by Mandy Baggot
She had to be brave here. Brave and kind. Let him down gently.
‘Tony,’ she said, her voice barely more than a whisper.
‘Yes,’ he answered. He looked so expectant, so hopeful. Why hadn’t she seen this coming? She drew in a breath. Because she had only been dating him five weeks and two days and any sane person would not be considering marriage after only three Italian dinners, Tom Cruise and a couple of nights at a Radisson.
‘Tony, please, sit back down.’
He smiled then. ‘Oh no you don’t. I want to do this the right way, Tessa. The traditional way.’
And that was near enough what Adam had said. Another time, another plate of scallops, the metallic taste was in Tess’s mouth before she could do anything about it. That ring had been Adam’s grandmother’s, passed down that side of the family and apparently originating from the Mozambique diamond mines. That time she had cried. Cried so hard she thought her eyeballs were actually going to burst and shower the entire restaurant with the crop of tears she’d unknowingly cultivated. She had felt so totally, completely happy. Love Actually happy. Love was possible for her. Love was real. She was not going to be another daughter from divorced parents who couldn’t make a relationship work …
‘Tony,’ she tried again. ‘Please get up.’ She chanced a glance at the other diners, not wanting nice, decent, slightly Ambre-Solaired Tony to be embarrassed. She narrowed her eyes at the woman in blue who had a baby plum tomato on her fork midway between salad bowl and mouth, until the diner had the good grace to get on with her eating. Looking back to her date, she saw that Tony remained unmoved, like Angela Merkel on the subject of migration.
‘Tessa.’ Tony cleared his throat. ‘Will you—’
She couldn’t hear the words again. It was no good. She was either going to have to inflict blunt force trauma to the ear canal or use a desperate lie. What to do? Make it crystal clear and break his heart? Or tell a fib?
Tess leapt from her chair, phone in hand, like she’d just sat on a nest of wasps. ‘Oh my God, no!’ She put a hand to her chest where her heart was truly palpitating with shock and adrenalin.
‘What’s wrong?’ Tony asked, finally shifting his position, preparing to stand up.
‘It’s … my … cousin … she …’ She glanced first at her phone, then over at the ring, letting the engagement dread do its work on her. The sob was completely real. ‘She’s at the hospital.’
‘What?’ Tony said, standing up. He was up!
‘She’s … I need to go,’ Tess said, picking up her handbag and pushing her chair into the table.
‘Can I do anything? Drive you? Call you a cab? Come with you?’ Tony asked.
She shook her head, feeling immensely guilty. What was she going to do when he called her later to ask how her cousin was? Should she invent rapid childbirth or a small non-life threatening accident? What exactly was she going to do when he arranged another dinner to do this same thing all again? She swallowed. She could just say the words. She could just say, very, very quietly, quiet enough so the woman in blue with the Caprese salad didn’t hear, that she couldn’t marry him.
No, it was better this way. No public humiliation. No answers to the whys and wherefores. Tony didn’t know where she lived, or where she worked. She would just get rid of the phone number he used to call her on and … disappear. In the long run he would thank her, she was sure of that. He would find someone new. The new bae would jump at the chance of moving to Hackney and they would lead a blissful existence entertaining other car salesmen and making gin slings behind Tony’s Bar. Tony would be happy. Tess would be happy without him. It was going to end in five days anyway. They had had a good temporary life together.
‘I have to go,’ she said, backing away and trying desperately not to look at the Rock of Gibraltar, glinting underneath the slivers of scallop.
‘Well, bae, call me, let me know you’re OK,’ Tony said, looking slightly bewildered.
He was so nice. But this was necessary. She had obviously let him get too close. Well, she certainly wouldn’t be making that mistake again.
‘Bye, Tony,’ she breathed.
Tess didn’t wait a second longer. She made for the door and the humid, London air outside that smelled like freedom.
Two
McKenzie Falconer Media, London
It was almost 1.45 p.m. Running into the post room of McKenzie Falconer Media, Tess was already unscrewing the cap on one of the three plastic bottles in her hands.
And there was her best friend in the whole wide world, her rock, her anchor, the only person in London who knew everything: Sonya.
Sonya looked up from where she was laminating and binding and Tess immediately felt comforted. She had her best friend, right here, she had three bottles of full-fat Dr Pepper in her hands and Tony was six Tube stops away. She headed for the chair next to Sonya, currently occupied by a box of spiral binding coils. Before she had even reached the seat, Sonya had shifted the box and Tess plumped down, swigging at the first bottle like a liquid sugar junkie and dropping the other two on the desk.
‘Three, Tess?’
She managed to only nod her head. Anything more than nodding would send the dark, brown liquid spilling down her chin.
‘Really three?’ Sonya repeated. ‘Because last time you had three it was because your mum and dad were coming to visit. Together.’ A horrified look crossed her face. ‘Are your mum and dad coming to visit together again? Today? Sooner than today? I don’t think I’m going to be able to get all the ingredients to cook the mackerel hotpot before today and—’
‘Sonya,’ Tess said, finally taking the bottle out of her mouth. ‘My parents aren’t coming.’ She wasn’t sure either of her parents were ever going to visit again after last time. And it had absolutely nothing to do with Sonya’s skills in the kitchen. After The Day They Never Discussed, almost exactly twelve months ago, each sporadic visit was more awkward than the last. It was all eating, drinking tea and filling the silence with meaningless conversation until Tess took a call from ‘work’, made her excuses and her parents left. Why they even insisted on visiting together and putting on some weak pretence was beyond her. They had been divorced for years for God’s sake!
‘Oh. Oh, well then.’ She looked confused. ‘I don’t understand.’
Neither did Tess, not fully. All she knew was her heart was working overtime and she was waiting for the sugar rush to kick in. ‘Tony proposed to me.’
‘Shoot!’ Sonya exclaimed, clapping a hand to her mouth. She took her hand away again. ‘When? How? Why?’
And that’s how well Sonya knew her. Her friend understood what had happened was a disaster too. That’s why she had asked three one-word questions and not asked if Tess had accepted.
‘Just now, in Gianni’s.’ She took a breath. ‘With a scallop.’ She shook her head; this was sounding like a guess in Cluedo. ‘I don’t know.’
Tess slugged at the Dr Pepper again, trying to rid her mind of Tony’s anxious face and her mystery relative giving birth or cutting off their little finger in a cheeseboard incident.
‘Was he all right when you said no?’
‘I didn’t exactly say no,’ Tess admitted.
‘What?!’
‘I didn’t say yes.’ She breathed. ‘Of course I didn’t say yes. It’s been five weeks and two days and—’
Sonya held her hands up like barricades. ‘Keep out! No commitment allowed here.’
She nodded, eager to move the conversation on. A few seconds longer and her mind would be filled with images from that fateful day when commitment had meant grand humiliation. The vicar with the regretful smile, the knowing look from the chauffeur who had spun around that church twelve times too many, and her mother’s tearful expression as her daughter’s happiness flew out of the stained-glass window taking the rainy-day nest egg and their Experian credit score with it.
‘I ran away,’ she said, guilt taking a stab at her too. ‘I sort of ignored the ring
bigger than Saturn and told him I had to get to the hospital.’
Sonya folded her arms across her chest. ‘I hope you didn’t use me again. Because one of these days your tall stories of me being rushed to A&E are going to give me bad karma. In fact, maybe that’s it. Maybe that’s why—’
‘I didn’t use you,’ she said quickly. ‘I didn’t use any names, or any definite injuries or incidents. I just left.’
‘So,’ Sonya said. ‘No one needs mackerel hotpot?’
Tess studied her friend a little more closely. There was something about her that wasn’t quite right. What was it? Her gorgeous auburn hair was neatly French pleated as usual for work, her slight overuse of blusher was in place, smart yet comfortable yellow shrug over her favourite black and daisy-print dress …
‘Is everything OK with you?’ Tess asked, screwing the lid back on her drink bottle.
‘Yes,’ Sonya answered. ‘Of course. Apart from having to get fifty-eight more of these bound before three o’clock because the big machine that does them in batches is broken and Ian, my new assistant, is also broken – although in relation to him you could probably swap the word “broken” for “hungover”.’ She held up the report she was in the process of fixing together. ‘And if anything else in my life turns to crap then I’m going to be very close to being broken too.’
And then it happened. Sonya let out a sob and put a hand to her chest, the region just below her neck that usually had a silver chain with a heart-shaped blue topaz stone set in it.
Tess didn’t hesitate a second longer. She shoved the bottles of Dr Pepper on to the shelf and went to her best friend, putting her arms around her and holding her close, breathing in VO5 and the coconut oil Sonya had taken to coating herself in.
‘What’s happened? Where’s your necklace?’ Tess asked softly.
‘I … took it off,’ Sonya forced out between sobs.
‘What?’ Something was wrong. Sonya never took the necklace off. This was a necklace that had almost half-strangled her that weekend in Brighton when it got caught in a safety chain on the waltzers. It was omnipresent. There in every picture Tess had of her.
‘I took it off,’ Sonya repeated, moving out of Tess’s arms and wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
‘But why?’ Tess asked. ‘I know, in the past, I’ve suggested changing things up a bit when we’ve been in Accessorize but it’s the necklace. The almost-engagement necklace.’
Sonya nodded sadly. ‘I know.’
‘Then …’
‘Joey,’ Sonya stated through juddering lips. ‘He’s …’
Now Tess felt sick. Joey was Sonya’s boyfriend of at least a million years. They had been together since before Spotify took over the world. If something had happened to him then her worries about Tinder Tony would pale a shade lighter than Edward Cullen.
‘He told me he wants us to go on a break.’
No. No, this could not be happening. Sonya and Joey may not be married or even properly engaged but they were the absolute epitome of the perfect couple. They were two halves of a beautiful, laughing, smiling, Pokémon Go-chasing whole. Tess might be determined that commitment was never going to be in her future but Sonya and Joey, they were the real deal. They were the beacon of hope in an ever-disposable world. They were nothing like Tess’s sister Rachel and her ex-husband, Philandering Phil.
‘He said he needed some space and when I said, what did that mean, he didn’t really answer. I said, did he not want to do ballroom dancing with me any more, because that would be OK, one of the moves sets my tendonitis off anyway, and he said it was more than that.’ She took a breath. ‘So I said maybe we could do something a little bit out there – like not have lunch at Zizzi every Sunday – or we could, you know, try a couple of new positions … in the bedroom … or maybe even out of it and …’ Sonya swallowed. ‘He wouldn’t talk. At all. Not even when I mentioned the Summer Medieval Fayre to try to lighten the mood.’
Joey not talking about battle re-enactment was like David Walliams not acting camp. This was bad.
‘So I said, what about Corfu?’ Sonya carried on. ‘When I booked it he was so excited. He told me all the different varieties of butterfly that live on the island and I told him all the Greek dishes ending in the letter “a” I wanted us to try. I’ve been so looking forward to quality time, just the two of us, relaxing, talking, not talking, trying … new positions.’
‘Sonya, what did he say?’
‘He said …’ She breathed in hard. ‘He said he didn’t want to go.’ Sonya sobbed again. ‘It’s next week, Tess. I’m not going to get my money back and I can’t go on my own and … forget all the incidental crap. My relationship! The only relationship I’ve ever had is … could be … over.’ She sighed. ‘Joey won’t answer my calls or the thirty-five texts I’ve sent him since yesterday. Yes, I counted. I just don’t know what to do,’ Sonya admitted. ‘For the first time ever, I don’t know what to do.’
Tess took hold of her friend’s hand and gave it a squeeze. ‘It’s OK.’ She took a breath. ‘Because it’s all going to be all right.’
‘It is?’
She couldn’t vouch for Joey’s next move but she could certainly help. ‘I know exactly what to do.’
‘You do?’ Sonya asked, brown eyes wide. ‘Are you going to call him? I just need to talk to him. He might listen to you.’
‘No, Sonya,’ Tess said. ‘I’m not going to call him. And neither are you.’
A plan was forming. Her escape from the proposal disaster without any half-truths or fake relatives. She would call Tony – when she was far away – with a carefully prepared script. Greece, with her best friend. She was owed holiday. She had nothing to keep her here for a week. Maybe she could even find a little holiday romance. Not six weeks, just an easy seven nights of sun, sea and nothing serious. Exactly the way she liked it. The way it had to be.
Tess smiled. ‘I’ve got thirty minutes before my next client. I’ll bind as many of these as I can while you drink this.’ She passed a bottle of Dr Pepper over. ‘Then you can tell me where we’re staying in Corfu.’ She watched Sonya’s expression lighten just a little. ‘And most importantly, what I really need to know is does it have an infinity pool?’
Three
Kalami, Corfu, Greece
The sun was just coming up. Faint fingers of golden light beginning to appear on the horizon, that part between azure sea and the promise of cornflower-blue sky dappled pink, peach and violet.
Andras Georgiou hung from the beamed ceiling of his restaurant, hands, forearms, shoulders, core, all bearing his weight as he gazed out at the view that never failed to steal his breath. The pebbled shoreline of the bay of Kalami, the towering cypress trees either side of the beach scene and the village houses, scattered among the greenery.
He raised his body upwards slowly, focusing on the view and not the strain of the morning exercise – abs crunching, biceps tightening – and as he lowered his bare abdomen down he paused, his vision once more drawn to the beach.
‘Straight lines! I need straight lines! Paulo! Do you even know what a straight line is?! One foot, in front of the other, not wishy-washy and all together! One, two, three, four.’
Andras listened to his mother Isadora’s voice giving orders as he pulled his body up again, watching the group of people making their way across the pebbles in something resembling a conga line.
‘Spiro! If you do not know what a straight line is I fear for your marriage!’ There was a loaded pause that sounded close to menacing even from this far away. ‘Remember what happened to Uncle Dimitri.’
Andras shook his dark head of hair and let go of the beam, dropping to the floor. He picked up his abandoned T-shirt, wiping the sweat from his body and moving through the restaurant. This wedding preparation was getting out of hand. Yesterday, his mother had moved a group of six diners from their table so she could stick her tape measure across it. When he had protested, suggesting that the tables for six were all of
uniform size, she had glared at him like only she, or maybe she and Al Pacino, could.
‘What is this?’ It was his mother again, shrieking at the very top end of her vocal range. ‘It is a monster! Where is my stick?’
‘Mama, it is a tortoise, that is all.’
‘It is the size of a small car!’
Andras baulked then, knowing exactly what they had stumbled upon. He dropped his T-shirt on to the counter and hurried down the steps, heading for the wooden boardwalk and the beach.
By the time he had jumped from platform to stones, his Nikes crunching as he jogged, his mother, his brother, Spiros and all the members of the family who had already arrived for the wedding, were bent over the ‘monster’.
‘It is dead!’ his mother answered.
‘No, it is still breathing,’ Spiros replied.
‘Where is my stick?’
‘Mama, please, leave him.’ Andras bustled into the group and put both arms around the bulky animal, lifting it off the stones and away from the harmful intentions of his family.
‘It is prehistoric! A dinosaur! What is it doing here? Is it bad luck?’ Isadora sucked in a breath. ‘Antonia, look this up in wedding customs. What does a monster on the beach before a wedding mean?’
‘The tortoise being here has nothing to do with bad luck, good luck, or any sign from the gods,’ Andras informed her.
‘And you know this, do you?’ Isadora questioned, her eyes like glistening black olives.
‘I know that he has been here a week already so …’ Andras started.
‘He,’ Isadora stated. ‘I do not want to know how you know it is a he. It is hideous and it cannot be here for the wedding.’ She paused, observing the giant tortoise as it retracted its head. ‘Unless it can be cooked.’
Andras shielded the animal, taking a step back from the party of people. ‘I will make sure it is nowhere near the restaurant for the wedding.’
‘Nowhere near the restaurant?’ Isadora queried. ‘I don’t want this monster anywhere near the village.’