‘I do… love her,’ I say eventually. Because, when I ask myself the question whether or not I do, that is the only answer I come up with. Of course I do. She’s, well, she’s incredibly, infinitely loveable.
‘How much do you love her? Like, what would you do for her?’
‘I’d do anything for her. I’d lay down my life for her.’ I’m stating the obvious. Of course I would. ‘Including not making her miserable. And that is why, even though, yes, I love her and, yes, I’m missing her and, yes, I’d like to be with her every hour of every day if I could, I amnotwith her.Thatis what I’m doing for her.’
‘You know you’re an idiot?’ Vinny stands up. ‘Going to get us both another pint.’
I don’t want another pint. I want to leave the pub and go back to London this evening and bury myself in un-emotive work.
When he sits back down a couple of minutes later, he says, ‘So Flavia was obviously very drunk last night – in a way that she normally is not – and I was worried about her. And the fact that she was talking about you like that obviously made me think that something had happened between you. So I asked her. And she told me what happened. She was so miserable that she couldn’t even be bothered to pretend anything other than the truth to me. Sheisdoing a great acting job with Mum, who I don’t think suspects a thing. Thank God she was in the loos when Flavia made her big speech.’
‘Yeah,’ I agree. Small mercies.
‘So.’ Vinny seems to have entered dog-with-a-bone territory. ‘Summarising: Flavia is miserable because you are not together. Andyouare miserable because you’re not together.’
I nod. ‘Yep. That is true. But my point is that we are miserablenow. We willnotbe miserable in the future. I am saving us – well, Flavia – future misery.’
‘Because in the future you will both be with other people who you love more?’
‘No.’ I’m very certain of this point. ‘I cannot imagine meeting anyone I love more. I mean, I’m thirty-six and she’s the only woman I’ve ever felt like this about. So, no. But I’m sure Flavia will be much happier with someone else.’ I’m surprised at how deeply I hate that idea. I shouldn’t; I should bepleasedto think that she will one day be happy. ‘I thought she was going to get back with Jed but I’m guessing she didn’t.’
‘What? No. Blatantly not.’
‘He texted her,’ I say. ‘He said he wanted them to get back together and have kids. That’s part of the reason I walked away.’
‘Well, they didn’t.’ Vinny waves a hand, like he’s banishing the idea of Jed, unaware that the confirmation that Flavia is not back with him is big news to me. ‘You know how you went to a fancy uni and you have a high-flying job?’ His change of subject surprises me a little. ‘You’re actually really stupid, no offence.’ Oh, okay. This was not a change of subject. ‘You cannot imagine meeting anyone you love more than Flavia because you’ve never felt like this with anyone else?’
I nod. There is nothing stupid about that, actually.
‘You know I had alotof girlfriends in my teens and twenties.’ Yeah. He really did.
‘And then I met Amelie,’ he continues. ‘Every relationship I had before her ended, pretty quickly. Because they were the wrong relationship with the wrong person. Then I met her and fell in love and it turned out that I was not a serial relationship-ender, I was just with the wrong person, over and over again.’
‘But you aren’t a relationship wrecker,’ I say. ‘You aren’t from afamilyof relationship wreckers.’
‘I mean, Iwasa relationship wrecker. And I would argue that you aren’t from a family of relationship wreckers, you’re actually just from a family of people who serially get married too soon. And before you raise your dad—’ we’ve spoken in the past about my dad not being themost devoted of parents ‘—so what? You aren’t him and your mum’s great, isn’t she? And they seem to be fairly happily married, don’t they?’
Weirdly, what he’s saying is making sense. It also tallies very much with something Flavia said. Which in hindsight I think also makes sense. I nod.
‘Yeah.’ Vinny raises his glass in my direction. ‘I see that you’re thinking about it. Because I am right.’
‘This is not what you said on New Year’s Day,’ I point out.
‘And that is because I was also stupid and I did not realise you could ever be like this. You’re in love, mate. Properly. For the first time in your life. With my sister. Who is in love with you. You need to think hard about that.’
I nod, slowly. I’m not sure whether he’s right, but I do think that maybe I do need to have a think.
21
FLAVIA
It’s the Friday following the evening that will forever live in my memory as The One With the Shots (long version and more accurate title: The One Where I Got Off My Face and Humiliated Myself In Front of Dozens of Close Friends and Family), and I’m in a wine bar with five girlfriends from uni, including Jenna, and we’re all drinking Prosecco to celebrate our friend Gubby’s engagement.
Last Saturday was so bad that Vinny, my laid-back, fun-loving, avoid-a-serious-conversation-with-a-bargepole-especially-on-his-birthday brother, sat me down for a deep and meaningful over late-night cheese on toast and two pints of water to minimise my hangover. (It did not work; I spent about three days afterwards with the headache from hell and a churning stomach.)
When I say we’re all drinking Prosecco, what I mean is the others are and I am pretending to. One sip was enough to remind me of last weekend and make me feel like I was going to vomit again, so I’m now interspersing tiny Prosecco sips with large gulps from the pint of tap water I went and got myself from the bar.
I wonder how long it’s going to be before any form of alcohol stops tasting like rancid Marmite in my mouth. Maybe I’m never going to be able to drink ever again.
