Page 50 of Boyfriend Material
“So what about you? You didn’t go to the other place, did you? Could explain rather a lot.”
Miffy elbowed him.
“I mean,” Alex added hastily, “the vegetarianism. Not the homosexuality.”
“Oriel.”
And they were back to their private code. I’d just about worked out that House was an Oxford thing. So where was the other place? Was it hell? If so,Hi, weather’s lovely down here. And as far as I knew, Oriel was either a songbird or a biscuit. What was even happening right now?
This, right here, was why somebody like Oliver would never date somebody like me in real life.
Alex nodded approvingly. “Good show. Knew lots of splendid chaps from Oriel. Mostly rugger fellows, you know. Did you go in for that?”
“No,” said Oliver. “I was very committed to my studies. I’m afraid I was rather boring at college.”
“You’re rather boring now,” I muttered, perhaps a teensy bit louder than I meant to.
Which made Oliver look at me, finally. But not in the way I wanted.
“Luc,” cried Miffy. “I thought Oliver was supposed to be your boyfriend. That’s a beastly way to talk about him.”
Now Alex was glaring at me as well. “Well said, old thing. Can’t go around badmouthing the ladies like that. I mean, gentlemen. I mean, your gentleman.”
“If I were you”—Miffy patted Oliver on the hand—“I’d kick him to the kerb, girlfriend. Boyfriend. Oh I say, that doesn’t work.”
“I’m inclined to agree, Miffles.” Alex wagged his fork sternly. “I would never have suggested Luc get a boyfriend if I knew he was going to rag on the fellow. You should probably leave him and go out with me instead. Hashtag Ollivander.”
Miffy nodded. “Yes, do go out with Ally. I could have one of you on each arm. It’d be the most ripping lark.”
“For fuck’s sake”—once again, I was slightly louder than I meant to be—“stop trying to steal my boyfriend. You don’t even like men.”
Alex gave me a genuinely wounded look. “Of course I like men. All my friends are men. My father’s a man. You’re the one who’s being horrid to everybody. Telling Oliver he’s boring when he’s an Oxford fellow and has been dashed good company all evening. And now implying I’m the sort of chap who doesn’t get along with other chaps. When really”—here, Alex turned downright haughty—“it’s becoming very clear to me thatyou’rethe sort of chap who doesn’t get along with other chaps. I really feel I ought to apologise, Oliver.”
“Do me a favour.” I stood up. “Don’t apologise formybehaviour tomyboyfriend. I’ve had nothing but fucking Oxford talk for this entire fucking meal. I know it’s stupid to complain about feeling excluded from your little private club when we are literally sitting in a little private club but, sorry, it’s been long day and, yes, you’re trying to do me a favour, but I’m having the worst fucking evening and…and I’m going to the toilet.”
I stormed off, discovered I had no idea where the loos were, asked one of the Jameses, and made an embarrassing U-turn. Once I was safely in the gents—which were tasteful but simplistic like they were saying “Only Americans and the middle classes feel the need to put marble in a water closet”—I stood at the sink and did that thing people do in movies where they brace themselves on the counter and stare meaningfully at their reflection.
Turns out, it didn’t help. It was just a dick, looking at a dick, asking why he was always such a dick.
What was I even doing? Oliver Blackwood was a dull, annoying man I was pretending to date, and Alex Twaddle was an overprivileged buffoon who regularly stapled his trousers to his desk. What did I care if they got on with each other better than they got on with me?
Ooh, ooh, tally-ho toodle pip, which college were you at where did you sit at the annual duck following ceremony go fuck yourselves you self-satisfied pair of testes.
Okay, so calling them names didn’t help either.
And, actually, Oliver wasn’t dull. And he was only a little bit annoying. And Alex was terribly annoying, but he’d done nothing but try to help me. Maybe, and I’d suspected this for a while now, I was fundamentally unhelpable. Because somewhere along the line, I’d turned getting ahead of the story into a lifestyle.
When Miles had thrown me to the tabloid sharks, I’d been completely unprepared, and the only way I’d survived was by making sure that there was enough chum in the water that they’d only eat what I wanted them to. It had only half worked, but by the time I figured that out, the habit was so ingrained that I was doing the same with people.
The truth was, things were easier that way. It meant whatever happened wasn’t really about me. It was about this shadow person who partied and fucked and didn’t give a shit. So what did it matter if someone didn’t like him? Didn’t want him. Let him down or sold him out.
Except he wasn’t dating Oliver—pretending to date Oliver—Iwas. And so, suddenly it all mattered again, and I wasn’t sure I could cope with it mattering. The door swung open, and for a biscuit crumb of a second I hoped it might be Oliver coming to rescue me. And that was precisely the sort of crap I wanted out of my head. Anyway, it didn’t matter because it wasn’t Oliver. It was an old guy in tweed who looked like Father Christmas if Father Christmas only had a naughty list.
“Who are you?” he barked.
I jumped. “Luc? Luc O’Donnell?”
“Weren’t you once up before me for public defecation?”
