Chapter 13
? Festive-themed contest
‘Tom!’ Carly was carrying a big plate of chips, which she set down in
the middle of the table. Maybe there was a mystery shopper among us.
She gave him a tight hug as I had another go at mastering the beer mat flip.
‘Haven’t seen you in yonks!’ Carly continued. ‘We weren’t expecting to see you tonight?’
‘Well, I saw your WhatsApp message and thought I might as well call in since it’s on my way home. Can’t stay long, though.’
‘Amazing! And look who it is!’ Carly gestured towards me as if I was a speedboat prize on Bullseye .
‘Hey again, Mally.’
I glanced up for as brief a moment as possible and flashed a smile. ‘Hey, Tom.’
‘Oh yeah, I forgot you two had your own little reunion in the Morrison’s car park last night.’
‘Tesco,’ we replied in unison and caught each other’s eye as we did so. We both looked away quickly.
‘Yeah, my mum said she saw you at the checkout, Milly,’ said Gemma. ‘Said it looked like you’d seen a ghost!’
Amy hissed ‘Shh’ in Gemma’s direction.
‘Shit, sorry. I didn’t mean it like that,’ Gemma mumbled, blushing.
This was all getting way too awkward. There was only one thing for it: more alcohol. I stood up to make my way to the bar.
‘Anyone need a drink?’ I asked. Hopefully the slurring was just in my head.
Darren held aloft his half-empty pint glass and wiggled it in my direction, without smiling.
‘I’ll give you a hand, Mally,’ said Tom.
I smiled with gratitude – probably my most genuine smile ever since Darren had arrived – hoping that Tom’s offer of help meant there was a chance we could put the tension at the end of last night behind us.
‘Thanks, Tom. Drink?’
‘Sure. Just a Coke, please – like I said, I’m on my way home so need to drive in a bit.’
‘A Coke and another bottle of Prosecco please, Becky,’ I said. ‘Oh, and a pint of whatever Ryan’s mate’s having.’
We stood at the bar in silence while Becky poured the drinks. Tom tapped the bar nervously with his fingers while lightly bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet.
‘Here you go, you two! Shall I add them to your tab, Mally?’
‘Perfect, thanks.’
Becky walked to the other end of the bar to serve another customer.
‘Cheers.’ We clinked glasses, formally.
‘Yeah, cheers. Thanks for the drink,’ he said.
‘It’s the least I could do after your help yesterday.’
‘Honestly, it was no bother.’
More sips, more silence. Argh, the cringe.
‘Any luck finding somewhere for your Christmas do?’ I ventured.
‘That’s a negative. We’ve decided just to have some drinks in the office tomorrow evening instead, Wernham Hogg-style.’
I smiled at The Office reference, took a long swig of Prosecco and topped up my glass to replenish the void. Tom cleared his throat.
‘So, umm, I wanted to say sorry for how last night ended.’
‘Argh, no, I’m the one who should be saying sorry,’ I replied.
‘Whatever for?’
‘For saying such insensitive stuff about your upbringing and everything. It came out all wrong.’
‘Yeah, maybe it did, but my reactions came out even worse. I hurt you, and I’m so sorry about that. I barely slept last night thinking about it, but I didn’t even have your number to apologise. So, yeah, thought I’d swing by here to grovel in person.’
Before I knew what I was doing, I squeezed his forearm gently. ‘Thanks, Tom. That really means a lot.’
‘So, can we just forget about the tail end of last night, then?’
‘I think “forget” might be a bit of a stretch. How about we chalk it up as part of our mutual and ongoing personal development?’
‘Deal.’
We clinked glasses again. I started heading back to the table but Tom gently tugged me back to the bar by my elbow. ‘Hey, who’s that guy sat next to Ryan?’
‘You don’t know him? Someone called Darren – works at the garage, I think.’
‘Oh right. Christ. Yeah, I’ve heard of him, but I’ve never met him in person. Think he’s only worked there for the last six months or so.’
‘Yeah, he’s not exactly covered himself in glory so far tonight.’
He let out a long breath. ‘That doesn’t surprise me. Just know that he is not my friend, okay? He’s not even an acquaintance, to be honest. Look, how long are you planning to stay tonight?’
‘Gotta be honest with you, my instinct in these types of big social situations is always to escape as early as possible. But everyone seems to be having this rare child-free night out in my honour, so I feel like it’d be rude for me to leave anytime soon.’
He did his hair-rub-watch-check thing again. ‘Okay, so how about we stay for a couple more drinks until the quiz gets going…’
I felt my cheeks flush at the notion of me and Tom being grouped together as ‘we’.
‘I thought you needed to head off soon?’
‘Yeah, well, that’s before I realised Darren Chambers was here.’
‘I don’t need a chaperone, Tom. But it’d be nice if you stayed anyway – if only to convince Ryan to change our team’s name from Quiz In My Pants.’
‘Oh no, he didn’t?’
‘He did.’
We made our way back to the table, where a heated debate was taking place about the picture round that had been distributed to each participating table.
Each of the ten images featured an obscure still from a classic Christmas movie.
Or at least, obscure to anyone except fellow Christmas movie geeks.
‘I’m telling you, Gem, there’s absolutely no way that Groundhog Day is a Christmas film,’ Amy said.
I glanced down at the fuzzy yet indisputable image of Bill Murray.
‘Ah, that’s Scrooged ,’ I said. ‘Probably the most eighties movie ever made. An underrated classic.’
‘Told you! Here you go, Milly, see if you can fill in any of the other blanks.’
I did, and without effort. Tim Allen’s swollen stomach in The Santa Clause , Arthur Christmas’s musical slippers, Kevin’s uneaten plate of macaroni cheese from Home Alone (surely he could’ve squeezed in at least one mouthful?), an aghast Alan Rickman as he toppled from the tower in Die Hard – they were all there.
Disappointingly, none of the made-for-TV classics had made it onto the sheet, but all those images would’ve looked the same anyway.
The rest of the quiz passed by in a bit of a booze-fuelled blur.
Dare I say it: I had fun. I had vague memories of sports, TV and literature categories – all of which Tom aced – and the obligatory Christmas number one music round.
And, at some point, someone invented a drink called a Prosecco blitzer, which involved adding a shot of vodka to each glass of fizz.
Our team ended up winning, much to the displeasure of the other tables, who claimed that nepotism was at play given that Ryan was married to one of the managers.
Becky came over with our winnings, which came to ￡11.
50 each. For some reason, my inner drunken calculator was trying to work out how many packets of Space Invaders that would’ve paid for from the leisure centre vending machine where I used to watch Josh’s swimming galas.
It therefore took me way longer than it should have to notice that Becky looked fed up.
‘What’s the matter, Becks?’ Amy asked.
‘Oh, someone’s just messaged me to cancel his volunteer shift for tomorrow and we’ve got a big party booked in for their work do.’
A blurry image of my Christmas movie bingo sheets flashed before my eyes.
I’d been mentally ticking off the tropes throughout the evening, and here was another opportunity that had landed right in my lap – because this ‘failing family business’ needed help!
I spoke quickly and squeakily before I could chicken out.
‘Umm, maybe I could lend a hand?’
Becky smirked and raised her eyebrows. ‘I’m not sure you’re going to be doing anything other than recovering tomorrow, if I’m honest.’
‘Ah, go on, Becky, let me help.’ Why was I speaking in an Irish accent?!
‘I mean, if you’re being serious it would be so amazing if you could?’
‘I’m being serious. Look at this serioush face.’ I pointed at my face until I was poking it. ‘I’ve got nothing better to do.’
‘Amazing, thank you, thank you, thank you! It’s going to be one of our busiest nights of the year, mind.’
‘All good, all good. What time shall I come?’
‘Would five o’clock work? The table’s booked for six so you could give me a hand setting up the private dining room. And I’ll feed you as recompense.’
‘Free food! Even better.’
I stood up to give Becky what I intended to be a casual fist bump to seal the deal, but as I rose, my alcohol-infused blood plummeted to my feet and I began to topple.
A tattooed arm grabbed me around the waist and yanked me back into my seat before I hit the ground.
It was Darren. He pressed the side of his head against mine as he took a selfie.
The entire incident probably took fewer than four seconds, but in that time Tom had stood up with chair-scraping urgency, grabbed our coats and pulled me out of Darren’s strong grasp.
‘Not cool, mate. What the fuck was that about?’
‘Chill out, mate . Just wanted a quick photo with Josh Allister’s sister, that’s all.’
Tom rolled his eyes and turned to me, proffering my coat. I went to grab it but missed.
‘Do you want to get going?’
I managed a nod.
‘I’ll walk you back.’