Just Last Night(75)

I hadn’t thought of that, of the value of my escape, but I know exactly what Justin means.

“Yes!” I say, gripping the phone handset in gratitude. “God, yes. Forgetting and then remembering again is so awful. It’s like hiring someone to follow you around to kick you, every time you relax.”

“What’s the brother like? He seem sad, or is being up north yet more time away from his home planet? Planet of the Tall Sexy Rude Men?”

“Sad, I don’t know. I think he was already sad. There’s more to him than we thought, I think.”

“Oy oy! I knew you were stupid, but I never thought you were blind. Plumb those hidden depths, definitely.”

“Yeah yeah.” I heavy sigh at Justin, smiling.

“Listen, I didn’t call you up to insinuate lewd things, though it’s enjoyable. You know it’s my birthday next weekend?”

“Yup.”

“I was going to forget about it altogether, stay in and drink myself into a stupor. But I’ve decided to go the other way and drink myself into a stupor at a second location. What do you think to me, you, and Mr. and Mrs. Ed in a cottage in Derbyshire for a weekend? Thursday, Friday, Saturday nights? It speaks to my need to be out of the house and around people, but not out of a house and around people, if you know what I mean.”

“Oh. Me and Hester in close proximity?”

I blurt this before considering he presumably knows nothing about what went off at Susie’s wake. Fortunately, Justin seems to take it as a reference to the standard antipathy.

“Yes, I know, as ever. But, drink through it. I think Ed must’ve read her the riot act about being a Bridezilla as we’re hearing a lot less about the merits of blush ranunculus versus peach peonies in springtime bouquets.”

“Argh, OK. I doubt I can swing another day off so soon though. I’d have to get there for Friday night?”

“Good. That way we’ll have unpacked the groceries, made the ice cubes, and found the firelighters.”

Justin asks what I’m up to and I tell him about dinner.

“What are you wearing? Can I see?”

I switch from the call to the camera, take a selfie, and send it to him.

“I think you’ve correctly judged the mood of the nation there,” Justin says, after receiving it. “Hair up, maybe? Knock him dead. If we’re still allowed to use that phrase after Susie. She’d squawk at that!”

“She would.” I smile, and get the solar plexus punch of happy-sad, lemon juice with sugar.

After I ring off, I spend time in front of the mirror in the gleaming marble bathroom, sticking pins in handfuls of my lightly backcombed hair until I have an acceptable bird’s nest that I think looks sort of French chanteuse in smoky speakeasy.

Within half an hour and one Kir Royale, it will no doubt land as more “It’s fine if she doesn’t want to be found, her family just want to know she’s OK.”

IN THE LOBBY, I can’t see Finlay at first. I pick my way very carefully across the marble floor, which resembles an ice rink in my precarious footwear.

Annoyingly, as I’ve had my tongue poking out in concentration and I’m holding the sides of my coat for balance while I thought I was unobserved, I spot Finlay leaning against a wall, watching my progress with an expression of indulgent amusement.

“Still not giving up on those boots, huh,” he says.

There I was thinking my hobbling on the beach had gone undetected.

“I’m very loyal,” I say.

We walk to the Café St. Honoré in a glacial dusk, me trying in vain to pretend I’m not walking like I’ve got two hip replacements on the steep inclines of New Town.

I wonder what lives are being lived behind the smart blank blinds in the sash windows.

At one point, I slide-stumble and Finlay catches my elbow and says, “Got it?” and I say, “Hmm mmm, yep ta,” and feel furious at myself for emulating some Bambi-legged ditzy cliché. It’s fine to go arse over tit around your friends (well, if you must have an audience) but with Finlay Hart I want to stay in control.

When we get to the restaurant, my feet are sore but my heart lifts.

“This could not be any more my thing if it was named Evelyn’s Actual Thing,” I say, under my breath, looking around once we’re seated, waiters having politely shaken their head in unfamiliarity at Fin’s discreetly proffered photo of Iain Hart.

The floor is black and white square tiles, the walls are crammed with artfully tarnished mirrors. There are glossy black curved chairs, the pendant lights are glowing orbs that throw everyone into moody, woozily drunk half-light. It’s a pastiche of 1940s Paris that makes me feel as if I’ve fallen face first into a date in a romantic novel.

“Lollipop bay trees in box planters outside, those fairy lights above the wall of wine . . . it’s my Moon Under Water of restaurants,” I say, as we open the menus.

“Let’s hope you like the food then,” Fin says. “It’s got a lot to live up to.”

“They could put a slab of Morrisons chicken liver paté onto a plate with some Ritz crackers and I’d be happy,” I say and Finlay smiles a small smile and asks my approval of the red he’s ordering.

“What originally took you to the States, did you go there to study psychology?” I say, as we finish the bread.