You Belong With Me

chapter039

While she was waiting for the kettle to boil, Edie had an alert that Elliot had posted on Instagram. His presence there remained smoothly professionally anodyne, unlike Fraser’s, which was exuberant and unruly, an accurate reflection of their respective taste.

‘Fraser’s Instagram is set private,’ Elliot said once, ‘in the sense that you have to request to follow him. However, given the conditions for acceptance seem to be sending him a request to follow him, I don’t know why he bothers.’

Elliot had shared a ravishing red-gold sunset, seen from the Old Town, which had 7,412 likes. There was also a new post on Fraser’s grid.

Ruh roh – English girls hen do in the next villa found out my brother’s here

With a stomach plunge, Edie examined a photo of Elliot being flashmobbed by scores of girls in varieties of miniscule swimwear. They were hanging off him, arms draped round him, taking selfies. She felt the kind of sudden jealousy pang where your stomach contracts and your skin goes cold-hot.

She screen-grabbed it so she could zoom in, squinting at the many stunning bodies on show. Shimmering body cream on tanned limbs, no hair below eyebrows, belly button jewellery. Edie had never felt so pale, under-waxed, soft fleshed, and unadorned.

(Irrational, given there was no one on earth who’d demonstrated a greater enthusiasm for her body than the man in the middle of that photograph. ‘My, er, structure is so different to yours,’ she once said, concerned about being made of yielding wobble instead of taut muscle, and Elliot had replied: ‘That’s how heterosexuality works?’)

As soon as the sight of the Austin Powers entourage afflicted her, she surprised herself by almost bursting out laughing. It was intimidating, yes, but above all, it was absurd. The scene only needed some Yakety Sax, and it wasn’t actually anything to worry about. If she lost him, she had a feeling it wouldn’t be to a Henrietta from Farnham in a Melissa Odabash triangle bikini.

It’d be to someone else famous,her traitor brain whispered, uninvited. Your sort is a one-off deal. Your quota is filled. Check cast lists for suspects.

She sent the image to its subject.

Wow, just wow. Guess that’s bye from me, then? Disgusting, Elliot. Like the Costco Hugh Hefner.

Edie ended it with a row of three litter dropping emojis, to avoid confusion about whether she meant it. She had done this for real not so long ago, and Elliot could be forgiven for being wary.

He replied:

Is making new friends a crime now?

SMH.

Edie

If you’re ‘friends’, what are you talking about?

Elliot

Martin Amis’s short stories.

Edie

Oh, you like his books? Name one.

Elliot

Martin Amis’s Collected Short Stories. Got to go – we’re playing strip beer pong.

Edie giggled stupidly. She received the ‘typing’ dots and then:

Elliot

(NB: We’re not! I don’t have the steely nerves for this game with you, Thompson. YOU WIN.)

She beamed. Look at her, living fearlessly, trading the gags. It probably helped she was socialising herself, not trotters up, wearing her period week nightie and trying to keep track of a Harlan Coben.

An hour later, Elliot sent:

Free to talk? Only brief and non-urgent. Don’t want to disturb your evening. xx

Edie

Sure, it’s noisy in here though. I’ll nip out into the garden. Give me one minute. xx

Elliot

Got it. Here’s your homework! X

Edie refilled glasses and excused herself, as Elliot pinged her a link to a minor item story on the showbiz page of a national.

Things may be heating up with Elliot Owen and his girlfriend, Edie Thompson, who lives in his home city of Nottingham. Our spies hear Owen has bought a house in a leafy suburb as a base to visit the 36-year-old ad exec. It will do nothing to dispel rumours that the Blood Gold sex symbol is planning to break many hearts and make an honest woman of the lucky gal. ‘Elliot’s keen to settle down and says Edie is the woman for him,’ said our expertly placed source. ‘They’ve talked about marriage and starting a family and they’re on the same page.’

Edie closed the back door behind her, iPhone once again weighed like an unpinned grenade in hand. She and Elliot, she noticed, never mentioned the febrile wedding bells element to any write-ups. It’d be awkward if it was true and awkward if it wasn’t. This one, however, might need probing.

‘Fuck’s sake,’ Edie said, by way of hello.

‘Evening, darling! Fuck’s sake indeed.’

‘What’s the list of suspects this time?’

‘Me, you, Mum and Dad, and my parents told Fraser. End of list. The temporary news blackout plan with my brother isn’t working in this respect as I’m not going to tell my parents to keep any more secrets from him … The stag do has gone on to a local bar, by the way, and I’m catching them up.’

‘Only you and the henners in bikinis, eh.’

‘That reminds me – I let Fraz post that photo. I want to see if it somehow escapes his social media. I don’t know why, though, because it couldn’t be more obvious that the leak is via Fraser, without his knowledge. I still haven’t spoken to him, and I’ve got to. If he goes ballistic at any Molly imputation, I’m going to say to him: I’m not suggesting I have an explanation, give me your explanation.’

‘Imputation! You’re so clever for a pretty boy,’ Edie said.

‘You are riddled with prejudice. Some of us worked in school, instead of truanting with the guy with the smutty DVDs.’

Edie grinned. ‘You know, the timing here is another signpost away from Molly. I doubt she’d have the head space to be in Palma with her Prosecco coven and doing this?’

‘Smartphones being what they are, I think you can multitask. You know what has been worrying at me and has finally moved from back burner to front brain?’

Elliot’s flat vowels in ‘worrying’ was purest East Midlands. Edie liked being reminded of his roots.

‘What’s that?’ She stamped her feet to stay warm: March was spring in name only.

‘It’s been what, a week since the house decision? If I was selling stories on someone, I’d pick and choose – I’d take rests. I’d try to evade detection. This is relentless. At first, it came off to me as sloppy amateur, but I’ve realised there’s a darker interpretation. What if this is someone who really dislikes me? Properly vindictive: fuck you, every time you cough, I’m going to the red tops?’

‘You don’t have any enemies, though?’

‘I didn’t think I did … maybe Heather, I suppose.’

‘That description definitely isn’t Molly, either,’ Edie said.

‘Honestly, even if she’s the leak, I’ve never thought she’s the saleswoman. She’s probably telling herself it’s an ongoing coincidence that what she’s gossiped about is getting out. How’re you anyway? Dinner going well?’

Edie cast a look at the low-lit conviviality. ‘It’s really lovely. Declan is getting on like a house on fire with my lot, and my previously rebellious sister is in her element.’

‘Do you know how much I wish I was there?’

‘Is it as much as I wish you were here?’ Edie said.

‘Is it like a whole-body longing that slides into a supercut of favourite memories? If so, yes.’

‘Yeah, very much that,’ she said.

Edie knew they were both simpering, cradling their phones like children with pet hamsters. Nauseating. She cleared her throat.

‘You know the part in this story about us discussing … a family, and so on? Did you tell anyone about that?’

‘God, no,’ Elliot said. ‘Not a soul. I didn’t think that was anyone’s business but ours.’

‘Me neither.’

‘They add those claims by rote, I think. Heather and I were constantly off to the Little Wedding Chapel with her Pomeranian dog Snowball as ring bearer or some shit. Safe to ignore it.’

‘Oh sure,’ Edie said, making sure that the fact she was crestfallen was absent from her tone of voice. We’re not a repeat of you and Heather, and I wanted it to be true.

Through the window, she saw Declan watching her. He raised his wine glass in acknowledgement at having been caught, and Edie waved back. She’d been unwittingly frowning.

‘Everything all right?’ Declan said, when Edie came back in. ‘That looked intense?’

‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘A knotty topic being discussed, that’s all.’

Declan said: ‘Ah.’ She could tell he thought he was being fobbed off and that he’d seen a row.

Later, as she banged plates haphazardly into the dishwasher and pressed the on button, Edie’s phone rang with an unknown London landline number.

Something about the unlikely late hour made Edie answer.

‘Hi – is that Edie Thompson?’

‘Yes?’

‘My name’s Simon Brggghhhm from the …’ Background noise from the appliance obscured the words.

Edie put a finger in her spare ear and said: ‘Sorry, what?’

‘We have a story running tomorrow.’

Ah, phishing about the Elliot house purchase.

‘No comment.’

‘It’s an interview with your ex-boyfriend, Jack Marshall. He’s given his side of what happened at his wedding last year.’

What? Edie was stunned.

‘If I read you his quotes, do you want to make a comment?’

‘He’s not my ex,’ Edie said, before comprehending she was simultaneously half-pissed, in shock, and on the record with a journalist – and ending the call.

A text arrived from Declan.

Tommo! Your friends are ACE. As is your sister. I can’t thank you enough for how well you’ve looked after me since I moved up here. A brilliant night, thanks. xx

It was no longer a brilliant night.