Chapter Three
Lady Phoebe
I’m pulling up my rather tedious white lace tights when Digby walks into the room, doing up his cufflinks.
It’s a shame that he is actually very handsome.
Kind of looks like a poster of British old money.
Dark brown hair he always keeps swept back, always got a polo tied around his shoulders in the spring, linens in the summer, Barbour in the winter.
He’s a bit perfect, looks wise. Deep set eyes, slightly murky (not an earthy brown), just brown.
Plain, boring brown. Nothing really special about them.
There’s always something special about someone’s eyes but not his for some reason.
They’re just there, in his head, allowing him to see.
Built up well, played a lot of rugby, polo and lacrosse at Eton. Big on sports, always drags me to a pub when England are playing.
Maybe that’s one of the reasons I was drawn to him in the first place—so like Arthur but so not at the same time and I guess I found comfort in that. He was too far off Arthur for me to change him but reminded me of him in strange ways.
Like, sometimes, I’d whip my head around and see Arthur in him for a very brief, quiet second—but I collected those seconds, put them all in a jar and stored them under my bed so he’d never find them. He wouldn’t like that, Digby.
“You nearly ready?” He calls from the wardrobe.
“I am.” I sit on the edge of the bed, slipping my heels on. “Could you grab my bag, please?”
He laughs. “What one?”
“The Chanel,” roll my eyes. “The black and white one—it’s tweed, if that helps. 2005!”
“The year it was made makes no difference to me!”
Just as I go to get it myself, he comes out holding two. One is the 2005 I was after and the other is the Kelly shopper, 2023.
I stare at them for a second, Arthur bought me the Kelly after I mentioned that I liked it one time in a passing conversation.
“If I said ‘get the Kelly’, I would’ve expected you to only grab that one,” I tell him, reaching for it and turning to the mirror. It does go rather nicely with my dress. “But it will do.”
“But you have other bags called Kelly—how am I to know?” He groans, sulks back into the wardrobe.
Take a deep breath, one that hurts my chest.
Arthur never complained about my bags—he bought me most of them.
“I’m ready!” I shout in a voice much louder than I anticipated.
Digby puts on a placating smile, hand on my back and leads me out of his apartment and down to where his horrid car is parked.
I hate his car.
Mercedes Maybach—I mean why do you need a car that has a bloody champagne cooler and tray tables?
We’ve never even fucked in here before.
Total waste of money.
Looks crap.
Too big.
And I’m pretty sure one of my drivers had the same car.
It’s fucking embarrassing.
But I let him open the passenger door for me and I get in anyway.
“Are you alright?” He asks, looks over at me, one hand on my leg, the other on the steering wheel. “You’ve been a bit off.”
“No, I haven’t.”
He pulls a face that I catch out of the corner of my eye. “You have but alright.”
Whip around, look at him. “I haven’t!”
He says nothing for a minute as we move slowly out of his Knightsbridge complex. It’s on the tip of his tongue, I know it is. I can fucking feel that is.
And then low and behold, it comes out, in a tone very sharp and very pissed off.
“It’s Arthur, isn’t it?”
I try my best to swallow the lump in my throat. “What is?”
Digby laughs, shakes his head once. “Don’t, Phoebs—not tonight, yeah?”
“How many times have I told you not to call me that?!”
His jaw ticks.
I can feel how hard I’m breathing.
The fragile trap door that’s been holding us up finally opens and down we go, into the abyss of all the things we didn’t want to face.
“And how many fucking times have I told you not to mention him?”
Lick my lips, stare out of the window. “I haven’t mentioned him.”
“The bag!” He points to my lap. “He brought you that fucking bag when you were kids!”
Throw my hands up, frown. “It’s a fucking Chanel, Digby! What am I meant to do? Burn it?”
“If it keeps him out of your head then, yes! Fucking burn it!”
“Fuck you,” I mutter, hating myself even more for the tears blurring my vision.
“Yeah,” he nods to himself, flicking the indicator. “Fuck you, too.”
We arrive at Le Pont De La Tour a few minutes later after a thick silence suffocating the both of us. It’s just a dinner, nothing fancy. Connie, twins, Zara, Athena, Spencer.
“Do not,” I warn Digby. “Bring up anything.”
“What, like, the future king banging his mistress?” He smiles, in a way that he hopes I will smile back.
But I don’t.
I shake my head instead, too lost for words.
“What about your dad banging his?” I spit back.
He pulls a face, cheeks red. “That was like, five years ago.”
“Recent enough for The Sun to be still talking about it, though.”
Now he goes silent and I get out of the car, leaving him to battle the sea of paparazzi on his own.
They’re rife at the minute, of course they are. I mean, have you seen the papers? It’s not even just the papers, it’s everything, everywhere. This is world breaking news.
Sebastian and Mia.
Broke the world.
Hope they’re fucking happy, twats.
I ignore their shouts and questions and rush straight into the restaurant where I’m instantly met with George’s chest.
“Woah,” he puts his hands on my shoulders. “Slow down.”
“Sorry,” I swallow.
He tips my chin up. “What’s the matter?”
“It’s his car!” I wail. “I fucking hate it!”
George pulls me into his chest, chin resting on top of my head.
“Who’s? Digby Beaufort II’s car?”
I smile. Not one of them has ever called Digby just Digby—no, it’s always his full name, ‘Dicky’, ‘Eaton Prick’ or ‘That Thing.’
Secretly love them for it.
“Yes,” I continue to sob. “I want his car to cease to exist!”
“I mean,” George tuts. “It is a fucking ugly motor but Jesus, you really do hate it, don’t you?”
“I do,” I sniff, pulling back.
“Alright,” he smiles down at me. “Go on, go to the table, Athena’s there.”
I walk off just as the door behind me opens and Digby walks in. Athena sits at the table, chin in her hand wearing quite the eye sore…a monogram Gucci playsuit.
“Did you get dressed in the dark again?” I ask.
She smiles sweetly. “Why? Does it clash with your high tea attire?”
Stare down at myself and then back at her and I know it’s such a cliche—hated her in school but now we’re best friends. It was that night in Ibiza almost three years ago that changed everything.
I sit down across from her, look around at the lack of people.
“Where is everyone?”
Athena rolls her eyes flippantly. “Apparently they all think they can buy time. But anyways,” she waves her hand around. “How are you? Seen Arthur yet?”
“No.”
She squints her eyes at me. “You’re avoiding him.”
“It’s been a day.”
“A lot of conversation could’ve happened between then and now.”
“I have a boyfriend.”
“One you hate.”
“How’s your relationship?” I smile.
She pouts, picks up a breadstick and waves it at me.
“Great.”
“Barbados?”
“Oh for goodness sake, Phoebe!” She throws the breadstick down. “Fine—fucking fine!” She huffs. “Since you’re begging to know, it was honestly, quite shit considering we spent the entire week doing fuck all on their big, stupid, super yacht.”
“How comes?”
She does a quick glance round—Digby and George are at the bar now having a drink—and then waves her blush pink manicured fingers at me to come closer.
“Get this right,” she starts. “So it’s like thirty degrees, the baby’s been screaming all fucking morning, no one’s slept but then George and Albie decide to drag us all out for a lunch with some guy they know.
I’m so hot, literally fanning myself so hard with the menu that I’m worried it’s going to catch fire.
I start feeling a bit sick. I get up to leave but then my legs just totally give out on me, I fall arse over tit in front of everyone and the next thing I know, I’ve woken up on the yacht with Albie handing me a full fat coke?
!” And then she looks at me with big, wide eyes.
“I mean, who’s still drinking full fat coke! ”
I frown, deeply.
“I didn’t know Lottie went with you.”
“Oh, yeah—me, twins, Connie, Lottie, Charlie and baby.”
“You took the baby on holiday?”
Athena rolls her eyes airily. “We didn’t ‘take her’, Phoebe, Jesus. She tagged along with Lottie. She loved it.”
Squint a bit. “I doubt she did.”
Athena pulls a face, stares at me dumbly. “And how would you know?”
My smile slips and splats onto the floor, awareness dawns and she opens her mouth, reaches her hand over the table with a wince.
“I’m sorry—I didn’t mean…”
“It’s okay,” I compose myself with a small smile. “Oh—look, here they are!”
Digby takes the seat next to me, leans over and presses a small kiss to my cheek that actually feels more like a right hook.
George slides into the booth next to Athena.
Connie strolls in a minute later, takes a seat on my other side, looks a bit like he was in a rush—you know, hair messed up, cheeks red.
“Sorry, did this dinner with your dearest friends disturb your more pressing matters?” I ask him.
“What?” He swallows, looks around. “No—no. I’m here.”
I take a deep breath, look off to the side and take a sip from the champagne Digby ordered me.
Spencer’s next, sits down on the other side and I wonder for a quick second if they’re—surely not. I mean, that definitely stopped in school, didn’t it? What about Primrose?
I go to turn to Arthur but then I realise he isn't here so I sort of just sink into my seat. And it’s been these kind of moments that have been getting me.
Those small, very mindless moments of seemingly nothingness that remind me of the stab in my chest. Even just catching his eye as Spencer walked in would’ve been enough because he would’ve been thinking the same as me and then we both would have disappeared off to the bar to debrief.
You don’t notice just how many of those moments you have with someone until you no longer have them.