‘You’ve made up?’
‘The opposite. I’ve finally realised that he means absolutely nothing to me.’
‘Really?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘Did you have a good time?’
‘Great. But it’s so nice to be heading home,’ I pause, ‘with you.’ I snuggle down under my coat and close my eyes, but not before I’ve sneaked a sideways look at my best mate. The man who seems to have burrowed his way into my heart. He’s smiling.
Chapter 22
‘What are you up to now?’ Freddie takes the bottle of beer I’m waving in front of his face and does his waggling eyebrow thing. I’ve never known anybody with such an expressive face.
‘What makes you think I’m up to something?’
‘Ha-ha, promise me you’ll never play poker. Come on, what’s up?’
‘It’s Jack.’ I sigh. I’ve got to talk to somebody, and when I tried Louie he headed for his litter tray. Since getting back from the hotel I’ve not been able to get Jack out of my head.
‘Guilt trip about breaking his ankle?’
‘It was his wrist, and I didn’t break it, he fell.’ I pick up the remote and flick through the channels, with the TV on silent. I don’t have to tell anybody. I should keep this to myself. Let them work it out themselves. Let sleeping dogs lie as they say.
I turn the TV off again, half turn to look at Freddie and sigh. ‘He still loves Maddie.’
‘So?’
‘But he’s married to Sal, who he likes a lot and doesn’t want to hurt.’
‘Ah. You sure about this?’
‘He told me.’
‘Was he drunk?’
‘He didn’t seem it, he seemed pretty sober for somebody who was on a stag weekend.’
‘Tricky then.’
‘Are you going to tell me to mind my own business?’
‘No, never.’ He gives me a mate’s hug, then pulls back in a way that could be reluctant, or that could just be wishful thinking on my side. ‘It’s cute how you care so much.’ His beautiful dark eyes make me feel all warm and squishy inside.
I swallow, clear my throat. ‘Cute?’
‘Just carry on, forget the cute. Tell me about Jack.’
I can’t forget the ‘cute’, but I probably should. ‘He says marriage is for life, so he can’t leave Sally.’
‘Honourable.’ He says it like he means it, but he’s still gazing at me as though he’s got other things on his mind. It’s unsettling. Distracting.
‘He is.’ I crash on but can’t stop staring back at him. ‘I always liked Jack.’
‘Until you slagged him off for marrying Sal.’
‘Yeah, but I think he’s just too nice for his own good. I mean, it’s just so sad. Maddie loves Jack, Jack still loves Maddie, they should be able to be with the one that’s made for them.’
‘Bit of a mess, isn’t it?’
I’m not sure if he’s really talking about Jack here, or something else. Like us. Either way, he doesn’t know the half of it.
‘So you don’t think I should tell her?’
‘You and your girlfriends have got complicated lives. But the timing isn’t always right, is it? And,’ his tone is so even and reasonable I wonder what’s going to come next, ‘Andy still loves you, but you’re not getting back together,’ he shrugs, and leaves a longer than normal pause, ‘are you?’
‘Never! He’s not my One, I know he’s not, and,’ I pause, I’ve never told a soul this bit, not even Rachel, ‘in the last text he sent me, he called me matchstick!’
‘What?’
I tap my head and wait for the penny to drop.
‘He didn’t?’ He grins, his mood suddenly lighter.
‘He did. I mean, there’s no going back from that, is there?’
‘Jane?’
‘Yeah?’
‘That kiss.’
I look at him warily. We’d not mentioned our kiss. The awkwardness between us had kind of been side-stepped because of the way I’d dived headfirst into his car after the Andy incident. No strained ‘How are you?’s had been required after that.
‘Horrible?’
‘Not horrible. I was lying when I said we should just forget it. I can’t.’
‘You can’t?’ I gulp. To say the air is tingling between us would be to disrespect a good thunder storm, we’re supercharged. Even Louie makes a run for it, his little tail stuck up with so much static he can’t try to get away from it fast enough.
‘And I’m not sorry. I can’t be sorry for doing something that was that good.’
‘Good?’ I’ve gone monosyllabic.
He frowns at me. ‘It wasn’t good for you?’
‘Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was good for me. Definitely good for me. Wow! Ace. I should shut up now, shouldn’t I?’
‘Carry on for a bit. It’s good for my ego.’ We do that silent stare thing. ‘How good?’
‘Don’t push it, it was only one teeny tiny kiss.’
‘Would you risk another one? A bigger one. Just so you can rate it?’
‘It scares me.’
‘I’m scary?’ His gentle smile is anything but scary. And the way he’s looking at me, all earnest and intent is unsettling, in a goose-bump kind of way, but is making me want to move closer, not further away.
‘No. Kissing is.’ I lick my damp lips, and swallow hard. ‘Like you said, it’s complicated. And like you said, the timing isn’t always right.’ Why do I feel all bubbly and expectant?
‘Sometimes it’s perfect.’
‘I don’t want to ruin what we’ve got, Freddie. What if we try it, and like it too much, and we get carried away, and …’ I know if I was drunk I wouldn’t be saying all these things, I’d be climbing on top of him. But I’m sober. ‘The last few days without you have been weird. Horrible. I don’t want to not be friends, to risk a lifetime without you.’ I suddenly realise I’m edging closer, even though what I’m saying and thinking should be sending me the opposite way.
‘I would, if it meant a moment of pure magic.’
I stare into his dark eyes, then something snaps inside of me. ‘Oh, to hell with it, I could get run over by a bus tomorrow.’ I put my hands on his face. Rest my finger on his perfect lips.
He pulls back a tiny bit, a very tiny bit. ‘You’re only doing this because you might get run over?’
‘You know I didn’t mean actually run over, it’s a figure of speech. I meant maybe I need to seize the chance, live for the moment.’
‘That’ll do me.’ He closes the gap between us, his lips are only centimetres from mine. His fingers are in my hair, and my scalp is tingling. His mouth is covering mine so lightly I wouldn’t know we were touching if it wasn’t for the way my whole body is reacting and I’m desperate to get closer. Oh, Gawd, I think I might be clutching at him. But wait, it’s okay, he’s clutching back, and his hand is on my bum, and we’re wrapped so tightly together, I can feel every (and I mean every) centimetre of his body.
‘Bugger.’ His mouth breaks away from mine, as there’s a loud clatter and the biscuit barrel tumbles to the floor. He spins me round, the hard work surface digging into my back, but who cares? I tease at his bottom lip with my teeth, as he curses and pushes me back.
‘Ouch!’ Banging your head on a kitchen cupboard doorknob is so unsexy.
‘Sorry.’ He’s paused, short of breath. ‘You okay?’
‘Knob, nothing, don’t stop now!’ I grab a handful of T-shirt, pull him in tighter, and he lifts me, plonks me on the work surface in a way I’d normally think was unhygienic, but it’s not. It is so not, it is fantastic, it is—
‘Sugar.’ There’s a crash, hell I’ve just swept a whole bag of Tate and Lyle’s best granulated onto the floor. ‘Forget it, forget it.’
Freddie manfully spins round in the small space, taking me with him, hanging on like a monkey with my legs wrapped round his waist.
‘Bugger.’ My elbow hits the fridge freezer.
‘Flaming he
ck.’ He cracks his toe on the wine rack and there’s a good chance that the one bottle of wine it houses has just crashed to the floor and right now might be spraying the kitchen with a layer of supermarket best Merlot. But who cares? We stagger into the living room lips melded together, apart from the odd escaping swear word.
We’re out of the tiny kitchen, oops forgot to navigate the sofa, over the back and nearly breaking our necks as we land, then bounce and tumble off to get wedged on the rug with our heads between the bookshelf unit and a stack of DVDs.
‘Okay?’
‘Okay.’
We’re ripping clothes off each other, which isn’t working and is frankly a health and safety issue. Scrambling back on to the couch as we go.
‘Let’s do our own.’ I pant out. Which is nearly as dangerous, when he’s half on me and half off. ‘Shit.’ A little ginger face has just appeared over his shoulder and blue eyes are staring at me. ‘Get him off my back, don’t want to hurt …’
I whisk poor little Louie off Freddie’s back – ‘No, little buddy, not now.’ – and deposit him on the chair.
‘I hope you’re not talking to me?’
I glance back up, and he’s all I can see. Freddie. Staring down at me with dark, dark eyes that are definitely intent on more than friendship.
I’ve seen his bare chest before, but this time it’s different. I can really see it, every arousing inch, every contour. The red marks that my nails have left as I clutched at him, the unfashionable wisps of hair that are suddenly the most on-trend thing ever in my eyes. The dark shadow that snakes down between our bodies, to where his belt meets the waistband of my jeans.
‘No way.’ I tug at the buckle, and he chuckles, easing himself higher so that his hip bones meet mine. There’s something sexy, something demanding about the clash and I grab more desperately at the buckle.
Then we’re going, on the move, rolling off the stupid, too-small sofa again.
‘Stay here.’ His words are strangling, because he’s taken over the belt duties, whilst coming in hard for a teeth-jarring kiss that is making my lips throb and my body desperate to get in the action.
Hot flesh hits hot flesh and for a second I freeze. This is it. We are totally naked. My best male friend has his very male parts snuggled between my thighs and we’re on the brink of changing everything.
‘Oh my God, do it!’
He does, and I can’t help the little scream, followed by the near-hysterical cackle, which must be the un-sexiest thing ever. But Freddie just grins and goes for it, and we roll, and hit furniture and get carpet burn and fluff where it shouldn’t be, and we laugh and groan and shout and then … it’s over.
‘Wow.’ Freddie props himself on his elbows and blinks down at me. There’s a pause, this could get sticky. Well, it is sticky, but awkward, you know what I mean. ‘Talk about Mission Impossible!’ He wipes the sweat off his brow.
I can’t help but grin back. Then smile. Then laugh. ‘My stomach hurts, get off, get off!’
‘Loony!’ He tries to roll but there’s not enough room so he kind of back off onto his knees, then clambers to his feet, and offers me a hand.
He hauls me up. And we’re back in the position we were in before. Skin to skin, but on our feet this time.
‘Okay?’
He looks worried. I reach out, stroke my hand down his cheek. ‘More than okay.’
And he kisses me, then backs off, pulling me with him.
‘Yours or mine?’
‘Yours.’ I blow him a kiss. ‘You’re tidier than me, and anyway,’ I can’t stop grinning, ‘I don’t want a damp patch.’
‘Ha. Who said you’ll get the chance to make one?’
I do. I get more than one chance. Then afterwards, I flake out with my head on his slightly hairy chest until I’m woken by a rude banging.
On the door. Not the other, ruder, type.
Chapter 23
‘Oh, sorry.’ Andy doesn’t look sorry. ‘Not interrupting anything, was I?’ He also doesn’t look like he thinks he is.
I don’t normally scramble to the front door with a sheet wrapped round me, bed hair and the aura of somebody who has spent too few hours asleep and too many hours with their hands on a fellow human being, but I thought it was a delivery. I have ordered the most amazing play den thing for Louie, one with scratch post and tunnel and dangly things, and a feather on a wand and … well, I thought it was amazing, and I am sure he will. And you know what delivery guys can be like, don’t you? Knock-and-run round here, and a card stuck through the door inviting you to drive 30 miles up the motorway to your ‘nearest’ depot to collect. Which you do, then discover that after a two hour wait they can’t locate it.
So I’d grabbed the closest thing to hand, a sheet, and stumbled to the door yelling out ‘hang on’ and ‘don’t go’ as loudly as I could.
From the smug look on my ex’s face he thought I knew it was him. As if. ‘Not going anywhere honey!’
‘I thought you were a cat activity centre with added extras!’
‘Oh, yeah?’ He grins. ‘I’m all about the extras.’ Talk about cocky.
‘Fancy fresh orange?’ Freddie strides up behind me, then stops short. ‘Oh, Andy. Hi.’
Andy’s grin fades, and his eyes narrow as he takes in Freddie in PJ bottoms and nothing else and me wrapped in a sheet. Us discussing breakfast choices.
It’s classic. I should be punching the air. Instead, I find myself turning a colour that will outdo my auburn hair any day of the week.
‘I never say no to something sweet and juicy in the morning, do I, Janey?’ He recovers and winks. I want to gag.
Full marks for recovery, into the negative for cringe-worthy. How did I ever think I wanted to spend the rest of my life with this man? I was deluded, crazy.
‘Sorry?’
‘Bugger, sorry, didn’t mean to …’ He suddenly looks awkward, embarrassed. ‘I just, it wasn’t easy to come round, I’ve worked myself up into—’
Freddie gives him a look, then squeezes my shoulder, and wanders off to squeeze the oranges.
I don’t know quite what to say.
‘Why are you here?’ My brain isn’t up to niceties and working out what I should and shouldn’t say. It is still sleep-fogged.
‘Sorry. You, erm, well, look busy?’ He rolls his eyes in the direction of the kitchen.
I fold my arms and decide not to comment.
‘Look, I’m, erm, sorry.’ He shifts about from foot to foot, and forgets the script, and just like that bravado-man is replaced with the man I fell for. The man I was going to marry. ‘For everything. We ended on a bad note.’
‘A bad note? A bad note?’ My tone shoots up an octave. ‘You dumped me on my hen night!’
‘Maybe the timing wasn’t great, but I was drunk and things just came to a head and if I hadn’t said something I’d have exploded.’ He flares up, trying to justify what he did.
‘You’d have exploded?’ I’m spluttering. I can’t believe the man. ‘You texted me!’
‘We needed space.’ He looks at me, dejected and slightly pathetic.
‘We?’
‘Okay, I did. But I want to make it up to you,’ he doesn’t say ‘apologise’ like any real man would. ‘I miss you, Janey. We can at least call a truce, can’t we? Be friends? Like you and geek man here.’
I glare.
‘Sorry, sorry, that came out wrong again didn’t it? It’s just so frigging hard.’ He runs his hand through his hair, and it’s like a light-bulb moment in my head. I get it.
I stare at him.
One of the things I’d fallen for with Andy was his total self-confidence and self-belief, the way he’d make decisions with total certainty, the way he liked to take care of me. Now I realise that he never was sorry, he never knew when he made mistakes, he was often selfish. Apologising and seeing things through other people’s eyes was something he never did. Things that come as naturally as breathing to lovely Freddie.
I’d not
really analysed it before. Never realised how little compromise there had been, until I’d moved on.
I had loved Andy once, but he’d never been the right guy for the grown-up me. Maybe for the teenager, who’d been wowed by such a masterful man, but I’d outgrown him. And he’d realised that.
And he’d been scared.
He just hadn’t stopped to think about how I’d feel when he’d announced his findings when he did.
‘I know it’s hard, Andy. You never were very good at apologies, were you?’
He looks confused, then is distracted by Freddie coming back bearing orange juice in one hand, and Louie in the other.
‘I know I said look after her mate, but this is going a bit far.’ Andy guffaws. He sounds like a donkey. Bravado-man is back, and I want to slap him
Freddie looks at me, ‘he didn’t …’
But I barely hear him. ‘Look after me? Look after me?’ I seem to have got into this thing where I have to repeat everything twice, but it’s the only way I can believe he’s actually coming out with this crap. ‘How dare you! And as if you give a rat’s arse. You didn’t even know I’d moved in with Freddie!’
‘I do give a rat’s arse! It was for you babe, for us, that’s why I did it. I just thought we’d got our whole lives ahead, so why rush, why risk fucking it all up?’
I want to give him a good shake. But instead, I sigh and try to let the anger out. I’m not going to let him wind me up any more. He’s not worth it.
‘Yeah, you’re right Andy. I’ve got my whole life to do what I want.’ I poke him in the chest, I can’t help it. ‘I don’t need looking after. I’ve got friends,’, poke, ‘a job,’ Andy splutters, I ignore it, ‘a cat, well, maybe not a whole cat, a kitten, half a—’
‘You don’t like cats!’ He moves forward as though he’s going to grab my poking finger, and the rest of me, and I leap back and cannon into Freddie.
‘I never said I don’t like cats.’ I address this to Freddie, then repeat it for Louie. ‘Honest, I just said I hadn’t got time for cats.’
‘Aww, come on, Jane. I only want to talk, a coffee, maybe?’
‘No, go away, Andy, it’s too little too late. Sod off out of my life.’
Bridesmaids Page 18
