A Girl Like You - A Girl Like You Part 35
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A Girl Like You Part 35

The rest of the pub is completely silent, looking at Robert passed out cold on the floor and me huddled over him. Robert blinks a couple of times, and opens his eyes. 'Abby . . .' he says croakily.

He's fine. I sigh with relief. 'I take it you faint at the sight of b-'

'Don't say the b-word,' he whispers, and takes a sip of water. Someone else brings over a glass of lemonade. Then, like someone turning the music back up, everyone in the pub realises that the drama is over and starts talking amongst themselves again. We are forgotten.

One of the bartenders comes back to chat to us. 'Sorry. We were keeping an eye on those guys all night, we knew they were trouble,' he says. 'Are you OK, mate?'

Robert is now leaning against a table leg, sipping lemonade. Somehow, I've ended up perched next to him stroking his hand and hair, like some kind of tipsy Florence Nightingale. 'I'm fine . . . but I think I need some air. Abigail, will you take me walkies?'

Chapter Thirty One.

'Well, my nerves are still completely shot,' I comment 20 minutes later, when we finally leave The Punchbowl.

'Your nerves?' echoes Robert disbelievingly.

He's had two pints of water and a lemonade, and I've had a large whisky (just to calm the nerves). His face has colour again, and we've decided to wait for Luke, Sophie and Dave in a bar in Notting Hill that Plum keeps talking about.

'Fresh air is good,' says Robert, when I suggest a taxi, or that perhaps, for his sake, we ought to go home. (Dave can always join us there, right?) 'I want to walk. It's not that cold.'

I keep my arm around him as we're walking along the top of Hyde Park towards Notting Hill. At first, I was supporting him because he was a little woozy. I felt like he needed looking after. But then it was just comfortable: we walk well together.

'Are you sure you're OK?' I say. 'Do you want me to go and find that guy and beat him up for you?'

'No,' says Robert, laughing. 'Thanks. You're my knight in shining four-inch-heels.'

We stop in two pubs on the way, getting a lemonade for Robert and a whisky for me, then pretend to go for a cigarette and just keep walking with our drinks. We deposit the stolen glasses at the next pub.

'This is one of the naughtiest things I've ever done,' I say, as we wait for our drinks at the second pub.

'Apart from the viola bow,' he says.

'Obviously apart from that,' I nod as the drinks arrive. 'Mmm. Lovely warm whisky.'

'I think you've probably had enough,' he says.

'No,' I say, wrenching my glass away. 'My whisky. Mine.' Robert grins. 'Are you sure you're OK?' I ask again. He doesn't say anything. 'You're embarrassed to have lost control for a split second, aren't you? You are!' I start laughing.

'Ah, you find yourself hilarious, I'm glad someone does,' he says.

By the time we reach the Portobello Star, the whisky has made everything warm and fuzzy. We find a place to stand, smushed against the wall down at the back of the bar with a lot of West London too-cool types and start chatting or rather, we both listen to my drunken gushing.

'I love hipsters,' I say, as Robert hands me an orangey-whisky cocktail (name? Who can tell!). 'I want to be with a man with a beard before I die. I think it would be warm and cuddly, like kissing a man-shaped teddy bear . . . Oh! That girl is pretty,' I say. 'Look at her, she's just your type. Your two o'clock. I mean my two o'clock, your nine o'clock. I mean . . .' I crack up at myself. 'I can't even tell the time! Ah, you're missing out on beautiful chicks, Roberto . . .'

'You're beautiful,' he says.

I laugh at that, as obviously I must look like a shiny-faced drunkard, and he shakes his head and starts laughing too. I like Robert so much, I think. I feel warm and fuzzy and very happy. He's such a lovely man. I hope he finds true love.

'I hope you find true love,' I say. Oh dear, I am pissed.

Robert smiles. How dark green his eyes are, I think. So steady. I feel like I might see double if I keep staring at them. 'I hope I do, too.'

'You're supposed to wish me true love back,' I retort.

'You have Dave,' he reminds me. 'Though I'm surprised you're not pissed that he's so late.'

'Oh yeah. Dave . . .' I say, checking my phone. Nope, nothing, although Robert texted him when we decided to come to this bar. I sigh deeply, my mood suddenly plummeting. 'He'll be here soon . . . He doesn't like to be text-terrogated, and he doesn't like to make plans. So I have to just wait for him. Always, always waiting for him . . . Which is bullshit, right?' I drink all of my cocktail in one gulp.

Robert nods and then catches himself, and stops.

'And he said he wanted to be my girlfriend and, and, and ever since, ever since . . .' I reach out and, after a couple of attempts, put my empty glass down on the table behind Robert, and try to get the thoughts in my head straight. 'When I hear from him or he's around, I feel alright, more than alright . . . good. I feel good. Plum says I am chasing emotions. But sometimes, not.' Robert is smiling at me, but I've got almost double-vision now. One-and-a-half vision at least. 'Oh, Robert. I am tired of this powerplay, I am not the player, I am not playing the powerplay. You know?'

'Are you in love with him?' asks Robert. I only just hear him saying it, the bar is so loud.

'I don't know,' I sigh. 'I don't, um, don't know,' I look up at Robert and start laughing.

'I don't know seems to be my catch-' I hiccup 'my catchphrase.'

'That's a terrible catchphrase,' he says, with a grin.

'My dad says, the right person, I'll just know. Most annoying thing in the world.' I can't tell Robert about how my brain short-circuits whenever Dave touches me, and that it's that reaction, above anything else, that makes me feel he might be the right man for me. I can't even remember what that feels like, or even what he looks like. I can't remember anything right now.

'You're not making sense,' says Robert.

I look up at him and grin happily. What were we just talking about? I forget.

Suddenly the DJ stops the music, and the crowd starts counting.

'Ten! Nine! Eight . . .' Robert and I join in, in that excited and totally unselfconscious way that you do when you've been drinking for hours.

'ONE! HAPPY NEW YEAR!' screams the crowd.

I grin at Robert and stand on tiptoe to reach up and give him a smacking Happy-New-Year cheek kiss, when someone elbows me violently in the back and I'm shoved forward, my mouth landing forcefully on his.

'Whoops', I think, and go to say it, but I can't, because all of a sudden his arms are around me and his lips are on mine and we're kissing, properly kissing, and his lips are so warm and my heart starts beating wildly and I don't want to stop and everything around me goes whoooooooooosh . . . Seconds, minutes I don't know later, we break apart. The instant that Robert's lips are off mine, I put my hands on his chest and push him away from me, trying to catch my breath. Or my thoughts. Whichever comes first. (Neither do. The slackers.) My heart is hammering so loudly in my chest that it almost hurts.

'Happy birthday,' he says. He looks as surprised as I am.

'I . . . I-' I'm horrified. I keep meeting his eyes and then looking away. I didn't push him off me fast enough, we shouldn't have kissed, I didn't stop it, Dave, his friend, my boyfriend, oh God . . .

'I'm sorry,' he says immediately, reading my face.

'No, I'm sorry,' I say. I feel completely sober all of a sudden. 'I'm going . . . I'm going . . . to the bathroom.'

I pick up my bag and turn to push my way through the crowd.

A glance in the mirror is every drinking girl's nightmare: my make-up is AWOL on my red face, my eyes are glittering weirdly, and my eyeliner is very badly smudged.

'Fuck,' I say. My mind is racing. Fuck, I just kissed Robert, my best friend, my boyfriend's best friend, fuck, Dave, my boyfriend, is he my boyfriend? He must be, he said he was, fuck, I just kissed Robert, I liked it, did I like it?

At least I'm sober.

'Fuck,' I say aloud again.

A girl comes out from the toilet cubicle behind me. She's very pretty, and wearing a tiny green dress with her hair in a funky beehive. Why do I look so drab, I think irritably. My jeans and plain top looked so classic and fresh when I put them on, now I look like a nun. A J Brand-wearing drunk nun who just cheated on her boyfriend and jumped on her best friend. Fuck. I look in the mirror again, and notice that the girl washing her hands next to me is crying silently.

'Are you alright?' I say automatically.

'Fine, fine,' she says, and wipes away a tear.

'My boyfriend and I broke up on Boxing Day,' she adds, her voice choked with tears.

'Shit, I'm so sorry,' I say. 'That's so awful. Are you having an awful night?'

She shrugs, heaving an enormous make-up bag onto the sink. 'I knew I'd cry at midnight, so I brought my entire make-up bag,' she says, laughing through a small sob.

'I've got eye drops,' I say helpfully. 'And . . . mints, and powder, and perfume, and Benefit High Beam, and, let me see . . .' I open my make-up bag and put it next to hers on the sink. 'Just help yourself. At least you don't look like you came straight from a triathlon, like I do.'

'I've got foundation,' she says, grinning at me. 'And a Q-tip that you can use to fix your eyes.'

Ah, the power of make-up to bring girls together. I don't want to think about Robert, or what just happened, or what's about to happen. So instead, as we pass Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick and MAC Smoulder back and forth, I counsel my new friend Millie on her break-up, which she said she could see coming all through Christmas, especially when he gave her a book with the '3 for 2' Waterstone's sticker left on.

'Who got the other two books?' I say.

'That's what I want to know!' she says and we cackle with laughter.

'Well, frankly, I think you are much better off without him,' I say, handing her MAC Nuance blush.

'I know,' she agrees, handing me some Benefit Hoopla bronzer. I never wear bronzer. Hey ho. In for a penny.

'And,' I say a moment later to my new, tanned reflection. 'I think that you're going to meet someone tonight. Someone,' I pause to add some more to my nose and chin 'to make you forget all about him.'

'You know what I want?' she says. 'I want a fling. It was an intense five months with that dickhead. I want something casual. With lots of sex.'

I pause, and look at her. 'Then I have just the man for you.' We traipse back down the stairs together. Yes, I will introduce Millie to Robert, and that will make him happy, then I will go home and to hell with it, I'll call Dave and tell him he's missed me, I mean, that I've missed him, and that he needs to come over and have sex with me and that will fix everything. Yes. Good plan.

Then I look over to where Robert is waiting for me and see my sister and Luke and . . .

Dave turns and, grinning, grabs me and lunges into a huge kiss. Immediately, the electrical reaction is back, like someone flipping a switch in my body. I'm tingling all over, but I'm also horrifically conscious of Robert watching us. Robert, who I just kissed. Oh God, did that really happen? It doesn't seem real . . .

'Happy New Year, angel,' murmurs Dave, standing me back up and looking into my eyes. Holy blue eyes. Can he read my guilt? I blink and look away. 'And apparently happy birthday. Right, now that's done, I'm getting drinks.'

I am quickly enveloped in a happy birthday hug from Sophie and Luke, who are ranting about their nightmare drive from Bath with pit stops for wine and how Sophie and Dave are annoying drunks and Luke is an 'annoying sober'.

I haven't dared to look at Robert yet. Instead, I pull forward Millie and introduce her.

I notice Dave appraising Millie's body with a practised eye. I wish I looked hotter tonight. I want him more than ever. I don't even care why he's late anymore. (But oh God, please let it not be because of Bella.) It's so good to see him that the relief has overtaken everything else . . .

I want Millie to talk to Robert, but when I finally look over at him, he's expressionless, staring into space. Luckily, Millie takes the initiative, and puts her hand on his arm, smiling up at him.

'Robert, Abigail tells me that you protected her virtue earlier . . .'

'Uh, yeah,' he says, without looking at me. 'I did.'

'What? Story!' says Sophie.

Robert and I manage to tell the entire Punchbowl punch-up story, together, without our eyes meeting even once. We both leave out the fainting bit automatically. I don't want to drop Robert in it, and he doesn't seem to want to talk about it either.

God, I feel self-conscious. If they'd walked in 15 minutes earlier . . . No, don't think about it.

'Well, that all sounds very chivalrous,' says Dave, who returned with drinks halfway through the story.

'Well done, Robbie. What a brave boy you are.'

'He was, actually,' I say, suddenly irritated by Dave's usual jealous ribbing. 'It was amazing.'

'It sounds wonderful,' says Millie, smiling up at Robert. He looks down at her with a little grin on his face. Good, he's back to normal. Great.

'Birthday lunch tomorrow?' Sophie says to me.

'Yes please,' I say. 'But no singing. No cake. None of that shit. Henry and Charlotte will be back too.'

'Half of our mates are at a ball tonight,' says Luke. 'So they might come along tomorrow.'

'What ball?' I say.

'A charity ball. Organised by Louisa's husband,' says Luke in a low voice. 'Dave refused to go, said it was a waste of his money. He caused a massive fight.'

'It is a waste,' says Dave, placing a lazy hand on the back of my neck and stroking it. I fight the urge to purr, then glance at Robert, and for a moment our eyes meet. I look away quickly. 'I'm not giving my hard-earned money to the impoverished hamster association.'

'It's the RSPCA,' says Sophie.

'You know that.'

'I like to choose the animals I help,' he replies. 'Dogs, yes. Cats, no. Horses, yes. Parrots, no. And I've always thought the RSPCA was a front for a vice ring of some kind.'

'You just don't like her husband,' says Luke.

'Well, he's a wanker,' says Dave. 'And a ponce. That's why I try to undermine him at every given opportunity.' He pauses. 'It's actually a beautiful thing.'

He glances at Robert, who has turned to talk to Millie and hasn't heard a thing. In a flash I realise that despite the competitive put-downs, Dave and Robert really are best friends. They may operate an official policy of 'don't get involved', and he couldn't stop the way his sister behaved with Robert, but he's clearly been a complete prick to her and her husband ever since.