Page 98 of Between Us

Roisin and Meredith shared yet another nonplussed look.

Gina smoothed her hair. She’d pulled it into a French plait and, Roisin noticed now, was quite radiant.

‘Derp. Matt has always had a huge thing for Roisin. A major, major thing. Would fight on a horse for her with one of those long poking implements. You know the ones I mean?’ She made a jousting move.

‘… A sword?’ Meredith said.

‘No, like a spear.’

‘I think that’s a lance?’ Meredith said.

‘To return to the point,’ Roisin said, hardly daring to trust Gina’s apparent equanimity. ‘Did Matt tell you this?’

Gina turned to Roisin with the look of a kindly caregiver to infant. ‘No, course not, but you don’t have a doomed obsession with someone for as long as I have and not sniff out a few things about them. Trust me, Matt McKenzie has yearned hopelessly for you since forever. YEARNED. I would go so far as “pined”.’

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‘News to me,’ Meredith assured Roisin, who said, ‘And definitely me.’

‘You never mentioned it?’ Roisin said to Gina.

She fiddled with a stud earring. ‘Well … I thought you knew and were too classy to let on. Plus, you were with Joe. It was mischief. I knew Matt would never do anything about it. He’s pure chivalry.’

‘How did this knowledge come to you?’ Meredith said.

‘Oh, it’s so obvious!’

‘Evidently not …’ Meredith said.

‘OK, so remember that time Dev made us go to Center Parcs?’

‘Ugh, yes,’ Roisin said. He’d been up to his activities for a while. (That was a point: wherewasDev? Roisin had tried to call him for a state of the nation where she finally broke the news that she and Joe were exes, thinking he was back from Sóller. The length of time it took to connect, and then the connection dropping, made her feel he was further afield than Spain.)

‘Matt wouldn’t swim and spent all his time with his eyesboring into one of thoseWolf Hallbooks, blushing. Wouldn’t glance within three feet of Roisin in a swimsuit.’

Roisin squinted. ‘… He prefers Thomas Cromwell to log flumes?’

‘No! He had such major hots for you that he was insanely self-conscious when you were partially undressed! When you’ve thought about someone naked a million times, you can’t act casual when there’s skin on show. I should know.’

‘I’ve got to say, as evidence goes, I probably wouldn’t build a case on it at the High Court,’ Meredith said, indicating to the waiter whose eye she’d caught with circling forefinger in mid-air, and then thumbs up thatyes, they’d like the same again.

‘Yeah. “Doesn’t have any interest in my patchy bikini line” feels short of conclusive,’ Roisin said, starting to laugh slightly hysterically, as much in relief as anything. ‘Given that applies to pretty much everyone sane on earth.’

‘Oh, he does.’ Gina nodded, sagely. ‘He really does. I could find you other examples, but that’s the one that comes to me. Youneversee Matt look shy.’

‘It was either that or the visual impact of Dev’s flamingo swim shorts,’ Meredith said.

‘Why didn’t I notice this?’ Roisin said.

‘You’re modest and not ever looking for it, and Matt has a scarily good poker face,’ Gina said. ‘He’s more of an enigma than we realise. I don’t get the impression he’s very close to his family, for example.’

Hmmm, she’d got that right, though Roisin wasn’t at liberty to confirm it.

‘I could never hate you for it, Rosh. I’ve always thought you were a goddess, too,’ Gina said.

‘I can’t believe I was caught in this web of sexual psychodrama the whole time,’ Meredith said.

‘Well, either way with Matt, I can’t believe you’ve been so understanding about my lunacy,’ Roisin said to Gina. ‘Thank you.’

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