After he’d gulped his way through a McFlurry, he trailed her around a painfully expensive shop which claimed to sell handbags but had only about eight of them on the starkly bare shelves.
‘This one?’ he tried, examining a mulberry-coloured thing with short, hooped straps and a tiny flap on the front with a big gold catch. ‘Mind you, if you are planning on shopping for luxury goods while you’re away, you can’t do any better than a trip to St Gallen, lovely little stores, all the designers and…’
‘There’s no price tag on this,’ she said, interrupting his weird travel blogger monologuing.
Who was he trying to kid? This was Murray McIntyre, the boy who’d devoured Heat magazine for celebrity gossip and made her go with him to see Harry Styles in Glasgow, where they’d worn matching outfits and they’d both screamed themselves hoarse when he sang ‘Kiwi’ as an encore. He might try to hide his insecurities under this pretentious act, but he was still her twin brother and he couldn’t bluff his way out of telling her what the hell was wrong.
Having had enough, she snatched the – admittedly very nice – bag from him, dumping it back on the shelf and, even though he was mortified, hauled him from the store under the cool glare of the shop assistant.
‘That’s it!’ she snapped, when they hit the bright lights of the concourse. ‘What is up with you?’
‘I’m totally fine.’ He leaned back on the glass barrier with a crooked arm, glancing down at the shoppers and fountains on the floor below. He tried crossing a sockless ankle but failed entirely to pull off the pose of ‘unbothered and fabulous’, appearing only slightly daft and utterly transparent to the person who knew him best in all the world.
‘Is it because I’ve accepted the job? I did say if it made you upset in any way, I wouldn’t touch it.’
‘I know, and I told you not to be stupid. Of course I’m not upset about that. I promise.’
‘You’ve been acting strange ever since you got back, and I just cannot with you right now. I need Murray, not this bougie international playboy thing you’ve got going on.’ She held up the fancy shopping bags he’d forced upon her – all lovely stuff, but she’d have been happy travelling in her old faves from the charity shop.
His face fell. Good. She was getting through to him in his delusion.
She aimed her last shot. ‘A playboy who’s been sleeping all day and prowling between the fridge and the telly all night, and who’s putting away mall snacks like they’re about to be banned! Just, stop. Breathe. Tell me what’s wrong. Please.’
His expression cycled through affronted, then irritated, before landing on defeated.
‘Tell me.’
With a heavy sigh he mentioned in a sorry voice that he’d spotted a Krispy Kreme on the way in and she should probably follow him.
Back in their mum’s car in the multi-storey and with an hour left on their ticket, having returned all the unnecessary clothes he’d charged to a shiny gold credit card for her, they lifted the lid on the original glazed dozen.
‘Thing is,’ he told her between chews, fully dropping any charade of being dignified at this point. ‘There’s some stuff you should know, about Switzerland. My life there… it’s not quite as high-flying as you’ve probably imagined.’
‘What are you telling me?’ she said gently, biting her own donut, her legs curled beneath her on the driver’s seat. ‘Your luxury life in Switzerland has been a big swizz?’
‘Well…’
‘Oh my God, it has?’
‘It’s true I had an apartment and everything. That came with the contract.’
‘Right?’ She waited.
‘Only, I shared that flat with three other guys and, I don’t know if you’ve flat shared with a bunch of straight Dutch and German environmental engineers before, but there was a lot of bro behaviour. Crunches on the living room carpet, that sort of thing? Squats and hundred litre bottles of water downed all day long, and so much sliced cheese for breakfast and 6 a.m. before half marathons and, oh my God, the sports kit tossed everywhere!’
Ally was beginning to see his problem. ‘Bro overdose?’
‘It was too much! I just wanted to crash in front of Love is Blind and eat my snacks in peace.’
‘Okay, so what happened?’
‘Well, I got friendly with someone.’
‘Andreas?’ Ally said matter of factly. ‘I know. He was the one ringing me looking for you, remember?’
‘Well, he asked me to move in with him and of course I jumped at the chance. He has a seriously nice apartment.’
‘The one you sent us photos of? Pretending it was yours?’
