Before I Do(36)

Kelly and Josh were quiet, and Audrey let go of Kelly’s arm, conscious she had gotten carried away and that other people might not be as interested in the night sky as she was.

“It’s amazing you know all that,” said Josh, looking at her with wide, curious eyes.

“Yeah, wow, Audrey, that’s pretty cool,” said Kelly brightly. “If I ever get lost in space, I’m calling you.”



* * *





As the evening went on, Audrey drank more, trying to distract herself from the stab of jealousy she felt every time she looked in Josh and Kelly’s direction. Somehow, the fact that she quite liked Kelly made it worse. Everyone around the table appeared to have coupled up. Paul was flirting with Josh’s sister, Miranda, doing his usual party trick of impersonating various Bond villains but giving them regional accents. Miranda had tears streaming down her cheeks at his Brummie Blofeld. Clara was chatting animatedly with her fiancé, Jay. The guitarist was flirting with Clara’s friend Billy, and Audrey, as ever, was alone. Suddenly worried she might be the drunkest person in the room, she picked up two bottles of wine and walked around the table topping up everyone else’s glass.

At the end of the night, she found herself in the living room, kissing a man called Hamish. He was Jay’s flatmate, a performance poet who wore a porkpie hat. He had tried to kiss Audrey in the past, but she had never been keen. Clearly a cocktail of wine, jealousy, and loneliness caused her to make bad decisions.

“Bye, Audrey,” she heard Kelly say behind her, and pulled her lips away from Hamish’s to see Kelly and Josh, holding hands in the doorway.

“Sorry to interrupt,” said Josh. “We were just leaving.”

“Thanks for having us, we had a blast,” added Kelly.

Audrey thought she noticed Josh eyeing Hamish with the same air of disapproval he had given Sage at the Halloween party.

“Nice to see you!” Audrey shouted, a little too loudly.

“Shall we go somewhere quieter?” Hamish whispered into her neck as the door closed behind them, and she tried to nudge him away. Her head was full of smoke, cheap red wine, and a creeping sense of self-loathing that she knew would hit her with full force in the morning.

“I’m going to bed,” she said, abruptly standing up. “Good night.”

“Can I come?” Hamish asked hopefully.

“No, no you can’t.”



* * *





The next morning, as the three flatmates cleared up the aftermath of dinner, Clara said, “Did you notice how Kelly’s hair didn’t get flat even by the end of the evening?”

“Yes, I noticed that!” Audrey cried, and then had to sit down because she was too hungover for such animated exclamations.

“Who knew someone that spectacular looking could be so normal and be doing a PhD,” said Paul as he stacked the dishwasher. “Josh is such a dark horse.”

“What do you mean?” Audrey asked, getting up slowly to put the kettle on and make them all coffee.

“Well, I don’t know where he meets these women. Fit girls always love Josh. I don’t think he’s any better-looking than the rest of us.”

“Audrey clearly thinks he is,” called Clara from the living room, where she was now sprawled on the couch, apparently too hungover to help. “And I saw you and Miranda, Paul. You can’t complain you never get the girl.”

“I don’t think anything about Josh,” Audrey said, scowling in Clara’s direction.

“Did you know Miranda’s a perfumer? She’s got the most incredible nose,” Paul said wistfully.

“And lips?” shouted Clara.

“You’d better start showering then, Paul,” said Audrey.

“Hang on, I get it now,” Paul said, tapping a finger against his chin. “Josh was slightly mean to you because you didn’t remember his name, and now he’s unavailable.” Paul cupped his chin between thumb and forefinger. “That’s really strange, I’ve never known Audrey to go for guys who are unavailable and slightly mean to her. Have you, Clara?”

They both laughed, and Audrey felt her cheeks burn. The observation was so perceptive that it felt like a small, sharp skewer, piercing a chink in her armor.

“You’re both idiots,” she said. “I couldn’t be less interested in Bad Jeans Josh.”

“You do know that as soon as you started dating someone like that, you’d lose interest,” Clara said, finally emerging from the living room with her arms full of discarded wine bottles. “He’s too straight for you.”

“I don’t want to date him, but what makes you say that? Why is he too straight?” Audrey asked, propping a hand against her hip.

“Because he’s a nice guy and he’d treat you right. He wouldn’t mess you about, so you’d assume there must be something wrong with him,” said Clara.

“You’d ditch him in favor of some arty wanker who never calls you back,” Paul said.

“Weren’t you kissing Hamish last night?” Clara added, as though suddenly remembering.

“Handsy Hamish, no!” said Paul, putting a fist into his mouth.

Audrey was never drinking again.

Clara and Paul both collapsed into fits of laughter. Once they’d composed themselves, Paul reached out to give Audrey’s shoulder an affectionate squeeze.