Page 21 of When We Are Old

“Is there anything less?”

“Not for you, no,” he paused. “I’ve got Ewan and Jack until Monday. What about next weekend? Are you free?”

“Define free?”

“Available for wine, dining and on-boarding.”

“Matthew.” I grinned though; a big, stupid, sloppy smile.

“I can’t help it. I crave you in ways you’d probably find deeply disturbing.”

I shivered at the low tumble of his words.

“I could maybe see if Ma could watch Hannah. Or Ange?”

“Best friends again yet?” He laughed, but the hard edge to his forced mirth couldn’t be ignored.

“No. I haven’t called her. But I do need to. I need to talk to her, she’s my best friend.”

He sighed. “I just don’t know if she’s ever had your best interests at heart.”

“What do you mean?” I frowned at my reflection on the pine dresser. “You mean about her always trying it on with you?” I whispered. “You should have told me.”

“Would you have believed me?”

“I don’t know.” That was the truth. Would I have? Did I find it hard to imagine now? Did it matter really in the grand scheme of things? Or was I just making excuses so I could still have my best friend?

“I bet you ring her before you go to sleep,” he said. Funny that he still knew me so well. But maybe not this time.

I felt stronger than I ever had before. The shackles of my anxiety were loosening, and I could stand a little straighter.

“Do you know what happened between Scott and Ange at the reunion?” Angela’s drunken revelations about the reunion she’d made me try to go to looped around my head. I began to see it as a web of lies. I’d run away, taken one look at Matthew and legged it like the chicken shit I was. But she’d given me the impression Matthew had been there, the life and soul of the party. Now I knew the truth, that Matthew hadn’t even gone. He’d left straight after I bolted. Instead, Ange had been with a married former friend of ours.

Married… surely she had more scruples than that?

Nerves ran down my spine, but I couldn’t figure out why.

Matthew barely disguised his tut. “No. But I would say it’s the same as always.”

“You should have told me, Matthew.”

“Why? So you could have hated me for making you choose between your two best friends? I would have hated that.”

I’d ring Ange in the morning, as not talking to her gnawed at my insides. “I need to sleep. I’ve got to open the office tomorrow.”

“Any chance you're going to make Fred redundant?”

“Why would I do that? He’s amazing.” I bit down on my lip to stop from giggling.

“Ronnie,” he warned.

“I mean, with those skinny jeans, and that young twenty-year-old body. Come on, what’s not to love?”

“Muuuuuum! You’re gross.”

I needed to reinforce the walls with soundproofing before Matthew came to stay.

I chuckled and Matthew joined in, but with only a fifty percent commitment to my lame arse joke.