‘Sounds about right.’
I change the subject. ‘It’s mad that you’re a teacher. Who’d have thought that was what you’d end up doing.’
‘It’s alright.’
‘And you’re happy? With the way things turned out?’
He leans down, putting his plate on the floor. ‘What, teaching a bunch of sixteen-year-olds about Hamlet?’
Although he sounds flippant, he worked so hard to qualify. Getting a degree with a toddler wasn’t easy for him. His parents helped a lot, back then. They moved to Cyprus a few years ago. Living the retirement dream as Spence puts it, all beer at noon, walks on the beach, and a ground-level apartment next to a pool.
I did what I could when I was home – took Georgia to the park, looked after her while he studied. But all of that graft is down to Spence. Luckily the school that offered him a job had a breakfast and after-school club which Georgia loved.
‘And you do have the added bonus of being the hot teacher with all the swim mums swooning after you…’
He shakes his head. Eyes clouded with thought for a moment. ‘And my irritating best friend has moved back home, so that’s something.’
‘It is. I missed you.’ No matter how happy I was in London, and how successful I became, I always missed not having Spence close by. I had friends there, but they knew that version of me, they didn’t know the version of me that would sneak out and stay over at his house so I could escape Mum and Dad’s arguments, which were held late into the night behind closed doors. They didn’t know the girl who was always in her sister’s hand-me-downs, that cried when her shoes were rubbing the backs of her heels. But Spence did. Spencer knows me like no other person on this planet.
‘I missed you too.’ His phone vibrates and he frowns. ‘Hey, pudding, what’s up?’
Then, after a moment, ‘Are you sure that’s what they said?’
I put my glass down and lean forwards.
‘Maybe they were talking about someone else?’
I can hear Georgia’s voice, urgent, hushed, desperate from the other end of the phone.
‘OK, OK. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.’
He hangs up and looks at me. ‘She overheard the other girls talking about her when she went to the loo. I need to fetch her.’
‘Do you want me to come?’
‘No… she’ll be embarrassed. You’re kind of her hero.’
He grabs his car keys and I follow him to the door. ‘Hope she’s OK. Is there anything I can do? I can pop over tomorrow, take her out? We haven’t had any girl time for a while.’
Spence hesitates and looks down to his keys. ‘Yeah. She’d like that. Year eight girls can be brutal.’ He rushes his hands through his thick hair, just a hint of the curls left from when he was younger. ‘What would have helped you, you know, when you were thirteen, and kids were being kids?’
‘Honestly?’
He nods, waiting for a pearl of wisdom.
‘You.’
He gives me a quick hug. ‘Get some sleep, eh? And stay away from the brandy.’
I nod, close the door behind him and clear the detritus away. I bin the chip paper, my eyes drawn to my phone, staring at me from the corner of the room.
Taking a deep breath, I swipe the screen and click on my WhatsApp messages.
There’s my message to Spence, asking him to come and help me with the furniture. But other than that, there are no other texts. I take a deep breath and click on recent calls. Nothing there either. Oh, thank God. I didn’t drunk-dial Ryan and…
No.
I have a flash of memory. I was dancing to Kate Bush, pausing occasionally for another swig of brandy. I see my fingers tapping on my laptop, red chipped nails, not researching, not cutting and pasting the various cast members ofGame of Thrones, but writing.
