Cecelia Ahern - The Time of My Life

‘Adam,’ Lisa said, shocked.

‘Come on, I’m sick of this, always skirting around the subject like she’s high almighty.’

‘Because it’s none of our business,’ Chantelle said, eyes wide and warning at Adam.

‘Blake’s our friend,’ Adam said.

‘And so is Lucy.’ Lisa gave him a look.

‘Yes, but he’s not here because of her and that makes it our business.’

‘He’s not here because he got a job he always wanted that required him to leave the country. Get over it,’ Jamie backed me up, veins throbbing in his neck. I could tell he was angry. I wanted to give him a big kiss but I was more concerned with finding an excuse to leave the table immediately, as everything had been lowered to a level that made me deeply, deeply uncomfortable.

‘I think we should all just change the subject,’ David said.

The waiter moved around the table and stood beside me. He could sense it was an awkward moment for me and he was loving it. They were all looking at me to speak, to say something that would clear this tension.

‘Soup of the day,’ I said. ‘Please.’

Adam rolled his eyes. ‘There she goes again, not answering anything about anything, all fucking mysterious.’

‘I just don’t know what soup it is,’ I joked, weakly.

‘Butternut squash and corn,’ the waiter said.

Adam mumbled something under his breath that I didn’t catch, and I was quite pleased as my knees were already trembling from the long line of personal insults from a supposed friend. I was used to that from Adam, but he wasn’t hiding them now; everybody could hear his tone and not just my paranoid ear.

‘Hey, man, don’t speak about her like that,’ Jamie said, suddenly serious. Suddenly it was all very serious.

‘I don’t even know why we’re all talking about this, it was what, three years ago?’ David asked.

‘Two,’ I said quietly. ‘Two years and eleven months.’

And eighteen days.

Jamie looked at me.

‘Yeah, so it was ages ago, they went out, they broke up, they moved on, they’ll meet someone else. Just because two people were together once doesn’t mean we all have to dwell on it forever,’ David ranted. This made everybody stare at him knowing he was referring to his own personal life, namely Jamie and Lisa. David took a gulp of water. Jamie studied his plate. Lisa reached for more bread and picked the nuts out.

‘I’m just saying what all of us were thinking,’ Adam said.

I swallowed. ‘You all think I cheated on Blake?’ Now that was news to me. I looked around the table.

Chantelle looked awkward. ‘It just all seemed a bit sudden and then you became so secretive …’

‘I’m staying out of this,’ said David. He wouldn’t meet my eye, which said it all.

‘I raised the issue once ,’ Lisa said. ‘I’m not going to lie, but I’m not like Cagney and Lacey over there, trying to figure it out every second of my day.’

‘Cagney and Lacey were two people,’ David said without thinking and Lisa looked at him with demon eyes.

Jamie ignored them and looked me straight in the eye. ‘I absolutely do not think that you cheated on Blake. You are perfectly entitled to break up with whoever you want, whenever you want – no offence, man,’ he added to Life, ‘without us having to know anything about it. It’s none of our business. Adam has had too much to drink and he’s full of shit.’

‘Hey,’ Mary said, insulted, ‘he’s not drunk.’

‘Fine, he’s just full of shit,’ Jamie joked, but no one laughed, not even him, because it wasn’t really a joke.

‘Mary?’ I looked at her. ‘Do you feel the same?’

‘Your behaviour seemed to change drastically, Lucy. As far as Blake was concerned everything between you was fine and then, as Chantelle said, you just left him and became, well, very secretive.’ She looked at my life. ‘I mean, no offence, this is the first we’ve heard of you. I’m surprised she even invited you.’

‘We’re just friends,’ I said, feeling extremely uncomfortable.

‘So now we’re supposed to believe that this guy is just her friend?’ Adam said to Jamie.

‘Who gives a shit? Why do you care so much?’ Jamie asked.

‘He cares because Blake is his best friend, and Adam is loyal, and poor Blake doesn’t know what he did wrong—’ Mary began, but I interrupted her. I didn’t need to hear any more. I couldn’t or I would break all of the Silchester rules in less than a minute.

‘Yeah, poor Blake,’ I interrupted, and stood up. I heard the shake in my voice. Silchesters didn’t cry and they certainly didn’t get angry, but I was close to blowing it. ‘Poor little Blake, living such a sorry little life travelling the world, while here’s me livin’ it up with my fabulous job, in my fabulous mysterious apartment, with my secret lover.’ I grabbed my bag. Life followed my lead and stood. ‘And you’re right, Adam, he’s not just my friend. He’s a lot more than that because a friend is what you were supposed to be, and he’s been there for me a lot more than you ever have.’

And then I left. Early. When I got outside I kept walking until I was too far away for them to see or hear me. Then when I found the right place, in a doorway, away from everyone, I took out a tissue from my pocket and thought about breaking all the rules. I waited, and waited, knowing that there must be tears, years’ worth of them all built up and ready to fall. But nothing came so I crumpled the tissue and stuffed it back in my pocket. Not now, not over them; my tears had pride.

Life appeared beside me with a concerned look on his face. When he saw that I was all right he said, ‘Okay, maybe you’re right.’

‘He hates me.’

‘No.’ He looked confused. ‘Jamie and David are totally okay with each other after the whole Lisa thing.’ He said it in such a deliberate mock-gossip way that it made me smile. ‘Though technically I don’t know if that’s true,’ he added, ‘but they are the least of my worries. Are you cold?’

I shivered as the night breeze picked up.

‘Come on,’ Life said gently, then he took off his jacket and wrapped it around my shoulders, keeping his arm draped protectively around me, and under the orange glow of the streetlights, we walked home together.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

‘What do you want to do today?’ I asked.

We were enjoying a lazy morning on the couch; the Sunday papers were strewn around the place, used and abused, as we’d searched for our favourite sections and discarded the remainder and then fell in and out of silence as we commented on, laughed at and shared stories we were reading. I was perfectly content in his company and it seemed he was in mine too. My clothes curtains were open to allow the sun to shine through and the windows were wide open, bringing in the fresh air and the sound of Sunday silence. The flat smelled of pancakes and maple syrup, which he’d made, and fresh coffee, which stood on the counter, still piping. Mr Pan had settled in, on and all around Life’s shoe, looking like he was the cat who got the cream, which ironically he had, along with fresh blueberries which I had planted and grown myself in the organic roof garden I’d cultivated since Life had come into my world. I’d freshly plucked them that morning while wearing a straw sunhat wrapped with a white ribbon and a white see-through linen dress that blew in a hypnotic way in the gentle breeze on the rooftop to the delight of the male neighbours, who were chilled out on deckchairs, oiled up with sun lotion like cars in a showroom.