Chapter 9
We spend the rest of Sunday evening waiting for Karina to come down from the high of her date with Matthew and find the flaws as she always does.
As we exchange text after text, asking her about the date and as she fills us in on the details, I wait for the buts.
Unbelievably, none come, and Karina insists Matthew was a perfect date.
I read her messages with a huge grin on my face.
This must be the first time since Karina was eighteen and had her heart broken by someone she thought was ‘so’ perfect that she’s given someone such a warm review with no caveats included.
Much as I forced this plan on Karina and Teddy, and told them it was exactly what we needed, I’m not sure even I believed it would work out quite as well as it has. One date down and all three of us are lined up for second dates with men we actually like.
I’m swept into Monday on a tide of enthusiasm and smugness, and my day is made better when Elliot texts to let me know Mr Montgomery, our head, has called an urgent staff meeting before school begins, and I have to drop everything.
I’ve only ever worked in one school, so I’ve no comparison, but I don’t imagine most teachers would be all that delighted by that news.
Then again, most schools aren’t spearheaded by Mr Montgomery.
‘We need to get our ducks on the same page here,’ he tells his staff once we’re assembled.
It seems he’s opened his inbox to a slew of parental complaints about the state of our discipline system.
Some teachers are issuing detentions for offences such as forgetting a pen, whilst others don’t deem them necessary even after they’ve broken up a fight.
He stands in front of us with his hands on his hips and his lips pinched like he always does when trying to exude authority, only the effect is slightly lessened by his Wallace and Gromit tie.
As always, I cover my mouth with my hand so he doesn’t see me trying not to laugh.
‘Let’s tighten up this ship, crew mates,’ he says, before dismissing us with a wave of his hand.
Elliot is squeezed into the overcrowded staffroom by the door.
He tries to remove the smirk on his face and act like he’s reading the notice board with great interest as Mr Montgomery passes him.
After he’s left, Elliot turns to face me and we smile widely at each other before I wave him over to where I’m sitting with our department.
‘Come on now, tighten up your ship, Mr Drake,’ I whisper when he sits next to me.
His eyes sparkle with amusement. ‘Very well, Miss Cook. While I’m working on my loose ship, do make sure you gather those ducks on the right page.
They’re all over the place. Lizzie, are you planning on leaving the staffroom today?
’ he asks, noticing the drink in my hand, my shoes on the floor and my feet curled up under me.
‘Not if I can help it. I’ve got a student teacher taking my form and my first lesson today, so I get to stay here.’
‘Lucky you.’
I try to dampen down the light, buzzy feeling I have as the other members of the English department solemnly file past us to get to lessons.
‘So?’ I ask when the staffroom has sufficiently emptied out.
‘So?’
‘Are you going to tell me how it went?’
‘It went well, thank you. Teddy’s a great girl.’
‘OK. Anything else?’
‘Nope,’ he says, before smirking. ‘Now some of us do need to go and teach this morning. See you later and you can tell me about Jordan?’
‘Yeah, sure, great,’ I say to his back as he rushes out.
If Elliot wants to be so brief and to the point, I figure I’ll do the same when my turn comes. But I never get the chance. The next time I see Elliot at the end of the day, he comes over to talk about an upcoming lesson observation, never mentions Jordan, and we’re back to being how we always are.
Elliot’s good at this. He’s able to focus on the parts of a relationship he believes are worthwhile and cast aside the rest as though they don’t exist. I see him doing it all the time with pupils and staff – getting the best from them by refusing to focus on the bits that don’t fit how he wants to see them.
It’s how he was after we slept together.
He cast that night aside as though it never happened and put all his efforts into being a ‘good buddy’.
I’m sure by not mentioning Jordan that’s exactly what he’s trying to do again, and I expect he’ll give me more space than normal this week like he does whenever he feels the need to pull us back to firmer ground.
So, I’m surprised on Thursday when he shouts for me across the car park just as I’m about to drive home. Racing up to me, his hair is dishevelled by the wind, and his horn-rimmed glasses sit askew on his nose.
‘What are you doing now?’ he asks.
‘Right now?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m about to go home and eat half a loaf of bread. I’ve not eaten all day, and I’m starving.’
‘Good, that can wait. I need you to come back to mine for a bit. Slight emergency. Can you drive us?’
I’ve only been to Elliot’s a handful of times before.
Without ever discussing it, we’ve always tended to spend most of our time in cafés or pubs, and we especially try to avoid my flat after what happened there.
His flat is in Cheadle, which is an inconvenient thirty-minute drive from school.
Elliot normally gets a lift from one of the science teachers, so the need for me to go over rarely comes up, which is a shame because I love Elliot’s flat.
While my flat still doesn’t feel like it belongs to me, Elliot’s flat feels like an extension of his personality.
It’s in a converted red-brick factory that gives off strong Dickensian workhouse vibes and probably has the odd ghost knocking around once the sun sets.
Inside, however, it’s modern with chrome and industrial lighting.
His flat is small but everything works, and that attention to detail I’ve come to expect from him is evident everywhere you look.
‘I suppose I could help if there’s an emergency,’ I say.
‘Oh, there definitely is.’
‘But please tell me there’s time in this emergency for you to make me some toast.’
‘Fine. We can fit toast in. Ready?’
He gets in the car, and the first thing he does is switch the radio on and turn the volume up.
Neither of us talk much on the way to his.
It’s been a busy day. My throat is dry and scratchy, and I need to give it a rest. Elliot must be the same as apart from giving me the odd direction, he’s content to change radio channels every few seconds until I order him to please leave Zara Larsson on and keep his hands to himself.
We’re comfortable enough with each other for silence, and I like how we both know how precious silence is at the end of a teaching day, but my eyes can’t help involuntarily glancing towards him to try and catch a look of his face and work out what he’s thinking.
There are some subjects you can’t stop Elliot talking about, but he’s been especially quiet at times this week, about his date with Teddy and now what this ‘emergency’ is all about.
I park up outside, and he leads me into the building and down the long, industrial corridor to get to his flat.
The big windows and stone floor do nothing to keep out the chill, and I pull my coat further around me.
We get to the end of the corridor and through a set of double doors that leads us to a staircase.
After climbing to the top, Elliot leads me back onto another corridor identical to the one downstairs.
‘Here we are,’ he says. He opens up and stands aside for me to enter first. I’m immediately bathed in light from the two floor-to-ceiling windows letting in the last of the low November sunshine, shadows drawing patterns across the pale grey rug that takes up most of his living area.
I bend down to take off my shoes before stepping any further in.
To my right, there’s a very sturdy shoe rack, with Elliot’s footwear neatly lined up in matching pairs.
I step into the open plan living area, take in the white gloss kitchen, the navy L-shaped sofa and the huge abstract paintings that line the white walls and exhale.
The space isn’t cold or stark but inviting with central-heating warmth and a pomegranate scent from the diffuser on the kitchen counter.
‘Why don’t we hang out here more often?’ I ask.
‘Because you can never be arsed coming over.’
‘That’s not true,’ I say, but I’m smiling because we both know it is.
‘But now you’re here, would you mind if we dealt with my emergency?’
‘Sure, it’s not like I’m about to eat my own arm.’
‘Great. This way, then.’
He opens a door to my right, and I follow him through into a large bedroom, again, pale with white furniture and white bedding, but this time with the warmth of a sage green throw and a huge painting of a forest behind his bed.
This is a room I’ve never stepped foot in before, and as I’m standing in front of his bed, I become aware that my heart is speeding up and I’m suddenly too warm.
Whether it’s because a person’s bedroom is their most personal space and Elliot’s just opened it up to me, or because any proximity to a bed and Elliot is bound to dredge up memories of our night together, I’m not sure, but either way, I focus on ignoring how I feel for Teddy’s sake.
I don’t want what happened over a few hours one night a whole year ago to get in the way of my happiness for what could be such a good thing for her.
If Elliot can get over it, which he so clearly has, then so can I.