Love Getting Even

12. Chapter 12

12

‘ K atie,’ Tom called from his spot on the chaise in the living room. ‘It’s 7:30! We need to go.’

He felt pretty relaxed after his afternoon of spa treatments and wasn’t actually worried about being late. He just hadn’t heard any noises coming from the main bedroom for a while and was starting to wonder if she had fallen asleep.

He ran a hand over his face. His skin definitely felt softer. Grinning, he pushed himself off the chaise and made for the bedroom. He had lifted his hand to knock when the door was flung open, and Katie stood there.

The sight of her punched the air out of him. She wore a loosely fitted bright yellow dress with slender straps over her shoulders. Her hair hung in thick, loose waves around her shoulders. The soft lamplight of the room made her pale skin glow, and her hazel eyes were wide as they looked up at him.

‘No need to yell,’ she said as she slipped past him. ‘I’m ready.’ She spun back to him. ‘And I’m starving.’

Tom grinned at her and found his voice. ‘Me too. Turns out being pampered is hungry work.’

He crooked his elbow towards her, and she slipped her hand through his arm. In lockstep, they made their way out of the suite and down to the dining room.

At the entrance to the dining room, they were greeted by a young waitress who showed them to their table, a corner booth with padded green velvet banquette seating. The high backs of the seating and the discreet lighting made for an intimate dining experience.

‘Everything on the menu,’ the waitress bobbed her head towards the sheets she had placed in their hands, ‘is included in your reservation. It’s three courses each.’ She smiled and pulled out a pad. ‘Can I get you some drinks?’

Katie was turning the menu over in her hands. ‘Yes, do you have a wine list, please?’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ the girl said. ‘We don’t serve alcohol here. We do have a lovely range of sparkling non-alcoholic low-sugar wines,’ she leaned across to point them out to Katie, ‘just here.’

Tom groaned internally at this new information, but he had to try not to laugh at the stricken expression on Katie’s face as she let the menu fall limp in her hands.

‘So,’ he cleared his throat. ‘No beer or anything...at all?’

‘No, I’m afraid not.’ The girl shook her head, looking a little apologetic, pen still poised above her pad.

‘Um, can you give us a minute?’ Tom asked, mustering a polite smile.

‘Sure,’ the waitress said, slipping away.

‘Tom,’ Katie’s hand shot out, gripping his wrist. ‘Have you seen this menu?’

He hadn’t and began to study it as Katie started to read aloud.

‘The main course tonight is a slow roasted cauliflower steak on a bed of braised crushed sprouts.’ Her eyes flicked to his. ‘Or you could have Seeded Salad - a melange of mixed, roasted nuts and seeds mixed with garden-fresh leaves, fresh and sun-kissed tomatoes, drizzled in lemon oil. With the option of no dressing, if you prefer.’ Her eyes were wide. ‘Cos you wouldn’t want to ruin it.’

Tom looked at the menu. ‘There’s no meat,’ he said, his eyes running down the short list of options.

‘There’s no meat, no carbs, no fat, no flavour!’ Katie hissed. ‘Tom, I’m starving. Surely this isn’t it?’

‘Jeez,’ Tom said on an out breath. ‘This is undoubtedly really healthy, but…’ He scanned the menu again. ‘We can’t live like this.’

‘We can’t,’ Katie breathed. ‘I need sugar.’

‘And salt,’ Tom added.

‘The more I look at this menu,’ Katie said, ‘the more I want something heavily processed, packed with e-numbers and deep fried. With some sort of creamy sauce to dip it in.’

Tom was looking around the restaurant. ‘Katie, I think this is a health hotel. I think the whole place is a wellness retreat.’ He watched as the couple across from them shared a fruit platter for dessert, and took in the jugs of iced cucumber water dripping with condensation on a serving table nearby. ‘I can’t believe Melissa thought I would enjoy a place like this,’ he muttered.

‘I can’t believe I haven’t eaten since we had that sandwich on the motorway, and the only option now is roasted cauliflower!’ Katie grumbled, pushing her menu away from her. ‘We agreed not to eat too much, to save ourselves for the dinner tonight.’ In a gloomy voice, she added, ‘This feels like karma for us coming on this weekend instead of giving it to Melissa and Ryan.’

The waitress reappeared. ‘Have you had time to decide what you’d like?’ she asked, notepad at the ready once more.

Tom leaned over to her, and she bent her head towards him. He tapped the menu in front of him and said in a conspiratorial tone, ‘Is this the only menu? Are there other options, maybe things we can request from the kitchen? We would happily pay more.’

From the corner of his eye, he saw Katie nodding enthusiastically.

The girl looked puzzled and shook her head. ‘No, I’m sorry. We only serve a limited menu of fresh, locally sourced ingredients. Is there….’ she looked worried, ‘is there nothing you’d like?’

Tom said, ‘We just didn’t realise the sort of food that would be served.’

The girl smiled and glanced over her shoulder before saying quietly. ‘It’s all health and detox food here. You didn’t know that?’

Tom shook his head. ‘No. So, there’s no steak back there? No pasta, no roast chicken?’

The girl shook her head and lowered her pad, sensing no order would be forthcoming.

‘Just the cauliflower and the seed salad?’

She nodded, then, seemingly for want of something to say, added, ‘We offer room service if that’s of interest?’

Tom paused and looked at her. ‘Will the food taste better if we eat it in the room?’

The girl looked nonplussed for a moment, then grinned and gave a quick shake of the head.

Tom looked at Katie. She had sunk back into the banquette, one hand pressed to her stomach. He knew they wouldn’t be eating there tonight.

Smiling at the waitress, he said, ‘Thank you, but we’ll think of something else.’

As the girl bent to clear the menus, she said quietly, ‘I know it feels like we’re in the middle of nowhere, but there’s a pizza place not far from here that delivers. D’Angelo’s,’ she whispered.

‘Thank you,’ Tom whispered back, leaving a generous tip on the table as he and Katie slid from the booth and made for the restaurant exit.

Back in the room, they found D’Angelo’s online and scanned the menu, full of meats, carbs, fats, and salts. D’Angelo’s had given an artistic theme to their menu, so everything was named after an artist or famous painting.

Katie had dissolved into fits of giggles just trying to explain her order to Tom, so Tom drew the short straw and placed the order on the phone.

The man on the phone said, ‘Ahh hahahaa,’ when Tom gave the hotel address, as if they weren’t the first people to seek out pizza instead of the healthy food offered in the restaurant.

Tom consulted the scribbled paper in his hand.

‘One Mona Pizza,’ he said. ‘One Pie-Casso, a side of da Vinci Fries, and two beers.’ Katie bounced on the chaise beside him. ‘Four beers.’ He listened. ‘Okay, okay, four Beers of Venus.’

He rolled his eyes.

Katie had the corner of a pillow stuffed in her mouth, tears running down her cheeks as Tom, with a straight face, managed to get through the order for their dinner.

Tom hung up and said, ‘It’ll be about thirty minutes.’

‘Aaaaahhh,’ she wheezed. ‘I can’t… Ahhhh….’

Tom, watching her, broke into a grin.

‘Enjoyed that, did you? Well, dear friend, I am telling you now,’ Tom stood and loomed over her as she dribbled into the cushion cover, stomach heaving with laughter, ‘you are the one picking those up from the lobby.’

‘Nooo,’ Katie said, backing away on the sofa and holding up a cushion in front of her. ‘You saw that woman’s face when I asked about a vending machine. I think they’ll stop me at the entrance if I try to bring in pizza.’ Her hazel eyes were wide and earnest, but a smile played about her lips.

‘Katie,’ Tom said, shrugging out of his suit jacket. ‘I put in that ridiculous order,’ he jabbed a finger in the direction of his phone, ‘so this now sounds like a you problem.’

He grinned as he loosened the buttons on the top of his shirt and rolled his sleeves up.

‘Fine,’ Katie said, jumping up and heading for the bedroom.

‘Where are you going?’

She glanced back at him. ‘I’m getting changed into something more comfortable. I want to see if there’s a back entrance I can smuggle it in.’

Tom burst out laughing. ‘Just hold your head high and march past with it. It’s not contraband.’

‘Um, I think you’ll find it is in this place,’ she retorted with a flick of her head. ‘And if it’s so easy, you get it!’

‘Okay, okay,’ he conceded, unlacing his shoes. ‘I’m sure there’ll be a fire exit you can bring it in.’

Katie disappeared briefly before re-emerging in a hot pink and navy leopard print jumper, and wide-leg pink trousers.

‘This is your smuggling outfit?’ he asked, swallowing down a chuckle at the sight of her.

‘I didn’t exactly expect to have to forage for food,’ Katie said as she pulled her hair back in a ponytail. ‘I’d have come more prepared if I had known.’

She shoved her feet into her trainers and sashayed out of the room.

Tom waved her off with a grin. A few moments passed. The room felt drab without Katie in it, the silence not so much peaceful as it was oppressive. He checked the time. She had been gone for two minutes.

Glancing across the room, he saw her colourful coat discarded on the arm of the sofa. He got up and shook it out to put it away, a soft floral and citrus scent rising from the fabric. Tom stopped a moment to breathe it in. He shook his head.

‘What am I doing?’ he muttered as he crossed the room and hung it up on the coat rack.

Looking around the room, he fidgeted, idly straightening a cushion.

Hearing a tap, he went to the door and opened it. There was no one in the corridor. He let the door swing closed and thought he must be hearing things when there was another tap. He stopped and stood in the middle of the room. Where was it coming from?

There was another tap, louder this time. It was coming from the other side of the room. He headed to the window and looked down. There, squatting in the gravel, picking up a handful of stones, pizza boxes by her feet, was Katie. He watched as she stood back and took aim and missed, the little stone hitting the brick and falling down harmlessly.

Tom wrenched up the sash window and stuck his head out just as a stone whizzed past his ear and knocked a lamp off a side table behind him.

‘Katie!’ he hissed.

She had her hands pressed to her mouth.

‘You nearly broke a lamp!’

‘Sorry!’ She stage-whispered up to him.

She opened her hands, and a small handful of stones dropped back into the gravel.

‘What are you doing?’

‘I’m locked out!’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘The fire exit. I wedged it open with a plant pot, but someone has closed it, so I can’t get back in.’

‘Go round the front, to the main entrance!’ Tom hissed, jerking his head in that direction.

‘Nooo,’ she shook her head emphatically. ‘I can’t carry this through there. Go down and open the fire exit and let me in. It’s the back stairs, just round the corner from the suite,’ she hissed, then ducked to pick up the boxes before starting to run, head down and hunched over like some kind of amateur commando.

Tom shook his head and whispered, ‘Fine!’ to her retreating back then turned back inside.

When he pushed open the fire door a couple of minutes later, Katie was waiting on the other side, clutching boxes of pizza and a bag clanging with the glass beer bottles.

‘Thank you.’

She grinned, pressing past him into the corridor. The pizza smelt amazing.

‘Why didn’t you just call me?’ Tom grumbled, taking the pizzas from her. ‘You didn’t need to try to smash a window.’

‘Left my phone in the room,’ she said over her shoulder as they climbed the stairs. He tried not to stare at the sway of her bottom right in front of him.

Back in the suite, they fell on the boxes, spreading out pepperoni pizza, chilli chicken pizza, and the side of potato wedges. Katie opened a bottle of beer and took a long drink.

‘Ahhhh, that’s delicious,’ she said.

She slid a bottle across the table to Tom who caught it before it went over the edge. Katie pressed the cold bottle to her cheek.

‘Feels so good.’

Tom, folding a slice of pepperoni into his mouth, nodded and huffed agreement through his pizza. ‘Umhum. This is the best pizza I’ve ever had. I don’t know why it tastes so good!’

‘Because we’re starving, and it was this,’ Katie held a slice aloft, ‘or cauliflower steak and sprouts.’

They fell into an easy silence. The only sounds were the occasional rustling of pizza against cardboard as they reached for another slice, and energetic chewing.

‘Imagine,’ Katie said, with a mouthful of the chilli chicken Pie-Casso, ‘if you had come here with Melissa. You’d probably be eating,’ she consulted the room service menu, ‘chickpea stew with riced broccoli right now.’

‘If that had happened,’ Tom said, licking ketchup off his fingers as he reached for another potato wedge, ‘I think that would have been the end of the road for us. You can’t force chickpea stew on someone and expect the relationship to work out.’

Katie snorted. ‘Oh my god, Ryan has to deal with that now. He’ll probably love it.’

‘Melissa messaged me after you posted those pictures,’ Tom said in a casual tone.

Katie paused and mumbled, ‘Really?’ though a mouthful of pizza.

‘Yep. Said she thought I should have done the decent thing and given her the booking details.’ Katie’s eyebrows were nearly in her hairline. ‘Not gone away with ‘that woman.’

Tom watched with some amusement as Katie, eyes furious, jaws working to chew the pizza, managed to splutter through the bread and pepperoni, ‘That woman?!’ She swallowed, nearly choked and took a swig of beer to clear her throat, her face flushed with effort and anger.

‘I’m not ‘that woman!’ She’s ‘that woman!’ she said, stabbing a finger towards Tom’s phone, as if Melissa was in there somewhere.

Tom nodded. ‘I told her this weekend was a gift and I’d use it with whatever beautiful woman wanted to keep me company, and she could fuck off.’

Katie stopped, mouth open. ‘Did you really say beautiful?’ she asked in a quieter voice.

Tom nodded, watching her. Her face was still pink, her eyes bright, her skin clear and smooth after their facial earlier. ‘Sure. Always best to tell the truth.’

‘Sure,’ Katie echoed.

‘Let’s not talk about them anymore tonight,’ he said then, not wanting the spectre of Ryan and Melissa to loom large over their time together.

‘Good plan,’ Katie said, her eyes fixed on him. ‘Let’s talk about us.’ She waved a potato wedge with a flourish. ‘Why did you become an accountant? Was it what you always wanted, ever since you were a little boy?’ she asked with a grin and a tilt of the head.

Tom wiped his fingers carefully on a napkin, then tucked it under the pizza box. He hesitated and bought time, taking a swig of beer, wondering how much to share. Katie’s face was open and curious as she leaned forward slightly, her attention trained entirely on him. He sucked in a breath.

‘I had um, a bit of a…. chaotic childhood.’

Katie’s brow furrowed slightly. ‘Chaotic? How so?’

‘Uh.’ Tom leaned back, stretching his long legs out in front of him, and tipped his head back to drain his beer. ‘My childhood was a real case of famine or feast. My parents weren’t great with money.’ He picked at the label on the bottle and gave a wry grin. ‘I mean, they were terrible. They both worked, and they earned good money. We were well off by any measure. But as much as they brought in, they spent even more. When I was very young, I had no clue about it. We had a big house, went on nice holidays a few times a year. My brother and I always had the newest, most expensive toys for Christmas. And then…’

He rubbed his face, feeling silly all of a sudden about sharing, but Katie’s hazel eyes were fully focused on him, and she inclined her head slightly to urge him to continue.

He sighed and picked at the corner of a pizza box.

‘Then, when I was about eight, they lost the house. Bailiffs came and took all of our things, and we moved out. We stayed with family for a few weeks, and then they managed to rent somewhere. It was tiny compared to where we had just left. I remember the little kitchen smelt like burnt fat. The curtains blew when it was windy because the windows were so old and didn’t fit in the frames properly. Me and my brother didn’t really know what was going on, just that money was tight. It was a pretty big adjustment for us because we didn’t understand what was happening—but we got used to it. We stayed there for a couple of years, then suddenly, one day, we moved to a big detached place again, big garden…’

He hadn’t told many people this story—not even Melissa—and he had a sudden urge to stop and change the subject. Then he raised his head and saw that Katie was still, her body angled towards him across the table, her gaze steady, and patient.

‘Go on,’ she said softly.

He swallowed and reached for the second beer.

Tom cleared his throat. ‘We thought that the previous couple of years were a one-off blip. It was back to the smart cars, the fantastic holidays—they were great holidays…’ He smiled to himself. ‘Then a few years later, when I was about thirteen, it happened again. We lost it all. Ended up living with my grandma for a few years in her tiny house, all of us in there. She converted her dining room to another bedroom.’ He sighed. ‘They fought a lot at that time. I think it nearly came to divorce. My brother and I shared one tiny room, a shock for two teenage boys used to having so much space. But this time,’ he squeezed his hands together, twisting his fingers into each other, ‘this time I understood what had happened. I knew it was them. I love them to bits.’ He smiled sadly. ‘But they are terrible with money, still. We moved out of my grandma’s when I was about fifteen back into a bigger place and me and my brother had our own rooms again. Just before my eighteenth birthday, it happened again.’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t know why they didn’t learn. Kept making the same mistakes.’ Dropping his head, he ran a hand through his hair. ‘It taught me at a young age that if you give people a second chance, they’ll generally make the same mistakes again.’

Katie’s gaze was still trained on him. She nodded her head very slightly, her eyes urging him to continue.

Tom shrugged with one shoulder and continued. ‘I went to university as soon as I could, studied economics. Got interested in accounting and personal finance. Mum and Dad are more stable now than they were, but my god, the lessons we all went through… They earned lots but spent so much more than came in. I feel compassion for them now because it’s still all or nothing with them, though it hasn’t been so bad that they’ve lost the house since I went to university. But for me and my brother, it was traumatic to keep changing schools, losing friends, moving house with no notice, to not understand why things were happening. I wouldn’t want anyone else, anyone else’s kids to go through that. So…I suppose I became an accountant because I was so scared of ever being in a position like that. I wanted to understand money, how to handle it, how to manage it. And I wanted to help other people understand their finances and control their money.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s why.’

Katie was blinking rapidly, her eyes moist. She sniffed and dabbed at her eyes with a napkin.

‘So… do all accountants have tragic stories like this, or is it just you?’

He sat and stared at her for a moment, then burst out laughing. ‘Fuck off.’ He grabbed a cushion from the chaise behind him and threw it at her. ‘I’m never telling you anything ever again.’

‘Really,’ Katie said, a smile playing about her mouth and eyes as she picked the cheese off a cold slice of pizza. ‘Do the other accountants come from mob families or something? Are they trying to make amends?’

Tom snatched the box of pizza away from her. ‘No more pizza for you. And no, plenty of people become accountants for all the reasons you would expect—steady job, decent income, reasonable hours.’ A little more quietly, he added, ‘But I have bigger ambitions than that.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Are you kidding? For you to laugh at me and rip my idea to shreds! Not likely!’

‘Okay, okay, I am sorry.’ She reached across the table and took his hand. ‘Sorry. I was kidding. I can only imagine how stressful that was for you as a kid. And it makes sense,’ she shrugged, squeezing his fingers, ‘that you’d want to become a bean counter as an adult.’

‘Oi!’ Tom snatched his hand away and reached around him, but there was no cushion to hand.

‘Honestly, I’m done now.’ Katie held her hands up, and her face became serious. ‘Thank you for telling me, Tom. I mean it. And what are these bigger ambitions? Treating yourself to a new abacus?’

He burst out laughing. ‘Maybe. Might be nice on my desk in my own firm.’

Katie laughed, then paused; her eyes widened, and she whistled as she fully registered what he said.

‘Your own accounting firm? Wow. When do you plan to start that?’

Tom, the excitement of sharing his plans making his grin stretch wide, replied, ‘Later this year, with any luck. I’ve been building up a client base by taking on small clients in the evenings and weekends. I know from my research—and by how many clients we have to turn down at work—that there is plenty of business out there for a new firm. I applied for a local business start-up grant. I got shortlisted and have to do a presentation in a few weeks.’ He blew out his cheeks. ‘If I get that, I’ll be able to set up this year. If not,’ he shook his head, ‘I’ll have to rethink, but it will probably be a year or two.’

‘Your own firm,’ Katie mused, shaking her head softly. ‘Impressive.’ She cracked the cap off her second beer. ‘And a great way to show your mum and dad how your childhood trauma continues to play out in adult life.’

Tom nearly spat beer across the room as he tried not to laugh. His nose fizzed, and he wiped at his eyes.

Eyes sparkling, Katie cackled and took a long swig of beer.

Wiping his mouth, Tom changed the conversation.

‘What about you?’ he probed. ‘Why be a technical writer? Some tragic words related incident in your childhood? Were your birthday cards always misspelled?’

‘No,’ Katie bowed her head. ‘No one loved me enough to give me birthday cards.’

Tom’s stomach dropped. ‘Oh, Katie.’ He sat forward, reaching his hand across the table. ‘I’m so sorry—’

‘Kidding.’ She grinned at him as she tipped her beer in his direction.

Tom, reeling from their exchange, felt a little giddy. He hadn’t had this much fun in ages. Banter like this hadn’t been a part of his relationship with Melissa.

‘Nope, no great story as to why I became a technical writer. I enjoy writing and it’s a strange and weird way to make a living. It’s not the sort of job that comes up at a school career day. I did English at university and it was a lecturer of mine who told me about it—she had a friend who did it. I know an awful lot of utterly useless information about products and companies because I have had to learn to decipher it to turn it into website copy, internal releases, user manuals etc.’ She sighed. ‘I am basically an expert on things that will never be on a pub quiz. ‘

‘Wow.’ Tom nodded. ‘Now that sounds tragic.’

Katie laughed and then covered her mouth to hide a yawn. Tendrils of hair had escaped her ponytail and hung softly about her face.

‘I think that massage and these carbs,’ she flicked the pizza box, ‘have taken it out of me. Don’t get me wrong, you,’ she pointed at Tom, ‘are glittering company. But I think I need to sleep.’

Tom nodded. ‘Go on, you head to bed. I think there are some potato wedges here I can finish off.’

Katie nodded and pushed herself to her feet.

‘Tom,’ she said, her face soft. ‘Thank you for today. It’s been fun. I haven’t laughed that much since… Well, in a long while, actually.’

He felt a dull ache in his chest, and everything suddenly went deafeningly quiet.

‘Me neither,’ he said, looking at Katie in her bright pink trousers, her red hair trying to free itself from the ponytail. ‘Me neither.’

‘Night,’ she said as she walked to the bedroom door.

As she pulled the door closed, she stuck her head back through, a wide grin on her face, and said loudly, ‘And I said next left turn!’ Then she yanked the door shut and was gone, a cackle emanating from behind the closed door.

Tom, a cold potato wedge halfway to his mouth, dropped it into the pizza box and threw his head back, laughing.