‘My sister,’ Dylan explained. ‘Not the one that Mr Wickham ends up marrying. A different one. Jane is the loveliest girl in the world.’
‘Jane’s very sweet and very nice,’ Romeo-Dylan said. ‘Wouldn’t hurt a fly. Would probably let a fly hurt her.’
So… a doormat. They both thought I was a doormat.
Don’t be a doormat, Mandie,Jac had said to me once in exasperation. I’d been refusing to pick a restaurant to eat at in case I picked the wrong one, trying to turn the conversation around so she chose instead.You know what you want. Just say it.
She was right. I did know what I wanted.
I wanted to be in control of what I did and what happened to me. And that meant I didn’t want to be a doormat.
I gritted my teeth. Dylan wanted me to channel my ex? I was going to fucking well channel my ex.
‘Not today,’ I said, smiling Jac’s little sexy half-smile, the one that had driven me wild whenever she turned it on me. ‘Today, I’m a fuckboi.’
It would have been such a great moment if we hadn’t had to go back and do it again, because we weren’t allowed to swear.
They started the photo shoot with the Dylans sitting at the little table, looking into each other’s eyes over the eclairs. I was in the background, arms crossed, mostly turned away from them, looking back over my shoulder.
The position gave me a great view of what an incredibly stunning couple they made. Dylan was facing away from me, but I could see Romeo-Dylan smiling as he looked at her, those little crinkles forming at the corners of his kind eyes.Can we eat the cakes?I saw him mouth to her, saw her shoulders move ever so slightly as she laughed.
They were perfect.
Before Jac, I’d been part of a perfect couple too. I’d had a perfectly sweet, perfectly nice boyfriend called Mark, who, sure, hadn’t exactly set my world on fire, but who I could have been happy with. Especially when you considered that I wasn’t the kind of girl who set anyone’s world on fire either.
Then along came Jac.
My breath still caught in my throat when I thought about the first time we’d met. It had been at a wedding for one of Mark’s friends. I’d been standing at the bar. She’d walked up and ordered a whiskey, looked over her glasses at me, smiled that sexy little half-smile, and said, ‘Hey.’
And it was all over. No more Amarkda. No more perfect couple. Jac had cut me away from Mark as precisely as if she had a scalpel, and my universe had exploded in flames.
I wasn’t a doormat today. I was a Jac, and I was in control, and that meant no perfect couples that didn’t include me.
‘Hey,’ I said, walking up behind Dylan and putting my hand on the back of her chair. ‘I believe that’s my date to the ball you’re flirting with, Mr Darcy.’
If the show really was planning to out me as bi, they were going to have a field day with this.
But Jac wouldn’t give a shit. In some weird alternative universe where she’d found herself onMarry Me, Juliet,she would have screamedI’M GAYso loudly in Romeo-Dylan’s face the first time they met that his ears would still be ringing from it.
Straight shoulders. Half-smile. Wear the suit, don’t let the suit wear you.Be Jac be Jac Jac Jac Jac.
‘Oh dear,’ Romeo-Dylan said, standing up, his eyescrinkling even further as he tried not to laugh. ‘I do hope you’re not going to cause a scene, Mr Wickham.’
‘Damn straight I’m going to cause a scene,’ I said. ‘I’m going to, um –’
What did old-timey people do when someone tried to steal their girlfriend?
‘– duel you,’ I said. ‘Let’s have a duel, Mr Darcy. For Lizzy.’
Dylan broke into peals of laughter.
‘What?’ I said, turning around. ‘Did I get it wrong? Do they not have duels inPride and Prejudice?’
‘Oh, Mandie,’ she said, wiping tears from her eyes, ‘you’re the most adorable person to have ever lived.’
Adorable is a word for puppies and small children.
I gritted my teeth.
