“I’d be Rosalind from Twelfth Night. Collected, calm and in control,” Erin spritzed herself with perfume which then scented the whole car. Thankfully it was nice, unlike some of her experiments where she’d tried making it herself.
“I think you’re Beatrice from Much Ado. You’re too argumentative to be Rosalind. And I think Harriet is Cordeliafrom King Lear.” This was a good way to take my mind off Carter.
“Why would I be Cordelia?” The driver asked.
“Because you don't care what anyone else thinks of you, you’re not bothered about being noticed – except when you are – and you’re our moral compass.” I could’ve added more, but I wanted her to concentrate on us getting to the hotel without some kind of event.
“I would’ve said I was Ophelia.” She actually used her indicator again.
“You’re not that delicate or dippy. You let people think you are, but you’re anything but.” I could say that with confidence.
“I think you’re Viola,” Harriet said. “You’re an observer who doesn’t cause any drama.”
“Unlike last Saturday.” I grumbled it, still feeling bad for derailing Erin’s birthday.
“That was no one’s fault,” Erin said. “We were annoyed that it looks like Carter’s led you on. We don’t know that he has – we have no understanding of who Laurie is – although I did like her. She didn’t introduce herself as his girlfriend and we didn’t see any signs of her being touchy with him, which is what you’d expect if she was with him like that – she’d have been practically spraying him to mark her territory.”
“Who’s the psychologist now?” I asked, although I agreed with Erin. “But still – it was a jolt going from kissing Carter for the first time since - ” I stopped. They didn’t know that story.
The inside of the car was frozen with silence, especially as the engine was now off. We had arrived at our destination.
Erin turned around and pinned her eyes on me. ‘I’m sorry, I thought I heard you say ‘the first time since’ which suggests there was a previous time.”
“Rose?” Harriet prompted encouragingly.
“We all know you kissed when you were fourteen and he was your knight in shining armour,” Fallon said. “But you didn’t mean that, did you, Rosie?”
Rosie. Carter was the only one who called me Rosie. He was the only one who could get away with it.
I could lie and say that was what I meant, but I hated lying. I sometimes refrained from telling what happened or what I’d done, but that meant I didn’t say anything about it.
“We kissed when I was seventeen.” Factual. Just stating what the events were.
I felt Fallon’s eyes boring into the side of my face. I didn’t turn round to look at her.
“Can I suggest we pause the interrogation here and go and check in. I feel like I need a cocktail as well as a glass of champagne.” Practical. Nice, practical side quests that would cease this line of questioning, for now at least. There was no way I’d get away with not talking about it later.
We had our own rooms for the first time. Usually we’d have booked two twins, but we could afford not to now, and the space was welcomed, for me at least. We agreed on ten minutes to freshen up, unpack anything we needed, and then meet outside Erin’s room, which was the biggest.
The place we’d booked for afternoon tea was about a five minute walk away, which meant clustering under umbrellas because the English weather was doing its thing – slow, large drips of rain fell on us and bounced off the pavements as we walked around to the café bar, a venue decorated to look like it was set in the nineteen forties.
We were seated straight away and presented with menus and a run through of what afternoon tea looked like. Champagne had been poured before Fallon could complain about being thirsty and three pairs of eyes landed on me, two sets of arms folded, and Harriet was giving me a sweet assassin’s smile.
“Seventeen, Carter, kiss. Tell.” That was Fallon. To the point.
“We’d gone to Clapham Common - ”
“I knew this would be Clapham Common. You were so secretive that day about what you’d been up to and you had this really dreamy look for weeks afterwards. You stopped talking about the boy who was doing work experience at your law firm as well.” Erin’s memory was impressive.
“Let her tell us what happened.” Fallon would’ve made a good detective. Interrogator.
“It wasn’t much. We were sat down on a blanket and I’d ended up between his legs, resting against his chest and we kind of ended up looking at each other and we kissed. Just once. And we never talked about it afterwards until Erin’s party.” Facts, stripping it back to just the facts.
None of them said anything.
I studied the afternoon tea menu, different selections of sandwiches to pick from, a variety of cakes. It all looked very good and the champagne was lovely.
“Rose, we’re waiting for more details.” It was a gentle prod from Harriet.
