Chapter 14
Time trotted on as it invariably does, rather like I imagined Mervyn would be trotting in a pair of ladies’ pumps to his next unsuspecting victim.
It had been a couple of weeks since my date from hell with him. I now referred to this encounter as “my meet with Merv the Swerve”. As swerving away as fast as possible would be my modus operandi on ever seeing that particular gentleman again.
That one night with him had completely put me off arranging any more dates with prospective suitors, fearful that they might turn out to be just as bad or, perish the thought, even worse.
I really didn’t feel equipped to throw myself into the dating pool again: too scared I would belly flop right into another nutter. But I knew it wasn’t just the fear of all the single freaks out there that walked amongst us, posing as eligible bachelors. No, it was also because I’d come to a startling realisation. And that was the fact that I had feelings for Seb.
I had sidelined him for so long, been convinced we just weren’t right for each other; when really I should have recognised what had been under my nose the whole time ? that we were meant to be together.
After Duncan, I had locked my heart away, deep within me. I didn’t want to face my fears, that was the whole point, why would I want to face something that scared me? And I was scared, scared of being hurt once again.
I didn’t need love; all it did was damage you in the end. I was happy as I was, in control of my life and my relationships. I set the rules. There were far too many perils to falling in love, thank you very much. Much safer to settle for casual flings with attractive men. Fun that would never prove fatal to my heart. The very heart which still bore the bruises from entrusting it so completely to my ex.
I had convinced myself that Seb and I would only ever be friends, could only ever be friends.
He was just too nice, too dull, too thoroughly dependable for me. Where was the excitement in that? But now I realised that my self-preservation had built up a wall of excuses. A wall I now wanted to dismantle, brick by brick, until it tumbled down completely.
I had believed I was protecting myself by never seeing Seb as anything but a work colleague and friend. I had placed him in a box I felt comfortable with, and that is where he had stayed, closed in it, for years.
But that was me protecting myself, never giving “us” a chance. I wanted to open that box now, see if love would pop out like a jack-in-the-box; or would it be a metaphorical slap in the face? I needed to take that chance.
I had always thought Seb would be there as my friend, or whatever I wanted, when I wanted it. Things would always be on my terms. I had never envisaged him with a girlfriend, but now I realised how smug and entitled I had really been.
Seb and Jocasta had now been seeing each other for several weeks. Although it had only started with that informal pub quiz and a bite of food, it seemed they really clicked and then had been out and about to different venues on quite a few occasions.
Seb was of course still his normal lovely self. He hadn’t changed a jot in his attitude towards me, but for some reason I felt rather awkward and ill at ease around him.
Never one to lack confidence, I had suddenly become a little tongue-tied and stiff when chatting with him. My laugh appeared false and hollow to my ears. It was as if the power dynamic had shifted and the world had tilted slightly on its axis.
It wasn’t just the fact he was seeing Jocasta, although I had to admit I was far from happy about that. It was because I had realised my depth of feelings for him.
I couldn’t believe I had been so blind for so many years: always believing he would be forever waiting for me on the sidelines, his life on hold until I eventually decided it suited me, snapped my fingers and he would come running.
I had been such a fool. What is it they always say ? you always want what you cannot have. And I did want him, far more than I had ever desired a designer dress or craved the latest “must have” handbag. All those irrelevant meaningless things I had once considered so important.
I was sitting at my desk, aware of the mountain of papers piled up in front of me and yet unable to concentrate my mind on anything but thoughts of Seb.
My workload was building by the day, like the leaning tower of transcripts, and I really needed to focus on it to keep myself distracted from pining away like some lovestruck puppy.
I felt as if I were Snow White, had finally woken from my sleep to the reality of how things really were. But it hadn’t been the kiss from my dashing prince that had finally roused me from my slumber; oh no, it had been a 6 foot 2 slaphead wearing my ruby slippers that made me see sense – that Seb was my prince and always had been. But alas, my prince had a princess of his very own and she just happened to be the bitch from across the office.
And speaking, or at least thinking, of the Devil had summoned Jocasta in all her simpering glory.
After the briefest of knocks at my door, without giving me a chance to respond, her head poked around it. The way it jutted through reminded me of the Punch and Judy shows I had watched as a child at the seaside, and I sincerely wished I had a big stick à la Mr Punch to give her noggin a good bash at this precise moment.
“Hello, Lila, just wanted to remind you about the spa afternoon tomorrow. Hope you haven’t forgotten?”
Bloody hell, I absolutely had forgotten. I felt a sinking feeling come over me. There was nothing I wanted less than to spend the afternoon half naked being massaged in the vicinity of this vixen, or encased in mud for that matter, as I imagined there would be enough mud-slinging as it was.
I answered her through gritted teeth and a rictus grimace.
“Yes, of course I hadn’t forgotten, I’m really excited for it.”
I doubted very much whether this excitement was evident on my pained face.
She walked right into my office now, she was carrying a thick cream coloured padded envelope under one arm.
I hated to admit it, but the woman looked good. I’m sure she could barely breathe in her two-piece fitted fishtail suit, cut short and extremely tight. It was teamed with a cream blouse that was verging on the scandalous from the number of buttons undone. The suit was a tartan print, one I didn’t recognise, possibly the McSluttish clan.
“Me too Lila, I’m looking forward to it so much.”
She let out a deep sigh, as if she had the weight of the world on her narrow tartan shoulders.
“January is such a dire month; it will be lovely to have a bit of a pamper.”
I smiled at her stiffly. I really didn’t want to get into conversation with the woman I knew I’d be stuck with tomorrow. But for now I just wanted her to piss off back to her own desk.
I wasn’t to be so lucky. She thrust the envelope she had been carrying towards me, mere inches from my nose.
“Mr Fluck has asked if you wouldn’t mind dropping these important documents off with his clients at Hogan McKenzie? I would do it myself of course, but he’s asked specifically for you to. He wants to have a meeting with me in his office in...”
She paused for a second to glance at the gaudy designer watch hanging from her slim wrist.
“About five minutes.”
She let out a little fake, self-conscious giggle.
“I seem to be quite in demand at present.”
I could feel my hackles rising. Why was Fluck having a meeting with her? She was a junior in the firm, after all. And when had I suddenly become the office lackey?
Was this Fluck purposely exerting his authority over me in front of a more junior staff member because he was still pissed off with me about the fashion show? Or was it something else? I didn’t know, but I certainly wasn’t chuffed with the situation, that was for sure. And I certainly wasn’t going to let this little madam know the extent of my feelings.
I took the padded envelope from her with a stiff nod.
“Fine, I’ll do it now. I was going out anyway, so it’s not an inconvenience.”
This was a lie; I’d had no intention of leaving my office for the remainder of the day, not because I was feeling lazy, but simply because of a stronger motivation to sit on my arse for the afternoon. However, it made me feel slightly more in control if she thought I wasn’t going out of my way to run an errand on her say so.
I left the room, slipped on my warm winter coat and busied myself wrapping my scarf around my neck numerous times in preparation for bracing the elements of a dreary Yorkshire January.
My mind wandered to Seb. I wondered if he was busy. I doubted very much whether Fluck would have insisted on him having to take time out his day to deliver paperwork to another firm.
Then I suddenly spotted him. He was shaking hands with a client and showing them towards the door, making polite small talk as they went. His glasses were perched on the end of his nose in an almost comical way, and I felt a sudden unexpected wave of affection for him.
He ushered the client out of the building, and as he turned to return to his office our eyes locked for a mere second. Not long at all, but long enough for my heart to leap as if I’d just glugged a triple espresso at breakneck speed.
I scolded myself inwardly. Seriously, I needed to get a grip. But I felt like a lovestruck teenager clapping eyes on their crush in the back of geography class. I hoped I wasn’t blushing too, as I did back then.
There was something different about him though, something I couldn’t quite fathom in the brief moment our eyes connected.
But with a sudden jolt of realisation, I knew what it was. Seb looked good, no strike that; Seb looked bloody great. As if he had just stepped out of an advert for male grooming products. All handsome and rugged and, yes, there was no denying it, stylish too.
Gone were his garish woollen jumpers and half-mast corduroy trousers. Now he was seriously spruced up and dressed in an elegant crisp white shirt with fitted charcoal grey suit that somehow showcased the blueness of his sparkling eyes to perfection.
On second thoughts, never mind the male grooming advert, he could have stepped straight out of a Sunday supplement on elegant male living. He had most certainly had what I think was commonly called a “glow up”.
I felt a sudden desire to give myself a sharp pinch to check I wasn’t dreaming.
His back was already to me as he made his way down the corridor. But I had to stop him, had to say something, anything. I hated the awkwardness between us, whether it was all in my head or not.
“Seb, you look good…different.”
He stopped abruptly and turned on his heel to face me. His demeanour seemed to be tinged with embarrassment.
“Yeah…well, l, Jocasta gave me a few tips on things, told me how I should dress, you know, smarten myself up a little. It took me a while to take her advice; you know me, I’m stuck in my ways, but it was high time I bought a few new things as my clothes were so ancient some were dropping to bits. So I let her take me shopping.”
I felt as if I’d been physically punched. Shopping? She had taken him shopping?
I would have felt less hurt if she’d taken him to a Soho strip club dressed in full-on gimp attire. Shopping was and would always be “my” thing. I should have been the one to share that with him, not her!
“You look good.”
I had to say it. I had no choice, because the truth was that he really bloody did.
“But I always liked the way you looked.”
Seb seemed to relax a little, his eyebrows becoming rather less knitted together. But then again that might have been just down to the fact that there was so much less of them now. His monobrow of old, stretching across his face like a slumbering slug, was now divided into two neat arches of well-plucked perfection.
I cast my gaze down to his hands, which always well-presented now boasted the neatest manicured nails I’d ever seen. Quite clearly Jocasta had talked Seb into visiting the beauty salon too.
“Come on, Lila, you’ve got to be kidding me, you’ve ripped the shit out of me for years about the way I dress. Saying I’ve got as much style as Jeremy Clarkson wearing his grandad’s hand-me-downs.”
I couldn’t argue with the facts. I had mercilessly teased him throughout our friendship about his style, his lack of knowledge on all things sartorial. But strangely now, seeing him standing here looking so elegant and dashing, I felt choked with sadness for the Seb I’d lost. And I had lost him. I knew that now.
He didn’t seem to notice though and was tugging at the sleeve of his suit jacket, clearly impressed.
“I never realised that clothes could actually be so smart yet still so comfortable. It always felt like some of my jumpers were so itchy and intolerable that they actually hated me, like they were bearing a grudge.”
He let go of his sleeve and smoothed it down carefully, his expression clearly impressed.
“Yes, I wasn’t sure to start off, but I must admit I’m beginning to get used to the new more stylish me. I’ve even had women talk to me as if suddenly they can see me. I’ve been pretty invisible to women my entire life, and now suddenly…poof, as if by magic, they can see me. It’s shocking, really. I never knew clothes could make such a difference.”
I felt an ache in my heart for his childlike enthusiasm. He was in his fifties before he had cottoned on to what us women had known since the playground: that fashion could really elevate you; not just your look, but your outlook too.
I smiled weakly. Seb, my devoted loyal lapdog, had morphed into a veritable fox, a salt and pepper-tinged hottie of the highest order, from his elegant tailoring to his sparkling blue eyes, like flashing gems, now beautifully showcased by his well-groomed brows. His skin looked fresh and glowy too. There was no escaping the fact that, ding dong, he was dishy.
He could literally make me swoon, like a Victorian woman suffering an attack of the vapours. Why had I never realised just how handsome he was? It was as if I had been under a spell. And now I wanted him, he was no longer mine. Now he was with the wicked witch and her spell was well and truly cast.
“You’re going to the spa with Jo tomorrow, aren’t you?”
Jo? That made my heart break a little more. They were sounding much too familiar for my liking.
“I am, and I’m really looking forward to it.”
That was an out and out lie. I was getting so good at fibbing, they just tripped off my tongue like baby ducklings tumbling over each other on an icy pond.
Seb nodded his head.
“I’m so glad. I knew you two would be OK. She really is a nice girl. She’s a great listener too, and she even gets on with Adam, and nobody apart from me ever likes him. She tucked into an enormous portion of his home-made shepherd’s pie, so she’s an absolute star in his book.”
I kept silent, but inwardly I was fuming. I knew without a doubt that Jocasta was up to something.
There was a good reason why nobody liked Adam, and it wasn’t just his monotonous whine of a voice and his questionable body odour. He really was the dullest chap you could ever have the misfortune to run into. The “yawn of Yorkshire”, I had even heard him referred to on occasion. There was only Seb who really liked him, and sometimes I felt even he just tolerated him; but then again Seb liked everyone. It was part of his charm.
Maybe I should have made more of an effort with Adam the few times I had met him. But honestly there was only so much sci-fi chat I could stomach before I wished I had the kinks in my own time machine worked out, so I could escape the monotony of the conversation and transport myself back to a week last Tuesday.
Now, though, I was feeling very different. I wished I hadn’t poked so much fun at Seb’s beige-based diet and teased him and Adam for being so boring. Now the prospect of enjoying a mash-based meal with Seb sounded just the ticket, even with Adam lurking in the background.
I had always known Seb was a good man. But now he was good-looking one too.
Why had I wasted so much time with younger flings, when the perfect man was right under my nose the whole time? For someone who classed themselves as an intelligent woman, I had really been a fool.
Lottie had always told me that Seb was the right man for me, and I had repeatedly laughed it off, forever thinking my dear friend a little na?ve and just an incurable old romantic at heart. She had told me that I was just scared of commitment, and I in turn had quipped back that commitment should only ever be reserved for mental health facilities.
I had maintained that Seb would never be right for me. I needed someone who would challenge me, and the only way I would ever be challenged by Seb was in the sports round at the pub quiz. But I had been wrong all along. And Lottie had been the one in the right. She had even warned me that if I didn’t snap him up, then someone else would. I had arrogantly thought that notion ridiculous, but she had been spot on. If only I had listened to her.
I passed by Fluck’s office on my way to the main exit. His door was slightly ajar, and I could hear a startling high-pitched squawking noise. It sounded to my ears like a parrot on the loose. Had one bizarrely flown through the open window and landed slap bang on Fluck’s desk? But no, it was just the dulcet tones of Jocasta Jennings laughing.
Through the slit in the door, I could just make them both out.
She was sitting across from the old slimeball. He was evidently speaking, although I couldn’t quite hear what was being said; then once again Jocasta nearly slid off her chair, convulsed with peals of laughter. I knew that whatever he was saying could never ever be that funny.
I suddenly realised that Fluck was out of his chair and striding purposefully towards the open door. Before I could hurtle through the building’s main doors and escape into the world beyond, his door was unceremoniously slammed shut, right in my face.
I felt like a peeping tom caught with my hand gusset-deep in the knicker drawer. My face flamed for a second, and I felt hot tears sting my eyes.
What was happening to me? It must be my hormones or something. I never ever cried, not even as a child when watching Watership Down, and boy was that film traumatic for an eight-year-old.
I always took comfort in the fact that I was so tough; but now it appeared I was about as tough as a wagyu steak. I just felt wretched. If this was a competition, then I was definitely on the losing side. It seemed that woman had it all: my Seb, and now the boss too, eating out of her hand like a devoted donkey.
I hated to admit I was jealous about Fluck too, but I really was. I had never been his biggest fan, but at least I felt we had a grudging respect for each other professionally.
We had worked together for years, after all. But seeing him with Jocasta, he seemed so utterly charmed by her: like a delighted little boy at the ice cream van who had been offered a Flake as well as sprinkles on his double cone. And her two scoops certainly seemed to be mouth-watering to men.
As I left the building to deliver the letter, like an office junior, I decided to give Lottie a call. I was keeping my fingers crossed that she would be able to meet me for a drink after work. I could really do with seeing a friendly face. Even if she was going to say, “I told you so.”