Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

Christmas Eve 7:00 p.m.

We head to The Elgin pub, and on the way we pass Tesco. It’s utterly rammed. I peer through the glass window longingly, thinking of my noodles and the peaceful, solitary night that is very quickly getting away from me. I feel regretful for suggesting the pub now, but it seemed like the right thing to do, and however miserable I might be feeling, that must have sucked for Adam in the bookshop. I’m trying to do a nice thing. A kind thing. Not exactly the act of a hardcore bitch. It must be all the music and twinkle lights. This is why Christmas is dangerous – it makes people soppy.

Inside The Elgin it’s peak celebration vibe. I spot a luminous coloured poster on the wall declaring this The Big Notting Hill Christmas Bash. Ah. It’s full of giddy people wearing Christmas hats, drinking cocktails and singing along to the very loud Christmas tunes. It’s a hellscape.

‘Shall we go somewhere else?’ I shout to Adam over the noise.

‘No, this is brilliant!’ he shouts back.

Maaaan.

We head to the back of the pub, where there’s a small table free, a group of people standing around it swiftly making space when they see the wheelchair, shopping bags, crutches and Christmas tree. I push the wheelchair to the edge of the table, and spin it slightly so that Adam has a view of the room.

‘Is that a good position?’ I ask.

‘My favourite position,’ Adam smiles innocently, although that sounded flirty to me. I narrow my eyes at him. He narrows his back.

‘What do you want to drink?’

Adam blows the air out through his cheeks. ‘After the week I’ve had, something strong would be awesome.’

‘You’re going to have to be more specific,’ I say, eyeing the queue at the bar.

‘Double vodka and coke.’

‘Great. Back in a second.’

I head to the bar, squeezing past high spirited revellers, one of whom, tells me to cheer up because it might never happen.

‘It is happening,’ I say in response, gesturing madly to the crowd and the Christmas music and the fact that I am not at home in pyjamas with my earplugs in.

Waiting at the bar, I find myself swaying to the sounds of East 17 singing Stay Another Day. It is objectively a pretty excellent song when you think about it, and not technically a Christmas song.

‘Phoebe! Wow, what are you doing here?’

I spin around around to see Ellie from work, wearing sparkly face makeup, a tinsel crown and the slightly cross-eyed expression of the absolutely sozzled.

‘I’ve come for a quick drink with a friend,’ I say.

‘I’m here with people from work!’ She points over to another table where I spot Jim, Horace the creepy IT guy and Tracey the overtly sexual admin assistant.

‘You should come and sit with us!’ Ellie sings, slinging an arm around my neck and pulling me in a sort of headlock.

I wriggle myself out of her grasp. ‘Maybe!’ I say, knowing that I definitely won’t.

Ellie places her hands onto my cheeks and looks at me imploringly. ‘I’m really happy to see you,’ she slurs. ‘Really happy. But… Phoebe, why are you always so mean?’

I frown. ‘I’m not mean!’

‘You are sometimes.’

‘No, I just prefer to keep myself to myself.’

‘But also you are meeeeean.’

Am I? I didn’t think I was mean. A tad grumpy, yes, but not mean. But… Ellie doesn’t seem like the type to lie, so whether I’ve intended it or not that’s clearly how she’s interpreted my behaviour.

‘Well, I’m sorry.’ I say, gently taking her hands off my cheeks.

Ellie tilts her head to the side and squints one eye, the other one fluttering close as if she’s trying very hard to focus. ‘When I first started at Harmonious Spaces I thought you and I would become great friends.’

‘You did?’

That’s surprising.

‘Yes! I thought you were really cool and stylish. And then one day I saw you watching an episode of Broad City on your phone during lunch and, oh my goodness, I love that show.’ Ellie presses a hand to her chest. ‘I mean, I really love it, you know?’

I nod. Broad City is sublime. ‘I do know.’

‘So I said to you, I said, ‘Broad City is the best, right?’ And you just rolled your eyes and span away from me in your skinny chair.’

I shake my head. I wouldn’t have done that. I may be a grump but I’m a polite grump.

‘Are you sure that happened, Ellie?’

‘Yep. I know because it was the first week back after the Christmas break last year and the heating in the office was on the blink. I remember feeling fed up at your snub and also because I was very very cold.’

I lean onto the bar while I wait to be served and try to remember this encounter with Ellie. January last year was just after the whole debacle with Mitch. I was completely miserable and yes, probably a total bitch.

‘I’m sorry I did that,’ I say to Ellie. ‘I was in a bad place.’

‘And then you ignored me twice more in March and then in August when I tried making a conversation with you.’

March and August? Huh. It’s odd. I always think of my grumpiness as being an insular thing that doesn’t really affect anyone else, but looking at Ellie’s earnest, albeit pissed face, I’ve clearly upset her on more than one occasion. And it feels horrible. Plus she wanted to be my friend? She thought I was cool? That doesn’t happen to me very often.

I put Ellie’s hands back onto my cheeks and put my hands onto her cheeks.

‘I’m genuinely sorry. Let’s hang out in the New Year. Maybe you can come to my house and watch some Broad City with me?’

Ellie’s eyes glisten. ‘I would adore it!’

I shrug. Not quite sure why I am inviting a co-worker to my house but noticing that in my stomach, it feels quite nice to be doing so. It must be all these cheesy twinkle lights and people singing having a weird effect on me.

Once Ellie has wobbled off back to the team from Harmonious Spaces, I finally get served, ordering Adam’s double vodka and coke and the same for me. Taking into consideration the size of the queue, I order a couple more of the same along with some salted peanuts. Gathering the lot on a silver tray I head back to our table. As I’m edging through the crowd I notice Adam politely talking to two women. I say talking but the three of them are completely flirting – Adam doing that smile that everyone seems to be falling over and the two girls touching his shoulder, one of them draping a piece of tinsel around his neck. I squint a little, trying to see what they see. He is very good looking, I suppose, with those dark brown curls and almost black eyes. I mean he definitely looks more attractive to me than he did when I picked him up from the airport. Which is weird because he’s been annoying me all day. I mean, he’s definitely not my type. Then again Mitch was exactly my type and look how that turned out. With him suggesting a vague old age marriage pact that made it impossible for me to stay with him afterwards.

I reach the table and Adam offers a polite goodbye to the two girls as I take a seat opposite him, wriggling into position to avoid hurting the bruised portion of my bum. The girls dance off into the crowd and I take a large sip of my drink, Adam doing the same. Now that we’re here it feels a little awkward. What the hell are we supposed to talk about. Adam is just staring at me and smiling. I feel my cheeks go hot.

‘So! Your fiancée cheated on you?’ I say, at a loss for anything else to say and deeply mortified once the words tumble out of my mouth. ‘Sorry, I mean… shit. Sorry.’

Adam, to his credit, ignores my blabbering apology and answers. ‘Yes. Danielle cheated on me with a friend of mine, in fact. But let’s not talk about that. It’s boring and not a topic of conversation for a lovely Christmas Day with a new friend.’ His voice is breezy and the only thing betraying a hint of pain is the slightest pursing of his lips.

‘Deal,’ I say. ‘But just so you know, I know how you feel and I’m so sorry that that happened to you. At Christmas too. It’s the worst.’

‘You also got dumped at Christmas?’

‘I had to end a relationship I didn’t want to end,’ I explain. ‘We’d been together for over a year and it turned out that he didn’t love me quite as much as I loved him. I was devastated, but I couldn’t stay with him after that.’ I sigh. ‘It sucked, you know?’

‘I do know.’

‘Yep. Last Christmas was horrible.’

‘It was last Christmas?’ Adam narrows his eyes. ‘That makes sense then.’

‘What?’

‘We met at Mum’s office in January last year.’

‘Did we?’

‘Yeah. You were so rude to me and I wondered why. People aren’t rude to me very often.’

I think of Ellie making the same comment.

‘I’m sorry I don’t remember meeting you. And that I was mean,’ I say. ‘I was pretty broken at the time.’

Adam nods and hold his glass up to mine. ‘To healing hearts.’

‘To healing hearts,’ I echo, clinking his. We smile at each other for a long moment and then, out of the corner of my eye, I spot something that makes my heart drop into my feet.

It’s Mitch.

He’s at the other end of the bar with a girl and he’s looking right at me.