Chapter Nine #2
My phone buzzed again and Marcus looked at me expectantly.
‘Need to get that?’
I shook my head. ‘Sorry, I should have turned it off.’
‘Any more photos shown up online?’ he asked.
‘Not that I know of.’
I’d barely thought about all of that since I’d seen the pictures of Charlie and the woman I was becoming increasingly convinced he’d left me for.
I should probably ask him – it was a fair enough question when he’d posted it all over Instagram, wasn’t it?
– but part of me didn’t really want to know the answer.
When he’d called me yesterday morning, maybe he’d been planning to tell me he was already shagging somebody else but had bottled it at the last minute, banging on about knitwear instead.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ I said, gauging Marcus’s reaction as I went.
‘Don’t wear yourself out,’ he said.
‘I’m up for it, if you are.’
There, I’d said it. I wasn’t sure anyone was going to believe we were actually together, anyway – I mean look at us, we were like chalk and cheese in almost every way – but if it put the tiniest, most miniscule amount of doubt in Charlie’s mind, if it made him realise that just because he didn’t want me, it didn’t mean nobody else would, I’d come to the conclusion that it would categorically be worth it.
‘Up for . . . ?’ he enquired.
Taking a deep breath, I said the words out loud – quickly, before I started to overthink it.
‘I’ll go along with the fake dating thing.’
Marcus cocked his head, looking utterly confused. ‘Really?’
I cleared my throat. ‘Really.’ He still looked dubious, so I said it with more conviction. ‘Definitely.’
If I said it enough times, maybe I’d even start to believe it.
‘Why the sudden change of heart?’ he asked, shifting in his seat and crossing his arms, as though he suddenly didn’t trust that I was of sound mind.
‘Some . . . new information has come to light,’ I said, being deliberately vague and hoping he wouldn’t be interested enough to push for more detail.
‘Information about what?’
Damn.
‘My relationship,’ I replied.
‘I didn’t think you were seeing anyone?’
God, nothing got past him, did it?
‘I’m not.’
He sighed, seemingly frustrated. ‘Sorry, you’ve lost me, then.’
I closed my eyes for a couple of seconds so that I could think straight. I was going to have to come clean and tell him at least part of the truth.
‘My ex-boyfriend has met someone else. And it’s all happened very quickly. So quickly that maybe there was an overlap, if you know what I mean?’
‘Right,’ he said, as though he still didn’t get it.
‘And he’s splashing photos of the two of them acting all loved-up across his Instagram feed.’
There, I’d said it, and it sounded even worse in the cold light of day. How could Charlie do this to me? What was it about this girl that made him want to shout about her from the rooftops? Already? And to not consider my feelings while he was doing it?
‘Sounds like you’re well shot of him,’ said Marcus, his Manchester accent coming out thicker than I’d noticed before. I supposed with all the international travel it had been softened over the years and only came out in force when he felt . . . what, exactly? What was he thinking of me right now?
‘Yeah. It’s a bit crap, but I’ll get over it,’ I said, weirdly feeling tears well up in my eyes like a tsunami.
God, please not now. Not in front of Marcus.
The professional boundaries of our roles may already have been blurred by the whole fake dating set-up, but that didn’t mean it was appropriate for me to start howling in front of an interviewee.
I’d literally cried more in the last three weeks than I had in the rest of my life put together, and it did not sit comfortably with me. Bloody Charlie.
Marcus shifted on his seat. He was probably finding this exceptionally awkward since I was pretty sure he never cried about anything ever, mainly because every emotion he had seemed to manifest as anger.
Maybe I could try that myself – it would be much less humiliating and having a good shout at Charlie might do me the world of good.
‘You okay?’ said Marcus half-heartedly.
‘Yes,’ I said, sniffing. ‘Sorry.’
‘There’s no need to apologise, Ava.’
If he carried on being this nice to me, the tears were never going to stop.
‘So yeah, there you have it. The exceptionally superficial reason behind why I’m happy to pretend to date you,’ I said, trying to lighten the mood. Marcus was probably feeling like celebrating, not comforting a tearful woman he barely knew.
‘Well, if it makes you feel any better, you can’t get much more superficial than faking a romance to get your brand sponsors back on side, can you?’ said Marcus.
This was a good point. He didn’t seem money-obsessed, but that’s all sponsorship deals were about, wasn’t it? Or was there something more behind it? Some gentle digging might be required to get to the bottom of that one.
‘On a different note, my boss at the magazine is loving the exposure,’ I said, attempting to make myself look less like a jealous ex and more like an ambitious young woman who simply wants to open all the doors she can.
‘She’s bumped your profile up to the September issue, and is giving us six pages instead of four. ’
Although, if we did go through with the pretending-to-be-into-each-other thing, I was going to have to find a way to reconcile the moral code of being a journalist writing an impartial piece on a celebrity with being photographed cosying up to him.
Would people really take me seriously if they thought I was sleeping with him?
I bit down hard on my lip, dragging the image of what that might look like from my mind.
Not helpful. It was just, when you saw an elite athlete close up, it was kind of breathtakingly impressive.
And yet, I reminded myself, he had a terrible attitude and the kind of aggressive, testosterone-fuelled manner I really couldn’t stand.
There, I could still be objective! Just because I was going to pretend to fancy him didn’t mean I would go easy on him, not at all!
Marcus stretched out his arms, lacing his fingers behind his neck.
‘I’m still not entirely sure we’re doing the right thing,’ he said.
‘I feel the same way, obviously,’ I said, secretly trying not to take what he’d said personally. He probably couldn’t stand the idea of having to spend more time with me than was strictly necessary.
‘I like to be straight up with people,’ said Marcus. ‘In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s a case of what you see is what you get with me.’
‘That’s definitely coming across,’ I said.
‘In which case . . . what are we going to say to people? People we know?’ he asked.
‘As little as possible? We let the pictures – if there are any – do the talking. We don’t have to confirm or deny anything, we can just be sort of . . .’
‘Enigmatic?’ he suggested.
‘Exactly. Leave them to fill in the blanks. That way we don’t have to out-and-out lie. Which, for the record, I don’t feel comfortable doing either.’
‘Good that we’re on the same page with this,’ he said. ‘We can get Dean to iron out the details later.’
‘There’s not going to be some weird Hollywood-style contract or anything, is there?’ I asked, keen to avoid being sued if I slipped up, which knowing me wasn’t beyond the realms.
‘Don’t worry, Ava, you won’t be legally bound to pretend to like me.’
I pressed the palm of my hand into my chest, giving him a mock sigh of relief.
‘Haha,’ he said.
I smiled. Teasing him was actually quite fun.
‘Are we done for today, then?’ asked Marcus, no doubt desperate to get away.
‘Sure. You probably need to prepare for tomorrow . . .’
He nodded, downing the dregs of his coffee.
‘Round two,’ he said. ‘And it’s not a great draw.’
‘Sorry, I know you’re probably sick of my questions, but who are you playing?’ I asked.
This could be a useful conversation about his pre-match routine – perhaps I could gently ease the information out of him.
‘Federico Rambetti. Italian, twenty-six years old. Difficult to beat on clay.’
‘So the surface makes a difference?’ I asked. ‘Your game works better on one surface and not so well on others?’
‘Exactly,’ said Marcus, ‘and clay is not my forte.’
‘How come?’ I asked. How much could what the court was made of change things – surely you could either play brilliantly or you couldn’t?
‘The ball bounces higher on clay,’ he explained. ‘So if my game is to hit fast strokes, preferably from the baseline, occasionally using the serve and volley, it means that my opponent is more likely to be able to return them. I’m naturally better on hard courts or grass.’
‘So grass is Wimbledon?’ I said, images of the enticing green courts popping into my mind, along with all the pomp and ceremony that came along with it every summer.
‘Wimbledon, Queen’s, Eastbourne, a couple of others.’
‘And the hard courts?’ I asked. This I had no idea about.
‘Australian Open and US Open are the big ones,’ he said. ‘But also Miami and Indian Wells.’
‘What is Indian Wells?’
He looked at me, amused. ‘It’s a place, Ava. In California.’
‘Ah. Good to know. And where else has clay?’
‘Roland-Garros – the French Open,’ said Marcus. ‘Obviously here, also Rome and Madrid.’
I nodded, thinking this was useful information to have.
I was assuming most of my readers would know as much as I did about the game – some would be more clued up, but it would be good to put Marcus’s game in context.
From what I had deduced, he’d be hoping to reach the finals – and preferably win – at Wimbledon, and would give it a good go at a couple of the others, but probably wasn’t going to triumph at the French Open.
I presumed, however, that he never said never.
‘How are you going to approach your match with this Rambetti guy, then?’ I asked casually, hoping he would answer me before he realised what I was trying to do.
‘Federico is a master of the unexpected,’ said Marcus, leaning forward, warming to his subject. ‘He does these stealth drop shots that are almost impossible to reach, although not so much on clay, and he has a great spin on his backhand.’
‘Interesting,’ I said. ‘So you’ll be doing what to try and beat him tomorrow?’
‘You wouldn’t be trying to coax my game plan out of me, would you?’
‘Who, me?’ I said, mock innocently.
‘Nice try,’ said Marcus, standing up. ‘But you can see for yourself tomorrow, can’t you?’
‘It would be much more helpful to hear it directly from you,’ I said, shielding my eyes from the sun as I looked up at him.
He laughed and went to walk away. ‘See you at dinner?’
I nodded.
‘By the way, is it true I shouldn’t congratulate you on your win today?’ I called after him.
I still couldn’t believe it, and wanted to hear it directly from him.
‘There’s nothing to congratulate me for,’ he said, slowing his pace and looking over his shoulder. ‘I played terribly. I was sluggish, my backhand was all over the place, I didn’t move him around the court as much as I should have.’
‘But you won,’ I said, incredulous.
‘Luck,’ he said, turning his back on me and walking away towards his bungalow.