Chapter 18 #2
‘That will be nice. I’m sure the house I booked in Glasgow has a massive kitchen.’ She picks her phone up to jot something, probably leaving herself a reminder to speak to him about it. Nerd. ‘So, are you going to get something now?’
‘Nah. I’m pretty full.’
Her phone clatters to the table, and if we were standing, I reckon she’d clamp her hands to her hips. ‘You’re such a wind up.’
And you’re too easy to tease. ‘I have put a couple of boxes of doughnuts in my basket.’ I slide my mobile across the table towards her for proof. ‘Was gonna take them for the others. I can be nice sometimes.’
‘You’re nice a lot of the time. Now you’re not being awkward about things.’
‘Yeah, funny how shit changes.’
The fairylights laced above us throw a shadow down the line of her neck, mapping a path over skin I want to run my tongue over.
I’ll always have space for a bite of her.
She rights herself, and the same lights shimmer in her deep, green eyes.
This would have been a great fucking first date.
I should have bitten the bullet, made my intentions clear when I knocked on her door.
No. I’ll keep my cool. She loves a rule, and probably has some stupid no-sleeping-with-her-workmates boundary that I’ll have to carefully persuade her is worth breaking for me.
I, on the other hand, have no such rules. Or there’s never been a colleague I wanted to do more with. Gethin doesn’t do it for me. Cai would, after a few drinks, but my sister got her claws into him first.
As if reading my mind, Lucy presses her foot to mine and leaves it there.
We’re magnets, pulling towards each other even if we try to keep things friendly.
I force myself to take a breath, slow things a little.
It’s a long tour, and it’ll be grim if we’re not talking to each other because I took things too far too quickly.
I’ve already suffered a round of cold shoulders from her. I wouldn’t survive another tundra.
‘So,’ she says, ‘I’ve obviously met Bethan. But what about the rest of your family? How many more Pritchetts are there?’
She props her chin on her hands, her eyes wide and curious. But her interest burns into me. Seems like I don’t get to avoid the topic after all. ‘Not much to tell.’
‘Uh-huh. Only, on the coach this morning, you said about Cai’s parents taking you and Bethan in when you were younger, so I just wondered what happened.’
It’s easy to forget not everyone knows about your past after working with the same people for so long.
Cai blabs about us being roommates since we were sixteen to anyone who didn’t ask, but I have a chance to start afresh with Lucy.
Maybe skirt around the fact I’d get a kicking if I didn’t get home from school at three-thirty on the dot, even though the bell rang at quarter past and was over a mile away.
I shouldn’t tell her that I only got a decent job because my mate took a chance on me.
If I’d been left alone all those years ago, I’d be in the same position as Tad. Alone. Shit job. Nothing to live for.
Nobody wants to hear all of that.
I’m about to launch into some sort of vague description of a boring life in the Welsh valleys that isn’t mine, but she reaches across the table and squeezes my arm. Her touch is gentle, her fingers warm, despite the cooler breeze now whistling through the food court.
‘Rhys, you don’t need to explain anything. I’m sorry for bringing it up. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.’
But I kinda do. I could give her a little more.
‘Reckon I’d be dead by now if it weren’t for Cai’s mam and tad taking me in. My tad isn’t all that nice. Not to me. Adored Beth, but I could never achieve whatever it was he wanted from us. Gwarthus, he used to call me. Disgraceful.’
Her thumb strokes soft lines along my lower arm, calming the creep of insignificance clawing up my spine.
My left ribs ache with the ghosts of bruises I got the time I skipped rugby training to hang out with Cai.
The pattern of them matched the tread on the bottom of my dad’s steel-toe-cap boots.
Could have played for Wales, according to him, but I wasn’t committed enough.
‘What did he do?’ She practically breathes out the question, as if she’s too scared to ask.
‘What didn’t he do? Locked me up in the old coal shed.
Beat me. Stole my shit. Wasn’t too bad when Mam was around, but she got cancer.
Then she died, and it was like he got a pass to do whatever he wanted.
Cai’s teulu saw it and took me and Beth in.
Made space for us in their little terraced house.
Me and Cai shared a room until we moved out. ’
‘That explains a lot.’
‘Like what?’
‘How defensive you get about being his best friend. Your job. He protected you, and now you’re repaying the favour. I’m glad you and Bethan got out. How awful.’
Yeah, it was awful. But I survived and I’m damn better for it.
Her eyes have gone all watery. Fuck’s sake. No guy wants a girl to cry on their first not-a-date. It’s a good job I didn’t ask her out properly. I don’t want a sympathy fuck.
The confession has my mouth dry. Facing the truth’s fucking difficult, which is why I keep it all locked up. I reach for my glass, but it’s empty.
‘Want another drink?’
Without giving her a chance to answer, I pull my arm from her grip.
Her glass is empty too. I collect it and leave, wandering in the general direction of the bar.
If the prickle of my scalp’s anything to go by, her gaze stays on me.
Doesn’t she have emails to answer? I join the short queue, and drop my head to stare into the dregs of foam in the glasses.
I’m not my past, or my tad, or anything that happened to me when I was a kid. When I get back to the table, there’ll be no more talking about Tad or Mam or my tragic teen years. No woman’s gonna fall for a misery guts.
The queue helps me get my thoughts rearranged. I order, pay, then carry both drinks to the table. Luce’s head’s in her phone, her elbows resting on the wood. Doesn’t switch her attention as I take my seat. Bugger.
‘See, I knew telling you the deepest darkest parts of my life would scare you off. Can't believe you’d choose work over more depressing chat.’ I push her glass past her phone until it’s right under her nose. It does the job. Now she’s looking straight at me.
‘Oh, it’s not work. Not really.’ Her phone’s screen down on the table now. She takes a sip of her beer. ‘Sorry. I joined a few of Cai’s fan groups the other day. I made a fake profile to keep an eye on what they’re talking about. Thought I’d check in and see what’s happening.’
Huh? None of the awful you can always talk to me, Rhys, or any other fake platitudes people throw my way when they hear about my childhood. It’s not as bad as I thought it was. I told her my truth and she just accepted it, then got on with life.
‘It’s weird,’ I reply, ‘that there are whole spaces on the internet dedicated to him. I’ll never get used to it.’
‘I found some threads devoted to you, too. The girls especially seem to love you. Some of the guys as well.’
‘Get lost.’
‘Seriously. I won’t show you what they’re saying. I don’t want to inflate your massive ego. Or make you sick. Apparently, if they get their hands on you, they’re going to—’
‘Green’s not your colour, Luce.’ I don’t want to know what they’re gonna do with me. I’ll have nightmares for weeks.
‘I’m not jealous.’
She looks so offended with her pursed lips and arms folded across her chest that lightheadedness threatens to take over me.
‘Has anyone spotted us at the house yet?’ I ask instead of admitting my crush on her.
‘No. I’m limiting the time I spend in the groups, so I might have missed it.
I don’t want them to indoctrinate me. Aside from their love for’ — she scrolls through her phone, glowering — ‘Cai’s hunky chunky security guard, it’s clear they’re obsessed with Cai.
Some of this might be worth sending over to the police and the PI. I could take screenshots.’
‘I doubt some kid has the balls to hack Cai’s house, but they might be behind the letters.’
‘Some of these aren’t kids. They’re older than Gethin.’
‘Okay, that’s gross.’ I’m on the pop now since I’ve got to drive us home.
I take a long draw of my Coke, praying the bubbles wash away the weird mental images of super old ladies chasing Cai down the street.
Batting away horny wrinkly women ain’t my idea of a job well done.
It’d be too easy, for a start. ‘Well, make sure you don’t spill any gossip to make friends. ’
‘I have enough friends, thank you very much.’ She shifts in her seat and slides her foot down my calf then tangles our ankles together. Friends don’t do things like that, Lucy Taylor.
My dizziness is back with gusto. I can’t lose my cool, even if there’s a stupid fucking grin on my face. Probably look like the Cheshire Cat.
I change the subject. If I inflate anymore, I’ll fly away. ‘What about your family? You don’t talk much about them.’
‘I’m the only child of two dentists. They sent me to Cheltenham Ladies College when I was twelve. I don’t see a lot of them anymore because of all the touring.’
I don’t understand parents who abandon their children. Mam would have done everything to keep me and Beth as close as she could. She’d still have me living with her if she had her way and stayed alive.
‘No siblings?’
‘Felicity, the poor girl assigned to the bunk underneath me when I started at the college, became a sort of pseudo-sister. Nothing cements a friendship better than being forced to share a space. I joined mid-term, and she brought me up to speed with all the rules and policies. Private schools are strict about how you wear your uniform, and what you’re allowed to do. ’
Makes a lot of sense as to why she’s the way she is now. ‘I can’t wait to meet her.’
‘Believe me, the feeling’s mutual.’