CALLUM
I bring Abby to Marco Pierre White, my favourite steakhouse, but she’s barely swallowed a morsel. Normally she clears my plate as well as her own. The girl has a fantastic appetite. It’s one of many things I love about her. I wonder if she’s stumbled across some unflattering newspaper clippings on my past, a fear I’ve been harbouring for a while. She’s so wholesome, and I’m so tainted. Does she know what she’s getting herself into with me? Or maybe she’s realised my family is crazy and I’m no better. Either way, her off-kilter behaviour’s making me uncomfortable.
‘What’s up, Abs?’
She stares at her plate. I use two fingers to gently lift her chin, raising her face to meet my eye.
Two rugby fans approach to ask for an autograph. I convey a look that they’re interrupting something important, and they leave us in peace.
‘If you won’t talk to me, I can’t help you.’ I’m terrified of her closing me off again. We’ve come too far now. Maybe it’s that dickhead Sean. Maybe he’s resurfaced in the flesh to beg for forgiveness. No, she’d have told me.
‘Candice wants me to offer you a permanent job on the radio,’ she blurts out.
‘What? No way.’
Abby’s cocks her head to the side. ‘You’re not interested?’
‘Absolutely not. The only reason I agreed to talk about love and stuff was to win you over. I’m not doing it again. We made a deal. I wouldn’t let you down.’ She flinches at the mention of the deal, but relief washes over her face. ‘Candice pretty much forced me to ask you. Don’t get me wrong, the thought of you hanging around the studio’s pretty appealing in a lot of ways, but to be honest, it’s my thing.’
‘There is no way I’m signing up for regular questions onwhere to get waxed in the cityor that other girly guff…sorry…’ I do not want or need another job. Not yet, anyway.
‘Is that all that’s bothering you?’ I can’t believe she had her knickers in a twist about something so insignificant in the real world. I suppose it is her real world. It’s her employment after all.
‘Yep.’ She looks away.
‘Abby?’ She’s holding out on me… I know every line of her face, have memorised each and every one of her expressions, and right now she has one of guilt.
‘It’s James and Nadine’s wedding…’ She looks at her plate, anywhere but at me.
‘What about it?’
‘I can’t make it.’
‘What do you mean you can’t make it? He’s my best friend, you’re my girlfriend, we had a deal.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I don’t understand.’ Hurt gnaws at my gut. Have I been used? Now she’s succeeded in winning the trip am I getting the boot? It would be karma for all the using I’ve unintentionally done in the past.
‘I won the trip to New York. Thanks to you. It’s the same weekend. I’m so sorry, Callum. It’s the opportunity of a lifetime. I can’t turn it down.’ Dark apologetic pools gaze tentatively at me.
‘We had a deal.’ It’s not about Marcus’s stupid Audi. She’s my girlfriend, and I want her there with me to enjoy the day and show her off.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘What about us?’ It’s barely a whisper.
‘It doesn’t change the way I feel about you.’ She takes my hand.
Does it change the way I feel about her? No. But if the roles were reversed would she be equally as forgiving? Disappointment reverberates through me.
