He squinted at his screen. ‘Whereareyou, by the way?’
I closed my notebook, keeping half an eye on the time. It was past eight-thirty – I couldn’t get stuck on this call and be late for Marcus, he’d never let me forget it. Charlie always did have impeccable timing.
‘Monte Carlo. I’m working, so I haven’t got long.’
‘Working?’
‘Tennis. I’m writing a piece on a player.’
‘That’s great!’ he said.
I bit my lip. He’d always been so invested in my career, so encouraging; my own personal cheerleader. Now I was going to have to do it all by myself again, like I had before I met him.
‘Zoe blagged it for me. It’s a four-page spread forLuxe.’
‘Wow. Fantastic, Ava, really well done. Good that you’re back out there, anyway, because I’d heard you weren’t ...’
He trailed off, his voice faltering to a halt.
I put my chin casually in the heel of my hand. ‘Heard I wasn’t what?’
‘Doesn’t matter.’
‘Go on,’ I insisted.
‘Quite yourself ...?’ he said, looking at me with sympathy.
‘And who did you hear that from?’ I asked, dearly wishing I could vehemently deny it and tell him he was deluded.
I was a bit miserable at times, but so what? Being broken up with out of the blue was hardly cause for celebration, was it? And if I was worried about anything it was likely to be money, thanks to him leaving me in the lurch with bills.
‘It was nothing,’ lied Charlie. ‘I can’t remember who mentioned it.’
‘Sure.’
He cleared his throat. Good, I was making him squirm.
‘Did you call for a reason?’ I asked, determined to regain some small semblance of control over proceedings. I flickered my eyes to the time at the top of my phone: 8.34. I was cutting this very fine, and immediately hooked my foot into the straps of my bag and dragged it along the ground towards me. Then, without breaking eye contact with Charlie, I slid my notebook and pen into it.
‘I wanted to know when I could pick up the rest of my stuff?’ he asked, having the good grace to look sheepish.
After four years together,thiswas what had prompted him to contact me? There was no hope he was calling to ask me to get back with him, then.
‘Well, as I said, I’m away,’ I told him. ‘So it’ll have to wait.’
‘When are you back?’ he asked.
‘Not sure,’ I said, being deliberately vague. ‘It depends when Marcus gets knocked out.’
‘Who’s Marcus?’
‘The tennis player I’m profiling. Who I’m supposed to be meeting in about thirty seconds. Sorry, Charlie, I’m going to have to go.’
He’d managed to go this long without the one remaining bag he’d left at ours/mine, which, as far as I knew, consisted of winterjumpers and a pile of ancient DVDs. Surely another week wouldn’t make any difference?
‘It’s just, I’ve got a trip coming up,’ he said. ‘So I could have done with some of my warmer stuff.’
‘Sorry. Not much I can do,’ I said, aware that I was now dangerously close to welling up.
