Page 29 of The Christmas Star

Theo placed a coffee, a plate of chips and a scone with jam and butter in front of me. ‘I wasn’t sure what you’d like so thought I’d play it safe.’ He handed me a knife and fork wrapped in a napkin and sachets of salt and vinegar. ‘Once the traffic gets going again, it shouldn’t be too long ’til we reach the port. When we’re settled, we can decide on a plan of action.’

I gestured to my phone as Theo took the seat opposite. ‘Hopefully by then we’ll have something to go on.’ I nodded to the individual servings. ‘Aren’t you eating?’

‘I’m good with this,’ he replied, raising his cup.

Unlike Theo who’d troughed his way through a tub of biscuits, I hadn’t eaten all day and was starving. As I ripped open the sachets, smothered the chips in salt and vinegar and dug in, I couldn’t help but swoon. ‘Who knew chips could taste so good?’ Shovelling forkful after forkful into my mouth, it wasn’t long before my plate was clear and I’d started on the scone. I cut it in half and eagerly spread thick layers of butter and jam onto the two pieces. I suddenly sensed Theo watching me and paused in my actions. ‘What?’ I asked, looking at him direct.

With a knife in my hand, then was not the time to offer an opinion on how much or how fast I was eating. Or, indeed, make some joke about women needing to watch their figures. Having kept a close eye on mine most of my adult life, I’d reached the age where no amount of gym exercise or lettuce nibbling made a god damn difference and if I couldn’t be happy with and accepting of myself at fifty, when could I be?

Theo smiled. ‘Nothing. It’s just nice to see you enjoy your food.’

‘Why wouldn’t I?’

‘Exactly. I can’t tell you the number of women who’d rather suffer over a salad bowl.’

Considering my sex, I stared at the man. ‘I think I have a good idea.’

‘Sorry,’ Theo said. ‘I don’t mean to mansplain and don’t get me wrong, you can do great things with fruit and veg. But tossing them together with a drizzle of vinaigrette isn’t one of them. Why would anyone put themselves through that?’ As if realising he’d done it again, he put his hands up in surrender. ‘I know, I know. Societal pressure, et cetera et cetera. I get it.’

The more time I spent with Theo, the more I warmed to him. I indicated the untouched half of my scone. ‘Would you like some?’

Theo smiled. ‘Tempting…’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘But after biscuitgate…’

Drinking my coffee, I almost choked. ‘Good looking and cheeky. I like it.’

His smile turned to a grin. ‘Oh, you do, do you?’

Holding each other’s gaze, we both fell silent. Simultaneously realising we were staring, we snapped ourselves out of it and started to speak, only to realise we were talking over each other.

‘Sorry,’ Theo said. ‘You were saying?’

‘No,’ I replied. ‘Please, you go first.’

‘Honestly, I’m happy to let…’

I raised my eyebrows.

‘Okay,’ Theo said. ‘I wanted to mention misophonia.’

‘Sorry?’ I didn’t have a clue what that meant.

‘That’s what you’re experiencing. It’s when someone can’t tolerate specific sounds. I couldn’t remember its name before. I’ve been wracking my brains.’

I still didn’t understand.

‘Sasha, Jackson’s Mum, she had it. You hate the sound of someone eating; for her it was breathing. If I remember rightly, it’s to do with lower oestrogen levels which makes your hearing hyper-sensitive.’

I stared at Theo, incredulous.

‘It’s surprising what you can learn when you need to. Periods, pregnancy, perimenopause. Sasha didn’t have it easy. The least I could do was understand why.’

After Rory’s speech about menopausal marketing campaigns, Theo’s ability to talk about women’s bodily functions without squirming was refreshing. And dare I say it, attractive. ‘Sasha’s a lucky woman.’

His smile waned. ‘Not really.’ He indicated my phone. ‘How hard is it to do a bit of research?’ He drank a mouthful of coffee. ‘Anyway, your turn. What did you want to talk about?’

‘I just thought, seeing as we’re travelling together, maybe we should get to know each other a bit more?’

‘That makes sense. Where do you want to start?’