Chapter 15
There’s no sign of Robert when I get back to the room, which is no surprise. I expect he’s gone out drinking with Stuart again. What is a surprise is the note that he’s left on my bed.
Hi Tori (or Libby, depending on your mood)
I’ve been thinking about our conversation last night a lot today.
It was incredibly helpful. I’ve texted Fliss to apologise for being such an arse.
She hasn’t replied – it’s already the middle of the night in the UK, and she might not reply because she hates me, but it felt good to at least say sorry.
So, as a gesture of my gratitude, I’d like you to have the big bed for the remainder of the holiday. I should have behaved like a gentleman and given it to you in the first place, but I was too busy being (as you would put it) a massive dick. Hopefully, that will change going forwards.
Thanks again
Throbbert
‘Bloody hell,’ I murmur as I glance around me.
Not only has he given up the bed but, unless I’m very much mistaken, he’s also put all his clothes away.
I open the cupboards to look and, yep, they’re all in there, either hanging or neatly folded on the shelves.
I stick my head in the bathroom, and am amazed to see that all his toiletries are also neatly stacked around one of the basins.
‘Who is this, and what has he done with Throbbert?’ I ask myself as I stretch out on the bed.
To be fair, the single bed was perfectly comfortable last night, but this is really nice.
However, lovely though it is, I wonder whether I should let Robert keep this bed as a reward for not being a dick.
He is quite tall, and he might overhang the single one.
I’ll just savour it for a little longer first.
‘Wakey wakey, rise and shi-ine!’
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ Robert’s voice grumbles in the darkness. I open my eyes and I’m momentarily disorientated, before I realise that I’m still in the huge bed.
‘Umm, Robert?’ I ask.
‘Morning, sleepyhead. Do you feel better?’
I take a moment to contemplate his question. I do, actually. I don’t remember waking once in the night. To be fair, I was so dog tired by the time I’d got back from Raphael’s and had something to eat that it would have taken something pretty spectacular to wake me up.
Before I can answer, there’s another pounding on the door.
‘I know you’re in there!’ Amy sings again, although her voice has an edge to it now, like she’s pissed off but trying to disguise it.
‘Leave this to me,’ I say, clambering out of bed and discovering, to my surprise, that I’m still fully dressed in the clothes I was wearing last night.
‘This is your 7 a.m. breakfast call!’ Amy chirps when I yank open the door.
‘You two are a real pair of slugabeds, although I’m pleased to see you’re actually dressed this morning.
’ She’s incredible, I think as I look at her.
The voice is all sing-song and friendly, but the look in her eyes is quite different.
Once again, Stuart is standing behind her, but he looks very slightly disappointed if anything.
Probably hoping for another eyeful of my nipples, the dirty pervert.
‘We’ve really got to do something about your timekeeping,’ Amy continues, adopting a school-teacher tone.
‘For my schedule to work, everything has to happen punctually, otherwise we’ll just get in a mess.
The mani/pedi is booked for eight thirty, if you remember, so you need to get a move on if you want breakfast before. ’
‘Yeah, about that,’ I tell her. ‘I’m not coming.’
‘Of course you’re coming. I booked you a slot.’
‘And I cancelled it.’
She crinkles her brow in confusion. ‘Why did you do that?’
‘Because I don’t want to go.’
Her eyes narrow. ‘That’s not how this works, Tori. The whole point is that we do things together. If there were particular activities you wanted to include, you should have brought them up in the group chat and I’d have seen if I could have fitted them in.’
‘Listen, Amy,’ I tell her, doing my best to keep the irritation out of my voice. ‘I’m very grateful for all the effort you’ve put in to organising everything, but this is my holiday too. I have paid a lot of money to come here, and I have other plans for today.’
‘You’re coming across as a little selfish, if you ask me,’ Stuart chips in.
‘I’m not asking you, Stuart,’ I tell him firmly before turning back to Amy. ‘Enjoy the mani/pedi. I’ll look forward to hearing about it later.’
‘I don’t believe this,’ Amy says furiously.
‘I think you need to remember that you’re only here because poor Fliss, who would have jumped at the chance to have the experience you’re getting, got royally shat on by your so-called roommate.
Do you have even the first idea how much time I’ve invested in this schedule to make sure that everything slotted together perfectly?
Only for you to decide, on some kind of mad fucking whim, that you want to chuck the whole thing in the bin because you’re not in the mood? ’
I’ve tried to be rational, but I’m struggling to contain my own temper now. ‘I’m not chucking anything in the bin, Amy,’ I tell her firmly. ‘You and Lily can still go and do everything you’ve planned. I’m just not going to do all of it with you.’
She’s looking at me with such venom now that I’m actually starting to worry she might get physical. ‘Tell me,’ she spits, ‘what’s so bloody brilliant that it eclipses the programme that I have spent hours curating, hm?’
‘It’s nothing brilliant. I’m going to spend some time on the beach, relaxing, reading and swimming.’
‘Oh, I see what this is. You’re hoping to get your claws into Stuart while I’m safely tucked away out of sight, aren’t you?
Well, he’s not interested, OK? He’s told me all about you, how clingy you were, how you begged him to change his mind when he finally couldn’t take any more of you.
The only thing that’s more pathetic than the way you behaved then is the way you’re behaving now. Tell her, Stuart.’
I shift my gaze to Stuart, who is looking distinctly uncomfortable. So he should. I’ve had enough of this. Before I have a chance to stop myself, my mouth is open and I’m speaking.
‘I can assure you, Amy,’ I tell her in a saccharine voice, ‘that I have absolutely no interest in Stuart at all. How can I be so sure? Because he’s a scheming, cheating, lowlife toad and I’d be more than happy never to clap eyes on him again. You are welcome to him. Now, are we finished?’
I’m breathing hard. I’ve just about managed to avoid telling her about New Year’s Eve, but it was a close call. To my amazement, however, she comes in for another attack.
‘If he cheated on you, that’s probably because he was desperate to spend time with someone who wasn’t a constant emotional drain on him. I can assure you, Tori, that he has no such issues with me.’
Stuart is frantically slashing his hand across his throat to try to stop me saying anything more but it’s too late.
‘Mm-hm?’ I continue in the same saccharine tone. ‘Ask him where he was on New Year’s Eve.’
Behind her, I can see Stuart visibly crumple, but Amy is having none of it.
‘I don’t need to ask him, because I know where he was. He was with Lily and Dan.’
‘Is that what he told you?’
‘Yes, because it’s the truth.’
A realisation dawns on me. It doesn’t matter what I tell her, she’s never going to believe me over Stuart. To be fair, given that she evidently dislikes me as much as I do her, I don’t entirely blame her. All I’m doing is confirming her suspicion that I’m delusional.
‘OK,’ I tell her, changing tack quickly to stop myself from letting the cat completely out of the bag. ‘Forget I said anything.’
‘What?’ For the first time, there’s a spark of uncertainty in her expression.
‘I said OK. He was with Lily and Dan.’
‘No. You don’t get to do that. Why did you say I should ask him where he was? Something isn’t adding up here. What aren’t you telling me?’ She turns to Stuart, who has turned puce. ‘Babe?’
‘It’s another fantasy,’ Stuart tells her, unaware that his face is giving the game away. ‘She’s just making stuff up to try to cause trouble between us. She’s obsessed with me, what did I tell you?’
Amy is now radiating uncertainty. Anyone with half a brain could tell from looking at him that Stuart is the fantasist out of the two of us, but I can see she desperately doesn’t want to believe that.
‘I think we’re done here,’ I say to her. ‘Unless there was anything else?’
She’s frantically looking between me and Stuart and, all of a sudden, I just feel desperately sad for her.
She is a horrific control freak and I don’t like her or the way she spoke to me, but once again I’ve let my mouth run away with me and, if there is a single innocent party out of the three of us, it’s her.
‘Enjoy your treatment. I’ll see you later,’ I say quietly. Then, with a sigh, I gently close the door.
‘That was intense,’ Robert observes from his position on the single bed. ‘Why were you asking about New Year’s Eve?’
‘Do you mind very much if we don’t talk about it?’ I ask him. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything.’
‘Stuart did something, didn’t he?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘It does. Stuart is one of my best mates, so if he’s been up to no good, I want to know about it.’
‘Then ask him.’
‘I’m asking you.’
‘And I’ve said all I’m going to say. Let it go, Robert, please.’
He looks at me for a long time before speaking. ‘Fine. It’s just that Fliss suspected he was being over-friendly with one of her friends a while ago. When she asked her friend about it, she told Fliss that nothing was going on, but Fliss wasn’t convinced at all.’
‘OK,’ I say to him. ‘Let’s say there was something going on with this friend of Fliss’s, and that something also happened on New Year’s Eve. What would you do?’
‘I’d talk to him about it, and tell him that kind of thing isn’t acceptable.’
‘He’d just deny it.’
He sighs. ‘You’re probably right. Anyway, I think we can all assume, given how your little chat with Amy went, that we’re not going to be missed at breakfast so we’ve got plenty of time to shower and get ready for the day.
’ As if to emphasise his point, he lies back and stretches languidly, unwittingly proving to me that the single bed is way too short for him and bringing me back to the other thing that’s been niggling me.
‘Robert,’ I begin carefully. ‘Where was I when you came in last night?’
He smiles. ‘You were completely sparko on the bed. I tried to wake you, because you were still dressed, but all I got was a couple of grunts, so I gave up and left you to it. Did you sleep well?’
‘Very,’ I admit. ‘I’m sorry though, because I meant to go back in the single bed. I only sat down on this one for a minute, but it was so comfortable I must have dozed off.’
‘It’s fine,’ he assures me. ‘Didn’t you see my note?’
‘I did, and it was very kind of you to offer me the bed, but I wasn’t going to accept.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you don’t fit in that bed.’
‘I was OK.’
I smile. ‘Of course you were. I’m serious though, as of tonight, you’re going back in the big bed and I’ll have the little one. It was a nice gesture, but your need is greater than mine.’
‘Only if you’re sure.’
‘I am.’
‘To be fair, that bed is so large we could probably both sleep in it and not know the other was there.’
‘Yes, but if you want to stand a chance of getting back together with Fliss, sharing a bed with another woman is not the way to go about it. Trust me, we females are definitely funny about things like that. Have you heard from her, by the way?’
He sighs. ‘I have.’
‘What did she say?’
He reaches across to the bedside table to retrieve his phone. Having unlocked it and launched the app, he hands it to me. There are just two messages:
Robert
I’m sorry. For everything.
Fliss
How’s Jamaica, dickhead?
‘She’s still quite angry, isn’t she?’ I observe gently as I hand the phone back.
‘She is, but at least she replied. It’s a start.’
Something occurs to me and I laugh softly.
‘What?’ he asks.
‘When I first met you, I thought you were the most objectionable human being I’d ever come across—’
‘Gee, thanks!’
‘You know it’s true. But it turns out that there’s a good man lurking under the gruff exterior. We just need to find a way to remind Fliss of that fact.’
‘I’ve got some ideas. Right, do you want to jump in the shower first? I’ve got to shave and stuff, so I’ll probably take a while.’
‘That would be lovely, thank you.’
‘My pleasure.’
As the hot water cascades over me, I can’t help but be amazed by the change in Robert. He’s twenty times the man Stuart is. If there’s anything I can do to help Fliss see that, I decide, then I’ll do it.