

  Shit. She was definitely regretting what had happened–awkward.

  I went into the toilet but didn’t use it, just stared at myself in the mirror over the sinks. I wasn’t that bad looking, was I? I ran my hand over my hair. I kept it buzzed short. I really didn’t think I was that bad?

  Bad enough to regret.

  But then I wasn’t rich. I wasn’t Jason, white, Mr. handsome and nice from-out-of-town. Nope–I was straight out of the ghetto. Not Portia’s type at all.

  I was seriously surprised she’d gone anywhere near me if I was being honest with myself.

  But dishonest… I wasn’t that bad, and persistence and a bit of charm usually paid off.

  I washed my hands and went back into the office.

  Mr. Rees came in a few minutes later. That would lift the mood. The man was a tyrant and as arrogant and ignorant as Portia. Really, what the fuck had made me want to kiss her… Oh yeah, her in a bikini.

  I started talking to Jason, about the party again–about everything other than me and Portia in the pool. But I’d lay hot odds she was sitting at her desk listening, fearing I’d throw in that little fact. Then all of a sudden Jason got up…

  “Hey, I’m talking.”

  “I got something to do.”

  Well, I knew when my company wasn’t wanted. I was getting a lot of messages like that today. Lucky I had thick skin.

  A few minutes later he came back with a look of thunder on his face and started shoving stuff in a box.

  What was up with this day? “Where you going?”

  “I just realized that this job’s not for me. Bye…”

  Nice fucking knowing you! I glanced over to see Mr. Rees was watching Jason.

  Well, what the hell was that about?

  The girls were watching too. I could see Portia. She’d turned her chair to face Crystal and, having seen Mr. Rees, they were all pretending they hadn’t been about to start gossiping, but any moment now, there was going to be a gossip fest…

  Jason walked out without a “thanks”, or, a “nice knowing you”, or, “see you”, or anything, and he looked pretty crazy with his cardboard box of stuff tucked under his arm, and an angry face.

  I watched him go feeling like my hangover from the other night had returned. Seriously, what was going on today?

  And now it was nearly twelve-thirty.

  Mr. Rees shut the door on his office. Normally I’d have gotten up and gone over to the girls–when the ogre had gone back in his cave–and they all began whispering. I didn’t. I figured Portia wouldn’t want me there. ‘Course I could go over anyway, to wind her up, seeing as she was so embarrassed over having had a thing with me. But that was the sort of game my dad used to play; I wasn’t that guy. If she regretted the stuff we’d done, that was fine. Let her regret. I didn’t, and there were dozens more women out there to be fished.

  When the clock in the left-hand corner of my screen rolled over to twelve-thirty, an email message flashed up. I opened it.

  ‘See you there.’

  Showdown time.

  She got up, threw a red scarf around her neck and pulled on her coat, then threw her purse over her shoulder and walked out.

  Here we go. I gave her a few minutes head-start so no one would think anything of me following, then got up too, and went to get my coat. The shock of Jason going rattled through my nerves. The guy was there, then gone.

  Mr. Rees came out of his office as I walked past, and I heard him speak to Hilary, our sub-editor, asking for Jason’s contact details, to forward a letter of notice.

  Jason had been sacked.

  Shit. The guy had done nothing wrong. I’d better watch my ass. I was nowhere near as focused as Jason had been. Keith was always having a quiet word with me. Usually it was, “Don’t talk so much,” or, “You’re too loud.”

  Shoving my hands deeper into the pockets of my coat, I walked out.

  When I reached Starbucks, a block away from the office, Portia was in the queue.

  I walked up and joined her.

  “Hey.”

  She looked at me and turned red again. “Hey.” She looked away, like she was looking at something else. Anything else – as long as she didn’t have to look at me.

  “You eating?”

  She shook her head, her chin and her nose tilting up, like I was a bad smell, or something else revolting.

  The girl was not a great eater. She was always on the latest celeb diet. But she wasn’t overweight.

  Whatever, I decided to buy her a ginger muffin. I knew she liked ginger. For the last three weeks, the smell of her seasonal gingerbread latte had hung around when I’d walked into the office in the morning.

  The guy looked over to take my order. She must have given hers already. “Black coffee, two ginger muffins, and one of those pepperoni things, heated.”

  The guy nodded at me and headed off to put it all on, to cut the queue. We moved along, not speaking. But when we got to the point to pay and she reached for her purse, I said, “I’ll get it,” pulling out my wallet.

  Her fingers rested over my hand for a moment. “No, it’s okay, you don’t have to.”

  “It’s okay. I want to.” My answer was probably sharper than it should’ve been, but I was starting to get a little pissed. I may have a millionth of the money her family did, but I could afford to buy her coffee.

  I really didn’t think I was so bad. Maybe I was thick skinned–but I did have some pride.

  She picked up her drink and left the rest for me to carry on a tray. She moved right to the back, probably to avoid anyone in the office seeing us together through the window.

  Such a glowing assessment of my performance New Year’s Eve. She obviously hadn’t had as much fun as I had, although she’d seemed to be enjoying it at the time.

  I slipped into the chair opposite her and lifted one of the muffins off the tray. “For you, eat it or don’t eat it, whatever.”

  Her blue eyes, which were mid-gray in reality but reflected blue, glanced down at the plate and then up at me. She bit her lip then opened her mouth as if she was going to speak, her expression hardening. She shut it again, turning pink, saying nothing, and then gripped her cup with both hands and looked down.

  The girl looked meek. When had I ever seen Portia look meek before? Never. Her arrogance was cringing over this. Her blush no doubt expressed the shame this society girl, felt for slumming it with m
e.

  “Portia, you asked me here to talk?” My pitch probably rang with sarcasm, expressing my impatience.

  “Justin…” she said to her coffee, in a voice that told me off for my belligerence. It sounded a little more like the Portia I was used to.

  “What?”

  She looked up again and stared at me, appearing anxious, which was a new look for Portia, as far as I was concerned.

  “I… we… did…?” She bit her lip, and then she came right out with it suddenly, “Did we do it? The other night… I mean… Shit… Did we, you know? I was so drunk I don’t remember.”

  So that was what all the blushes were about. I started laughing, I couldn’t help it. Really I should be insulted; she looked so terrified, like it would be a scene from a horror movie if we had done it. “No. We didn’t, Portia.” The air swept out of her lungs and her breath brushed my cheek before she looked down at her coffee again.

  I leaned back in the chair, trying hard not to feel insulted… “We kissed, and I made you come, and you never returned the favor.”

  That had her eyes and her color back up, along with her chin and her nose tilting. “Justin.” It wasn’t a shout, it was a hard whisper. “That would have been disgusting in a pool anyway.”

  “Nice to know you got your priorities right, Portia…”

  She screwed her face up at me–she even looked pretty when she screwed her face up.

  “I take it you regret it?”

  “I don’t remember it. Well, only in the form of a few patchy images. I can’t remember getting dressed, or getting home. How did I get home?”

  I hadn’t realized she was that bad. “I helped you get dressed and you were unsteady on your feet but you weren’t out of it. We came back on the subway, and I walked you to your door.”

  “You did?” Her gaze was boring into mine, like she was looking for a lie.

  “Yeah, I did.”

  “Thank you.” Those words were reluctantly said, and she looked away, but as she spoke she reached out and picked a piece off of the muffin I’d bought her.

  “You’re welcome.”

  She glanced up again.

  I picked up my muffin and took a bite, watching her as she watched me. So what now? Did I want this to be something, or was it just a hook up.

  I didn’t say anything, nor did she.

  Then eventually, after she’d nibbled a couple more pieces off her muffin, I said, “Do you regret it?”

  One of the staff set down my toasted pastrami thing.

  Portia took a breath as they walked away.

  She did regret it.

  “I–“

  “Forget it, Portia. We hooked up at a party, it’s nothing big, it probably happened a ton of times all over New York. Two people had too much to drink, end of, no headline.”

  ~

  End of. Justin was right. I was embarrassed, and I felt awkward as hell, ‘cause I couldn’t remember exactly what we’d done, but I believed we hadn’t gone the whole way. I hadn’t had any flashbacks of that, and as soon as he’d said he took me home, I saw an image of him next to me in a subway car.

  “Sorry.” Embarrassment led me to say it.

  He shrugged. “So anyway; what the frick went down with Jason?” There was a sudden glint in his brown eyes.

  Wicked and funny. That was Justin.

  He always joined in with the gossip but we never knew if he was making fun of us when he did. Crystal’s theory was that he was a douchebag and he was joining in with the hope of getting lucky. Well if that was true, his moves had worked on me. I was staying sober from now on. Resolution.

  “What the hell you gonna do now, Portia? You won’t have pretty boy to stare at over your computer every day… Shame. You’ve got no chance of pulling him loose from his girl now…”

  “I wasn’t trying to.”

  He lifted his dark eyebrows. “Yeah, right, but if he’d have offered, like I did…”

  Shit, he had to go and bring that back up. My skin heated. I was sick of blushing. I’d spent yesterday with my head under the pillow, too embarrassed to even face myself. “Don’t talk about it.”

  “Was I that bad?” He was joking but he wasn’t joking. I was kicking his ego in the balls.

  I gave him a lopsided smile and narrowed my eyes, “Justin, I told you. I don’t even remember!”

  His eyebrows lifted higher. “Great. That bad.” His wide lips tilted. He wasn’t unattractive. I’d never really looked at him like that before. But he was okay. I mean his eyes were nice, dark brown and glowing like treacle, with that wicked and humorous glint, and he had a wide smile that came in flashes. His short black hair, which he kept cut close to his head, suited him because he had a nice shaped head… That sounded stupid. But he did. I wanted to reach out and touch him, run my fingers up his cheek and then over his hair. Maybe that was how things had got started in the pool.

  He was talking about Jason again. I wasn’t really listening.

  “… so you girls are going to miss the eye candy.”

  I smiled at him, and just nodded. I wasn’t going to lie. Jason was pretty hot. I could have just sat for hours watching him.

  “We oughta get back.” He stood. “Otherwise we’ll be the next to be fired.”

  I got up.

  When we reached the office, he held the door open for me. Crystal was wrong. He wasn’t a sleaze. He was just a normal guy–girl hunting. He was nice in a way. He’d made this whole thing with me easier. He could have been really horrible.

  He whispered in my ear, “We better go back separately, seeing as we’re incognito… You can go up first, I’ll hang back.”

  I smiled at him, “Thanks,” then walked on ahead.

  I glanced up when he walked into the office five minutes after me, and watched him take his black Parka coat off on the other side of the room. His body wasn’t that bad either, I remembered. He had abs. He’d looked pretty good in the pool.

  Another blush racing over my skin, I looked down at my computer before he caught me watching. But ten minutes after he’d sat down I sent him an email, giving him my cell number, with a message saying… “Why don’t we be friends outside of work? If you want? What’s your number?”

  A second later an email came back from him. It was just his number and nothing more.

  I looked up, and leaned ‘round my computer to see him but he wasn’t looking at me. He was staring at his screen, like he was totally focused on work.

  ~

  “Justin!” My kid brother, Dillon, hurtled out the school gate, right into my belly, with his rucksack falling off his shoulder and smacking me in the thigh.

  “Hey Dillon, woah. What’s up with you, kid?”

  Having hugged me, he pulled away, laughing. “Nothin’.” His eyes were shining with a I-love-my-big-brother look of idolization. That look got me in the chest every time, with a sharp bite of affection.

  “Did you have a good day?”

  “Yeah.” He liked school but he hated the after club he had to go to when Mom was working and I had to pick him up.

  “Dillon!” A pretty little girl with pigtails shouted over, taking her Mom’s hand. She did a huge exaggerated wave, the way young kids did.

  My already super cool and chilled little brother just lifted his hand. “Bye Miah.”

  I laughed. He looked up at me, taking my hand. “Are you working on the ladies already little bro?”

  He laughed. Then he said, “She does like me but it’s annoying. She hangs around all the time when I just wanna play.”

  I gripped his hot, sticky hand tighter, looking up the street watching the traffic and getting ready to cross. “Yeah, well, one day, you are gonna be begging girls to just hang out with you.”

  He made a disgusted sound, and I glanced down laughing at him. “Urrgh, no way. I don’t wanna play with girls … ”

  For now. The day will come Dillon when you will love playing with girls… I didn’t say that. Just smiled at him, wishing I’d
had a childhood like he did.

  He may have to go into after-school clubs, but he never had to comfort Mom like I did at his age, after her and Dad had fought, and he’d knocked her about, or after he’d had a run in with the cops and ended up in jail.

  When we’d crossed the street, Dillon let go of my hand and started telling me about his day. Telling me all the eight-year-old-kid gossip from the school. I loved it when he did. He made me laugh the way he talked with masses of enthusiasm at a hundred miles an hour.

  Along the street I saw Jake, waiting on the corner of the sidewalk, where he always met us. He turned the corner and walked on as soon as he knew I’d seen him.

  Met us–was a loose term. He never actually bothered waiting for us, or spoke to us, but walked two hundred yards ahead of us, pretending he didn’t have to walk back home with his fricking annoying older brother and the baby of the family.

  Dillon chatted on. He didn’t care… Jake only stirred me up… and he knew it.

  How the fuck had I ended up being treated like our frickin’ shit Dad? I didn’t know. But Jake treated me like I was his parent and not his big brother. He had an inbuilt button that said disobey.

  My cell buzzed, vibrating in my back pocket. I pulled it out. A message from Portia. Dillon kept talking.

  It was a stupid picture of some weird dressed-up dog in a park. I laughed. Then another text came in.

  ‘Thought I would send you that to make you laugh. Did it?’

  ‘Yeah, it did.’

  She could have punched me when she sent me her number. I hadn’t expected that, and I’d played it cool, just sending her my number back. But now she’d been the first to text too. What was that saying? The girl had my attention whether she wanted it or not.

  “What did you laugh at?” Dillon’s brain finally caught up and overtook his mouth…

  “Here.” I showed him the picture of the Jack Russell dog wearing a red and white wooly hat, sweater and scarf… He laughed too.

  I slipped my phone back into my pocket, then rubbed a palm over Dillon’s hair as he started up with his eight-year-old bullshit again.