by Clare Lydon
Matt touched me on the arm and I looked up.
“Why don’t you take the bull by the horns? Leave now, go home, get changed and go to her work. At least then you’ll know one way or the other and can move on. For my money, I bet Lucy is watching the door just as much as you and every day that passes she’s a bit sadder.”
“You think?”
“I do.”
Maybe he had a point.
So it was that I hung up my apron around 3pm and headed home. Now here I was, climbing the stairs to the top floor of the 243 bus, dodging the chewing gum glued to the penultimate step. I was on my way to Lucy’s opticians and laying my heart on the line.
En route to the bus I’d stopped at the flat to have a quick shower, change into my favourite shirt and jeans and beautify myself so that I looked as irresistible as possible – a must in these situations. Eye liner, mascara, lip gloss and spot cover; I’d also brushed and flossed, tweezed some stray lashes from my brows and practised sucking in my stomach for the big speech. Even though I didn’t have a big speech.
However, right now, watching the afternoon slip by and feeling my heart beginning to pound, I wondered why I hadn’t prepared a PowerPoint presentation or brought some of those enormous flashcards to explain exactly how I felt. It seemed they would have done the job far better than me, who was likely to stumble and blush bright red. I needed something gold-plated and watertight in this situation and the simple truth that she was an old flame who still fancied me wasn’t good enough.
As I stepped off the bus, the afternoon seemed to have increased its heat, but the sun shining down this afternoon wasn’t the sun I’d soaked up of late. Rather, it seemed to me a burning star from a mean-spirited galaxy, intent on making me sweat. Not that I needed any help with that today.
As I turned into the road that housed Lucy’s opticians I took a deep breath and ran my tongue along the front of my top teeth. I was now standing ten metres from the front door but propelling myself forwards was proving tricky, all my regrets, what-ifs and time itself weighing me down. I looked up at the black-and-white signage over the entrance and before I had a chance to change my mind, I pushed the door to her shop. A little bell rang, causing the blonde woman at reception to look up. She wore a name badge that read ‘Nicola’.
“Can I help you?” she said. I noted her green shirt was neatly tapered to her body.
“I’m a friend of Lucy. I wondered if she was in today?”
I hoped I sounded casual and I think I pulled it off as the blond woman smiled warmly, looking me up and down in one eye sweep.
“She is but she might be with a client. Let me just check for you, take a seat,” she said. She pointed at some red velvet chairs to my left. “Sorry, your name?”
“It’s Jess,” I said. My heart was now beating far too fast for my chest and I wondered if it might jump out at any moment or simply stop from over-exertion. It would be a terribly inopportune moment for that to happen. I drummed my fingers on my legs while I waited, and when I got bored with that I twisted my body around to check out the rows of glasses in clear cases lining the walls. Unlike Specsavers, some of these had very fancy price tags and I wondered if I could get a discount for my mum. Yes, even in this situation, that’s what I was thinking. Sometimes I truly disappointed myself.
But not as much as I’d disappointed Lucy, which was etched all over her face when she appeared ten minutes later. She was dressed in what I perceived to be funereal black trousers and grey shirt, with white Converse boots to offset the gloom. Her dark hair was just as I remembered but her smile had vanished, replaced by a stoicism that it pained me to realise was my fault. As she neared me I got up, put my left hand behind my neck and stood in just about the most awkward position I could. I wasn’t sure what the protocol was in this situation. Last week this woman had been in my bed but now she was looking at me with a face that said ‘Say what you’ve come to say and then get out’.
“Hi,” I said.
“Hi,” she replied. Behind her, I saw Nicola glance up and clock the situation. Did she know? Had Lucy told her if I wasn’t out the door within five minutes, she should come over and evict me?
“Thanks for seeing me.” I was aware I sounded like I’d made a last-minute appointment to get my eyes checked. “You’re looking good.” I knew this was a weak line before it came out of my mouth. Why hadn’t I prepared a speech?
Lucy sighed. “Why are you here?”
“I want to talk to you about what happened.”
The silence with which she greeted this was disbelief-flavoured. I ploughed on.
“I just wanted to tell you that it wasn’t what it looked like. I knew that girl…”
She spluttered. “And that’s meant to make me feel better?”
There was no intonation in her voice as she said this, no sarcasm, no rising incredulity. It was flat with no emotion and I knew that wasn’t a good sign. Lucy had probably already made up her mind about me. Player. Idiot. No good.
“No, I suppose not.”
My voice was now drained of its initial optimism, now as flat as hers.
“It’s just – it’s not how it seemed and I just wondered if you had time for a coffee? So I could explain to you what happened. Do you have five minutes?”
My voice had taken on a slightly begging tone now I knew, but that’s what I felt in my heart. At that precise moment I would have gone down on one knee to beg her for forgiveness. I knew Lucy was the woman I wanted but it wasn’t until she was standing in front of me that the full force of that truly hit me. Our connection was more than just physical and I had to keep hold of it. Lucy had to understand, had to see it my way. But looking at her face, it didn’t seem like that was happening.
“Do I have five minutes? I went out of my way to see you on Saturday. It took half an hour from the restaurant to the bar. Then when I got there – and I’d told you I was coming, that’s what really gets me – you were kissing someone else.”
Her voice was full of emotion now and I could see she was fighting back tears. She sat down on one of the two red chairs and I sat down on the other one. Lucy bowed her head, took a deep breath, gripped the side of the chair so that the velvet crushed all around the tips of her fingers. She pulled her head up and looked me straight in the eye.
“You made me look a fool. I’d been going on to my mate all night about you, how great you are… Were.” Ouch.
“I drag her out of our way on our night out to say hi to you – I was literally only going to stay for half an hour, one drink and then go – and I get there and you’re at the bar kissing someone else. And not just a peck, but a full-on, tongues-in snog.”
“It’s not what it looked like…” I said.
“No, I think that’s the thing. It was exactly what it looked like. It might not have meant a thing to you but you can say what you want – you were snogging that girl…”
“She was snogging me…” I said. My voice was now at Ange range. Bloody Ange.
“And you were snogging her right back. Or did I get that wrong? Were you pushing her away, telling her to stop?”
I dropped my head in shame and stared at the plush beige carpet.
“Were you?” she said. The bell rang and a customer walked in, glancing curiously at the two women on the red velvet chairs who must have appeared to her to be having some kind of heated altercation. Her face told me that no pair of glasses was worth getting this worked up about. If only she knew.
Having this conversation in public wasn’t part of the plan. I’d thought we could go for a coffee, chat about it, I could explain it’d all been a huge mistake and within half an hour we’d be ordering cake and laughing at the insane mix-up.
In the far-off distance I dimly heard Nicola talk the woman through the range of products available and heard her unlock some glasses cases along the walls. But my focus was on Lucy, who was wiping away a tear and gripping the chair. I put my hand out to touch her leg and she didn’t pull away. I
realised I’d really hurt her but the injustice of the whole situation made me want to scream. I decided to be honest, lay all my cards on the table.
I reached over and took hold of her right hand with both of mine. She flopped forward, putting up no resistance. I opened my mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
“Lucy, I’m so sorry. This was nothing, absolutely nothing. I knew you were turning up that night and I was looking forward to seeing you. I really was. And then Ange turned up…” Lucy was looking directly at me but she didn’t flinch. She held my gaze and wiped away a tear.
“Ange is a woman I had a one-night stand with a few months ago. She’s one of Julia’s work colleagues but I didn’t know she was going to be there that night – I swear that, I would have told you. Anyway, she turned up and it was the first time I’d seen her since I tipped her out of my flat a few months ago so it was a bit awkward…”
“And so you thought you’d kiss her to make it better?” Lucy’s face now seemed to be twisted into an impossible angle and my gut wrenched.
“We spoke earlier in the evening and we sorted it out – she’s coming to the wedding so we agreed to be adult about it and call it what it was. A one-night stand, nothing more, nothing less. I actually felt better about the situation, believe it or not.”
At that precise moment, Lucy didn’t look like she cared.
“And then… and then we were chatting at the bar, she’d had a few tequilas and she just… she just lunged at me and kissed me. That’s it. And, no, I didn’t push her away, but that’s probably because I was so shocked at what was happening. I’d been really looking forward to seeing you too – I bored the whole hen party to tears with how great you are. And then you saw that…” I paused, but didn’t let go of her hand.
“Look, I know you owe me nothing and we haven’t known each other long. But I think we have something here, something worth giving a go. And what happened on Saturday night was a drunken snog I had no control over. Honestly.” I squeezed her hand to emphasise that point. She made no movement. I carried on.
“I was looking forward to you turning up. I raced up and down the street looking for you afterwards but I couldn’t find you. I left loads of messages on your phone. I was desperate. I wanted to find you, to explain. But you’d gone.”
She was still listening, still looking at me, still looked like she wanted to believe me. I was making my unplanned speech up but I had the punchline all worked out. I just had to hope she played along with it too.
“Before I left for Brighton we had a couple of great dates… So let’s turn back the clock, pretend Brighton never happened and I’ll show you I’m into you and nobody else. I’m not a player… I’m really not. You’re the first woman in a long time who’s made me feel… something. I don’t want to lose that.”
Her face remained impassive, giving away nothing, although she took some time to fish in her pocket for a tissue and blow her nose. I caught the line of her leg through her trousers and remembered kissing it only a week ago. It could have been in another time zone from where we were now.
Another customer came in and Lucy looked up and said hi to the man who was in his forties with thick grey hair like a Hollywood film star.
“That’s my next customer, I have to go,” Lucy said, indicating the film-star guy. She got up and adjusted her shirt, pulling it down at the front and back before running her fingers through her hair. I could tell she wanted to go to the toilet to check her appearance before seeing her client.
“Before you go, I really want to see you again,” I said. I stood up. Lucy looked pained, and then like she might punch me. I continued talking before she could put any of her plans into action.
“But I know you probably need some time. So let me take you to dinner on Saturday night. I’ll meet you at Athena bar first for a drink at 7.30. If you’re not going to turn up, text me by Friday lunchtime. Deal?”
She looked at me and my stomach flipped. She was gorgeous and I wanted to kiss her there and then, but thought that might be deemed inappropriate. She pursed her lips, sighed and I wondered if she was going to turn me down. Please don’t turn me down…
“Okay.”
“Okay?” I was taken aback.
“Okay.” She gave me thin-lipped smile. “I’ll text you one way or the other. I’ve got to go.”
And with that she turned and greeted the man. I watched her walk with him through to the back of the shop, gave Nicola a weak smile and heard the bell go as I left. I’d said what I’d come to say.
Now I just had to wait and see.
I got home about an hour later and assessed the situation – I didn’t think I could have done much more. I hoped I’d conveyed my feelings to Lucy without coming across as too much of a desperado. Above all, I hoped she knew I was genuine. I threw my clothes on the bed and changed into some blue shorts I liked to wear around the house and a well worn T-shirt to go with it. After my exertions, I needed comfort.
I went into the kitchen, flicked the kettle on and took a couple of biscuits from the recently installed biscuit jar Kate had introduced to the kitchen “for sugar emergencies”. A Caroline-induced measure, the emergencies seemed to be happening most days but I for one was grateful as I poured some boiling water into a mug, watching the bag try to swim in the heat.
I took my tea and biscuits through to the lounge and sat on the sofa, pulling my phone out of my pocket. I had a text. I took a deep breath, realising that every text from now until Friday was a possible dream-killer. This one, however, was from my brother Jack asking if I was free for after-work drinks tomorrow. I texted straight back saying I was around. My brother in town and kid-free was a rare occasion.
Five minutes later another text arrived, this time from Kate telling me not to wait up. I imagined Kate would be throwing herself into her social life this week, which is what she did when she suffered a break-up – I’d witnessed it before. And that suited me just fine, as tonight would be a night of solace. I drank my tea, ate a Jammy Dodger and fired up Facebook. I wasn’t about to update my status with anything relationship-wise, but I was keen to see if Karen had replied to my email. She had. Super.
I clicked on the message, saw my curt reply flash up and then her reply, still jovial, still coming. Bugger. The gist of it was she was glad we might be able to be friends, she was coming to London for two weeks and she’d message me when she was around and perhaps we could go out and “catch up”. Just like that. Like nothing had happened between us at all. Apparently, in Karen’s brain we could now be friends in the time-honoured lesbian tradition. Friends with benefits if she had her way.
I shook my head and gulped my tea. There was no need to panic, she didn’t have my address and there was a half-full biscuit tin in the kitchen. No problem was insurmountable. Apart from Lucy telling me to bugger off.
I rang Julia who was no help at all, being as she was currently engaged in a war with Tom’s mum about seating plans, photographers and the wedding cake. Julia had asked me to make it and I was quite looking forward to it. However, Tom’s mum thought wedding cakes should only be ordered from professional wedding-cake makers and not from some casual acquaintance who also happened to be a lesbian.
“That’s when I really exploded at her,” Julia said. “What on earth has you sleeping with women – and we’ll get to how that’s going in a moment – possibly got to do with your ability to bake? Answer me that?”
I told her to just ignore it and I would make her the best cake possible. She told me to make the icing grey and the inside red like they did in Steel Magnolias just to piss off her future mother-in-law.
I wiped some dust from the remote control as I filled Julia in on the Lucy showdown. She seemed sure Lucy would show but warned me that spurned women needed extra-special wooing and I was going to have to pull out the big guns if I wanted success. I agreed that nothing less than full-on gallantry would do, along with champagne and an obscenely expensive restaurant. Julia promised to email me a list o
f recommendations seeing as she frequented such establishments far more than I did these days.
“I’m keeping you as a plus-one for the big day, though – I have faith. But you do know that chances are Ange will be coming to the evening?”
“Don’t remind me. Between that and Karen’s imminent arrival, I’m suddenly the most desired lesbian in London – by everyone apart from the one person I actually want to desire me.”
Chapter 25
The next day at work and the Polish builders were in fine form, teasing Beth about her new sparkly apron as she cleared the tables. Artur in particular seemed to be paying her close attention and I saw her blush bright pink as he smiled at her. Was he too late to win Beth’s heart? He should have moved quicker.
I chatted to the morning coffee crowd and was outside taking a breather just before the lunch rush when who should walk past but Caroline. Surprising, seeing as she knew where I worked and if I was her I’d be giving anything Kate-related a wide berth. She caught my eye and carried on walking, but within seconds was back in front of me, eyes to the floor. She fiddled with one of her ear piercings before speaking.
“Hi,” she said. She finally worked up the courage to look at me fully.
“Hi,” I replied. A tight smile.
“Look, I know you probably hate me and I would too in your shoes. Believe me. I know I hurt Kate but I didn’t mean to. These things just…” A shrug. “Happen.”
She looked at me directly now.
I shrugged back.
She took a deep breath. “But anyway, I didn’t stop to talk about Kate.”
“You didn’t?”
“Nope.” A definite shake of the head. “I was going to walk on by but thought I owed it to Lucy not to.”
Lucy. Now it was my turn to look down.
“Like I said, I never meant to hurt Kate and I’m sure you didn’t mean to hurt Lucy either. But you did. However you’ll be pleased to know I’m in your corner. I stuck up for you.”