‘Scotland is nice,’ he agreed after taking a deep drink of prosecco and reducing the amount in his glass to a more manageable level. ‘Except Mum decided it would be fun to move as far north as it’s possible to go without getting wet. It’s a trek. Can’t blame her for wanting to stay clear of my dad though.’
‘You don’t get on?’ It was possibly the most redundant question ever.
A small half-smile appeared on his face and that little crease between his eyebrows ironed itself out.
‘My dad is a lot. Best enjoyed in small doses. Mum put twenty years into trying to change him before she gave up and legged it to America. She and I moved to Boston when I was sixteen.’
‘Fancy,’ I commented as the very loud music echoed around us. ‘What brought you back?’
He looked away, vaguely shaking his head. ‘Lots of things.’
‘Did you go to school in America?’
‘I did. A little place called Harvard.’
Something in the room changed and our easy back and forth shifted into something else, an interview rather than a conversation, less sharing and more stating. His genuine half-smile was swallowed up by the louche, smug grin that had put my back up atlunch. My defences sprang back into action and I was forced to remind myself just because a man knows all the words to ‘Crazy in Love’ doesn’t mean he’s a good person.
‘Have you ever heard of Harford – Harford-on-the-Water?’ I asked, backing across the room and searching for the glass of water I hadn’t touched since the first bottle of prosecco arrived. I needed to hydrate. I needed to keep my distance. ‘That’s where my parents live. It’s beautiful. Bit boring, very quiet, but beautiful. It’s on the river, lots of limestone cottages, even more sheep.’
‘Sophie Taylor.’ Joe said my name slowly and, in spite of everything, this time I did not hate the way it sounded as it tripped off his tongue. ‘Wait, your dad isn’t Hugh Taylor, is he?’
I groaned inwardly and blanched outwardly; there was no need to confirm or deny, my expression said it all for me.
‘I should have known,’ he exclaimed, raking his hair away from his face. ‘Malcolm’s your godfather. You’re Hugh and Pandora Taylor’s kid.’
‘One of. I have a younger sister and an older brother,’ I replied in between glugs of water but Joe wasn’t listening. His face tensed with concentration as he worked through something in his head.
‘Isn’t it his big birthday party this weekend?’ he asked as I started on his glass of water after finishing my own. ‘That’s why you’re going up north?’
The backing track played on and Pat’s lyrics scrolled merrily across the screen, completely unaware they were being ignored. No promises, no demands.
‘That’s why I’m going up north,’ I said, his self-congratulatory Sherlock Holmes smile melting away asI spoke. ‘I know everyone in publishing worships them, I’m sure you’ve got some amazing story you can’t wait to tell me about how one of them once imparted some words of wisdom and changed your life forever. Go on, get it out your system.’
‘Call me crazy.’ Joe leaned against the closest wall, just a couple of feet away. All the walls were close, the room was tiny and getting smaller by the second. ‘But I get the feeling you have a conflicted relationship with them.’
‘Everyone has a conflicted relationship with their parents,’ I replied before quickly correcting myself. ‘No, I don’t, they’re great parents. Amazing, best parents who ever lived. Is it me or does it feel like they’ve turned the heating on in here?’
‘Then why did you say you weren’t looking forward to going home?’
‘I hate travelling,’ I lied. ‘Trains are a nightmare, taxis cost a fortune. It really is getting very warm.’
Joe watched my futile attempt to fan myself with a damp napkin, finished his drink then reached for the prosecco to top off his glass.
‘You’re not going to believe this but,’ he said, laughing as though he couldn’t believe he was really about to say what he was about to say, ‘when I first saw you with Malcolm at lunch, I thought you were Este Cox.’
My water glass slipped out of my hand, fell to the floor and shattered into a thousand pieces. Well, three pieces. It was a cheap glass.
‘Come on, it wasn’t that far-fetched an idea,’ Joe said, draping himself over the zebra-print seats. ‘You and Malcolm, book on the table, clandestine meetings in back alleys.’
‘We were having lunch in a curry house in the middle of the day.’
‘A secret lunch,’ he amended, ‘and you were both extremely shifty when I came over.’
‘Because you were acting completely normal?’ I replied. ‘Watching us like a weirdo then emerging from the shadows like some sort of shit spy.’
‘Obviously Hugh and Pandora Taylor’s daughter would never write anything likeButterflies,’ Joe chuckled, shaking his head at the very thought. ‘God, imagine the look on your mother’s face if she had to explainthatto her friends.’
I felt like I was going to be sick. It was one thing to think that kind of thing myself but it was another to hear someone else say it out loud. My eyes welled up with tears and I wiped them away with surprise, slowly sinking to the worryingly sticky floor. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d cried and here I was, seconds away from bursting into hysterics in front of an absolute tosspot who had no idea what he was saying.
