‘I thought you were going with Thomas?’ I asked.
She reddened. ‘I thought he was going to surprise me with tickets a few weeks ago, but he hasn’t yet.’ She smiled, no doubt thinking about lovely Thomas. They’d snogged at our company Christmas party and, unusually, didn’t spend the next month avoiding each other in the kitchen.
‘I wouldn’t wait around for him,’ Pixie said. ‘Why don’t you book them?’
‘Well, if we want to go together,’ she said, ‘then let’s book tickets for us.’
Pixie grinned. ‘We’ll have a girls’ night out. Jane, could Andy watch my two on the night as well?’
‘Of course, I’m sure he won’t mind.’
‘Thanks, love. It’s bad enough that Trevor’s got to mind them tonight.’
Ellie, Jane and I bounced our usual looks between us. Trevor was a waste of space. Unfortunately he was wasting space in Pixie’s house, as the father of her children.
‘Are things any better at home?’ Ellie asked as we collected our coats and bags.
Pixie nodded at first, then shook her head. ‘Darts have started again so he’s out after tea most nights.’ She sighed. ‘A point to the temple is probably too much to hope for.’ We smiled at her lame joke, recognising the honesty in it. ‘At least by the time he gets home, the children and I are in bed.’
They’d had separate bedrooms for years on account of Pixie’s sleep apnoea. Trevor claimed to need a good night’s sleep since he worked. Given how sporadic that work was, he should have been okay with sporadic sleep as well.
Pixie had a new plan to leave him at least twice a year. Her list of reasons was endless, and totally justified. Not that he physically abused her. She’d knock his teeth out if he laid a finger on her or the children. But his constant complaints and insults were a slow form of torture.
The problem was, since she hadn’t worked in years, she was a bit stuck. So she stayed with him, hoping things would get better. As her friends, we added our hopes to hers.
Ellie and I splurged on takeaway sushi on our way home from the meeting. Eating tiny bits of fish and rice made us feel virtuous on a par with the Buddha. Which justified the ice cream we bought for dessert. Life was a balancing act, after all.
Ellie got the good wine glasses from the kitchen and threw herself beside me on the ancient sofa. Mum and Dad had brought it from home when I bought the flat. Lucky for me, as I was so skint by the end of the process that even Ikea was out of my reach.
I loved our sofa. It was old and worn but its scarlet velvet cushions held countless memories. It was where I was sitting when Mum announced she’d been appointed headmistress of her school. I threw myself on it when opening my university acceptance letter. And it was where I first had sex … a detail I’d skipped when reminiscing with my parents on moving day.
How I’d loved Rory McAdams, ever since Year Nine when he offered to help me with maths. He wasn’t the most popular boy, or the sportiest or smartest or funniest. He was a bit on the short side, and failed to grow the peach fuzz that our classmates managed. But he was incredibly nice, and he became one of my only friends at school.
It would be generous to say that I went through an awkward phase at school. It was more like a pariah phase. I slowly outgrew it at uni, away from the bullies who’d tormented me, but it was a slow process and I never did gain a big group of friends. Since meeting Ellie, Jane and Pixie, I hadn’t felt I needed any more.
But Rory wasn’t put off by my leper-like status at school. We became such good mates that our parents started referring to us in the plural. We were Katie-and-Rory. Naturally this convinced me that we were as good as going out, in a non-kissing, non-hand-holding, one-sided way.
But while I pined for my friend, he pined for a tall girl on the hockey team who didn’t know he was alive. Sometimes I wondered if anyone got to go out with the person they liked.
One night, just before leaving sixth form, we went to the pub. We’d both had too much cider and before I knew what was happening, Rory kissed me. Or I kissed him. The details were fuzzy but the fact was, we kissed. I was snogging the boy I loved. We left the pub holding hands, and he kissed me again when we got to my door.
Mum and Dad didn’t usually leave me alone overnight but as I was now eighteen (I reminded them of this every chance I got), they’d taken a rare trip without me to visit my cat-wee auntie. When I invited Rory inside I knew exactly what I was doing and wasn’t at all nervous about having sex for the first time. I was, however, self-conscious, aware that my body wasn’t slim like the girls in the magazines. I was probably around the same size as Ellie is now, with the same puppy fat coating my five-foot-five frame. Rory switched the light on. I switched it off. He laughed and said I was being silly, but left us in the dark.
The sex mostly involved fumbling with the condom he optimistically carried in his wallet for Miss Jolly Hockeysticks. We both tried to hide our surprise that he was using it with me. The velvet cushions weren’t great for traction and we slid to the floor more than once.
My head was too full of our new relationship to sleep after kissing Rory good-bye. By morning my imagination had us nearly engaged. Unfortunately Rory’s sleep hadn’t been disturbed by similar fantasies, and when he said he wanted to talk the next day, I knew he wouldn’t be proposing. I managed to hide my dismay when he apologised for taking advantage of me, and he managed to hide most of his awkwardness. I was his best girl mate, he said, and a right laugh, and he didn’t want to lose me as a friend. I pretended not to mind and we did stay friends as we went off to university. I saw him in London a few years ago and finally told him of the torch I’d carried all those years. He swore he’d had no idea of my feelings. He was, of course, just being kind. He’d have had to be blind not to notice. Infatuation isn’t a subtle emotion.
Now, at thirty, I wasn’t yet consigned to spinsterhood, despite Great Aunt Bernardine’s theories. But I had to be realistic as I looked in the mirror. Sure, my face was okay. A teacher once even likened me to Elizabeth Taylor (presumably in her early years), probably because we had the same colour eyes and dark wavy hair. My nose and lips were about the right size and I wasn’t too spotty. But not everyone wanted to go out with a woman who carried the equivalent of a seven-year-old under her dress.
‘I feel ill,’ Ellie said, chucking the spoon into her empty bowl with satisfaction. ‘I can’t believe we ate the whole thing.’
‘It was light ice cream,’ I pointed out, patting my own tummy. ‘And we did only have sushi.’
‘We should definitely go for a walk.’
‘Are you sure? It’s kind of cold out there.’
‘Shivering burns calories.’ She went for her trainers. ‘Come on. Get off your arse.’
I made a face, which she ignored. Ellie was one of those annoying women who enjoyed exercise. She had a gym membership that she actually used, whereas I spent thirty quid a month to feel guilty that my gym shoes sat in the wardrobe most of the time.
Ellie’s phone rang just as I locked our front
