Chapter 16 #2
‘You know now,’ he says snootily as he folds his arms across his chest.
‘Stop posing,’ I complain at him.
He looks down at his arms. ‘I always sit like this.’ I recently caught him flexing his biceps while fishing for reassurance from Brendan that he wasn’t chubby.
Again, he grins and I half want to slap him.
Cian turns to my parents. ‘Zoe told me you’re both teachers?’
They grunt.
Mum goes to the counter and tips an utterly ridiculous measure of vermouth into a glass.
‘Regrettably, yes. We’re counting down the years to retirement, Cian.
Teaching is a slog. Thank God Zoe chose to take another path.
You’ll always have marketing, but teaching –’ she tuts several times – ‘I don’t think so, not with all this AI stuff.
’ She hands him a martini I do not recall him asking for. ‘Has Zoe been taking care of you?’
He studies me long enough to make me curl my toes under the table. ‘She’s been great. Always checking in on me and making me sandwiches.’
‘She’s a lovely girl. A real Florence Nightingale.’ Mum comes to stand behind me and smooths out my hair. ‘You know she wasn’t planned?’
‘Mum!’
‘I was barely twenty-two when I found out I was pregnant. I’d been careful with boys up until then; when you’re abroad your guard goes down, doesn’t it?’
Cian nods tightly then glances at me as if for an explanation.
‘Us two,’ she says, indicating herself and Dad, ‘met while I was teaching English. My parents went nuts when I got back to the UK, in love and up the duff.’
‘Mum, please. Cian does not want to hear about your unplanned pregnancy and—’ I stop to laugh because between Cian’s face and the general awkwardness of the situation, it’s hard not to, and Mum, because she knows what she’s doing, joins in.
Cian’s mouth drops open as he comments, quite incorrectly, ‘You laugh the same.’
When my parents get up to prep the food, Cian leans close. ‘Your dad doesn’t say much. Does he speak English?’
‘Of course he speaks English. He just chooses not to.’
The table is loaded with mini mango chicken fillets, mini baked potatoes, mini naans and mini quiches.
‘There seems to be a theme,’ I note while Mum shoves a pile of plates my way and directs me to: ‘Move next to Cian so you can serve him.’
I hand him a plate which he holds on to while staring at me intently, and my entire body fills with heat. What is this? Why now? I turn away and sit down, keeping my focus on the food as Mum chats Cian’s ear off about how much alcohol she can safely drink and drive on.
‘Alright, love?’ Mum asks and, assuming she’s addressing me, I begin to speak.
‘It’s because I overwork one arm with the crutches,’ Cian answers as he pulls his shoulders up and winces. ‘It keeps cramping.’
He really does look different in that colour. And different here, in another place. Somehow brighter and more real. I don’t know. It’s weird. I’m being weird.
‘I can get around on one,’ he continues, ‘though I’m meant to use both equally.’
‘Yes, you should, or you’ll end up with one bulging arm and one scrawny little one,’ Mum cackles.
‘Like Popeye on one can of spinach,’ Cian says sadly, as he checks each flexed arm. ‘I’ve been worried about that.’
Mum squeezes his shoulder as she stands. ‘He’s like a rock. Zoe, come and feel this.’
‘Oh, no. I’m good.’
‘Get Zoe to give you a massage,’ Mum says. ‘She’s very good at them. She used to give me massages all the time when I did my back in.’
Dad cracks open another beer and asks gruffly, ‘Are you two together?’
‘No,’ we both say.
‘Glad to hear it,’ Mum says. ‘Not that you don’t seem lovely, Cian; it’s more she’s only just broken up with Ikenna.’
‘I was waiting for Ikenna to be brought up.’
‘Loved Ikenna,’ Mum says with a whistle and Cian finds this hilarious.
‘Still glad you came?’ I ask him.
‘I’m only making small talk,’ Mum says. ‘I’ve never known you to have a male friend before.’
‘What are you on about? I have tons of male friends. Anyway, Cian and I are colleagues.’ I note the way his eyes widen at the descriptor.
‘You’re not seeing anyone then, Cian?’ Mum asks.
‘Not right now.’
‘It was something about having to be held at gunpoint,’ I say, ‘wasn’t it?’
‘Did I say that?’ he asks. ‘That seems extreme.’
‘That’s what you said.’
He fixes that unreadable expression on me, then explains, ‘I had a bad breakup. That’s all. It was ages ago.’
Mum loads the plates with more chicken. Again, no one asked, but we’re all getting it. ‘I dumped him once.’ She points her fork at Dad. ‘When I was pregnant with Eric. I got so fed up. Then I realised there was nothing better out there. So, you never know, Cian, she, or he, might come back to you.’
After what is probably around three hours, though feels like seventeen, my parents pack up their leftovers and leave. I walk back into the living room, where we’d earlier adjourned for martinis, and attempt to fix my face into a frown to show Cian I’m mad at him.
He looks up and smiles, wide, unguarded and oblivious to the magnitude of what I’m feeling.
I sit on the arm of the sofa.
‘Why did you never tell me you and your mum have matching cackles?’ He topples slightly as I pull the cushions from under his arm. ‘She’s so much fun,’ he says. ‘Also, slightly inappropriate in some of her comments.’
‘You’re lucky my dad was here, or you would have been in for a bit of inappropriate touching as well.’
‘I’m glad I came over.’
‘You weren’t invited,’ I remind him.
He angles himself so he’s facing up towards me. ‘Your mum, she’s very—’
‘Think carefully before you finish that sentence.’
‘Am I allowed to say attractive?’ He rolls his shoulders back. ‘She was very glamorous for a Sunday afternoon.’
‘She always looks like that.’
‘I see where you get it from now.’
‘The glamour, the beauty, the charisma?’
I simmer in his gaze till he clarifies. ‘The flirting. As well as the laugh. I can’t believe I’m your one male friend.’ He tugs at his shoulder. ‘Why is that?’
‘Do you want a heat pad?’
‘Heat’s not going to help. I’ve got physio on Tuesday. I’ll live in agony until then.’
‘I feel like you’re heavily hinting for a massage.’
‘I’m not.’
‘Good, because that would be weird.’
At this, he frowns. ‘Why would it be weird?’
‘Are you serious? I don’t give my friends massages.’
‘Okay,’ he says, lifting his arms and twisting his torso side to side. He catches my eye and flicks his eyebrows up suggestively.
‘Cian,’ I chide, ‘stop it.’ What is this? Is he hitting on me?
‘You’re making out like I’m being creepy,’ he says.
‘In a strange turn of events, you are.’
‘Massages are services, you pay for them. It’s nothing more than that.’
‘I’m not servicing you.’
He laughs, in a slightly exasperated way. ‘I’m not asking for a massage, of course not, but could you please, in the most platonic way possible, dig your knuckles into this spot on my left shoulder?’
‘Oh my God.’
‘Like this –’ he mimes the action – ‘it would help so much.’