After You Left(27)

His pupils flickered with mild amusement. ‘Agenda? Like what? Tell me.’

‘I don’t know. You’re a bit personal and a bit intense.’ Stupidly, I felt like crying. I tried to stare across the room, at the door, willing the feeling to go away. If I cried, he was going to think I was mental.

‘Justin,’ he addressed himself after a good pause. ‘Is Alice a bit pissed off with you for some reason?’

It was playfully done. It made me smile. He had chosen to make light of it. I was never more grateful. ‘I’m not pissed off with you, Justin. I just don’t know what to make of you. What you want.’

What he wanted? It sounded so tart and un-charming. Good Lord – why did we have to get on to the topic of babies and families? I was convinced I’d never set eyes on him again.

But suddenly, I caught something in his eyes. It was a look of quietly burgeoning adoration. ‘Well, Alice, I, on the other hand, know exactly what to make of you . . .’

He was imploring me to smile, to save this. ‘Let me guess,’ I said. ‘Alice, you’re a cynical, un-trusting, nearly over-the-hill woman who bears little sentimentality for family, and if it weren’t for that, you’d be perfect?’

He laughed now. ‘Close-ish. But no. What I was going to say was, you’re a lovely, multi-layered girl. Well . . . woman. You’re interesting to talk to. In fact, I’ve had a better time with you tonight than I can remember having with anybody in quite a long time . . . You’re real and you’re honest, and you’re a good person, I can tell . . . And, well, to be truthful, I wasn’t really expecting this . . .’ He shook his head as though rendered speechless. ‘I’m impressed, Alice. I’m very pleased we met. And if I say much more, it’ll probably spoil things . . .’

I was completely taken aback – by his sincerity, by the look on his face, by everything. He’d stopped me from having a meltdown. I was suddenly fonder of him and felt more affinity for him than anyone should have a right to, considering we were strangers until a couple of hours ago.

‘Justin MacFarlane . . .’ He addressed himself again, which made me grin because it was a strange quirk of his, and it had only been a few hours, but I was already getting an idea of his quirks. ‘You don’t meet girls like this one every day. So the pressure is on to ensure you don’t say something to put her off you – like grill her about her family and put her on the spot.’

‘Multi-layered, you said?’ It just came back to me. ‘Like I’m a German pastry.’

His face lit up. ‘It’s another compliment. I’m clearly crap at giving them.’

Our eyes did a little dance again. I wondered what it would be like to kiss him. If he would want a debate on that topic first, too! Or if he would say, Justin MacFarlane, do you think this is the right time to kiss her? As I looked at his face, I pictured it. That electric rush when his face would move in and my eyes would involuntarily close. And then I would feel his lips, the slightly fuller bottom one, and the top one with the small vertical scar that lined up with his right eye tooth. I wondered how he got it, and if I would be able to feel it with my tongue.

He was watching me, full of suspense. I didn’t know what to say; didn’t know how to not disappoint him. Perhaps because I always tried to make such a good impression with men, I decided that, this time, I’d just be myself, and see what happened. ‘Justin, I’m going to be honest. I’m caught in this strange place of wanting more of you, yet feeling like I’ve had enough. You’re not like anyone I’ve ever met. And I don’t know if this is a good thing or a not-so-good thing. Or maybe it’s just a new thing.’

He went on watching me. His expression didn’t change. ‘Well,’ he said, after a while. ‘Why don’t we leave it at, It’s just a new thing? I think that sounds more promising.’

When he walked me home, he pressed a lengthy, gentle kiss on my cheek. At this point, I had zero idea if I would ever see him again. Perhaps he was just being gracious. It might well just go down as the weirdest ‘first and only’ date in history. Yet even though the thought of inviting him in for a passionate tumble was appealing, it felt like the fastest way to ruin possibility.

‘How did you get that scar?’ I pointed to his top lip.

He suddenly looked besieged by me, as though he’d bestowed much greater significance on the question than I had intended. He touched his lip. ‘I fell on some glass when I was a little boy.’

‘Aw! I suppose your dad must have made you all better, though?’

‘He did, actually.’ He looked wistful suddenly. ‘I remember him telling me it was okay to cry, because I had a thing about not crying back then, apparently. And that was all it took. As soon as he said that, I bawled my eyes out, because deep down it hurt like hell.’ He smiled deeply into my eyes. Words petered away, and we were held there in the suspenseful, wondrous liveliness of our chemistry, of what would happen next.

After a moment or two, he said, ‘Alice, I feel like I should be coming on to you in a seriously big way . . . I’m running a bit fast and loose with you.’

‘But you’re just not that into me?’

‘No, I am definitely that into you. But my instincts are telling me to slow down or I’ll spoil it.’ He kissed my cheek again, fractionally closer to my lips this time, then when I opened my mouth to speak – to tell him those had been my thoughts exactly – he popped a kiss there. It was neither brief nor prolonged. But I would think about it so many times after, relive the loose and lovely choreography of it.