‘He got the job. We’re going out to celebrate.’
‘Oh my God, that’s great news. But what about the date?’
‘Next week. He was cool about it.’
‘OK. Good. That’s great about Angus. I must meet him one of these days.’
‘Yeah, definitely.’
‘Well, have fun,’ she says, her voice stilted.
‘Thanks. Should be a laugh. There’s a group of us going.’
‘Great.’
‘Send my love to Dave and the children.’
‘Will do.’
‘Love you.’
‘Love you too,’ says Milla, before hanging up.
She might not say she’s worried about me, but she doesn’t have to. That’s the trouble with a best friend. We can read each other like books. She knows I’m trying too hard to make it sound casual. She knows, deep down, that I am lying as much to myself as I am to her.
The guy behind the brightly lit bar does Tom Cruise proud, making and shaking our cocktails. Angus is still off alcohol, and Laurie and Ian don’t drink as they don’t fancy failing the breathalyser test at the night-shelter and sleeping rough tonight. Thankfully Scottie and Nina join me, ordering pina coladas. As I hand Laurie her Diet Coke, I think how much she has grown in confidence. Never in a million years could I have imagined the Laurie I initially met at Soul Food standing in a crowded nightclub. She still wears baggy T-shirts tucked into men’s trousers and tonight is no exception: no makeup, and she’s cut her hair as short as Angus’s. I get the impression Laurie’s clothes and her boyish hairstyle serve to stop people, especially men, looking at her inthatway. Perhaps it helps her to feel safer? But she told me the exercise has helped her back pain, and sleeping on a bed isn’t nearly so uncomfortable as it used to be. I’ve also noticed she doesn’t breathe as heavily when she’s standing beside me. ‘Cheers,’ I say, raising my glass to Laurie’s, adding, ‘This place is amazing, isn’t it?’
‘I like ABBA,’ she says.
We have travelled back to the 80s, with its Rubik’s cube and cassette tape tables, animal-print seating, and a giant retro fish tank. Angus had wanted to relive our youth by taking us to a club where we could dance to music we knew the words to. Angus joins us. ‘Come on you two, and Ian.’
‘I’ve never been to a nightclub,’ she tells Angus, staying firmly put. ‘I can’t dance.’
‘Nor can I,’ I say.
‘By the end of the evening I promiseyou you’ll be able to dance as badly as me,’ Angus tells Laurie, taking her hand and leading her on to the dance floor. Whatever Angus says, it always seems to do the trick. Because Laurie is dancing with us. He should work in sales, not finance.
It’s eleven o’clock and the dance floor is heaving. Nina, Scottie, Ian and I are chatting round our table. Scottie is saying something about Angus’s new job, Nina’s discussing plans for Soul Food’s Christmas party, and Ian told me on the quiet that he’s moving out of the night-shelter into a joint living space, but he hasn’t had the courage to tell Laurie yet. He needs to find the right time. I’m feeling steadily tipsier, the words floating around me as I watch Angus dance with Laurie to ABBA’s “Dancing Queen”. Laurie isn’t the only one who has changed. I look back to meeting Angus at the café, wearing clothes he’d worn the night before, smelling like he’d crawled out of a dustbin.
As if reading my mind, Nina shouts across the table, ‘Got to hand it to him, he’s pulled himself together. So has Laurie. She could barely look us in the eye.’
‘She’s a legend,’ says Ian, getting up and joining her on the dance floor.
Nina turns to me. ‘So have you, Holly. You’ve changed.’
‘Have I?’ I take another gulp of my drink before leaning towards her, intrigued. ‘How?’
‘The day I interviewed you, I knew there was something you weren’t telling me. I’ve interviewed enough people to sense things like that. I could see it. Feel it. Some people volunteer at the café to show off their cooking.’
‘Never works,’ calls out Scottie. ‘Nina’s giving Pete the boot.’
‘I thought maybe you were going through an unhappy marriage, or a divorce. Angus wondered that too. We had a quick word over lunch, he told me if I didn’t hire you, he’d quit. I told him I’d hire you if he had a shower and shaved.’
A smile spreads across my face.
‘You’re happier, Holly,’ Nina continues, ‘well, you seem it.’
‘Who’s happier?’ Angus asks, joining us at our table, before grabbing my hand. ‘Your turn, Holly.’
