It's Not You It's Him: An absolutely hilarious and feel-good romantic comedy

by Sophie Ranald

  I stepped out and sat next to him on the wooden bench, which was faded to a silvery grey by years of sun and rain. He splashed pink wine into both our glasses.

  ‘I really am sorry, you know,’ I said, even though I’d said it before. ‘Parading you around under Renzo’s nose like that, and not telling you what I was up to. It was pretty shitty of me.’

  ‘We all do shitty things.’ Then, looking sideways at me, he added, ‘Just, some of us grow out of doing them when we’re, like, sixteen.’

  ‘What? You mean, the school leavers’ dance thing? I’m sorry I knocked you back. I was so insecure, and I thought everyone hated me and I…’

  ‘And I told you, the morning after your party, that I’d asked you because I liked you,’ he said. ‘That was true, but it wasn’t the whole truth.’

  ‘Go on,’ I said.

  He sighed. ‘School – you know what it’s like, right? All those dumb petty hierarchies, and one minute people are best friends, or going out, even, and then the next they’re not talking and slagging each other off. I hated that, but I couldn’t help getting sucked in. I’d seen what the alternative was – when kids got cast out.’

  ‘Like I did.’

  ‘Well, yeah. And I liked you, but I could never let on, first because you were seeing Connor and then because you were… you know.’

  ‘One of the untouchables.’

  ‘Right. And I was pathetic and stupid and sixteen, too, and I just didn’t have the guts to go against the grain and risk that happening to me. I had it so easy, you see. I was just kind of coasting along. But then I started looking at you more and more, and imagining what it would be like to tell them all to get stuffed, and have the courage to just go for it.’

  ‘So you did.’

  ‘No,’ he looked down at his hands. They were kind of twitching in his lap, like he was strumming a guitar that wasn’t there. ‘I didn’t. I didn’t have the balls.’

  ‘But you…’

  ‘Not me,’ he said. ‘Kylie dared me to ask you. Her and Anoushka. I knew they were planning something, but I didn’t know what. And I thought that if I did, and you said yes, I could somehow find a way to make it look like I was playing their game, but also protect you from whatever they were going to do, on the night. And find some way of emerging looking like an all-round hero.’

  ‘And I didn’t play along?’

  ‘Nope. I don’t blame you, of course. I caught a whole load of flak for it – for being turned down by you. But I deserved it.’

  ‘I really wanted to say yes, you know,’ I said. ‘But that thing with the movie, and the text you sent me…’

  ‘That text,’ he said. ‘You mentioned it before. I don’t know what you’re talking about. Honest. I know I behaved badly, but I never sent you any text. I didn’t even have your number.’

  ‘Then who…?’

  I thought about it. I remembered Danielle holding out her phone to me, showing me the words I believed Josh had written, saying he fancied me. At the time, I’d been so desperate to believe it was true, I hadn’t questioned it at all. And I hadn’t questioned the other message, either, the cruel words I’d seen after waiting and waiting alone outside the Plaza cinema. You really think I’d go out with the town bike? Haha – you’re not just a slag, you’re stupid, too.

  It was pretty obvious, now, how easily I’d been manipulated.

  ‘It was them all along,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t even your number, was it? I was so desperate for them – and you – to like me. It seems pretty pathetic, looking back.’

  There was a brief pause, and then he said, ‘You’re not pathetic. Not now, and you weren’t then.’

  He reached over and put his arm around me, and I kind of snuggled into his shoulder.

  It was only a hug – but at the same time, it wasn’t. With his strong, warm arm wrapped tight around me, it felt like everything had stopped. Suddenly, I was safe, calm, able to just be without worrying about a single other thing. What had happened all those years before didn’t matter any more.

  It was like the woman had said on that mindfulness app about being in the moment. Except I found myself yearning for this particular moment to last forever – and it felt as if it could. I leaned my face against his chest, and I could hear his heart beating. I could smell the lovely scent of him: shower gel and deodorant and man, so different from Renzo’s smell of expensive cologne. I could feel his breath ruffling my hair, steadily, in and out.

  We looked at each other in the fading light. The dandelion clocks were all blown away, and the air smelled a bit of barbecues and a bit of rubbish, because it was bin collection the next day. There was a thin crescent moon just appearing over the chimneys of the house behind, and I could hear rap music playing loudly somewhere.

  It wasn’t the most romantic setting I can think of, but I guessed I had to work with what I had.

  ‘Josh,’ I said. ‘Come to bed.’

  He didn’t hesitate. ‘Your bed or mine?’

  ‘Yours is bigger.’

  ‘But your room’s tidier.’ In the end, though, we didn’t make it past the sitting room sofa until much, much later that night.

  Twenty-Nine

  The Spice Goals might not have been the worst netball team in London, but we were pretty bad. On the fourth Tuesday night in September, we’d been trounced by the Net Benefits by twelve goals to three, and my outstanding contribution to the match had been scoring one of the opposition’s goals for them.

  But no one cared – we always came off the court laughing and congratulating each other, and I was relishing rediscovering the sport I’d loved as a child, making friends with my team-mates and even baking a cake when my name was pulled out of the hat to provide treats for Carla’s birthday.

  It had kind of crept up on me, the realisation that things had changed – not just in my life, but in me. I noticed it one evening, when Adam brought home a massive box of doughnuts that a supplier had sent to his work, which no one would touch because they all thought carbs were far worse for you than cocaine. I’d eaten one, and enjoyed it, and realised with surprise that afterwards I felt no guilt – and no compulsion to punish myself by hoovering the rest. So we regifted the remaining ones to Hannah, who said they went down a storm in the school staffroom.

  I noticed it when I looked at myself in the mirror and didn’t automatically turn sideways and hold my arm above my head to check that I could still see all of my ribs. Instead, I noticed that the heatwave had left a dusting of freckles on my nose and cheeks, which I kind of liked. Very on-trend, very Meghan Markle, I told my reflection approvingly.

  I noticed it when I saw a pair of giant footprints in the film of dust that had built up on the bathroom scale, and realised that Josh had hopped on it to weigh himself more recently than I had. And when I was able to turn away from it, because I didn’t need a number to feel okay about myself.

  Part of it was the counsellor I’d been seeing, who specialised in eating disorders. Talking to her about my feelings in such raw detail was excruciating, but in a good way. It felt productive, somehow, like the enormous clear-out Jessica had made us do of the sample room, which had ended up in a sale that raised tens of thousands of pounds for charity.

  Part of it was netball, and the twice-weekly runs I’d been doing with Josh. Realising what my body was capable of – that it could do stuff, rather than just look a certain way – was so thrilling I didn’t care that I was even worse at running than I was at netball.

  And part of it was Josh himself. Josh, and how cheerfully, easily happy he made me feel. How I could have sex with him without worrying that my breasts were too small or my thighs too big, because he just utterly adored every inch of me, as he kept saying until I got all shy and told him to shut up. How, for the first time in ages, I felt secure.

  That night, as usual, everyone in the netball team was preparing to decamp to the pub for a commiseration drink, but this time I declined. Adam had texted earlier with exciting news – he’d
been promoted, and was now Chief Technology Officer at Colton Capital, and he felt a few beers and a pizza at the Daily Grind were called for to mark the occasion. So I was heading straight home to shower and change before meeting him and Josh there.

  The Daily Grind would be just the same as always, I knew – the stacks of vinyl records, the crowds of people chatting and drinking together, Luke smiling behind the bar and Yelena whisking around delivering orders and clearing tables.

  But there was so much else that had changed.

  Pru and Phil weren’t together any more, which was sad news for poor Phil, who I liked, but meant that Pru had been featured in Tatler as one of London’s fifty most eligible twenty-somethings, and had insisted on wearing one of Chelsea’s dresses for the shoot. Chelsea’s sales were going from strength to strength, and she was giving the Stitch Together ladies as much work as they could handle. Thanks to Luxeforless’s new flexible working policy, now that Lucy was back from maternity leave she and I were job-sharing, and I was able to devote half my time to Chelsea’s business. Chelsea had been nominated for a Young Designer of the Year award, and even if she didn’t win, it was a massive coup for someone just starting out. Nathan, too, appeared to be a reformed character – not least because, Harriet had told me, he was absolutely smitten with Malia, a Syrian girl he’d met when he dropped off some fabric at Stitch Together. Luxeforless was on the hunt for a new lingerie buyer, because, as Felicity put it, ‘I love Mummy to smithereens. But could I work for her? Could I fuck.’ And she’d decamped back to New York to stay with her father for a bit while she worked out what to do next.

  Josh and I were planning to visit her soon. It still felt weird saying it – ‘Josh and I’, ‘me and Josh’. But we were a couple, an item, a team. When we FaceTimed Debbie to tell her, she said, ‘I knew all along you two were made for each other!’ and Josh and I rolled our eyes and said that if only she’d told us a decade earlier, she could have saved everyone a load of grief.

  I was hurrying down our road, my mind on my shower and then hurrying back up again to the Daily Grind, when I heard footsteps pounding behind me.

  ‘Tansy! Wait up!’ It was Adam. ‘There’s been a change of plan. Josh and I are cooking. He packed me off to the supermarket to buy ingredients. There wasn’t any crème fraîche so I got normal cream instead and I bet he’s going to moan at me.’

  ‘You’re cooking? Why?’

  ‘Unexpected guest.’

  ‘Unexpected what? Who?’ We hardly ever had guests – and never unexpected ones – and when we did, we catered for them with a single trip to the off-licence (and, in the interests of full disclosure, occasionally a second trip later in the evening to resupply).

  ‘Wait and see,’ Adam said.

  ‘Adam! Tell me! Is it Charlotte? Charlotte and Xander?’

  Adam shook his head mysteriously, and there was no point in trying to interrogate him further, because we’d arrived at our front door and he was fitting his key into the lock. The house was spotless – fortunately, Odeta had been and worked her magic that day – and I could see that Josh had lit candles and put them on the kitchen table. He gave an excited little wave when he saw me, and half stood up, then beckoned me over.

  There was a woman sitting opposite him at the table, her back to me. At first all I noticed was her hair – it was a pixie crop, dyed bright pink with violet flashes.

  Then she stood and turned to me, and of course I recognised her straight away.

  ‘Mum! What’s with the hair? You look amazing!’

  ‘Hello, my love. Sorry to burst in on you like this. I thought I should come and see you in person rather than ringing up.’

  ‘Why don’t you two take the bottle and go through to the front room?’ Josh filled a glass for me and handed it over, accidentally-on-purpose brushing the inside of my wrist with his fingertips.

  I smiled gratefully at him – not only was he absolutely miraculous in bed, but he was turning out to be the hostess with the mostest, too.

  Mum and I sat down on the sofa, babbling away non-stop. She told me how Perdita, Ryan and the children were doing – although I already knew, because Perdita, unlike Mum herself, hadn’t been ignoring my calls and messages. I updated her on work, and on Josh, who she approvingly described as ‘absolutely charming’.

  And then, as I was filling up our glasses, she said, ‘I suppose you’re wondering why I’ve turned up here.’

  ‘Of course not,’ I lied. ‘It’s amazing to see you. Can you stay the night? Josh’s room is free.’

  And I caught myself blushing and doing a little squirm of embarrassed pleasure.

  ‘That’s very kind, but actually, I’ll head off after dinner. They’ve booked us all into a hotel for the night.’

  ‘What? Who’s they? Who’s us?’

  ‘Oh, love, it’s been too long since we had a proper catch-up! “They” is work, and “us” is a group of us who’ve been selected for fast-track management training. We’re in London this week for a course.’

  ‘Management training? But you…’

  ‘I’m only fifty years old, missy,’ she said, with a hint of spirit I hadn’t heard in her voice for years. ‘I could be working for another twenty, and I don’t see why I should be stacking shelves when I could be making something of my life after all this time.’

  ‘That’s great, Mum.’ But I didn’t sound convinced – and I knew why. Mum had always insisted that her job at Tesco was just a temporary thing – just until Dad ‘got back on his feet’, as she put it, and her life resumed the path she’d intended it to have: him making artisan furniture, her painting and maybe eventually opening a little gallery by the seaside, where local artists could exhibit and sell their work.

  But the temporary arrangement had dragged on now for almost fifteen years, and Mum’s conviction that things would change soon, get back on course, had become less and less believable as time went by.

  Tentatively, wary of reopening the wound I’d created the last time I saw her, I said, ‘Does this mean Dad has…’

  ‘He hasn’t changed, Tansy.’ She sighed. ‘God knows if he ever will. But I can’t let his problems take over my life any more. And I can’t let myself get sucked into it any longer, either. I’ve been going to a group, not a formal thing, just a meeting for partners of problem gamblers. It’s been a bit of an eye-opener. Enabling, that’s what they call it – what I did for all those years. Well, I’m not doing it any more.’

  She sighed again, but this time it sounded like a sigh of relief. I splashed more wine into our glasses and waited for her to carry on.

  ‘I’ve left him,’ she said. ‘I’ve rented a flat on my own. It’s only small, but it’s lovely. It’s close enough to Perdy and Ryan that I can still help out with the kids, and there’s enough space and light in the front room for me to paint. Perdy’s friend Marcus did my hair for me – he’s only an apprentice, and he said he needed models, so I volunteered. People are so kind, if you let them be.’

  ‘Mum.’ I felt a massive lump in my throat, and swallowed it away. I should be feeling joy for her, embarking on this new chapter in her life, but all I could think of was the years she’d wasted.

  ‘It was down to you, you know,’ she said. ‘Not the money, although that was part of it. I know how much you sacrificed to try and help out.’

  I thought of Travis, and Renzo, and Barri, and I realised she didn’t know, not really, and that I’d do everything in my power to make sure she never found out. ‘It was nothing.’

  She shook her head. ‘It wasn’t nothing. It was a lot. And I ought never to have accepted it from you. But I thought I was doing the right thing, keeping things afloat until he changed. Maybe now I’m not there, he’ll find it in himself to stop. But if he doesn’t, it won’t be my problem any more. Or yours, or Perdy and Ryan’s.’

  ‘So are you…’ I began. I wanted to ask, Are you getting divorced? Not that it ought to matter, not at my age, whether my parents were together or separate
d, or if everything was all formal, with lawyers and stuff involved. But I worried that Dad, and his debts, could come back and haunt Mum, destroying her new-found freedom.

  ‘We’re formalising everything,’ she said with a sigh. ‘It’s all too legal and dull and complicated for words. But I’m in touch with a lovely solicitor who specialises in cases like mine – financial abuse, it’s called, apparently. I had no idea it even had a name – and she’s on the case. So you mustn’t worry.’

  We sat in silence for a minute. I could hear Josh and Adam in the kitchen, clattering pan lids and Josh saying, ‘No, Freezer, get off the counter,’ and Adam arguing that as it was a celebration, surely he could have just a tiny bit of ham.

  The rich, savoury smell of mushrooms frying drifted through to us, and I heard my stomach rumble. Mum’s did, too. I knew we’d enjoy the pasta the boys were making just as much as I’d enjoyed meals with Renzo that had cost hundreds of pounds – more, even, because it was made with love, by people I loved. I knew I’d share it as a whole person, not as a decorative prize to be paraded around, acceptable and desirable only as long as I had no skills or opinions of my own.

  ‘I tried for so long to change him, you know,’ Mum said, in a way that was both sad and matter-of-fact.

  ‘I know. But you can’t change other people. You can only change yourself.’

  If you loved Sophie's sassy, hilarious and fabulously fun It's Not You It's Him, make sure you don't miss out on the bestselling Sorry Not Sorry, which tells the story of Charlotte, and her quest to learn how to be a ‘bad girl’. Guaranteed to make you laugh out loud! Order it now.

  Sorry Not Sorry

  ‘Absolutely brilliant… I devoured it in a few hours because it was impossible to put down… Be prepared for a rollercoaster of emotions… Had me laughing all the way through… Perfect.’ Goodreads Reviewer

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