Chapter 11
I now understand why they call it a hangover.
It felt like the darkest of clouds was hanging over my head, rain pounding down against my skull with no intention of stopping any time soon.
You know you’re in a bad way when you feel like you might need sunglasses to open the fridge.
How was it possible to be this thirsty after drinking so many liquids last night?
My mouth was drier than the Sahara Desert, but making it to the kitchen required actual physical movement, and after the wave of nausea that hit me when I attempted to roll over, it was clear that wasn’t going to happen any time soon.
I was face-down in a sea of pillows, one side of my face roasting from the sun I could feel streaming in through the gap in the curtains, the way it always did whenever Joe didn’t shut them properly.
Something scratchy was tickling the backs of my bare legs and I tugged at it, producing a grey woollen blanket that I’d never seen before.
Somehow, I managed to lift my head up long enough to register the four-inch gap in the curtains through squinted eyes, before the room started spinning and I let my head fall fast and heavy into a pillow. I was never drinking again. Like, ever.
The sheets were worn and bobbled beneath my fingertips as they reached out towards Joe’s side of the bed.
He always slept on the left. The side closest to the door, so that any hypothetical intruders would have to go through him first , as he put it.
Just like he always walked on the side of the pavement closest to the traffic and twisted his fingers through mine whenever we crossed a road.
A sigh escaped my lips as my palm traced the familiar dip in the mattress, the memory foam still moulded to the contours of Joe’s body, refusing to forget.
I opened one eye, wincing against the sunlight as I searched for Joe’s smiling face in the frame that lived on the bedside table.
But there was no frame. No bedside table at all.
Just a taped-shut cardboard box with a leather-bound notebook, a pencil in need of a good sharpen, and a full pint glass of water sat on top.
It took all my energy to drag myself into a sitting position, my back flush against the bedframe as I waited for the room to stop spinning.
I gulped giant mouthfuls of water, even though my brain told me to sip it, frowning suspiciously at the leather jacket hung from the bedpost. It wasn’t Joe’s, and yet something about it looked familiar.
My brain, which currently felt like it was submerged underwater (or one too many shots of tequila), kicked into gear just long enough for me to register that I wasn’t in my tiny box room above the pub.
I was in mine and Joe’s old bedroom. In our old flat. No, in Luca’s flat. Shit!
I scrabbled about on the bed, wrapping the scratchy grey blanket around myself like a protective shield.
What the hell was I doing here?! Had I gotten confused on the way home, autopilot propelling me down the same streets I’d walked for years?
And where was Luca? Oh my god, did we—? No.
There’s absolutely no way. I mean, we couldn’t have.
Right? My eyes fell reluctantly on the left-hand side of the bed, mildly mollified to see the duvet – which apparently, I’d slept on top of?
– still tucked neatly down that side of the mattress.
Two pillows stacked on top of one another, their cases smooth compared to those I’d pummelled into oblivion on my side, one of which had half of last night’s make-up smeared across the top.
I turned it over, hoping Luca wouldn’t notice.
As I did so, I caught sight of my puzzled expression gawping back at me from a large mirror sat atop three other cardboard boxes.
I was still wearing the black dress from last night, although it had ridden up, exposing my flesh-coloured control pants, which I was relieved to find still present and correct.
Not that anyone could easily remove those bad boys, even if they wanted to.
Myself included. My hair looked like I’d walked through a hurricane and been electrocuted all at once, sticking out at gravity-defying angles from all the hairspray Jacob had used.
Coupled with the mascara-rimmed panda eyes and red lipstick smear travelling from my mouth to right cheekbone, it’s safe to say I’d looked better.
A quick glance around the room produced no sign of my shoes, but I did spot my phone placed neatly on top of my bag on the floor by the bed.
I reached for it, hopeful it might contain some clues as to how I’d ended up in Luca’s bed last night.
But no amount of finger jabbing or button clicking would coax the black screen into life.
The battery was as dead as I felt right now.
The familiar squeak of the shower turning on had my eyes darting towards the hallway.
Steam was swirling underneath the bathroom door, a pile of discarded clothes on the floor outside.
I recognised the black t-shirt Luca had been wearing last night.
A pair of grey Calvin Kleins on top. The thought of still being here when Luca emerged from the shower was motivation enough to propel me out of bed, hugging my belongings to my chest as I tiptoed into the living room.
The tension in my shoulders eased a fraction when I saw the back cushions of the sofa had been removed, a blanket flung back to reveal the dent in the middle where Luca must have slept.
My eyes scanned the room, spotting one of my shoes underneath the dining table.
I tried not to think too hard about how it got there, dropping to the floor and shimmying commando-style beneath the table to retrieve it.
‘Morning, sunshine.’
I jumped, bashing my head on the underside of the table.
Luca was stood in the doorway. Hair slicked back, steam billowing around him like one of those corny aftershave adverts.
He was barefoot. Bare chested. Bare everything really, except for the impossibly small towel secured around his waist. God, it was hot in here.
Must be the steam. I resisted the urge to fan my face with my hand.
‘Good morning,’ I said stiffly, rubbing the bump I could already feel forming beneath my bird’s-nest hair.
‘How are we feeling this fine day?’ His voice was doing that annoying singsong thing people do whenever they ask you a question they already know the answer to.
‘Fine. Great, actually,’ I lied, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of seeing how much I was suffering.
Luca chuckled, as though remembering something I was not privy to, the bare skin by his ribs brushing against my forearm as he slipped past. I snapped my arm back as though I’d been burned, biting the inside of my cheek as my elbow collided with the wall.
Thankfully Luca didn’t notice; he was too busy pulling a bag of coffee down from the cupboard we used to keep the tinned goods in.
My eyes roamed the space. Illegible scribblings on the backs of envelopes stuck to the fridge door.
An unfamiliar green bottle of Fairy Liquid beside the sink.
Apple, rather than the lemon version we used to buy. This was no longer my home.
‘So – last night,’ I prompted casually, hoping he would fill in the blanks for me.
‘Yeah.’ Luca breathed heavily, lifting his chin in apparent agreement at something I’d just said.
Or not said? ‘If you’d have told me yesterday my night was going to end with Jenny Thompson in my bed, I’d have said you were crazy.
’ He chuckled, pressing a button on his expensive-looking coffee machine so that it whirred into life.
I stared unblinking at his face, not allowing my eyes to slide down his bare chest to where the towel was slung around the v of his hip bones, a neat line of dark hair guiding my gaze from his belly button down to the edge of the towel.
Not that I wanted to look. It’s just that thing when you know you shouldn’t do something, and your brain automatically does it.
Kind of like if I said don’t think about red buses and a hundred red double-deckers would pop into your head.
Well, wet, half-naked Luca was my big red bus.
‘So, I slept here last night?’
His lips twitched, apparently amused by my case of temporary amnesia. A bead of water fell from his hair, running over his collarbone, down to somewhere I didn’t dare look.
‘Evidently.’
‘And – you also slept here last night?’
His smile broadened as he crossed his arms over his chest. His bulging biceps didn’t make the whole maintaining eye contact thing any easier.
‘Do you not remember what happened last night?’
‘Of course I do,’ I lied.
‘Oh, really?’ He took a step towards me, a lion stalking its prey. ‘So, you remember giving Shania Twain a run for her money last night?’
I closed my eyes, an awful flashback of me centre stage, riding the microphone stand like I was coming up the home straight at the Grand National, making me cringe with embarrassment.
‘Mhmm.’
He took another step forward. ‘And then falling off the stage?’
I raised a hand to my temple. So that’s why my head was throbbing so badly. ‘Yes,’ I said tightly.
The floorboards creaked as he advanced some more. ‘And turning up at my front door at 1 a.m.?’
I could feel Luca’s eyes scanning my face, his teeth tugging at his bottom lip. He was testing me.
‘Yep.’
He took one final step forward. We were close now. So close that I could smell his shower gel. It smelt of bergamot and sea salt.
‘And what happened after? Do you remember that, Thompson?’
My cheeks were burning, my brain desperately trying to filter through memories of tequila slammers and – did I get on top of the bar at one point? – to find any recollection of how the night ended.
I swallowed. ‘Did we—?’