Chapter 20
TWENTY
‘Oh my God, did you fall in a river or something?’ Nick asks as I walk through the door of his apartment.
He stands opposite me, giving casual and relaxed vibes in grey joggers and a hoodie, bare feet on the floor.
I have no idea how I look but it’s not relaxed.
It’s sodden and damp, a cold in my bones and veins.
After the other Nick helped me transport my books, we returned to my car and he and Noah waited with me until the AA man (Larry) eventually arrived and told me my car was dead as a doornail which I told him was a very timely Dickensian reference that no one else got.
Anyway, the car and I were towed to a garage and then I called an Uber and came here because Nick invited me round for dinner.
I think the Uber driver might charge me for flooding his car but I’m so done with today.
I need somewhere warm, somewhere I can collapse. Somewhere with a towel.
‘I’ve had a day. My car is dead, I was stranded and…’ I moan.
‘Why didn’t you call? I could have helped?’ he says, sounding concerned as he ushers me inside and takes my handbag which seems to have absorbed all the rain.
‘You were at work. I had to wait for the AA. Just… nightmare.’
‘I could have sent help. A car maybe? I can’t leave a reindeer stranded at Christmas.’
See? He could identify the onesie. He has not batted an eyelid that I look like a big matted soggy mess.
He comes over and straightens my antlers.
‘Did you get your books delivered?’ he asks, disappearing into a room off the kitchen to get a laundry basket.
I nod, not divulging how. It was the other Nick who flew in to save the day but I’ll admit since realising he was the very abrupt man I spoke to years ago about the ridiculous Christmas tree he gifted my nana, that there’s a strange feeling there I can’t shake.
He was rude, so rude, and even though he’s now offered to help me with the book drive, I can’t get over the extremes of his personality.
‘Here, put all your wet things in here and I’ll throw what I can in the dryer. ’
Because here is someone who has just showered me with kindness since we’ve been re-acquainted.
I know him much better. I exhale deeply to be in the warm, marvelling at his domestic efficiency and his desire to help.
I immediately feel the warmth of his underfloor heating on the soles of my feet as I remove my socks. ‘Shall I just strip here?’ I ask him.
‘Well, I won’t complain… let me get you a robe…’
He disappears again as I try and undress, peeling my onesie off me. He returns with a dark-grey fluffy robe and wraps it around me, kissing me on the forehead. ‘I must look a state,’ I say, looking down at my knickers that have gone completely transparent.
‘You’re freezing. Come with me…’
He reaches down and takes my hand, leading me to his bathroom where he starts to run a bath, pouring in bubble bath.
I sit on the edge, watching him. As he glances over, I can see him smiling there and I feel incredibly warmed by the fact he doesn’t care what I look like.
I can show up at his doorstep and he’s brought me in and taken care of me.
It harks back to a time at university where we’d revel in joint hangovers and crawl to lectures looking our absolute worst. His bathroom has a window overlooking the Thames and I watch as the rain calms and the river twinkles from streetlamps and boats passing through.
‘I was going to order in food tonight but you get first dibs. What do you fancy? Something warm? Soup? There’s a good ramen place nearby?’
I tense my body, noticing that my fingers are all pruny and wrinkled. ‘Perfect. Can I get something with egg and pork belly?’
‘You can.’ He comes over to me and embraces me tightly and I sigh to feel his body heat but also the fact he wants to look after me this evening.
‘I’m sorry. Once I regain feeling in my joints, I might be up for something a bit more sexual.’
He laughs. ‘Is that why you think I invited you over?’
‘Well, no but…’
‘I’m sure if I was in the same situation you’d do the same for me.’
‘I would,’ I say, my cheek resting against his chest.
He unwraps the robe from my shoulders and kisses one before looking me in the eye, reaching around to unhook my bra and then bending down to remove my knickers.
I close my eyes, grinning as he does it because the intimacy of it sends a shiver down my spine.
‘Get in, warm up. I’m going to order us food.
’ He lends me a hand as I step over the side of the bath, and the water, the bubbles, the heat of it, is an instant relief, leading me to make an extraordinary sigh of joy. Nick chuckles to hear it. ‘Good?’
‘Magnificent. Is that lavender?’
‘It is. Good nose. I do enjoy a calming, relaxing scent after a long day at work,’ he jokes.
He leans over to give me another kiss on the forehead, not before lighting a candle on a shelf nearby. ‘Dumplings too, you like dumplings, yeah?’
I nod, my eyes closed in contentment as I continue to thaw out in the water, and I see his eyes glance down to see my nipples poking out through the bubbles.
I catch his eye as he grins cheekily. Was this a ploy to see my naked body?
I really don’t care. He escapes into another room to get his phone and I suddenly hear music coming out from somewhere.
Ibiza chillout sounds. The lights dim. God, this is lovely.
Can you rate baths? Because this is definitely in my top ten.
I glance at the toiletries on the side, looking at the shampoos and scrubs that Nick uses, smelling them and looking around at how immaculate it is.
I have issues with my grout but not here, it’s sparkling clean.
He returns minutes later and I watch as he hands me a glass of wine. I lied. This is now the perfect bath.
‘Get this down you,’ he says.
I nod, sitting up as his eyes travel down again to watch the bubbles sliding off my skin. ‘You’re an angel. Your bath is singing to me, by the way.’
‘It’s a good bath like that,’ he jokes. He drags a stool over to sit nearby and keep me company, his fingers gliding over apps as he orders food.
I take a sip of my wine and watch his body leaning against the wall, the curve of his shoulders.
Maybe I should have called him before, maybe I shouldn’t have had any doubts that he would have showed up for me. ‘All done. How are we feeling?’
‘Warmer.’
‘That is good. You soak in there for as long as you want. How’s the car?’
‘Most likely dead. It’s my old Renault 5,’ I say.
‘Shite, the Ronald McRocket? That thing is still driving?’
He’s remembered my car had a nickname and the many trips up and down the M4 we once shared in it. ‘It doesn’t have a second gear but it’s been a good run-around for many years.’
‘May he rest in peace.’
‘Amen.’
‘Did you need another one?’ he asks, sipping at his own glass of wine, reaching over to top up mine.
‘A car? Well, I didn’t drive a lot anyway living in London, maybe I need to start relying on public transport.’
‘We’ll get you a new one, no bother.’
I take a sip of wine as he says this. We? We’d go car shopping or pick one off the internet? Or he’d buy me a brand-new car? That is too much. He’s already bought me those earrings. I’m happy enough that he’s run me a bath. I’m a simple girl, really.
‘Or we can wait. Give me a chance to mourn the old car first,’ I say.
‘Actually, you probably don’t but do you have anything I could tie my hair with?
I’m starting to turn into a feral mermaid, the curls go a bit mental with the damp.
’ I shake my hair around. I just need it out of my face so I can enjoy this wine a bit more.
‘Anything, I’ll take a rubber band if you’ve got it. ’
He smiles but goes to a drawer under his sink and pulls out a scrunchie. ‘Will this do you?’
He hands it over. It’s black and silk. I shouldn’t think anything of it but I do. ‘Is this yours? For when you’re doing your skincare and stuff?’ I ask, pulling it over my hands and grabbing my hair into a bun.
‘Yeah, I do love a face mask,’ he jokes but he realises there are questions forthcoming. ‘Well, we all have relics from relationships past, eh? Things we inherit.’
‘Indeed. For me it’s usually hoodies.’
‘You women are awful when it comes to hoodies, you really are.’
I sit there, sipping on my wine, waiting for the story of the scrunchie. ‘Scrunchies have amazing other uses, you know? I tend to use them on rolls of wrapping paper to keep them tidy. I sometimes tie off bags of crisps with them.’
‘That is ingenious,’ he says, and I see a sadness return to his eyes, one I’ve certainly seen before.
‘How much did she hurt you?’ I ask him.
‘Unfathomable amounts,’ he says. I can almost feel his hurt, the way it makes him visibly gulp and rub his hands together.
‘I’m sorry. You could also burn the scrunchie.’
That makes him laugh, and it’s a relief to see the sadness dissipate from his face. ‘Maybe not while it’s still attached to your head though,’ he says.
‘Ideally not.’ I don’t push because he’s being lovely and I don’t want to bring up anything that might cause conflict and emotion in him. ‘I feel I’ve been greedy too. Did you want to come in the bath? There is room. Now my hair is tied back.’
‘Food comes in twenty-five minutes.’
‘More than enough time then,’ I say.
I watch as he takes off his hoodie and t-shirt in one fell swoop and then pulls off his trousers and underwear.
I am impressed at the speed of action but I tilt my head to the side to admire his naked body, the line of his back down to his arse.
He steps over the enamel and entwines his legs around mine, sitting opposite me.
He smiles, putting a hand to my much warmer knee, our bodies submerged and entangled below the water line.
A hand grazing the inside of my thigh. ‘Top up?’ he says, reaching for the bottle of wine.
I nod, sitting up, meeting him halfway so he can kiss me tenderly on the lips.
‘Thank you. For this,’ I say.
‘Never thank me. I don’t think you’ll ever understand how much you circled back into my life at just the right time, Kay.
’ There’s maybe some hidden meaning there, but I know that at this point, being here with him feels good, right.
‘But I’ve got an eye on that hoodie. Don’t you even think about stealing it,’ he says, laughing. I laugh back.