Erin Lawless - Somewhere Only We Know - The bestselling laugh out loud millenial romantic comedy

“I think I want… Chinese for dinner, then,” Nadia grinned, folding up the Home Office letter and slipping it safely back into its envelope, along with the appeals leaflet.

“I could go for some Chinese,” Holly agreed, thoughtfully. “The usual?”

“Of course.”

“Right, well I’ll get the order in. You” – Holly pointed mock-seriously at Nadia – “Go and call your parents and tell them the good news, right now.”

Alex

Thursday was Alex’s weekly “keeping up appearances” session at the gym. When he got home Rory was sitting on the sofa with a PlayStation controller in hand, besocked-feet up on the coffee table next to the remnants of a ready-meal curry, the neon-bright sauce already congealing on the white plate.

“No Lila this evening, then?” Alex asked, as he dropped his satchel onto a nearby chair.

Rory called up the menu to pause the game. “Nah. Good day? Kill any terrorists?”

Alex was never sure if this was just a long-running joke or if there was a part of Rory that genuinely believed his flatmate might be the British Jack Bauer. “No, not today.”

“You need to step up your game,” Rory told him matter-of-factly, starting up his own again. Alex sat down heavily on the sofa next to him, pulling the shoe off one of his feet with the other, relaxed in a way he never quite could be when he knew Lila was in the flat. He watched Rory progress through the level with a critical eye.

“No, you need to go up to the top of the general store. There’s a weapons’ cache up there. And a window with a great vantage point for shooting from,” he ordered.

Rory shot him a quick look whilst continuing what he was doing. “You really do know this game like the back of your hand, don’t you?” Alex shrugged. “You need to get out more,” Rory frowned, only half-joking.

Alex just shrugged again. “You have a girl, I have a game,” he replied with a sigh, also only half-joking. They sat in a comfortable silence punctuated only by the repetitive gunfire emanating from the television’s speakers.

“Do you want to maybe pub it tomorrow night?” Rory asked, casually. “We can hit Clapham High Street, you know that’s where all the totty is.”

Alex rolled his eyes. “Thanks, but no thanks, at least on the totty front. Pub sounds good, though.”

Rory continued, undeterred. “This guy at work says there’s an epic pub quiz in one of the places by the Tube, loads of film-based questions and stuff, apparently. And people stay on in the place afterwards because they do a tray of Jagerbombs for, like, a tenner.”

“A tray?” Alex echoed.

“A tray,” Rory assured him.

“A tray of shots sounds a little heavy for a Friday night…” Alex said, tilting his head back against the sofa. Rory rolled his eyes and paused the video game once again.

“Look, I’m going to make this easy for you, okay? Go to Clapham Common Tube after work tomorrow. I’ll find out the name of this pub from the girl at work and text it to you. You and I will then drink beer, astound everyone present with our fantastic general knowledge, win some cash, then spend it on trays of shots. You got it?”

Alex couldn’t really argue with that. “Okay, sounds good,” he smiled, getting to his feet to go and forage in the kitchen cupboards for something for dinner.

“Cool,” Rory said, starting his game up again. “I’ll tell Lila to get there early and make sure we get a good table.”

Alex raised his eyes to the ceiling, pleading for patience. Of course Lila was going to be there. Of bloody course.

Nadia

Nadia was just trying to have one evening where she didn’t have to think or talk about her immigration status. Unfortunately, nobody seemed to have got the memo.

“I really wish you’d let me get you some legal representation,” Caro said, frowning, using one finger to delicately scroll on her iPad. “The information on the Home Office website makes the whole process seem very obtuse.”

“Yeah, but the information in this leaflet makes the whole thing look like a piece of piss,” Ledge argued, waving said leaflet for emphasis. “Don’t worry, Nads. You turn up to court, you give ‘em a big smile, you present your case and then the judge goes, cool, I see that you totally should be allowed to stay in Britain, sorry for the inconvenience love, bosh, done.”

Holly rolled her eyes over her cousin’s head and silenced herself with a substantial gulp of wine.

“Do you think that you could get one of the managers from your old company to be there in the court with you?” Caro continued, ignoring Ledge. “If this whole thing is hinging on how much of a ‘private life’ you have in the UK, the wider range of people we can get to show their face on your behalf, the better.”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I’ll email them when I’ve got the court date,” Nadia replied, reaching for the wine bottle and topping up her glass, even though it was still half full. So much for having a nice night in to distract her from her visa woes.

“Hope you get it confirmed sooner rather than later,” Holly said. “It’ll definitely be a weekday, won’t it? And it’s an absolute bitch for me to get time off work at the moment.” Holly worked for a charity HQ, but her managers were the most hard-nosed, hard-arsed businessmen anyone could ever come across.

“Well, I’ll be there!” Caro said, giving Nadia a clumsy one-armed hug, causing both of their glasses to slop wine.

“Well, it’s not like you have to worry about getting your annual leave approved,” Holly remarked, her tone sweetly polite. Caro just screwed up her nose and stuck out her tongue in eloquent response before releasing Nadia and turning her attention back to her iPad. Holly and Caro had a strange relationship; they were both close to Nadia and so spent an inordinate amount of time together, but Nadia sometimes wondered if the two girls would even bother keeping in touch were she to be deported back to Russia…

Deported back to Russia. Nadia sighed and topped up her wine glass some more.

“And I’ll be there too,” Ledge said, hefting himself to his feet and shuffling towards the kitchen. At the door, he turned back. “Hey, what are you planning to do about your ‘boyfriend’?” he asked, genuinely curious.

Nadia jolted, her brimming glass of wine halfway to her mouth, sloshing chilled Pinot against her collarbones. She stared up at Ledge in horror.

“Her boyfriend?” Caro echoed, confused, looking from one to the other. “What boyfriend?”

“The one she mentions on her application form,” Ledge replied. “You know? The one I ‘play football’ with?” he clarified, with air-quotes to belie the lie he gave in his letter of support to Nadia’s application.

“Oh.” Caro settled back uncomfortably against the legs of the sofa. “ That boyfriend…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Holly said immediately. “They wouldn’t necessarily be expecting him in court, and even if they are, you can always just say you two just… broke up…”

“But that doesn’t reflect that well on Nadia,” Caro said, alarmed, sitting forward once again. “Besides, having a British boyfriend has got to be a massive box-tick for these people. You can’t get much more of a private life than that!”

“Guys!” Nadia pleaded, dabbing her neck with the drier part of her top.

“Ledge, how do you feel about telling the government that you’re seeing Nadia?” Holly asked her cousin, her ‘business’ expression firmly in place.

“Hols,” Nadia tried again.

“I don’t think that would work,” Ledge replied slowly. “Didn’t I say in my letter that me and her were really good mates, and that I play football with her boyfriend? Matthew, did we call him, in the end? Yeah, we used your dad's name, didn't we? It’ll be too suspicious if we change the story now.”