Hannah pouted. ‘You wouldn’t mind if I joined you, would you? It gets a bit lonely eating by myself upstairs.’
‘I think Taylor and?—’
She cut me off. ‘I mean you said it wasn’t a date, right? And I get so bored of my own conversation. Plus there’s nothing new on Netflix.’
‘Actually,’ I said. ‘We’re?—’
‘Great!’ Without waiting for me to finish again, she reached for an empty chair from a nearby table and placed it next to mine. ‘Have you guys ordered yet?’
‘Just drinks,’ I replied, as Fiona arrived. She looked understandably confused when she realized that Hannah had joined us. She wasn’t the only one. I tried to convey my apologies to Taylor with my eyes.
‘They look good,’ Hannah said, as Fiona placed the drinks down in front of us. ‘I’ll have one of those too, thanks, Fiona. Oh…’ She picked up the brown paper bag and held it out. ‘And can you give this to the chef and ask him to keep it warm until Jack and Taylor’s food is ready too?’
‘Oh. Uh…’ Fiona gave me a questioning look.
‘Hannah,’ I said smoothly. ‘If you don’t mind, Taylor and I were actually just getting to know each other better.’
She frowned. ‘I thought you said this wasn’t a date.’
I nodded. ‘I did say that, yes. But still, labels aside, we’d prefer to be alone.’
‘Oh.’ She blinked. ‘Oh my God. I amsosorry. I’ve completely misread the situation, haven’t I? I’m so stupid.Of courseyou guys don’t want me gatecrashing this, whateverthisis.’ She pushed back her chair with a loud scrape. ‘I’m normally much better at reading social cues, Taylor, I promise. I think it’s just the loneliness, since Alex died. It’s made me clingy, and I don’t really have many friends left, apart from Jack. But still, I shouldn’t be trying to latch on to you guys when you clearly don’t want me here. I’m absolutely mortified.’
‘Please don’t be,’ Taylor reassured her. ‘You’re not stupid at all.’
‘That’s nice of you to say, but I should have realized that I wasn’t welcome.’
‘That’s not what I said, or meant,’ I told her.
She blinked again and I could see that her eyes were glassy, as if she was trying to hold back tears.
‘Forget you ever saw me,’ she said, pushing in her chair, then forced a little laugh. ‘Hell, forget I even exist. Enjoy your evening, and I’m sorry again.’ She bumped into the table as she turned to go. ‘I can’t evenwalklike a normal person.’
Taylor and I exchanged a look, and I knew immediately what she was thinking. The problem was, she didn’t know Hannah the way I did. How adept she was at manipulating feelings. Case in point, she was making us feel guilty when neither of us had done anything wrong. But I knew Hannah wasn’t doing it to be malicious. She genuinely was lonely.
‘Wait,’ Taylor called out. ‘You can join us.’
Hannah froze, turning slowly, wiping a non-existent tear from her cheek as she did. ‘I don’t want to intrude.’
Taylor smiled. ‘You won’t be.’
Hannah looked at me. ‘Jack?’
Clearly, Taylor was kind to waifs and strays, even manipulative ones. I liked that. ‘Of course you can join us.’
It was like the sun came out from behind the clouds, how quickly and drastically Hannah’s expression changed once she had what she wanted. ‘Well if you both insist.’
‘So, what do you do, Taylor?’ Hannah asked, once Fiona had bought her drink over to the table and taken her food to the kitchen to be kept warm.
‘I’m an artist,’ Taylor told her, and the way she leaned back in her chair told me she was anticipating a reaction from Hannah that she’d clearly come up against before.
‘Really. And what sort of art do you do?’
‘That’s a bit like asking a chef if he only ever cooks one sort of dish. I dabble in a lot of different art forms, but my passion is painting. I do a lot of canvases. Paintings of the ocean and the creatures who dwell within.’
‘How fun,’ Hannah drawled. ‘And you manage to make a living from it?’
I frowned at her intrusiveness. ‘That’s not really our business, Hannah.’
