Chapter Twenty-Three #3
But it was inevitable that it would be just like all her other Love Library dates.
A disaster. The only date she’d had that could be classed as a success was with Winnie-the-Pooh and even Tess knew that she could never have a sustained and meaningful relationship with a fictional bear who would always love honey more than he loved her.
In fact, the most enjoyable thing about the whole Love Library fiasco had been meeting Gabe. Spending time with him. Bantering with him. Eating delicious food with him. Looking at him. Looking at him as he leaned against stuff …
Usually when she spent time with men it was in a date setting and then Tess tried so hard to be who she thought that they wanted her to be.
Not Gabe though. He’d got her authentic self.
The self she was with her friends. A little bit sassy, a little bit salty but also a whole lot of self-deprecating.
A woman who was clearly a pushover, which was why he’d pushed her right over.
She sighed. Saskia was still reading her the riot act about dating Darcy. ‘… this whole Love Library thing, I thought it was just an amusing diversion but it’s not real, Tess. It’s not what you need …’
‘Talking about what people need, I thought that you didn’t need a boyfriend,’ Tess interrupted because she didn’t want to listen to any more home truths.
‘Yuki seems great. Better than great. Excellent taste in bagels and women, but what happened to the whole I don’t need a man, I’m focusing on my career and I’m going to freeze my eggs? ’
‘A chance meeting in MegaCoffee in Seoul happened and I’m not so set in my beliefs that I was going to let it, Yuki, pass me by.
Sometimes you have to take a gamble on the unexpected.
The greater the risk, the greater the rewards,’ Saskia said with what Tess felt was a very pointed emphasis. ‘Life only stays the same if you do.’
Tess’s gaze drifted over to her closed laptop. She hadn’t just spent the entire weekend tormenting herself by watching the woman who’d supplanted her living her best life. She’d also worked on her CV and made the first tentative steps towards her own, if not best, then better life.
‘I don’t want to stay the same,’ Tess said, her voice suddenly husky with the threat of tears.
Physical touch was very much not Saskia’s love language, but she leaned over to kiss Tess’s cheek.
‘I know you’ll figure it out,’ she said stoutly.
‘But I also know the answer isn’t in a book.
It’s in the doing.’ She slid off the bed and stretched lazily, like a sleek well-fed pussy cat undulating in the sun.
‘God, I’m shagged out, quite literally. I need my bed.
But do me a favour and please think about what I’ve said. ’
Tess nodded. ‘I will.’ But once Saskia had shut the door behind her, she pulled a face and flopped back down on her pillows.
She was made from books. Her mother had sent her off to school already knowing her ABCs right through to her XYZs.
Tess couldn’t even remember a time in her life when she hadn’t been able to read.
Starting with fairy tales like The Princess and the Pea through to an unhealthy amount of Enid Blyton, then on to Jacqueline Wilson and after that, Twilight, before landing on her beloved Jane Austen and the other greats of classic literature; Tess had forged the person she was and the person she longed to be through the books that she read.
She didn’t even know who she really was if she wasn’t trying to emulate the characters from her favourite books.
When Claire at work was at her most insufferable, Tess tried to channel her inner Katniss Everdeen.
On dates that were barely limping along, she imagined herself as the heroine of whatever romcom she’d last read and thought about how she’d relay this latest tale of romantic woe to her friends.
Even when she was deliriously high on life, which didn’t happen very often, she’d wonder if this was what it felt like to get a happy ever after.
Tess Hardy without books was an incomplete work.
Ugh!
It was all too depressing to think about and she’d do much better to eat her feelings instead of having to feel them.
Once again, Tess reached for her tub of Magnum. It was now sugary, salted caramel soup, but waste not, want not. She picked it up and realised that, for want of a coaster, Saskia had put it down on a book.
It was the copy of Plato and Platypus which Gabe had bought her.
Even though she’d promised to read it, she’d plonked it down on her nightstand, and though her intentions were good, she was doubtful that she’d ever understand philosophy even if it was explained through the medium of jokes, so it had sat there ever since.
Tess picked it up, soggy cover and all, and tried not to think of the pleased look on Gabe’s face when he had given it to her. Like he actually wanted to share a huge part of his life, and what made him tick, with Tess. He’d been so convincing too.
She’d never been a fan of self-help books but if she was going to improve herself and her sorry lot in life, then this could be a good place to start.