After You

Chapter Twelve - Grow

"It's a dangerous game to play, but I don't have it in me to tell you "no".It's your smile; I just want to see more of that smile."
- Jude

'Just how beautiful was this model?' Tabby asked, as we huddled in the coffee shop on our lunch break the next day.

'Very beautiful,' I told her. 'Flawless, really.'

'How old?'

'I've no idea. She looked young – too perfect to need anti-ageing face creams – but she wasn't childish, which only made me hate her even more.'

'Her name's childish,' Tabby said, supportively.

'It is,' I nodded, grumbling into my giant mug of tea.

'You just need to ask him out – make it official, y'know?' Tabby told me, slurping at her soup.

'I don't think he'd want that,' I sighed.

'F*ck that, Merry!' Tabby scolded. 'You like this guy, and he's manhandling naked models. As things stand, you can't legitimately get pissed about that, but if he was your boyfriend?' She curled her lip derisively. 'You'd be shutting that shit down in an instant.'

'I don't think he was doing anything untoward,' I frowned. Jude had told me upfront, that he wanted us to be exclusive so unless he was a complete hypocrite, I very much doubted that he'd do anything with Luna whilst "seeing" me.

'Perhaps,' Tabby nodded, red soup splashing her chin. 'But has something happened between them in the past? Before you became his f*ck buddy? Because these arty types; they're pretty incestuous from what I've heard. You're beautiful and all, but I'm not gonna lie, Merry; you can't compete with a perfect, long, willowy, golden-haired goddess.'

'I know that!' I snapped. What a shit friend! Tabs was meant to lie to me and boost my confidence, by telling me that Jude ought to know when he was onto a good thing. She wasn't supposed to voice my own private doubts.

"NO, SHE'S YOUR BEST FRIEND SO SHE'S MEANT TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH. THAT SAID, SHE CAN ONLY GIVE YOU A WOMAN'S PERSPECTIVE. AS A MAN – A MAN WHO'S HAD SEX WITH YOU, I MIGHT ADD! – THERE IS NO WAY ANY MAN IN HIS RIGHT MIND WOULD RISK LOSING YOU, ALL FOR THE SAKE OF A SIX-FOOT TALL WANNABE RAPUNZEL."
Oh, so you're talking to me now? You've stopped sulking?
"ME, SULKING? YOU WERE THE ONE SULKING, AND SULKING OVER ANOTHER MAN, I'D LIKE TO REMIND YOU."
Oh... that's just semantics. The bottom line is, you shouldn't have left me like that.
"I KNOW. I'M SORRY. IT'S JUST THAT THIS "BEING DEAD" THING ISN'T AS EASY AS I'D EXPECTED. SOMETIMES I JUST NEED A TIME OUT, Y'KNOW?"
I know, I tell you, smiling.

'So ask him to be your boyfriend!' Tabby said. 'If he says yes, you can sort out this naked model business. If he says no, chuck him. There's like... zero point falling for a guy who's only interested in sex.' I knew that, of course, but I didn't want to risk losing him, even if what we had was purely physical.

'I dunno,' I sighed. 'Maybe. I'm seeing him tonight. I can try to put the feelers out – see how he'd react. Was it you, by the way,' I asked, frowning at Tabby as she spooned her spicy soup into her mouth, 'who texted Jude and asked if he'd "lick to be my boyfriend"? I don't remember doing that, but it's entirely possible I was just too drunk to remember.'

'We both did it,' Tabby told me. 'We spent about forty minutes crafting that message together. Stupid bloody Clint and his stupid bloody typos!'

'Forty minutes?' I repeated, whistling as I exhaled. 'We must have been smashed.'