An Autumn Crush

by Milly Johnson

  ‘It’s more down to these guys,’ said Guy, casting his hand towards the others behind him. ‘They’ve had to put up with me shouting at them all morning, throwing orders at them, when they could have been sitting at home enjoying their weekend. I must especially thank my second-in-command – Gina – who always does every job to perfection.’

  Gina beamed at the accolade and the applause. She heard love, hope and promise in every one of Guy’s words. She couldn’t help but flash a victorious look at Floz who was clapping dutifully but her eyes were downcast.

  After the meal the wedding party began to drift off. Some had travelled a long way and had to get home for work the next day, the bride and groom were being driven off to the airport to catch an early evening plane to the Bahamas, and the rest were going back to Alberto’s pub for a nightcap.

  ‘You are all welcome to join us,’ said Alberto, shaking Guy’s hand with his usual bone-crushing vigour.

  ‘Thanks, mate, but I’m knackered,’ said Guy. That was the response of them all. They just wanted to put their feet up and have a totally easy Sunday night.

  ‘We’ll make it up to you on Friday – I’ll be in touch during the week,’ said Alberto. ‘I can’t thank you enough. I even think if we had a fight in the ring, I’d let you win.’

  ‘Aye, course you would,’ scoffed Guy. Not for a minute did he believe that one.

  November

  ‘Autumn, the year’s last, loveliest smile.’

  William Cullen Bryant

  Chapter 92

  Gina went to the loo for the fourth time in as many minutes. To say she was nervous about this evening was an understatement. She had started her primping and preening at lunchtime, but her preparations for this night had begun much sooner. For over a year the lingerie, which she was now wearing, had been bought and stored in tissue paper in her drawer awaiting a date with Guy Miller: a black basque and matching g-string, stockings with seams and little bows at the thigh. The black dress over the top of it was new, chic and very expensive. She sprayed herself with her lucky perfume and stood back to view herself in the mirror and smiled. She was now as ready as she would ever be to put her first step on the road to being Mrs Gina Miller. It all comes to she who waits.

  When she heard Guy’s car draw up outside her front door, her heart went into a crazy rhythm. She slipped on her new black velvet heels, her new panther-black faux-fur coat, and blew herself a good luck kiss in the hall mirror. She looked good and she felt good, because before the end of the night she knew she would have felt Guy Miller’s lips on her own.

  Guy watched Gina come out of her front door. She looked lovely. Her hair was glossy, sleek and golden-blonde, her legs slim and long in those killer heels, but his heart-rate stayed constant – there was no skip, no kick, just a steady regular beat. But Floz, cutting up carrots in a huge white apron, had made it race like Red Rum towards the last fence.

  ‘Hi,’ said Gina, buckling herself up. Her eyes were shining, her smile was soft and hopeful, and Guy knew then that this was a mistake.

  He drove on, making conversation about Alberto’s wedding and the enquiries he’d had since from two of the guests about holding functions in the new restaurant when it opened.

  When they got to Four Trees and he opened the car door for Gina, he knew she was reading so much more into it than mere automatic gallantry. He had intended to order them champagne at the table but he couldn’t, because she would see that as more evidence of romance, and by the end of the night he was going to have to let her down very gently.

  They went to their table and he felt Gina staring at him whilst he was looking at the wine list. He knew her eyes would be big and doe-innocent, pupils dilated to max aperture. It make him feel slightly suffocated and he pulled at his collar.

  ‘Any preference – red or white?’ he asked.

  ‘White for me, please,’ replied Gina. ‘Have they got a Pinot Grigio?’

  Guy looked down the list. ‘Er, yep. That’s fine for me too. So what do you fancy for starter?’ he asked.

  ‘How about you choose for me?’ smiled Gina. She had seen that on films many times and it always looked so romantic.

  Guy cursed himself. He hadn’t realized she had it this bad for him. He dreaded the thought of hurting her, but he had to get through the evening. Maybe she would deduce his non-interest during the course of the meal if he gave off just enough of a chill for her to get the message and save her dignity. Like Floz had done with him.

  ‘I don’t know what you like though,’ said Guy.

  ‘Anything,’ said Gina.

  Balls.

  Gina was seeing them with different dishes. If he ordered her the scallops, she would take that as a sign that he wanted her to spear one with a fork and pass it through his lips so he could taste it. He would do the same for her, that’s what happened between flirting couples.

  He ordered scallops. True love, she thought. For himself, the mussels. They sounded a macho and sexy thing to request.

  ‘And the Pinot Grigio,’ Guy told the waiter.

  ‘Which one, sir?’ The waiter was fairly new. He wasn’t that familiar with the listings.

  ‘It’s number . . . er . . .’ Guy opened the wine menu; oh God, it just had to be, didn’t it? ‘. . . sixty-nine.’ He slammed the menu shut and handed it quickly over. He reached for some bread and busied himself ripping bits off and dipping it in olive oil.

  Gina did a lot of silent smiling at him whilst they waited for the starters to arrive. It occurred to Guy that he had never socialized with Gina in all the three years they had worked together. He didn’t know what she was like when she was free of her duties. From the looks she was giving him, he would have been forgiven for thinking that in between shifts, she worshipped at a shrine of him. In Burgerov she was all innocent blue eyes. Now, those eyes looked borderline feral.

  He refilled her empty wine glass.

  ‘That’s a lovely wine,’ she said. ‘You must be an expert.’

  ‘Hardly,’ laughed Guy bashfully.

  ‘French, isn’t it? I like France so much,’ said Gina. ‘I wish I could have gone there this summer but it’s hard to holiday solo, don’t you think? I miss going away with someone.’

  ‘It’s harder for a woman to do that, I often think,’ Guy replied, filtering his reply for come-ons.

  ‘Lots of things are,’ Gina sighed like Snow White at the Wishing Well. She was fishing for a ‘Like what?’ which Guy felt obliged to give.

  ‘Well, take for instance, asking a man out.’

  Oh shite.

  ‘Women have to wait around for years sometimes until a man asks her out. Otherwise she’s “forward” and a bit butch, don’t you think?’

  Guy made a series of hand expressions, eyebrow formations and huffs to indicate that he wasn’t sure about that one. He could have snogged the waiter, who rescued them by delivering the starters.

  ‘How’re your scallops?’ asked Guy, immediately regretting it as Gina picked one up with her fork and held it to Guy’s lips. To take it would have been suggestive, to refuse it ungentlemanly and churlish. He tried to take it from her fork as unsexually as possible.

  ‘Lovely,’ he said.

  ‘How’re your mussels?’

  ‘They’re good, thank you.’

  ‘Can I try one?’

  ‘Sure.’

  He felt obliged to reciprocate the fork thing. Gina closed her mouth slowly around the mussel and chewed seductively. ‘Fabulous,’ she said.

  ‘What are you doing with your time off then, Gina?’ Guy asked, when the waiter had cleared the plates. He hadn’t bargained for conversation to be this laboured between them. Gina had turned into a love-struck teenager. Her eyes were almost pumping out cartoon hearts in his direction and it all felt very intense and uncomfortable.

  ‘Ooh, not much,’ she replied, smiling and sighing again.

  He wouldn’t have been surprised if she had spent the time off just practising writing the name ‘G
ina Miller’. He couldn’t have imagined she was so enamoured. He felt dreadfully guilty now that there would be no second date.

  ‘It’s nice in here, isn’t it?’ asked Guy, looking around because the heat of Gina’s gaze was burning him.

  ‘We’ll have to come again. My treat next time.’ Gina’s smile was so wide the ends were almost touching at the back of her head.

  Guy was stuck how to answer. He couldn’t say yes because that would have been setting her up for more disappointment; he couldn’t say no because that would crush her. He plumped for needing the loo and excused himself. The mains were on the table when he came back. Guy waited for the inevitable forking-of-food ritual to begin: he didn’t have to wait long.

  ‘Are you looking forward to your sister’s baby arriving then?’ Gina popped the last of her pâté-stuffed steak into her mouth.

  ‘Yes, I am, very much,’ replied Guy. ‘I love children.’

  ‘So do I,’ nodded Gina with great enthusiasm, pleased to have found yet another way in which she and Guy were compatible. She wouldn’t be able to stop herself choosing four suitable names that went with ‘Miller’ when she got home. Four male and four female just in case they had all boys or all girls.

  ‘I bet the wedding will be lovely in Alberto’s Inn,’ said Gina, sure that any moment Guy was going to ask her to partner him.

  ‘I think he’ll do a grand job,’ said Guy, knowing exactly why the wedding subject had been brought up. ‘We’ll all be crammed though. It’s a very tiny room.’

  ‘They always seem to be able to squeeze one more in though, don’t they?’ Gina said with a tinkly laugh. ‘I bet it will be lovely and cosy with everyone squashing up.’

  The waiter cleared away the plates and brought dessert menus. Guy stared at his, hoping for a change in subject.

  ‘Ooh, look at these for two to share!’ Gina shrieked with delight, draining her glass of wine.

  ‘Not for me.’ Guy patted his stomach. ‘You feel free – I think I’ll just have a coffee. I’m not really a dessert person.’ It was a huge lie. He knew that if Floz was sitting opposite to him, he would have been the first to suggest a pudding to share.

  It was as if a cloud had fallen over Gina’s face. Having so much power over her emotions was a heavy responsibility, one that Guy really didn’t want to shoulder.

  Gina ordered a panna cotta whilst the waiter filled up her wine glass. She was full but didn’t want the meal to end.

  ‘How do you get on with that Floz?’ she asked. The ‘that’ before the name was telling, Guy thought.

  ‘She’s – she’s a nice person. I don’t really know her that well,’ he said.

  ‘You’re not setting her on in the restaurant, are you?’

  ‘Floz?’ he laughed, and Gina saw the genuine warmth in his eyes when he said her name; it pained her. She gulped back her wine. ‘No, she’s a writer.’

  ‘I’ve never heard of her.’ Gina couldn’t keep the snipe out of her words.

  ‘Not books – she’s a copywriter for greetings cards,’ he replied, thanking the waiter then for delivering his coffee and Gina’s dessert.

  ‘She doesn’t like you very much, does she?’ Gina stabbed her spoon into the panna cotta.

  ‘I don’t know,’ replied Guy, feeling a real moment of ouch.

  ‘All those arty types are strange,’ Gina went on, her tongue loosened by the wine. ‘I went out with a journo once. Writers should only ever go out with other writers, they’re so strange. Teachers should only go out with teachers, doctors with people in the medical profession and chefs with other chefs. We should stick to our own. Don’t you think?’

  Guy sipped his coffee and shrugged his shoulders by way of an answer. He felt so guilty for thinking it but he couldn’t wait for this date to end. He had been wrong to think that affection could be forced; chemistry had no master.

  Gina had no intention of letting Guy go early though. She ordered a Napoleon coffee and persuaded him to have another espresso to keep her company whilst she was drinking.

  ‘I can’t wait to get back to work,’ said Gina. ‘I’ve missed being in the kitchen with you so much.’

  ‘I’ve missed working too,’ said Guy.

  ‘With me?’

  ‘Sorry?’ Guy coughed.

  ‘Have you missed working with me?’ Her eyes were bright with tears or booze, he couldn’t tell which.

  ‘Yes, yes of course,’ Guy said, not returning the love-heart eye stare he knew would be waiting for him if he lifted up his head. He collared a passing waiter and asked for the bill. He hoped he’d be quick and fished out his credit card in readiness.

  ‘It’s been lovely, thank you, Guy,’ said Gina softly, moulding herself into another personality, hoping that this one would beat down the walls of his defences. She felt his distance, knew that this date would not lead to another. This had been a thank-you dinner that she hadn’t managed to convert to a romantic one. She drained the coffee in one, felt the hit of brandy in her stomach.

  ‘Thank you for your company, Gina.’

  ‘I really like you, Guy.’ Gina’s eyes were brimming with water. There was only a direct proposition left to try. She didn’t mind if he used her for a night. Maybe then, in between her legs, he would find that there was a connection between them.

  ‘I . . .’ The blessed waiter arrived with the credit-card machine and Guy and the waiter tried to complete the transaction whilst not making mention that Gina was dabbing at her eyes with the cloth serviette.

  Gina’s tears flowed faster, knowing she would not be coming back to this restaurant with Guy or becoming engaged to him. He would not be saying to her, ‘Do you remember our first date here?’ and on the anniversary of this first date, dropping to his knees and proposing to her. Her future and dreams were pulling away from her, out of her grasp, disappearing into the distance. She had to make him interested. She had loved him for so long. She didn’t know what she would do if he turned her down. They had crossed a barrier that couldn’t be uncrossed.

  She threaded her arm through Guy’s as they walked across the car park, enjoying the fantasy that this was her man. Guy opened the door for her and she climbed into the car as seductively as she could, flashing a long leg clad in a finely woven stocking, but he didn’t even dip his eyes for a micro-second.

  The air in the car on that drive to Gina’s house was so heavy, it needed extra lung-strength to breathe in. Gina sat defeated, fighting back tipsy-tears, half-hating Guy for being so impervious to her but knowing she was still going to try and seduce him on her doorstep. One ex-boyfriend had told her that her perfume was half Poison, half-desperation.

  Guy pulled up outside her house, got out of the car and opened the door for her.

  ‘Well, thank you for a lovely dinner, Gina.’

  She turned big watery eyes up to him. ‘What’s wrong with me, Guy?’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong with you, Gina. Nothing at all.’

  ‘Will you stay the night?’

  Gulp.

  Guy sighed. ‘No, Gina. Thank you, but no.’

  She stayed resolutely in the car, sobbing now. ‘Oh no, I’ve ruined everything. I shouldn’t have said that. I like you so much, Guy. Can we go out again, can we start again?’ Tears were streaming down her face.

  Guy knew that being soft now would be cruel, giving her false hope.

  ‘No, Gina,’ he said, trying to keep all emotion out of his voice. ‘I think that would be the wrong thing to do.’

  Gina’s features hardened. ‘Fine!’ Guy tried not to let her hear the sigh of relief as she suddenly propelled herself up and out of the car. ‘Maybe if I was Floz with her love-sick eyes, things might be different!’

  ‘Love-sick? What do you mean?’ said Guy.

  ‘ “Oh, Guy, I’m trying not to look at you whilst I’m cutting up my carrots all wrong!” ’ scoffed Gina in a puerile baby voice. ‘And you trying not to look at her in the same way! I won’t be back to work in the restaurant, Guy.’ S
he walked two wobbly steps forward and dropped her keys on the ground. Guy picked them up for her because she almost toppled, bending down to retrieve them.

  ‘Gina, don’t be daft . . .’

  She snatched them out of his hands, anger coating her like a suit of armour. Love dictated the rules to people, not the other way round. It would not be swayed by long legs in black stockings and blue eyes full of devotion. It had laughed at her efforts and chosen a short red-head who couldn’t cut up carrots to be Guy’s object of desire.

  ‘Thanks, but no thanks,’ she snarled.

  And her house door opened and slammed shut so hard it was a wonder the glass panels didn’t shatter.

  Chapter 93

  Two days before her wedding, Juliet lay on the sonographer’s bed shaking with excitement.

  The sonographer pulled down Juliet’s trousers a few inches and smeared her tummy with gel.

  ‘Jesus, that’s cold!’ yelped Juliet.

  ‘Sorry,’ smiled the woman, taking a seat and lifting up the probe. ‘So, your doctor has sent you up for an early scan. You’re not having any problems, are you?’

  ‘No, touch wood,’ replied Juliet, ‘but I’m a fifth-generation twin. He said you can tell quite early on if I’m carrying more than one baby.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said the sonographer, falling silent for a while, moving the probe around Juliet’s fast-growing stomach, studying the screen in front of her, Steve behind her trying to work out what the moving blobs were.

  ‘Yep,’ she said eventually and pointed something out to Steve. ‘There you go – twins.’

  She twisted the screen around to Juliet, who promptly burst into tears a second behind Steve.

  ‘You’re expecting sixth-generation twins. Congratulations to you both!’

  Chapter 94