Page 69 of Mad About You

She’d started the day thinking Scott Dyer was no longer a bad guy she need worry about, and Cal Clarke was a good guy she could count as a friend.

She should resign from the predictions business.

31

Harriet heard Cal’s parents’ gas-guzzler leaving, and looked out of the window for their son. She saw Cal sat on the swing seat at the far end of the garden, lost in thought.

It was high time Cal discovered he shouldn’t chat shit in his enchanting shrubberies. Harriet was smarting too much to pretend she’d not heard what she’d heard. She still had the text in her phone, with a slimy kiss, telling her an outright lie. He needed to know he hadn’t fooled her.

‘Hi,’ Harriet said, as she walked towards him.

‘Hi. I’m meant to—’

‘I’ve overheard you slagging me off for things that aren’t my fault before and I didn’t say anything. This time it was too much,’ she interrupted. ‘I’m sorry you didn’t want me at that lunch, but it was hardly my fault. Your dad didn’t leave me much of a choice.’

‘What?’ Cal’s jaw fell. ‘I didn’t say I didn’t want you there.’

‘That’s exactly what you said. “She’s my lodger, it’s a business relationship”,’ Harriet quoted. ‘You’re so two-faced. “Don’t put me in the position of saying I wanted her to stay.” You weren’t in that position. I’d offered to go.’

‘No, wait – this is—’

‘I didn’t ask to be your pal,you’re the one who dragged me into things you were doing. I don’t know why you have thisvanityabout being liked by people who don’t mean anything to you.Popularity is your drug, isn’t it?’

Cal looked both shocked and crushed at this. Admittedly, Harriet hadn’t intended to deliver a wide-ranging character assassination based on partial information. Still, screw him.

‘Let’s be clear that I’m only here to pay rent until I go. You can knock the chummy “come out for an Aperol Spritz, babes” stuff on the head. Cheers.’

She needed a gesture that acted as a full stop, so turned and marched back to the house. Good grief, where had all THAT come from? Harriet sounded well Huddersfield. Cal leapt up and followed her, catching her arm to make her stop.

‘Harriet, Harriet! Wait. You don’t have the context. That conversation wasn’t about you.’

‘Pretty sure it was.’

‘It was the easiest way of phrasing “back off”. I was embarrassed about my dad’s behaviour around you today.’

Harriet frowned and twitched her arm out of his grasp.

‘Why? Your parents were being nice.’

‘My mum was being nice. My dad wasn’t only being nice …’ Cal paused. She saw a flush that she’d never seen before creep up his neck, one she had to admit, he couldn’t be faking. ‘He was hitting on you. It’s what he does.’

Cal’s expression was a rictus of embarrassment. Even when Kristina walked in, he’d never looked as rattled as he did now.

‘Hittingon me?’ Harriet snorted. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘Yeah, I know. The idea’s so ridiculous it wouldn’t even occur to you. Unfortunately, it’s never too ridiculous an idea for him.’

Harriet tried to make sense of this. She’d not got predatory vibes from Mr Clarke Senior. She supposed he was over-familiar and slightly too tactile, but men of his age sometimes were.

‘It wasn’t that I didn’t want you there. I love your company,’ Cal carried on. ‘I didn’t want to be let down by his behaviour and look like a dick in front of you. I was trying to point out he’d crossed a line of familiarity with you. With my mum there, I was hardly going to say, “stop fancying my friends”.’

‘Your mum seemed fine with it?’

‘My mum seeming fine with it is a whole different … part of why I had therapy.’

‘Oh,’ Harriet said. She’d not anticipated any of this response and couldn’t help but wonder if Cal was a master of nimble diversions. “‘Forced me to ask her to stay” still seemed pretty definitive. No one had a gun to your head to say that.’

‘I was pointing out he’d interfered, not that the outcome was unwelcome. I hate you thinking I’ve been two-faced. Of course you’re not business. We’ve become friends. I hope.’

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