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Far away from me, too. Both Léa and Jerome still lived at home, neither ever had more than a five euro note between them, and Léa had about a million siblings. Jerome’s parents’ house was going to be the only solution as far as I could see. Michel would go ballistic.
Nico wolf-whistled, jerking his thumb over his shoulder. “Your hot date’s on his way.”
“Does he know you’re gay?” Jerome asked.
“Who, Nico’s Uncle Thibaut?” I let out a laugh. “Why do you think I run in the other direction whenever I see him?”
It was my turn to receive a face full of smoke.
“Yes. Charles knows I’m gay.” And it had elicited very little response, neither a flicker of interest nor a straight man’s polite wariness. I hadn’t known what to make of it, to be honest.
“You never know, you might be lucky. Maybe your Englishman fences with both hands.” Nico suggested. “Do you want me to ask him for you?”
I turned to see Charles walking towards the bar and let out a low whistle myself. With his pale skin and more formal clothing, he stood out from tourists and locals alike. Self-contained and serious, he looked very much alone. But oh, fucking merde he didn’t need to be. I was right here, ready to strip him out of that buttoned up shirt, run my lips across that creamy pale skin, kiss away the weariness from under his eyes and…
“You’ve got it bad, mon ami,” Jerome diagnosed, pushing himself from the table. “If you need any tips on how to persuade someone into your bed, I’ll be standing over at the bar.”
Nico snorted. “Don’t listen to him. He’s an amateur. Take advice from a man who really knows.”
As if about to demonstrate, he stretched out his long legs and his grubby shirt rose a little, exposing the bottom of the octopus tattoo inked across his lower belly. Mon dieu, if he’d been so inclined, I’d have been buried deep between those endless legs years ago. “I guess men are no different to women,” he added. “They need charming first. So for god’s sake don’t bore him with the whingy salt cooperative shit.”
CHAPTER 9
CHARLES
A fly on the wall would clock my fragile mental state and not only because of the bottles and bottles of pills lined up in the bathroom. The bigger clue was that I was meeting a guy for a quiet drink and casual supper yet had structured my whole day around it as if we were planning magic mushrooms in the desert.
Maybe my careful grooming and selection of outfit (black linen shirt and least loose jeans) would be more understandable if it was a date with a woman. But I hadn’t been on a date with a woman since… well, since the heavy charcoal shadows had come out to play and I’d fallen off the rails. And if I was honest with myself, it had been quite some time before that.
To put it bluntly, my sex drive had driven off, and as much as I told myself it was due to my new medications or that I’d become more picky of late, its foot had been hovering over the accelerator for the last ten years.
Like jealous lovers, orange wisps of anxiety prodded at the edges of my inner forest green. As I applied a squirt of aftershave for the first time in over a year, I reminded myself this was nothing more than a drink in the local bar with a kind and generous young man. So why was I trying so hard? Was it because he was young, and I didn’t want to be mistaken for his dad? I wasn’t that much older than him, even though my newly acquired grey hairs added a few years to my appearance.
Or was it because he was a young man, with silver dancing around his shoulders, and being in France and using my rusty French had woken feelings that had lain dormant for almost twenty years?
Slinging a sweater around my own shoulders, I gave my sallow complexion a final glance in the mirror, then pinched my cheeks to coax some colour into them like a heroine from a Jane Austen novel. Going out and socialising is good for me, and I’d be able to report back to Marcus with something positive for a change.
A group of locals surrounded Florian at the bar—some were the friends he’d pointed out from the other night. Spotting me first, one of them stood to make space at the table as I tried to casually saunter over, as if leaving the house with the express purpose of talking to people wasn’t a big deal. Taking a deep breath, I pushed the orange hovering behind my eyes to one side. Handshakes all round followed, and then Nico and Jerome left. An open bottle of local rosé stood in a bucket of ice between us
Florian poured me a glass. “Or I can get you beer? Or something else?”
“Rosé’s fine.” A glass of rosé was precisely what I needed to settle my orange nerves.
“We’ll have a quick drink and then go back. Papi will be wondering where his dinner has got to.”
Somehow, Florian seemed different tonight—still his usual beautiful self, but smarter.
“You look dressed up. Have you not been working today?”
A hint of blush stole across his cheeks and for a moment he seemed at a loss for words. “Putain, you’re the third person to comment.” He gave a light laugh. “I should wear proper shoes and clean jeans more often. It makes me wonder what a scruff I look like the rest of the time.”
“You look very nice both ways,” I reassured him, because apparently, I complimented handsome young men on their attire these days. “But what’s the occasion?”
“Oh, fucking merde.” He blushed even harder. “You’re as bad as Jerome and Nico.” His eyes slid to his drink, then around the packed bar, to anywhere that wasn’t me. “You’re the occasion. I smartened up because I was having drinks with you!”
“Me?”
Good Lord. Comprehension dawned. Cool, calm Florian, who had women tracking his every drag of the rake, who had the local copper drooling after him, who could probably name his price if he wanted to model underwear, had gone to the effort of dressing up for drinks with a nutjob like me? It was the funniest thing I’d heard in months.
