The House of New Beginnings Page 26

  ‘Let’s have another soon,’ he called after her.

  ‘You bet,’ she called back, clambering into the taxi. She could see Ned still standing there leaning against his door frame, and he put one hand up in a wave, as the driver pulled away. Charlotte waved back, grinning like an idiot, her heart pounding at what had just happened. I kissed him, she thought wonderingly, her fingers reaching up to touch her own lips. Her skin was tingling all over. I kissed Ned!

  The driver caught her eye in the rear-view mirror. He was about the same age as her dad and had a kind face, for all that he’d beeped them a minute ago and interrupted the best kiss she’d had in ages. ‘Had a good evening?’ he asked, as he swung round a corner and headed towards the glittering dark sea.

  ‘Yeah,’ she replied dreamily, leaning back against the vinyl seat and smiling to herself. ‘Yeah, I had a really good evening, thanks.’

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  You Send Me . . . Silent Speed Dating!

  By Georgie Taylor

  So this week, I’ve been sent to check out the mysterious world of speed dating – with a twist. Those clever people at Forever Yours matchmaking agency reckon that a silent encounter with a potential partner can be intimate, romantic and very sexy, and that gazing into a person’s eyes is often every bit as revealing as listening to them boring on about their job and love of Arsenal – perhaps more appealing, too!

  That’s the theory – but how does it stack up, in real life? As your fearless reporter, I went along to find out for myself.

  Tonight’s event was held in the Olive Tree on Grosvenor Street – and as soon as I walked in, I was hit by a wall of aftershave, perfume and the scent of thirty nervous people, most of whom looked as if they’d already taken advantage of the evening’s free cocktail and perhaps a few more besides, in the name of Dutch courage. Who can blame them? I went straight to the bar myself and ordered a Throbbing Orgasm (no sniggering at the back, please), conscious that this was not going to be a straightforward night out down the boozer.

  There is something quite liberating about being in a room full of singletons, there for the sole purpose of finding someone to love. People were openly checking each other out, there was a lot of meaningful eye contact, and I could hear several sneaky chatting-up attempts taking place as punters tried to get ahead of the game before the actual silent part of the evening got underway (or before they became too drunk to be coherent, perhaps).

  The dating event began with a series of warm-up exercises . . .

  Georgie groaned and put her face down in the bed. Dating schmating. What a load of bollocks it had all been. It was half-past one on Friday afternoon now, and she had three hours left before she was supposed to file her speed dating copy. If she didn’t, she was pretty sure Viv might tell her to stick her column. But what on earth should she write?

  Just as she was idly wondering about going foraging in the kitchen for Brie and crackers and maybe one of those pecan cookies Rosa had dropped round, the door of the flat suddenly crashed open, and her heart almost stopped in shock. Oh my God, she thought, eyes widening in alarm. This was it – she was going to be burgled. Assaulted. All the warnings on the dangers of city life from her mum rang uselessly around her head as she rolled off the bed – a proper stunt roll, thank you – and grabbed the nearest thing to hand as a weapon. ‘Hello?’ she yelled, trying to make herself sound forceful and menacing, before looking down and realizing that she was holding a fluffy slipper in her hand. Brilliant.

  ‘Hi,’ came the reply and Georgie instantly sagged with relief, adrenalin draining away as she recognized the voice. It was not, thankfully, the voice of some crazed crackhead hell-bent on ransacking the place for valuables after all, but the weary, dejected-sounding voice of her boyfriend instead. ‘Only me.’

  God, he sounded weird, Georgie thought, the slipper dropping from her hand as she quickly shut the laptop then hurried out to see why he’d come home so early. He sounded terrible, actually. Was he ill? Had one of the massive steel joists of the new hotel dropped on his head or something? ‘What’s up? How come you’re back already?’ she asked, finding him in the sitting room. He was slumped on the sofa with his head in his hands and she knew that something really bad must have happened. ‘What . . . What’s going on?’ she asked fearfully, wishing belatedly that she wasn’t still in her pyjamas and had got around to brushing her hair.

  ‘It’s over,’ he said, and for a terrible moment she thought he meant that the two of them were over, that he was dumping her right here, right now. Did he somehow know about the speed dating evening?

  ‘Wh—’ She gulped, breath seizing in her lungs. No. This could not be happening. Not when she was still in her jammies and had a massive looming-period zit in the middle of her forehead, please, she found herself thinking, which just went to show what a dreadful, shallow person she really was. ‘What do you mean, over?’

  ‘The hotel. It’s all off. The developer’s pulled out.’

  Oh, she thought, knees buckling as her brain caught up. The hotel was over. Not them. Thank goodness. ‘Shit,’ she said, trying to sound suitably devastated. Actually, this was pretty devastating. ‘How come? Was it money, or . . . ?’

  ‘It was those bloody women,’ he said bitterly, looking up at her for the first time since she’d entered the room. ‘Jesus, George, are you not even dressed yet? Fucksake!’

  ‘I’m . . .’ She found herself putting her arms around herself as if that was any kind of disguise. ‘I just got carried away,’ she mumbled. ‘Writing this new . . .’ She trailed off again. The last thing she wanted to talk to him about was her column. ‘What do you mean, those women?’ she asked him instead. Then the penny dropped, as hard and painfully as any steel joist on the head. Clunk. No, she thought in horror. Did he mean the women at the refuge and their campaign? Their campaign which she’d helped kick-start with her interview?

  ‘It’s the women on site,’ he replied darkly. ‘They’ve got a refuge there and have refused to leave. This campaign started up and now the national press have picked up the story and things have gone berserk. The Historical Building people have got involved and are calling for the house to be listed. The council have withdrawn planning permission—’

  ‘Can they even do that?’

  ‘Yeah. If details come to light of which they were previously unaware . . .’ He sighed, deflating into the sofa as if his last atoms of energy had deserted him. ‘So we’ve had to down tools while they decide what they’re doing. It could take months, to be honest. So . . .’ He spread his hands, grim-faced. ‘So that’s that, then. My big chance – come to nothing.’

  ‘Oh, Si.’ She went over and put her arms around him, feeling terrible for him. She knew how hard he’d worked on the original tender, she knew how delighted he’d been to get the commission. ‘God, what an absolute bummer.’ Her mind was in turmoil. All she could think about was her interview, and how passionately she’d written in support of the women’s centre. This house of women should not fall, she’d typed, regardless of how it might affect Simon’s career. This was all her fault, she thought, a cold sweat breaking out on her skin. ‘I’m sure something else will come up,’ she said weakly. ‘There’ll be loads of architect firms around here, I bet.’

  He shrugged. ‘Not where I’ve got contacts, there aren’t,’ he said. ‘I might as well go back home.’

  ‘Back to Stonefield? But . . .’ Whoa, this had all come out of the blue. Just when she was starting to feel at home down here in Brighton, too. She didn’t feel ready to go back yet! ‘But . . . Well . . .’ She thought frantically, unable to quite believe what she was hearing. What had she done? ‘Our place is rented for another four months, remember. We can’t exactly chuck the tenants out.’ However horrible they might be. (Although now that she thought about it, it would be incredibly satisfying to evict that awful Chloe, once and for all. Get out and stay out!)

  ‘We can stay with my parents,’ he said, shrugging. ‘Or give the tenant
s notice, tell them we’ve changed our minds.’ He turned to look at her, eyes narrowing. ‘I thought you wanted to go back anyway?’

  ‘Yeah, I did, but . . .’ She bit her lip. But that was before she made a few friends, before she discovered her favourite café and shops, before she found herself loving her brand-new writing career, moreover. And she absolutely did not want to stay with Simon’s parents longer than a single night either. ‘We probably shouldn’t rush into anything. The hotel might be back on again soon, mightn’t it? You could have some time off instead.’ She found herself gabbling in her desperation to lift his spirits. ‘Do some fun stuff. We could have a holiday, maybe!’

  ‘A holiday? When I’ve just lost my job?’ He looked at her as if she was mad. Then he heaved a sigh and got to his feet. ‘I’m going to the pub,’ he said. ‘I need a drink. The day I’ve had, I need a few.’

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Georgie said. Buying the man a drink was the least she could do, she figured. Hell, she was guilt-tripped enough right now that she’d shout him lunch too. ‘Give me two minutes to get some clothes on and I’ll come with you.’ Somehow or other she had to make this right, she thought as she hurried into the bedroom, fingers trembling as she yanked her pyjama top over her head. But how?

  A few days went by where, when he wasn’t packing up boxes of his possessions, Simon was on the phone to his old contacts in the north, still seemingly insistent on the idea of returning to Yorkshire as soon as possible. Meanwhile Georgie was carrying around her guilty secret like a lead weight in her stomach, feeling like the most disloyal girlfriend ever. She had managed to beg a few days’ grace on the delivery of the speed dating write-up by pretending to Viv she’d been struck down by violent food poisoning, but her editor had not been happy about being left with empty column space at such short notice.

  To make matters worse, Cleo, one of the women from the refuge, had emailed her to thank her for writing the interview in the first place. If it hadn’t been for you presenting our case so sympathetically, we could still be fighting, she’d written; every word like a dagger to Georgie. But as soon as your article was out there, the petition went viral and we were able to use the momentum to get the national press and council onside. It’s been amazing – we can’t thank you enough!

  Oh, it was just so killingly ironic! If the email had been from anyone else, under any other circumstances, she’d have been cheering from the rooftops and totally claiming all the credit. As it was, Cleo’s words just felt like another massive helping of guilt to add to the already considerable portion festering away inside her. On top of which, Georgie had undertaken some secretive googling and seen that the Guardian, Times and Telegraph had all quoted lines from her original interview in their pieces, which was, again, both gratifying and mortifying. If it hadn’t been for you! Cleo kept saying in her head, eyes shining with delight. Yeah, Cleo. If it hadn’t been for me, my boyfriend would still be in his job and there would be none of this box-packing and talk of going home. Good one, Georgie!

  It was almost enough to make her want to contact her own fictional alter ego for advice. Hey Em, I basically shafted my boyfriend with this article I wrote which has effectively meant him losing his job. Should I confess to him or bear the guilt in silence for evermore? Oh yeah, and I also went speed dating behind his back, but that was for an article too. What can I say, it’s complicated!

  Em’s disdainful reply came to her in a flash. The poor bastard. Sounds like one toxic relationship to me. What do you love more – him or your work? Whichever, it might be time to set the guy free and tell him the truth – I reckon he deserves better than you anyway!

  Even for an imaginary agony aunt, artificially constructed for a magazine column and existing only in Georgie’s head, Em had a point, you had to admit.

  ‘Do you think I should say anything?’ she asked Charlotte on Tuesday evening. Unable to bear the oppressive sound of Simon bundling shirts into a suitcase, she had slunk next door where she had made her guilty confession – whispering of her terrible misdeeds because she couldn’t risk any chances of being overheard, even separated as they were by a brick wall. ‘What would you do?’

  There was something different about Charlotte, Georgie realized belatedly, peering at her suspiciously. She’d opened the door with this goofy sort of smile, and her whole being just seemed . . . relaxed. Carefree. Having spent a couple of excellent nights out together, Georgie had come to feel very fond of her neighbour but, with the best will in the world, Charlotte had struck her previously as on edge. Nervy. She’d looked positively terrified that first time Georgie had badgered her into going roller skating. And now here she was, bare feet tucked up beneath her on the sofa, pouring wine, music on in the background, that Mona Lisa-ish secretive smile on her face . . . Something had happened. All of a sudden, Georgie was a bit less keen on talking about her own problems, she wanted to know what had changed so drastically in Charlotte’s world.

  ‘. . . I mean, trust is really important,’ Charlotte was saying. ‘Me, I’m terrible at keeping things to myself anyway, I’ve never had a good poker face. Keeping a secret like that would kill me.’

  ‘Mmm,’ said Georgie. Deep down, she’d known all along that Charlotte would advocate honesty; she seemed far too straightforward a person to choose the path of deceit, given the choice. But then again, it wasn’t Charlotte whose relationship was in such precarious straits, was it?

  ‘What do you think he would say? Is he the forgiving type?’

  Georgie remembered the sulk Simon had plunged into the day she’d borrowed his car and managed to scrape it against a wall during an abysmal reverse-parking incident. He’d had the hump with her for an entire week. But then again, back in the good old Yorkshire days when he wasn’t being stressed and bad-tempered the whole time, he’d laughed off other mishaps with good humour: the time she’d drunkenly attempted break-dancing in their old kitchen and managed to kick the Leeds United mug he’d owned since childhood off the table (smashed to smithereens) for example, or that Valentine’s Day when she’d managed to ruin her own surprise by taking him to the wrong restaurant at the wrong time. She’d been mortified, but he’d found it hilarious, and they’d ended up eating a Chinese takeaway and laughing their heads off. He could be kind when he wanted to. Gentle. Loving. That side of him had rather been swallowed up in stress recently, though.

  ‘Yes and no,’ she said after a moment’s reflection. ‘But he’s unhappy right now, and he’s one of those brooders who can’t just snap out of a mood. It’s much harder to forgive someone and be gracious about their screw-ups when you’re feeling crap about your own life, isn’t it?’

  ‘It is,’ Charlotte affirmed, just as her phone buzzed with a text. ‘Sorry, I’ll just . . .’ she said, glancing at the screen, and then her face lit up as she read whatever message had just come in.

  Georgie’s curiosity had reached peak capacity. She couldn’t bear not knowing any more. ‘Enough about me and my dramas,’ she said. ‘How about you? You seem very smiley. Is there something I should know about?’ Wait a minute, she thought in the next second, remembering the dinner party teasing the week before: the way Charlotte had turned quite pink when they’d been discussing Ned from the café. ‘Hold on . . . Did you two see each other again? You did, didn’t you, I can tell by your face.’ She topped up their wine glasses and sat to attention, Simon temporarily forgotten. ‘Tell me everything.’

  Charlotte’s happiness at her blossoming new relationship proved a welcome distraction but the very next day, Simon took things up a notch. Ever since he’d had news about the hotel project being shelved, Georgie had taken his talk of moving back home with a pinch of salt. He’d come round, she kept thinking; he’d get over himself, he’d find something else to do down in Brighton. All this packing and grumbling was just him letting off a bit of steam.

  But no. Apparently not. Because there he was, jingling the car keys in his jeans pocket and looking shifty when he brought her a cup of te
a first thing. He sat on the bed and she knew, just from gauging the set of his shoulders, that he was going to go through with it after all. ‘So . . . I’m heading off this morning,’ he announced gruffly. ‘I could come back with a van for the rest of the stuff at the weekend, or . . .’

  ‘Whoa,’ she said in alarm. She struggled to sit upright, banged her head and spilled tea all over the duvet. ‘You’re really going? Today? But . . .’ But what about me? she wanted to cry. Why hadn’t they had a proper conversation about this, together? This was him leaving Stonefield all over again, she realized: taking the decision without so much as a glance her way. I’m off. Can’t wait any longer. Stuff to do. Not hanging around.

  He seemed surprised by her reaction. ‘I did say,’ he pointed out. ‘I’ve said all along I was going back. Nothing’s changed. It’s you who can’t make your mind up.’ He put his hand on the duvet then removed it hurriedly, remembering it was soaked in tea. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘if you want to come with me, I can—’

  ‘No,’ she blurted out. She couldn’t quite believe this was happening. And she wasn’t ready to leave. It was partly her fault for being in denial, for not confronting him about his plans, but then again, he hadn’t come to her either, and said what shall we do about this? Let’s sort this out together, the two of us, like a normal couple would. ‘Can’t we talk about it a bit more before you go? Do you have to even go today? It feels so sudden – like you’ve just decided without me. Like you’re running away.’ She closed her mouth before she tacked a ‘from me’ to the end of her sentence, knowing better than to start acting needy. If there was anything more guaranteed to send him, foot down, speeding up the M1, it was her being clingy.

  ‘I’m not running away,’ he told her. Damn it, now she’d wounded his male pride and he was looking all defensive. ‘I’m just . . .’ He shrugged. ‘There’s nothing left here for me, that’s all. Well, apart from you, but you know what I mean.’