“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Jesus, Callum. I know your brain’s a bit weird with shit like this but you’re not thick. Don’t you think you need to speak with her?”
“About what?”
“That you want to do more than fuck her brains out.”
I shook my head.
“You’ve slept together. You like her. You’re jealous right now because she’s talking to someone else and not to you. How does that sum up the situation?”
Badly. Not because he was wrong; I’d worked out that I was feeling jealous and I wasn’t sure I liked it, so the situation was being done badly.
“I can’t stop her from talking to other men. I don’t own her.”
“No. But you can tell her that you want more.”
I shook my head. “She turned me down. Years ago.” I had no idea why I was telling Seph this. “We got close when we were at college. I told her I wanted more than friends who were messing about and she said she couldn’t do it.”
“Do what?”
He was intelligent but sometimes he left his brain in the gym.
“Be with me.”
Seph tipped his head to one side as if he was thinking and then nodded. “You’re not the easiest. You’re a womaniser. You’ve never had a proper relationship and I’m not sure you know how to have one. You can’t talk about how you feel unless it’s hunger or hyper. You keep everyone at arm’s length. I can carry on, but I know your ego’s secretly fragile. What reason did she give?”
I shrugged. “She couldn’t promise me she wouldn’t walk away.”
“More likely she couldn’t promise you she would walk away and then you’d push her.”
The man she was with leaned in and whispered something into her ear. She laughed, turned away, my chest feeling as if some alien, unidentified creature had burrowed in there and had eaten it hollow.
“Why’s she talking to him?”
Seph shook his head. “Go and say hi. She’s staying with you. It’s weirder to stand here and watch than to speak to her, for fuck’s sake.”
I nodded. For once – or maybe actually more than once – he was right. “Can you be trusted if I leave you on your own?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Seriously?”
I shook my head and headed to where Wren was, still talking to the dickwad. I wasn’t a caveman. I didn’t need to drag her way from what she was doing; she had a choice, she’d always had a choice. I would stand with them and talk and be pleasant and I wouldn’t be a tosser, because I had more self-respect than that, plus I wasn’t Max who would simply piss all over his territory and maybe growl.
She saw me before I spoke, smiling. Carl or whatever he was called didn’t look thrilled to see me so I gave him an even bigger grin.
“I didn’t know you were out tonight. Seph said he wasn’t sure what time you’d be back.” Her eyes shone, or maybe it was how the light caught them.
“My dad had to come back into the city so I grabbed a lift.” During which we’d talked about my mother, what she’d been like. He hadn’t told me anything negative, instead telling me stories about what she was like when she was younger, how they met, her sense of humour. He could’ve been bitter and sour about her, but instead there had been warmth and affection.
“If you’re hungry, there’s probably nothing in the fridge. Seph eats like a horse with worms.”
Carl flinched. I ignored it, or tried to.
“That’s an accurate description. He did leave an empty container of what I think was Chinese.”
She nodded, looking serious. “Last night’s supper. He ordered what I thought was enough for all of us.”
“And you actually managed to get some? He must like you.”
