SIXTEEN
THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS
Alex
I only had to wait twenty minutes at that point, but it seemed like forever and social media scrolling did not distract me at all.
It was exactly 5pm when I heard the car pull up outside. I resisted the urge to open the door and instead waited for him to knock.
I counted. One. Two. Three.
Then I opened the door.
We both stared at each other for a moment. Oliver looked amazing in his dark blue suit, white shirt, blue tie and a blue tartan pocket square. He was freshly shaved, and his hair still a little damp from his shower. He smelt delicious in that way it always did.
‘Hi,’ I managed to say at last. ‘Come in. I just need to grab my jacket.’
‘Hi,’ he replied. He swallowed and stepped inside. ‘You look amazing.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Erm, I have something for you,’ he said. He held up a ribbon brooch in the same tartan as his pocket square. ‘It’s a popular local tartan.’
‘Oh, what a lovely idea,’ I said, taking the ribbon.
I tried to unclip the pin, but my fingers decided they wouldn’t take instructions from my brain.
‘Shall I?’ asked Oliver, stepping in front of me.
I nodded. I didn’t trust myself to speak.
He unclipped the pin and slipped his fingers underneath the strap of my dress.
I thought I was going to internally combust at the sensation of his knuckles resting just above my left breast.
I realised I was breathing heavier. I forced myself to look away from his hand.
Shit. Looking at his mouth was no better.
Do not look at his eyes. I focused on the far side of the room instead.
‘There, all done,’ he said a few seconds later. He didn’t move away immediately. One of us had to, otherwise, I wasn’t sure we’d make it to the Burns Night party.
‘Thank you.’
Jesus, I gasped the word like I had no breath left in my body. I stepped back. Only when there was a bit more distance between us, did I dare look up at him. He returned the look. Intense as if he was arguing with himself about something.
He smiled. ‘We should get off before––’
‘Before we’re late,’ I managed to say with slightly more breath than before.
‘Yes. Before we’re late.’ I could see Oliver mentally regulating himself. He looked beyond me into the lodge. ‘Nice flowers. Very Burns Night.’
‘They’re lovely. Thank you.’
‘Right, let’s go.’
The cold night air cooled me down or at least moderated my exterior body temperature.
Internally, it wasn’t so effective. Oliver turned on the radio as we drove off, and I was grateful for something to fill the silence.
It gave me a moment to gather myself. I thought of what he’d said about the flowers, like it was a passing comment, almost an afterthought, that they were specific to Burns Night.
Did he not know that before he sent them?
Then again, I’m not sure either of us had been thinking straight in that moment in my lodge.
I let the thought drop. Oliver was telling me about who would be there tonight. I needed to focus on that. This was, after all, a work’s do. Not a date.
I looked in my handbag and checked the contents.
Not because I needed to, but because I needed something to do with my hands.
The closer we got to the town, the more I was aware of a familiar tightness in my chest.
Unfamiliar ground, unfamiliar people, no clear exit.
Maybe the business with the van had stirred up the unease that I had thought I’d left behind in London.
I hated that I felt like this. I never used to. Not before.
Oliver glanced over at me. ‘All good?’
‘Yeah. All good.’
The road ahead was very straight and very dark, and neither of us said anything else for a moment.
He knew I was nervous. I was fairly certain he knew.
The Harbour Bar had been transformed. Whatever I had been expecting from a pub function room in a small Scottish town, it wasn’t this.
Warm and low-lit, thick church candles, standing in glass cases on each table, threw just enough light to catch the tartan runners.
The backs of the chairs had been wrapped with tartan fabric, tied in a bow and a thistle placed in the knot.
In the far corner, a group of four musicians were playing something you’d tap your foot to, whether you meant to or not. The smell of something good filtered in from the kitchens.
It was already half full, and Oliver was recognised before we’d taken three steps.
I stayed close, let him work the room, greeting people, shaking hands.
He drew me into each exchange, introducing me and then gently steering me on through the next group of people.
I felt the light pressure of his hand on the small of my back, barely making contact.
Barely and yet totally enough that I registered it.
We reached our table, and Oliver pulled out the chair for me. He leant down and whispered in my ear. ‘Worst case scenario, we’re out of here in two hours.’
I laughed despite myself. Which was exactly what he intended.
He took the seat next to me, even though the seating plan on the entrance door had put him on the other side of the table.
When a broad, ruddy faced man, Michael Tarbuck, arrived and stood, momentarily confused, at the reordered arrangement, Oliver was already on his feet, hand extended, smoothly talking the man through it, making the whole thing seem like a perfectly reasonable development.
Michael Tarbuck nodded in my direction and smiled amiably, before taking what was originally Oliver’s seat.
Oliver sat back down. ‘Wine?’ He picked up a bottle of white.
‘Thank you.’ I waited while he worked around the table, filling glasses, then I lifted mine and told myself to take it slowly.
I hadn’t drunk alcohol for a long time, but tonight I had been ambushed by my emotions, not just towards Oliver but this tension that had rocked up unexpectedly.
I looked around the room as more people arrived, made their way to their seats, stopping to chat to others. Waiting staff wove their way through the guests, carrying bottles of wine, trays of complimentary champagne and small canapés.
I took another sip of wine and felt the tightness in my shoulders ease.
It was then I saw him. Just a fleeting moment.
The golden blond tightly cropped hair, darting through the guests.
My hand stilled. The glass just at my lips.
I moved my head, trying to see where he’d gone.
I jumped to my feet, trying to get a better look but he had disappeared. The wine sloshed out of my glass.
‘Alex,’ Oliver was taking the wine from my hand and passing me a napkin.
It took a second for me to register what I’d done.
‘Oh, shit.’ I sat back down. ‘Sorry.’ I looked around the table.
A few of the people were looking. A woman smiled sympathetically.
I returned an apologetic smile and rolled my eyes in a self-depreciating way.
‘Thought I saw someone I knew,’ I said, before turning my attention back to the wine glass.
‘All good,’ said Oliver. I was grateful he didn’t make a big fuss as he resumed his conversation with Michael.
My leg shook involuntarily, under the table. I was aware of it and couldn’t seem to stop it. I picked up my glass again, took another sip and did my best to look like I was following the conversation Oliver was having rather than conducting a private war with my own nervous system.
I scanned the room again. Looking for the person I thought I’d seen before. He’d been wearing a black jacket. I had only glimpsed him and had no idea if he was a guest or staff. In all honesty, I couldn’t even be sure it was him. I was on edge. It could just be an overactive imagination.
When I reached for my glass a third time, I felt it, the warmth of a hand beneath the table, settling gently but firmly on my leg just above the knee.
Oliver didn’t look at me. He carried on talking to Michael without missing a beat.
I put my glass down and left it there. My leg stilled.
Dinner passed smoothly. Clearly not their first rodeo at Burns Night. The haggis arrived with full ceremony as it was carried from the kitchen behind the piper, the room rising to it, and a man called Fergus, who turned out to be the landlord, delivering the “Address to a Haggis”.
The food was good, the wine better, and the company great. A woman on my left, Janet from the post office, who knew everything about everyone in Risk and made no secret of it, chatted away, and at some point, I stopped noticing I was nervous.
‘My sister, Heather, did all the table decorations,’ Janet was saying.
‘They are beautiful.’
‘She owns the florist in town. Heather Potts. I know, it sounds like it’s from a kids’ programme.’ Janet laughed. ‘But that’s her married name.’
‘It’s charming,’ I said genuinely. ‘And I guess it could have been worse.’
‘Oh yes, we’ve had that conversation. Heather Bush.
Heather Plant. Heather Flower. Heather Field.’
She counted them off on her finger one by one, and I knew this wasn’t her first time telling the story.
‘So Heather Potts is the best of the bunch of Heathers.’
She laughed out loud, and I couldn’t help but chuckle too.
By the time the plates were cleared and Fergus was thanking everyone, I realised I had been laughing for the better part of an hour. The tightness in my chest had gone. I felt like myself again, or at least the version of myself that I wanted people to see.
Naomi from the boutique spotted me across the room, came over for a chat, and introduced me to Rachel, who worked at the café on the harbour front called Driftwood.
‘You’ll have to call in for tea and cake one day,’ she said.
Oliver, who I assumed was deep in conversation on his other side, leaned back into ours.
‘Alex bakes. You might have competition.’
‘You will have no such thing,’ I said. ‘Ignore him.’
I gave Oliver a playful tap on the arm as he resumed his conversation.
Later, the fiddlers started up in earnest, the tables were pushed back, and everyone was on their feet, starting up a dance that they all seemed to know.
I took a moment to look around at the happy, smiling faces of the community.
It was the same kind of feeling I had when I helped at Hope Street church, warm and welcoming.
It didn’t stop me doing another visual sweep of the room, though in case I saw that familiar face again. I couldn’t.
Despite that, I had enjoyed the evening and hoped my networking was beneficial.
I was surprisingly tired from all the interacting with the locals.
I hadn’t been to a social event like this for a long time.
Moving around a lot meant I never quite reached the inner circle of friendships where I was automatically invited to things and felt part of that world.
That was, of course, the whole point of my nomadic existence.
Oliver was standing talking to a group of people, who were clearly delighted to have him.
He glanced over at me for a moment, turned back to the group, then excused himself before coming over to me.
He leaned in to be heard over the music, his mouth close to my ear.
‘We’re at T minus 2 hours. What do you want to do?’
‘Not dance,’ I replied.
‘That makes two of us.’ He looked at me. ‘Shall we bug out?’
I took one look at the dance floor and then at Michael Tarbuck, navigating the room towards me. I turned back to Oliver. ‘Dance with me. Quickly.’
He didn’t question it. His arm came around my waist, and he took my hand and moved me onto the floor in one fluid motion.
‘I thought you didn’t want to dance.’
‘I didn’t.’
‘And yet.’
I glanced back at Michael, who had redirected towards a woman near the bar.
‘You were the lesser of the two evils.’
Oliver raised his eyebrows. ‘Is that so?’
‘Don’t let it go to your head.’
He smiled. Properly smiled. The kind of smile he kept tucked away for the most part.
‘Just so I’m clear about our objective, you want me to lead you off this floor and to the nearest exit?’
‘ASAP. Please.’
‘Copy that.’