“I have five more minutes,” I lie.
“Yeah... London is home now. But it's not where I grew up, although near enough. We're Home Counties babies, Jake and me. From Surrey, but there’s no family there now and most of my friends have moved on too. I've lived in London for nearly twenty years now, so yes, it’s home.”
I soak up the information quickly and start counting down years.
“Stop with the maths!” she says with a pointed finger and a warning look that’s still part smile. I like how much she smiles, even when I’m sitting here giving her all sorts of mixed messages and I’m about to disappear.
“Just wait, I think I have it all figured out,” I say and close my eyes while holding my fingers up using them to count.
“Seriously, stop!” she says and grabs one of my arms, pulling it down. When her fingers leave my skin, the place she touched tingles for a long time, which I'm sort of focusing all my attention on until I hear her make the sound of the Countdown clock coming to a stop. “Time’s up. No more calculations, and no, I don’t want to hear what answer you came up with. Oh, God, wait. I hope you got that sound reference!”
I open my eyes. “Are you joking? My Nan watches that show every day.”
“Now I feelreallyold.” Jenna laughs. “Is she in Dublin too?”
“Yeah, in a nursing home. I try and see her once a week or so. It doesn't feel like enough but work and... other stuff keep me busy.”
“How old is she?”
“You know, I don't know for sure. Eighty-something.”
“Well, I can confirm that I'm younger than your grandmother,” she says with a wink. “Now, you should go.”
I wince. Now it’s my turn to hear Jenna dismiss me, I get why she looked so hurt a moment ago.
But she doesn't look as disappointed as I feel now. With a soft smile on her lips and slightly dazed eyes, she clears her throat again. “Would you like to know my villa number? For later?”
“I would love to know,” I say on a deep exhale, but then quickly add. “But I am going to ask you to put it in the fridge with all the other things we agreed not to talk about tonight.”
Now I see real disappointment on her face. It's like gravity pulls down on the pertness of her cheeks and the corners of her eyes.
“Oh,” she says.
“It’s not that I don’t want to-“
“No, it’s fine, Marty.” She shuffles forward as if to get up. “I just think I misread some messages.”
“Jenna, you got nothing wrong, and you did everything right,” I say and I see the old Marty approach, the one that likes to flirt himself out of an awkward situation, the one that’s ready to sayFuck itand ask for the villa number, but I ignore him. “You misread nothing. Like I said, I want to know. But I just want to maybe do this again first. Maybe tomorrow night?”
“This?”
“Have a drink with you while the sun goes down?”
“Watch the sunset together?” She seems puzzled.
“Yeah,” I say and I hold on to my smile tightly because I still haven't got the grin back on her face.
“Okay,” she says, sounding unconvinced. I watch as she re-crosses her legs and I notice the muscle in her upper thigh tense. Instinctively I wonder how firm or how soft they are or if they are a heady combination of both.Jesus, am I really turning her down tonight?
Yes. Yes, I am. I must. I need to.
I stand up as if to punctuate my resolve.
“Have a nice dinner,” she says, also coming to stand. There’s something about seeing her ready to leave that
glues my feet to the ground. Even though I know now that I’m going to be late, I don’t move. Even though there is already a scattering of glittering stars in the dark blue-grey night sky, I stay where I am looking at her. Even though I know I am going to be in so much trouble with my mother, I don’t even think about moving. I just look at Jenna.
“Your dinner,” she says and clears her throat again. I already know she does that before she says something she feels a little awkward or embarrassed saying. “With your parents.”
