Chapter 13 #2
‘It is,’ he replies with a shrug, his eyes following my gaze out to the harbour. ‘The seagulls here are pretty intense.’
And that’s when I remember. Lestat the bat. Bram’s mortal fear of flapping creatures.
‘Inside,’ I say, definitively.
His brows pull into a frown. ‘I can cope with a little bird-related anxiety if you want to eat on the seafront. Remember, I grew up here. I toughed it out for years.’
I shake my head and reach a tentative hand out to squeeze his forearm. ‘You can, but you don’t have to. You made me feel comfortable earlier. Let me do that for you now.’
The sigh of relief he breathes out is palpable, his gratitude obvious.
I squeeze his arm one more time before letting go, and when I turn away, I find Diane watching us intently with a faint smile on her face.
She looks away quickly as our eyes meet, and she busies herself behind the counter, humming to herself as she does.
There are three small booths along the front window, and we slide into one, the space so small that our knees touch underneath the table as we sit across from each other.
Bram unrolls the paper packaging from around the food and lays it out carefully, sliding one of the wooden forks over to me with a grin.
I stab a piece of fish and pop it into my mouth, my eyes closing at the familiar flavours of salt and vinegar and freshly fried batter.
‘So,’ I ask, lowering my voice enough that Diane won’t hear me, ‘do you know everyone in Whitby?’
He laughs at that, one hand going to his mouth as he finishes chewing.
‘Not everyone,’ he says once he’s swallowed his mouthful, ‘but a lot of people. It’s not a huge place.
Looking like this’—he gestures vaguely to himself—‘you kind of stick out. I mean, not so much today’—he looks out of the window, lips quirking into a grin as a group of four goths walk past—‘but generally, people remember me.’
‘Sounds nice,’ I say, stabbing at a chip and dunking it into the small polystyrene cup of mushy peas.
My words make his smile twist to the side. He looks almost wistful. ‘It is, and it isn’t,’ he says, after a moment or two, and he doesn’t elaborate.
I worry that I’ve said something wrong – that I’ve somehow offended him – but there’s sadness in his expression rather than anger.
‘I’m a big city girl,’ I say, awkwardly trying to lighten the mood. ‘Forgettable is the preferred option in my neighbourhood.’
But that only makes the crease in his brows deepen.
‘Lucy,’ he starts, his voice low and gravelly.
Those green eyes fix on mine, soft but unyielding, a muscle in his jaw twitching as his mouth parts like he’s about to say more.
He doesn’t though – not at first. He just keeps looking at me, holding my gaze as his eyes slowly darken.
No one’s ever looked at me with quite this much intensity before.
It’s like he can read my thoughts, and the feeling sends goosebumps across my arms as a warm shiver slowly licks down my spine.
‘You are anything but forgettable,’ he says eventually, and it lands like a punch, knocking all the air from my lungs. His eyes are locked on mine, focused so intensely that it feels like he can see into my soul.
‘I…’ I don’t know what to say. I’m not completely sure what just happened.
Eventually I manage to mutter an ok, and that seems to break the spell.
Bram goes back to spearing battered sausage with his tiny wooden fork, and I chase a pea around the pot of mush, trying to catch my breath.
An image of Jon pops into my mind and I’m suddenly flooded with guilt.
He said we’d go out when I finished the story, something I’ve wanted for so long.
This is not the time to be breathless over another man.
I make a stupid joke to compensate for my discomfort, and it breaks the tension entirely. We go back to eating in companionable silence, save for a few small squeaks of pleasure on my part and a chuckle or two from Bram.
‘I take it you enjoyed that,’ he says as we finish, crumpling the empty packaging into a ball with a grin as I down the rest of my drink.
I nod as I swallow. ‘Almost as good as eating it outside.’
His face falls before he can hide it.
‘Stop,’ I say, slapping him gently on the arm. ‘I’m kidding.’ I try and fail to suppress my giggle. ‘It was perfect. Thank you.’
He huffs, but the twitch at the corners of his mouth tells me it’s just for effect. ‘Another perfect moment not ruined by seagulls.’
I’m just about to ask him how the hell he survived growing up in a seaside town with a fear of seagulls when I see a familiar figure pass by the window, and freeze. My heart kick-starts, racing in my ears as I move closer to the window so I can see better.
I feel Bram move closer, like he’s straining to see what I’m looking at. ‘What?’
‘That was Jon.’
‘Jon?’
‘My boss.’ I press my face closer to the glass as I follow the direction Jon was going in. ‘He told me he couldn’t come this weekend because he had a family situation, and that’s why I had to cover the story.’
‘Ok…’
‘But he’s here.’
‘You’re sure that was him?’
I can’t help but laugh as I turn to look back at Bram. ‘Almost positive.’ Then my mouth takes the reins and continues talking after it probably should have stopped. ‘I’ve spent a lot of time studying him.’
Bram’s eyebrows fly up, and I immediately blush, regret flooding my cheeks.
‘We kind of … have a thing.’
His eyes widen even further. ‘A thing?’
‘It’s hard to explain,’ I say, but it isn’t. I’m just too mortified at this moment to know where to start.
That is, until Bram grabs my hand and gently pulls me away from the window.
‘Come on.’
I frown in confusion. ‘Where are we going?’
‘We’re gonna follow him.’ Bram’s grin pops that dimple again. ‘I thought you were a journalist?’
My chest lurches at the thought. ‘I’m more of an elderly-bats-and-school-fun-runs type of journalist,’ I squeak out, panic clutching at my throat.
Bram’s smile widens.
‘Hey,’ he says steadily, ‘you’re already out of your comfort zone. Let’s run with it.’
There’s something in his voice that gives me a rush of confidence. Bram’s eyes widen in delight when I nod. He shouts goodbye to Diane, and we scurry out of the shop, speed walking in the direction that I saw Jon going.
Bram predicts that he’s heading downhill to the sea, and he’s quite right. I catch sight of him as we round the first corner. He’s not going at breakneck speed like we are, but he’s still clearly in a rush, and my curiosity is piqued. Where could he be going in such a hurry?
He takes a left when he gets to the bottom of the hill, as if he’s heading to the bandstand, and we trail him, careful to stay a safe distance behind.
At one point he turns to look behind him, and Bram grabs me by the shoulders and sweeps me out of view, down the side of a seafood hut.
He shrugs off his jacket and drapes it over my shoulders before we carry on, and I raise my eyebrows in a question.
‘Disguise,’ he says seriously. ‘I look like every other idiot out here today, but he’ll spot you a mile off.’
I smile to myself, holding the jacket together with my free hand. It’s a comforting weight on my shoulders, sun-warmed and supple, and even though I’m starting to sweat, I can’t resist tightening it around myself.
Jon heads for the bandstand just as I spot another familiar face inside, and as Bram and I tuck ourselves out of sight behind a small fishing boat, I point her out to him.
‘That’s Amy,’ I say. ‘She works with us. Mostly on the HR side, but she does a few PA duties for Jon too.’
I’m just wondering if perhaps there’s a work situation they’re having to attend to when Jon reaches her and, without even a moment’s pause, grasps her face in one hand and kisses her lightly on the lips.
My heart, which had been thundering like a herd of elephants from the combination of unexpectedly seeing Jon and my speed march through the streets of Whitby, falls to my feet and shatters like fine china. I can already feel the burn of tears in my eyes.
‘I, um…’ Bram mutters as he strains to see around the hull of the little boat. ‘Oh.’
Their kiss intensifies as we watch, and if it wasn’t clear at first that the two of them were into each other, the grip of Jon’s hands around her hips would have confirmed it.
Shock and betrayal come together at once to send a sob up my throat, and when Bram turns to see me crying, his face softens in an instant.
He pulls me in by the lapels of his own jacket before wrapping lean arms around me.
I can feel the ripple of his muscles through the thin band shirt he’s wearing, hear the rumble of his voice in his chest as my ear presses against it.
It’s lovely and comforting, and I just want to lean into it and let him soothe me and forget all about the snivelling snot trails I’m probably leaving on his leather jacket.
But I can’t. My mind won’t let me.
I start to replay interactions with Jon in my mind.
Could I have misread what was happening?
I mean, I’m fairly sure I didn’t imagine kissing him, but did I build it all up to be more than it was?
I’ve never felt more ashamed in my life.
But then I remember something else – something that starts to turn the grip of shame into sharp stabs of anger.
Amy is married.
We all went to the ceremony where Amy and her lovely husband Scott tied the knot at Hazlewood Castle last September. I travelled with Mina, and we met Jon there. We drank too much champagne and danced till our legs were sore, and Mina threw up in a bush on the way to the taxi.
More importantly, Amy and Scott seemed happy.
They seemed happy then, and they seemed happy in the photos Amy posted on Instagram only last week of the trip they took to celebrate their first anniversary.
I can picture the way Scott was looking at her in the photos: like she was the only woman on the planet.
I remember thinking that I wanted that. A wave of nausea rises up my throat, and I hold onto Bram for dear life.
I don’t know how long we stand there, but eventually my sobs subside, and he pulls away, leading me to a bench set behind one of the buildings on the harbour front, further away from the bandstand. His eyes meet mine over the top of his sunglasses, steady and serious.
‘You were together?’ he asks, carefully, like I might start crying again at any moment. ‘I feel like a dick for flirting with you now.’
I shake my head. ‘No, we weren’t together.
I mean, not officially. We kissed once, and I thought …
God, I don’t know what I thought.’ My voice sounds tight through the grip of embarrassment.
‘That he liked me? That we’d end up together?
I probably made it all up in my head.’ The words are tumbling out unbidden.
I wouldn’t ordinarily admit this stuff even to a friend, let alone someone I’ve only just met, but something about the steady grip of Bram’s hands on my shoulders, or the groove of concern between his brows, makes me feel so safe that I can’t keep it in.
‘He had a nickname for me, told me that we’d go out sometime, just the two of us …
I guess I thought he liked me too. But—’
‘He led you on,’ Bram says simply, cutting me off.
I shake my head. ‘Bram.’
‘Bram nothing.’ He shrugs. ‘That was a shitty thing to do.’
I chance a look back at Jon, who’s still kissing Amy with far too much enthusiasm for a public place. There’s a roll of something in my stomach. Jealousy maybe, or pure rage.
‘Yeah,’ I say quietly. ‘It was.’ I steel myself against the truth – against the years of my life where I didn’t see it. ‘And the worst part is that she’s married – happily, too, or so I thought.’
I feel Bram stiffen as I say it, and he whips back around to look at the two of them making out like teenagers.
He doesn’t say anything, but I feel every inch of the fury that rips through him as he watches.
It’s in the way his hands leave my shoulders and clench into fists in his lap – the way his breath catches for a second before he blows it out slowly, like he’s trying to calm himself down.
There’s something close to despair in the way that he swears under his breath, and I don’t know why. All I know is that I want to try and make him feel better, just like he’s done for me. Twice now, in fact.
‘Bram?’ I say, softly, and I see his eyes dart back to meet mine behind his sunglasses, wide and wild.
‘Mhmm?’ he mutters through the clench of his jaw.
I chance a smile. ‘You were flirting with me?’
He doesn’t say anything for a moment or two, and I start to panic that I’ve misjudged my comment, but then all at once his energy changes, and he bursts out laughing.
His face softens, creasing with his amusement, and the hand that had been clenched into a tight fist reaches out for me, settling softly on my forearm.
‘Apparently not very well,’ he says, humour back in his voice, followed by a smile that I could write poetry about.
I smile back as his hand moves down to grab mine again, and this time I don’t feel a single shred of guilt about the way the contact sends ripples of electricity across my skin.
‘Come on,’ he says, and he pulls me back to my feet. ‘I’ve got a plan.’