Page 47 of Corkscrew You
And then I run out of strength for more words, so I get up and I leave him there alone in the office, and the hurt, angry part of me hopes he stews on his stupidity – my word but the correct one – for a good long while.
I get in the Flora Valley Wines truck and drive straight to Verity and the Silver Saddle, and I call my besties on the way and order them to meet me there. I don’t give a fig if it’s only lunchtime. I need to be with people who care.
* * *
“Another,” I say to Brendan, when he insists on taking away my empty glass.
“Things looking up?” he says, with a cynical tone that he can go bite on.
“Nope!”
I expect him to leave, but he doesn’t. He stands there until I glance at him again.
Brendan’s standard factory-mode expression makes troublemakers and loud drunks hush instantly and back away slowly. It could probably make a rearing grizzly drop down and do a rapid U-turn. Right now, though, his face looks almost … kind.
“Anything I can do?” he says, in a soft voice I frankly did not know he possessed.
“Uh oh,” I hear Chiara murmur. “Incoming.”
“Huh?” says Jordan, whose powers of observation are not so uncanny.
I burst into tears. Big, fat ones, accompanied by snot and sucking sounds.
“Shit,” I hear Brendan sigh.
A cloth is shoved into my hands. His bar cloth. It’s not allthatclean but it’s not like I’m going to make it any cleaner. I sob right into it and have no intention of stopping anytime soon.
Jordan has both arms round me. She kayaks; she doesn’t mind excess moisture. Chiara might pat me on the shoulder, but only if she can guarantee no snot has leaked onto it.
Eventually, like a clockwork toy that’s smashed itself into a wall too many times, I wind on down to a hiccupping sniffle.
Like magic, a glass of what looks like a very decent pinot grigio appears in front of me.
“On the house,” says Brendan, but not in his kind voice, just in case it sets me off again.
I offer him back the bar cloth, but he refuses, and walks off before any emotional shenanigans can resume. Jordan has to twist her neck just about full circle to perv at his butt, the weirdo.
“So,” Chiara has given me a grace period. Now it’s down to business. “Does crying mean you intend to give him a chance?”
“Why would it mean that?” says Jordan. “Can’t she just be upset about him being a dickwad?”
“That would beangrycrying,” explains Chiara. “Totally different from sad crying.”
We sit in awe of her wisdom.
“I don’tknow,” I say, hopelessly, because that’s how I feel.
“Do you love him?” says Jordan.
“I’ve known him less than aweek,” I protest. “I don’t even know if he has a middle name!”
“Mitchell,” says Chiara, immediately. “After his father.”
“Sexy,” says Jordan.
“Hisfather?” I say.
“No, thename, idiot. Not as sexy as ‘Brendan’ though.”
