Somewhere Only We Know (20 page)

Alex found he had to actively change the subject to bring Matt up at all. “Hey,” he tried, whilst the other two girls were diverted by Rory, pitching his voice low, and moving in close to murmur in Nadia’s ear. “Is everything okay between you and Matt?” He could feel warmth rising from the exposed skin of her neckline; it was like a sauna in the over-full room. A combination of the heat and the alcohol had flushed Nadia’s cheeks as pink as her dress.

Nadia looked at him suspiciously, as if his question was some sort of trap. “What do you mean?”

Alex had been expecting an immediate denial, so he was slightly put on the back foot. “I mean, you don’t seem very coupley tonight.”

Nadia laughed, but there was no humour in the sound. “I’ve told you a thousand times. As far as I’m concerned it’s very casual, me and Matt.” She gave that funny little laugh again and took a drink from her double-strength vodka and cloudy lemonade. “Is everything okay with you and Lila?” she asked, giving him a meaningful look over the rim of her glass.

Alex baulked. “What? Me and Lila? Where did that come from?” He sat back as far as he could on the uncomfortable sofa, trying to get out of Rory’s eye line, just in case he was listening. He racked his brain; had he ever drank too much and confessed his inappropriate, unrequited and embarrassing affection for Lila to Nadia? No. No way he ever, ever would have. Not even after
ten bottles
of vodka. It was something he had kept so close to his chest for so long.

“Nothing.” Nadia sighed to herself. “I just thought now that Rory’s out of the picture you would have made a move or something.” She rolled her eyes. “You’ve waited long enough.”

Alex threw his remaining half-glass of vodka and coke straight down his throat before answering. “Hey, I need another drink,” he announced loudly (once he’d finished coughing). “Come with me?” He phrased it like a request, but he knew Nadia would know it wasn’t.

Nadia

Vodka was evil; pure liquid evil. She needed to learn to keep her mouth shut. She needed to learn that vodka was not her friend. Much like Alex wasn’t likely to be if she couldn’t extricate herself from this.

She trailed Alex as he impatiently made his way over to the kitchen area and grabbed one of the few remaining clear plastic tumblers off the side. “So,” he said, conversationally, as he reached over to the sink to get some water, “What’s all this you’ve got in your head about me and Lila?” He handed Nadia the water to drink, which luckily gave her a few moments to compose her thoughts as she took a gulp.

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, airily. “Something I picked up, I guess.”

Alex looked mildly panicked. “Picked up?” he echoed. “How?”

Nadia wasn’t sure what to say. Because it was true that Alex had never given any outward sign of wanting anything more than friendship with the pretty, heart-faced, honey-blonde Lila. She’d never seen him touch her, or have a real laugh with her, that stupid, over-the-top one he did when he found something really and truly funny, a sort of guffaw that sometimes turned into a terribly unattractive snort. He didn’t overly mention her in conversation, and he certainly hadn’t seemed to be worried that since he’d met Nadia he’d spent less and less time in her company. If it wasn’t for Matt telling her about it, she’d never, ever have guessed…

“I guess…” She looked at Alex straight, guilt prickling at her when she realised how concerned he was about this. “I guess maybe it was that you never seemed totally comfortable around her.”

Alex tilted his head, confused. “I never seemed comfortable?” he repeated, incredulous.

Nadia laughed nervously. “You know. A bit edgy. Nervous.” She bit back a wince as she saw Alex’s alarm increase. “And so naturally I assumed you were secretly madly in love with her,” she finished with a dramatic gesture and a laugh, hoping her poor attempt at humour would defuse the situation. Alex laughed too, but it was half a beat too late and way too forced. “Oh, I don’t know, Alex. I’m drunk as hell. Don’t ask me difficult questions. Either way, clearly I was mistaken.” She mimed zipping her lips shut. “You won’t hear from me on the subject again.”

Her words seemed to mollify Alex. He stopped chewing his bottom lip to shreds and reached to pour his own drink of water from the kitchen tap. Nadia hesitated; she felt the vodka pushing the words up and out of her like bubbles. She needed to know.

“Unless you want to. Talk about it, that is.”

Alex frowned at her over the rim of his plastic glass as he drank from it. “Nadia, I don’t need to talk to you about Lila.”

“Are you sure?” Why was she even pushing this? Nadia took another self-conscious drink of her own water. “It’s just that… we’re friends, aren’t we?” She smiled weakly. “I just want you to know you can talk to me about things like that.”

An exasperated smile began to tug at the corners of Alex’s mouth. “Nads. My ‘dear friend’.” He grinned to soften the sarcasm, and plucked the empty tumbler from her grip. “Trust me, there’s nothing to talk about. Me and Lila-wise, anyway. Okay, so I sort of fancied her when we met up again, you know, after uni. But obviously, Rory did too!” Alex rolled his eyes. “And that was that. Hardly the greatest love story of the century, right?” he scoffed.

Nadia felt a weird sort of dizziness that was a combination of vodka and relief. Matt must have misheard or misunderstood. Alex wasn’t in love with Lila and this one small realisation made her feel inexplicable, like she could somehow stretch out and fill the entire room. It changed things. She could never have competed with a girl he’d known and wanted for so long, but now maybe. Maybe.

And it was in that moment that Nadia knew for certain that things with Alex had gone too far; there was no way back.

Alex slung his arm around her shoulders. “Come on then,
friend
, enough of this,” he grinned again. “Let’s go and try to liberate that rum from Caro, eh?”

Alex

He’d been feeling quite smug that he’d managed to head Nadia off and shut down the Lila conversation before it really began. He’d always known what he felt was unrequited, sure, but he hadn’t quite anticipated that there was going to be a whole other level of super-unrequitedness that was Lila being single and
still
not being remotely interested in him.

But to be entirely truthful, these days – with all of Lila’s belongings gone from the boys' Tooting flat and the corner of the sofa where she’d usually sat no longer feeling so empty – he was just starting to feel faintly embarrassed about the whole thing. It was pitiful, really, and Nadia’s pity was something he was quite sure he wouldn’t be able to bear.

As they moved back through the main room, which seemed to be growing denser with bodies with every passing hour, Alex felt Nadia hesitate. Matt was sitting on the sofa in the space they had just vacated, talking animatedly to Rory. Alex saw Caro and Holly catch Nadia’s eye apologetically; there was definitely something going on here; he just wished Nadia would clue him in a little.

As if they felt his attention on them, Matt and Rory suddenly looked up at him. Rory’s eyebrows came together in a small frown as he made eye contact with Alex. “What?” Alex mouthed across the room at his flatmate; Rory shook his head slightly. Not here.

“Alex,” Nadia said suddenly, and he felt her fingers fluttering near his wrist nervously. Without thinking about it, Alex grabbed Nadia’s hand in his and held them both curved into a ball against his chest.

“What’s wrong?”

“I want to break things off with Matt.” The words came out of her in a rush, as if she’d been holding them in for forever.

Alex blinked in surprise. “Okay.” He looked at her, confused. “So what’s stopping you?”

Nadia held his gaze for a moment, almost as if she was looking for something in his expression or waiting for him to say more. Finally she dropped her eyes. “I don’t know,” she answered, honestly, with a small shrug and a laugh. “I actually don’t know.”

“Excuse me?” Caro’s suddenly outraged tone brought their attention back to the group on the sofa; Caro sounded even more posh when she was angry. Jez had returned – a whole lot drunker and a great deal more determined to convince Caro to join him for that tequila nightcap.

“Look mate, I don’t think you understand English,” Rory bellowed, standing up to his full height in an attempt to look threatening. Matt got to his feet a second behind him. "The lady isn't interested."

Jez had an ugly twist to his mouth that spoke volumes about his level of drunken frustration. “Lady?” he echoed, with a nasty laugh. “Just because she looks like a fat Pippa Middleton and talks like she’s got a cock shoved in her mouth doesn’t make her a lady.”

There was a moment of horrified silence from everyone before Caro spluttered into indignant life.

“Seriously? Fuck you!” was her apt if not madly intelligent retort.

“Yeah, fuck you!” Rory parroted with a scowl. “What is your problem?”

“Who’s saying I’ve got a problem?” Jez answered immediately, turning to Rory, his stance combative. “Are you making this a problem?” This was escalating far too quickly.

“Hey, guys, calm down,” Matt tried, woefully ineffective.

“His problem is, clearly, that I would rather shit in my hands and clap than have sex with him,” Caro pointed out, blisteringly, making sure that everyone remotely nearby could hear her. “Like any sensible woman. Nads?” Caro turned to face the stunned Nadia. “I think we’re done here, yeah? I’ll call a taxi.”

And with that, Caro stooped to pick up Rory’s still half-full bottle of rum, tossed her hair over her shoulder as she stood and exited the room – majestic in her high, high heels – before anyone had a chance to say any more. Rory stared after her, looking more than a little thunderstruck.

Holly stood too. “Nads?” she called, cocking her head towards the door. She eyeballed the spot over Alex’s heart where his and Nadia’s hands were still entangled. Alex felt Nadia’s fingers suddenly flicker within his grasp as if she too was just realising how long they’d been holding hands and hurriedly let go. He wondered if Matt had seen. "It's time to go," Holly finished, flatly, the double-meaning of the phrase ringing obvious.

“I think we should probably get going too,” Rory pointed out; Jez was still glowering aggressively. “Besides, Caro’s taken all the bloody booze.”

“I’ll tell Caro to get a people carrier,” Holly said. “You guys are welcome to come back to ours for a bit.”

“You don't have to go, Nads,” Matt suddenly interjected, looking rapidly between Alex and Nadia like an overwhelmed tennis spectator. “I…thought you might stay here tonight.”

Nadia just sighed. “No, Matt. I’m going to go home. But you should come round tomorrow, maybe. We can get some food in and… talk.”

Alex had watched Matt’s face brighten all the way through Nadia’s sentence, until the fatal final word. Even Jez was respectfully silent in the face of it.

“Talk,” Matt echoed, trying to sound casual and failing miserably. “Yeah, sounds cool. I’ll text you in the morning, okay?”

“Okay,” Nadia smiled. “Let’s head down,” she told Holly and the boys. “Caro’s probably got a fleet of taxis waiting for us by now.”

At the very last possible minute, Nadia paused at the flat door. “Oh, and Jez?” she called back, into the open living space. Jez raised a bleary face from where he’d been resting his head on the arm of the sofa. “Happy birthday.”

From out in the corridor Rory snorted with laughter at the epic sarcasm Nadia had managed to load her words with. “You arsehole!” he couldn’t help but add with a shout, somewhat ruining Nadia's icy dignity, just as the flat door swung shut behind them.

“Well done,” Alex turned round to grin at Nadia as they made their way down the staircase to street level. “But you do realise that you totally gave him the head’s up there, right? He’s probably going to turn up tomorrow and immediately tell you some bullshit about it ‘not working out’, just so he can get in there first and won’t have to say he was dumped!”

Nadia laughed, and she already sounded lighter, freer than she had the whole evening, the whole month. “Honestly? I really don’t care.”

Chapter 16

Nadia

The sound of the front door closing echoed through the flat; Nadia finally let out the sigh that had been brewing.

On cue, Holly peered around the doorframe. “Is it safe to come out?” she teased.

Nadia shot her a withering look before turning back to the pizza she was trying to tear apart with her hands. She’d thoughtfully popped it in the oven before Matt had been due to arrive, assuming he’d want some sort of lunch. She hadn’t got as far as using the wheel to slice it into segments before he'd legged it. The hot cheese was burning her fingertips.

“Did you hear all of that?” she asked.

Holly shook her head. “No. But believe me, I tried. I even considered putting my ear to an empty glass on the wall like they do on TV,” she joked. “But it was just a lot of mumbling. So…” She moved to sit on the floor in front of the coffee table, legs crossed, and reached to tear off her own bit of pizza from the disc. “All broken off with him, then?”

“I think so. I mean, yes. I mean…” Nadia considered her response. “I think
he thinks
it was a mutual decision. So I suppose that's a success in itself.”

Holly laughed, holding her hand over her mouthful of food. “The big question is, did either of you use the phrase, ‘it’s not you, it’s me’?” she quipped.

“But it genuinely wasn’t him,” Nadia argued immediately. “It’s my fault, and I told him that. I told him I'd gotten carried away.” She sighed, listlessly watching the melted cheese stretch out into thinner and thinner strings as she pulled the pizza apart. “But, to be honest, I basically based it around the fact that I shouldn’t be starting any relationships of any kind at this stage, as I’ll probably have been booted out of the country before Christmas. I pretended I thought it was pretty much a done deal, the deportation." Was it pretence? Nadia was never quite sure any more. "I thought that would sting a little less than ‘I’m just not that into you’," she continued, with a wry smile. "Either way, it’s done now.” Holly frowned but Nadia ignored her, dropping the food back down to the plate without having actually eaten any. “Alex was right, though,” she continued. “Matt did come in here fighting. I gave him the head’s up last night that I wanted to
talk
. There wasn’t any messing around; he didn’t even have any lunch.” She gestured at the rapidly cooling pizza.