Somewhere Only We Know (22 page)

Chapter 17

Nadia

“Okay, so!” Alex punctuated himself with a dramatic flourish of a French fry. “I’ve got news.”

Nadia hurried up the chewing process of the mouthful of Big Mac she was working through so she could answer.

“Me too,” she managed as she finished swallowing. “You go first.” She was dying to see his reaction to the news about Matt being out of the picture, but wanted the time to savour it. Surely if he felt even the tiniest flicker of interest in her that way, she’d see it in his face as he digested the news? Okay, so the rammed Piccadilly Circus branch of McDonalds wasn’t exactly the most apt place for a romantic epiphany, but at this point she would take what she could get. Besides, it was the best place to fuel up on alcohol-absorbing carbs before a night at nearby Closet.

Alex smiled to himself, dabbing another fry into the swirl of ketchup he’d squeezed into the lid of his burger box; Nadia wasn’t sure if he was playing for time in order to increase the suspense or because he was trying to order his thoughts. She quite liked that about him, he was always so considered.

“Well, it’s about Lila,” he said eventually, the smile growing even broader on his face. The second mouthful of burger that Nadia had just taken suddenly turned to ash against her teeth. “It’s really funny that you were asking me about her at the weekend, actually!”

Nadia somehow managed to swallow. “Oh, yeah?”

Alex laughed. “Yeah! Which reminds me, I need to thank your Matt. Turns out he’s got a big fecking mouth, but it’s actually worked out quite well for me.” Alex pressed on, excitedly. “Well, as you might have guessed, I sort of downplayed the Lila thing at the weekend. I just didn’t think there was any point hashing it over. I truly thought I wasn’t even going to see her again, not even as friends. I wanted to start getting over her, so I thought it was counter-productive to tell you how I really felt. I didn’t want you feeling sorry for me.”

Nadia toyed distractedly with fries she had no intention of eating. “And so what’s changed?”

Alex’s smile spread even further. “I don’t know yet. Maybe everything.”

He looked so damn excited, so happy. Nadia steeled herself as she plastered a smile on her face. “Hold on there! Why don’t you start from the beginning?”

“Well, like I said, Matt’s got a big mouth. That night we all met? In Bison I sort of told him that I had a thing for my flatmate’s girlfriend, and so when he met said flatmate at Jez’s last weekend, he apparently couldn’t help but spill the beans. Rory had had no idea. But then he thought about it and decided that he should see if Lila, you know, could ever be interested in me in that way, because seeing his mate and his ex-girlfriend happy seemed like a win-win to him. And, you know, have I ever told you? I knew Lils first; we were friends at university. But, anyway, so he called Lila and arranged for her to be in the flat when I got home from work the other day so we could talk it out.”

Images of Alex and Lila writhing together on the boys’ dark sofa, their bodies sinking deep into the cushions raced through Nadia’s head.

“And so, you… talked?” she managed to ask.

“Yeah. Literally! We
just
talked,” Alex clarified, belatedly realising what Nadia had been insinuating; he grinned sheepishly. “I was in my underwear for part of it though!”

Nadia couldn’t help her startled laugh. “What!?”

“She, er, caught me by surprise…”

“Caught you with your pants down, one might even say!”

Alex laughed through his mouthful of food. “Indeed.”

“And so you’re what? Just going out with Lila now? It seems a little rushed…”

“Well, you haven’t seen me in my underwear,” Alex joked; Nadia felt her cheeks fire. “Nah, nothing like that, not really. We’re just going to go out on Saturday night.” He paused. “You and me didn’t have any plans, did we?”

Nadia – who had been planning on suggesting that Alex came over Saturday night and they cooked something together – simply took another bite of her unwanted burger and mutely shook her head.

“So I need your help deciding where to take Lila for dinner. Somewhere nice, but not, you know,
too
nice. Where would your perfect first date be?” Alex asked.

Nadia gave a small smile. “Bodeans?”

“Ha, ha.”

“No, I sort of mean it,” Nadia insisted. She paused, the urge to help her friend warring with the desire to completely sabotage this inconvenient fledgling romance. “You don’t need to try so hard. I mean, this girl already knows you. If you’re not acting like yourself, she’ll know it, right?”

Alex gave her a grateful smile. “You’re right. I just still can’t believe this. I’ve wanted this for so long. It sort of feels like a dream.” He was the handsomest she’d ever seen him in that moment, with his cheeks flushed and his eyes shining. How could Lila not fall in love with him?

“Don’t worry.” Nadia picked up her Coke and swirled it so the ice cubes tumbled and rattled. “Something tells me that this is going to be the start of an epic romance…”

Alex

Clapham Common and its surrounding environs boasted several supposedly high-end burger joints, but Alex always felt that simply putting “gourmet” in the restaurant name didn’t necessarily make them so. After a couple of days of indecision he decided to think totally outside the box.

“Covent Garden?” was the first thing Lila said when she arrived at the table, a teasing smile on her lips.

“I know, I know – ‘north of the river’!” Alex laughed. He dropped his voice conspiratorially. “This is where the real Londoners live, you know.”

“No, this is where the
tourists
live,” Lila countered. “This place better be good; I had to avoid a creepy living-statue street-performer and walk across cobbles in these heels!” She flicked her feet out prettily to show that she was wearing three-inch stilettos.

Alex laughed. “Wowza! But it’s appreciated. You being here
and
the great shoes, I mean.” He took her all in as she sat down across from him at the little two-person table, quaint and chintzy, covered in a gingham oil-cloth. She’d obviously made an effort, which was a good sign. The front bits of her hair were pinned to the crown of her head creating a little sleek quiff, a hairstyle he’d never seen on her before, and along with the killer heels she was wearing a powder-blue mini-dress that contoured all the way down her body. It reminded him suddenly of a similar dress Nadia had, although hers flared at the mid-thigh and danced around her body as she moved.

“This place is lovely,” Lila said, helping herself to a sip from the glass of tap water Alex had thoughtfully already ordered for her. “I hope you haven’t gone to any trouble?”

“No, no trouble,” Alex assured her.

“Are you sure? You know I would have been just as happy in a Pizza Hut!”

“In which case..!” Alex pretended to get up and leave, sending Lila into a fit of the giggles.

“No, no, we’re here now!”

And Alex, who still,
still
couldn’t quite believe that he
was
there, beamed at her. “Good. Because I’ve already ordered a bottle of wine.”

Nadia

“Hey,” Nadia greeted as she pulled open the flat door. “Thanks for…” She blinked; Caro was wearing a terrifically tiny red-and-black lace dress, heels and an unexpected amount of eyeliner. “Coming,” Nadia finished weakly. “You look… Were you thinking we’re going clubbing or something?”

“No,” Caro answered shortly as she kicked off her shoes and made her way through to the living room, where she petulantly threw herself on the sofa, tucking her legs up underneath her (whilst pulling her hemline as far down as she could). Her mobile phone had remained in her hand all the while; she began sliding the pad of her index finger across its touch screen distractedly.

“Hey, I know I might have sounded pathetic and lonesome on the phone earlier, but you really didn’t need to cancel a big night out to come babysit me,” Nadia assured Caro as she followed her into the main room.

“I didn’t. Don’t worry.” Caro finally dropped her phone to the sofa cushions and looked across at her friend with her expertly made-up smoky eyes. Nadia – in a pair of knee-length joggers without a scrap of makeup on – felt very underdressed. “So. Who’s standing
you
up this fine Saturday evening?” Caro asked with a dry little smile.

Alex

The first bottle of wine saw them through discussing the weather (yes, it was still bloody hot), how their respective jobs were going (both meh in the extreme) and a gross-out YouTube video that had recently gone viral on Facebook (disgusting yet oddly compelling). It was polished off before their starter plates had even been cleared away and within two minutes of Alex motioning at the waiter, a fresh one was placed in their ice bucket; now
that
was Covent Garden-style service.

Far too used to Nadia – who he’d seen on more than one occasion drinking wine out of a pint glass – Alex clumsily over-filled their glasses past the little white line that indicated a socially acceptable level. Lila thankfully didn’t notice and continued to chatter on, the wine blushing prettily high on her cheeks and in a ribbon between her collarbones.

“So,” she changed the subject with a mischievous smile, as if she’d just sensed his attention wandering. “It’s great that this isn’t weird, huh?”

Alex decided he was drunk enough that he could play the blunt game too. “Why would it be weird?” he asked, picking up his over-heavy glass. “We must have had a hundred dinners together.”

“Takeaway on your sofa with Rory sat between us hardly compares,” Lila laughed. They both paused for an off-kilter moment, sipping awkwardly at their respective drinks, as if they were waiting for the spectre of the ex-boyfriend/best friend Lila's unthinking remark had conjured up to get bored with them and walk away.

“Fair enough.” Alex conceded. “But I, for one, am glad – wait, make that
ecstatically happy
– that Rory’s not sat between us tonight.”

Lila returned his smile, reaching out across the table to give his hand a little squeeze, letting her fingers linger over his wrist, where his pulse jumped towards her.

“Me too.”

“God, I should have said something earlier, shouldn’t I?”

“I don’t know about that.” Lila moved her hand away and picked up her wine glass once more. “I mean, maybe it’s better that we got to know one another again in a casual way. You barely spoke to me the entire three years at uni, sure, and then I think it took about three months of me dating Rory for you to start to hold a conversation with me!”

Alex choked a little on his mouthful of wine. “That’s not true,” he managed.

“Oh, it is!” Lila laughed, but not unkindly. “You’d always hide in your room when I came over, never came along anywhere we invited you… Rory said that’s just what you were like nowadays, and not to worry. Said you’d had a bad break-up after uni. I said I'd heard. You and Alice, and all; I still have her on Facebook, you know.”

Alex bristled immediately at the thought that his ancient heartbreak had been a topic of casual conversation for armchair psychologists. “I really don’t think that’s the case at all, Lils…”

“It’s pretty obvious,” Lila insisted gently. “You couldn’t bear the thought of being hurt again, so you did the natural thing and kept yourself to yourself.” Her eyes dropped. “It’s something that I’ve had to struggle against recently. But it’s important to get back on the horse, you know?” She beamed at him encouragingly and took another large gulp from her glass.

Alex – unsure whether to be insulted or delighted that he was apparently considered a horse worth getting back on to – studied Lila carefully. Maybe she was drunker than he thought. Mentally he urged their main courses to hurry up; the carby pasta bake that Lila had ordered would go some way towards soaking up her indulgence and ensure the conversation steered itself back to safer waters – waters that hopefully didn’t feature Alice Rhodes, Rory Ryan or Alex’s allegedly hermit-like lifestyle.

“But you weren’t like that with Nadia, actually,” Lila continued, and her tone carried the slightest sting of jealousy.

“What? Nadia?”

“Hmmm. You were trotting off on adventures with her before you even knew her last name. Took you over a month before you’d even come into your own kitchen for a glass of water if I was in there!” Lila’s tone was jovial, but the little twist to her bottom lip was anything but. “I felt for sure you were going to end up going out with her, you know.”

“What? Nadia?” Alex repeated, feeling utterly confused by the person that Lila was painting and calling himself. Surely he had never been so cringing around her? Surely Nadia hadn’t caused that massive an impact on him?

“Yes, Nadia,” Lila mimicked. “You’re always with her. When you’re not, you’re talking about her. She reminds me of Alice, sometimes. Smiley. Social. You know," she waved her hand dismissively. "It seemed obvious what was going to happen between you two.”

“Did it?” Alex asked, incredulous.

“Of course! Rory used to tease you about it all of the time.”

“Rory teases me about
everything
all of the time,” Alex pointed out.

Lila gave one of her little musical laughs. “Good point. But no, genuinely, we all thought it was, you know, on the cards.”

On the cards
; Alex had a sudden flashback. Nadia curled beside him on the floor of her flat; the going-threadbare carpet managing to itch him even though his jeans; the brightness of her nail varnish flashing on her fingertips as she dealt herself playing cards, worked them into intelligible piles; Nadia turning her face to his and telling him that she wasn’t going to get what she wanted.

“I was really worried for you,” Lila had continued.

Alex struggled out of the memory to catch up with the conversation. “What do you mean, worried?”

“Well, you know… she’d hardly be a sensible choice, Alex!”

Alex felt his shoulders stiffen immediately at the senseless insult to Nadia. “What do you mean?”