12. Audrey
When I made it back home, I screamed. Enough to make Lucy think I was dying, because in my mind I felt like I probably was, and enough to look like I was Regina George from Mean Girls when she wrote about herself in the ‘Burn Book’. It seemed all of the paranoia I’d held while being in London so far wasn’t unreasonable, and exactly what I’d feared had come true.
“What’s wrong?” Lucy ran out, floral oven mitts still covering her hands.
Then my scream stopped, and I was filled with another emotion, fatigue. I followed Lucy over to our couch, giving her a look that said ‘dinner can wait’. When she sat down beside me, I finally spoke. “I saw Theo today.”
Her eyes turned into wide saucers. She looked just as shocked as I was when I first saw him, standing there in all his glory. “You’re kidding me.”
Then, my head tipped back, now realising why the last name Atkins had felt so familiar to me, back when I met with Ava. The signs were staring me right in the face, and I didn’t even see them. “No, I wish I was. Ugh, I knew this would happen, I just freaking knew it.”
“Maybe you manifested it by thinking about it so much?” Lucy posited. I shot her a look as if to say ‘not helping’, because the one thing I wouldn’t be doing was making myself feel at fault. Lucy held her hands up in surrender. “Sorry, sorry.”
“To make matters worse, it’s not just a one-time thing.” I gulped. “You know that project I’m working on?”
“The biggest business gala of London?” Lucy eagerly confirmed. “How could I forget?”
“Well, Theo Atkins,” I said his name as if it was rotten meat in my mouth, “is the son of the gala project manager.”
“Oh, fuck.”
“Big fuck. Tell me why I didn’t—despite being so paranoid—connect the dots earlier?”
“What are you going to do?” She frowned, unsure of what options were available. Probably because there were no ‘ways out’, and I’d be wedged in this situation until the gala came and went.
“I guess some other bad news from today is my failsafe,” I explained, and Lucy gave me a grimace, learning that it gets worse. “Ava said the company is extending my contract here for another three years.”
“Wait, Audrey, that’s incredible!” Her expression turned gleeful.
“Sure, if it didn’t mean that puts my plans for France on hold for even longer. This was supposed to be my last quick stint, making just enough money to put a deposit on somewhere nice, and cover my moving fees. I’ve been saving up for this for years.”
“I know you have.” Lucy placed a hand over mine. “No one can doubt how hard you’ve worked on this… so what’s your plan, then? Won’t an extended contract mean you’d have to deal with Theo more often?”
“Well, Ava said the company will let me go if I don’t agree to the extension, so I guess that’s my way out. Quit by time the gala is over, head home as planned, then book a one-way trip to France after I finish packing my things.”
It was hard to tell in the dim light of the living room, but I thought I could almost see a hint of disappointment on Lucy’s face. She trailed her fingers over my hand in contemplation, and just like the other day, I could see what she was battling. Lucy loved it here. She was in her element—and while she could’ve gotten any job as a home-chef back in Australia, she didn’t want to go home just yet. Hearing that we could have a shot at staying here for another three years, it must have been hard to come to terms with, knowing I was prepared to throw that all away. But this was the deal, and Lucy made it clear that she didn’t want to live overseas alone… so it was back to the original plan as always.
“Sounds pragmatic.” She exhaled.
“I try to be,” I replied. “Besides, there’s no way I could agree to working with Theo for more than I already have to. After this gala is over, we’re done for good.”
Lucy studied my reaction, a knowing look on her face. “Incident aside,” she started, and I knew where she was heading. “Don’t you think this feels like a bit of a second chance for you?”
“No. No, no, no—” My hands went up, trying to block out the thought, but Lucy interjected before I could talk some sense into her.
“Come on, Audrey!” Her hands went to her hips as she stood. “You’ve been hung up on him for years, are you sure you don’t want to at least make amends?”
“Hung up on him?” I scoffed, putting on my most disgusted face at the implication. “Have you ever heard me when I talk about him? I’m not pining over the man, Luce! I’d rather die!” I spat dramatically. But as my phone buzzed, she saw that I still had his number saved as a contact. The truth was, Theo must’ve kept my number as well, since he had just sent a provoking text that read, ‘It was nice to see you again’.
“It’s fate.” Her jaw dropped, and I threw one of the couch pillows at her.
“It’s not fate,” I exclaimed, trying hard to find the right word. “It’s mockery!”
“Be serious, Audrey. Now that he’s working with you, are you really just going to ghost him?” Lucy asked. “Might as well make your intentions clear with him here and now, to make life easier for you this next month.”
“Why do you have to be so reasonable?” I rolled my eyes, hating every minute of the tantrum Theo caused me to have. That’s right, it’s all on him. There’s no way I’d act like this on my own, in all my twenty-seven years of wisdom. I started to reply, and Lucy’s eyes lit up with excitement… until she read what I had to say.
“You can’t send that!”
I looked down to my device, a beautifully crafted message tailored just for him, with a few curse words decorated between my sentences that clearly expressed the chummy feeling wasn’t mutual. “I think it’ll be quite effective, honestly.”
“Audrey.” She huffed, and I knew she was worried about my professional reputation here. Again, she was right, and I hated her for being so much more mature than me. Theo was the son of my client, so that made him my client, too. I didn’t even have to tell Lucy that he threatened to take his work elsewhere if I continued to act up; she was smart enough to see the consequences herself.
“Fine, I’ll tell him how I feel in a more delicate manner… but like you said, I need to set the tone here,” I justified.
“Well, think about it,” Lucy started, heading back to the kitchen’s fridge to pull out more ingredients. “From what you’re telling me, all you have to do is last out the month. If Theo knows this is only short term, he might not even try to make something out of it, or maybe he’ll realise he should be focusing on the actual project.”
“So, I just be straight with him?”
“You just be straight with him.” She nodded, as if to say it was resolved. My fingers got to work, erasing the previous message and putting effort into something classier. ‘Don’t bother, Theo. I’ll be gone in a month. Once the gala’s over, you can forget about me all over again.’
I passed my phone to Lucy, and after she gave it a look of approval, I pressed send.
To pay Lucy back for her incessant cooking, I’m tasked to take care of all the cleaning around our home. From vacuuming, doing dishes, and wiping up the aftermath of her manic pot-stirring, to picking up any loose herbs that found their way onto the floor. It was normally therapeutic, being able to do a task without having to think. And while I felt bad that Lucy took on the mental load of what we ate each day, she claimed it was to build her portfolio, and every recipe was an opportunity to practice. To help even it out, I sent her some subtle inspiration recipes every now and then, only for her to cook it up three days later like it was her idea in the first place.
On the menu tonight was homemade spinach and ricotta ravioli, covered in a pesto sauce that was to die for. But even though it gave me a sense of warmth, making me feel at home, I couldn’t help but still feel irked. Exactly why did I expect Theo would reply to my message?
It was like I got a thrill from the argument we had earlier today, and I wanted it to continue all night long. But no, like any respectable man receiving a text that spelled out rejection, he took it on board, leaving a looming ‘read receipt’ and nothing more.
“Stop looking at your phone,” Lucy chimed in, after watching me click my lock screen, only to close it again once I realised no notifications were there.
“I know, I know.” I breathed out from embarrassment. “But what if he comes to the next meeting with his dad tomorrow?”
“He probably will,” Lucy spoke cheerfully, the mood boost due to the tasty forkful in her mouth. “What happened to stoicism?”
“I’m new to it.” I groaned. “I can lapse this once.”
“What can you really do about this though?” Lucy prompted, knowing that was part of the stoic process. “Whining about the guy isn’t going to change the fact that you still want to do a good job on the project, so you should really be focusing on how to stop him from getting to you. Mind over matter!”
“Whining?” I spat. “Jeez, Luce. I thought I’d get a little more sympathy after how many weeks it took to console you after your last break up?”
“Don’t you bring that up.” She pointed her fork at me.
“Oh, you mean when she cheated on you and you decided you still wanted to be with her, only for her to do it again and again? Where was your rational thinking then?”
“Be better than me.” Lucy shrugged. “And the first step of that process is not throwing my bad decisions back in my face.”
I finished wiping the counter and began rinsing out the cloth. “Look, I may have gone a little far there.”
Lucy gave me a triumphant, ‘holier than thou’ look. “You’re forgiven.”
“Of course, I am,” I scoffed. The thing about Lucy and I was that our friendship had changed shape so much over these past few years. But no matter how much we changed—where she watched me turn from an optimist to a complete cynic, and I watched her go through her own motions of self-healing after having her heart broken by countless men and women—we stuck together. Our resilience to each other made our jabs easier to take when things were stressful, and frankly, sometimes those jabs were the only thing bringing us back to earth when our heads were up in space. After all, what greater feeling is there than being pulled back to reality by your best friend—even if it was with some cheekiness—only to receive a comforting hug afterwards.
But there were some rules we had in place; the main one being no matter what, we didn’t doubt each other’s ability to achieve our dreams. Whether it was me and my French escape, or Lucy becoming an industry-recognised chef, we supported each other wholeheartedly. It was an easy thing to do, when Lucy was as talented as she was… but she met me halfway, all the same. Even when I threw out all of my ‘French inspired’ attire after a breakdown two years ago, thinking I’d never make it. I remembered Lucy telling me “it was for the best”, and after seeing my own style evolution since then, I couldn’t agree more. Still, just when I thought my French dream wasn’t going to happen, Lucy reminded me to focus on the baby steps. And now, I was officially on the other side of the world, closer to France than I’d been since I was little, on that family trip that stuck to me like a tattoo. England wasn’t France in any way, but just like Lucy, I saw its charms, and I was able to enjoy myself while I was here, especially with my best friend by my side.
“Now, can we both stop talking about him, just for tonight?” Lucy asked. “We’re hardly passing the Bechdel test.”
“Good God, you’re right.” I recoiled. “Want to go watch a cooking show and judge their techniques?” I knew this would be a winner; it had become one of Lucy’s favourite pastimes, ever since an episode of Mary’s Kitchen had inspired her to work in the culinary arts. We were different people now, but some things never changed.
She put a hand to her heart as if I’d just proposed, and based on how good she cooked; I wouldn’t say I never considered the idea before. Wasn’t that the goal?To marry your best friend? With a toothy smile, she sighed dramatically. “I thought you’d never ask.”