CHAPTER24
2012
‘Alex, you’re not seeing Niall Doyle, are you?’
Seeing Tara upright on a Sunday morning after a heavy night out was almost unheard of. She’d gone out with some friends from her business course and crashed through the front door around 5am. Seeing that she still had her makeup on and that, given the visible smudge level, the rest of it was presumably on her pillow, Alex immediately felt glad that she’d chosen to have a quiet night in.
‘Seeing him? What, right now?’ Alex asked, looking around the living room. ‘Nope, he’s definitely not here.’
She heard Erin chuckle from behind her book, another housemate who had chosen to spend Saturday night at home.
Tara smirked. ‘Very funny, no I meant like dating him. I know you shifted the face off him in that club, and you had drinks the other week, but I just wondered if it was anything a little more serious.’
Niall Doyle was a six-foot-two, blonde-haired, third-year physiotherapy student that Alex had found herself locking lips with at Lillie’s Bordello one Friday night. This had led to an afternoon bar crawl around Temple Bar where he’d spent the entire time staring at her boobs. Still, Alex quite liked him and had arranged another date for the following week. She was looking forward to it. It wasn’t often that men who looked like Niall showed any interest in her. Personality wise, he maybe wasn’t exactly her type, but physically, well, she’d never dated someone with visible bicep muscles before.
‘Serious? Well, no,’ she replied, ‘It’s a bit early for that, we haven’t even done the deed yet.’
‘Oh good! I didn’t think it was. Just a wee casual thing then. Grand.’
‘Why?’
Tara smiled sweetly. ‘Nothing, just wondering.’
Tara never smiled sweetly. Alex heard Erin snap her book closed. She turned to see her glowering in Tara’s direction.
‘Tara…’
Tara didn’t reply, her face beginning to scrunch awkwardly as she deliberately avoided Erin’s gaze.
‘Oh, you didn’t!’ Erin exclaimed. ‘Please tell me you didn’t.’
Alex watched as Tara pulled her polo neck over her face. ‘Maybe,’ came the muffled reply. ‘Not on purpose.’
The penny finally dropped. Alex sat bolt upright on the couch. ‘Wait… Tara, did you shag Niall?’
She peeled back her polo neck as Alex felt the colour drain from her face.
‘Look, I’m sorry, I didn’tmeanto!’
‘You didn’t mean to?’ Alex replied, ‘What, was it an accident? Did he just trip and fall into your feckin’ gee?’
‘You know how I get on whiskey; I was absolutely rat-arsed! I don’t care what it says on the label, I swear that stuff is like ninety percent horsepower. And the club was dark so I didn’t even realise it was him until we got to his place, which by the way, smelled weirdly like mustard.’
‘Did you realise it was him before or after you didn’t mean to sleep with him?’
As she glanced at Erin, the look on Tara’s face said it all. She threw her head back and huffed in annoyance.
‘Look, under normal circumstances I wouldn’t have ridden him if he had wheels,’ she stated. ‘He’s not my type,andhe kept his socks on throughout. I did you a favour, really, saving you from a very underwhelming sexual encounter.’
Tara found herself ducking at the plastic coaster Alex fired in her direction. ‘Maybe I’d like to have found out for myself, you absolute arse. You’re so bloody selfish sometimes, Tara, always taking whatever you want and to hell with the rest of us!’
‘I do not just take whatever I want,’ Tara protested. ‘Wait, are you still mad that I ate your Pringles?’
‘It’s not about the Pringles!’ Alex exclaimed (absolutely still mad about the vanishing Pringles). ‘It’s not just food: it’s clothes, makeup and now apparently men.’
‘For God’s sake, I don’t take stuff, Iborrowit and I certainly didn’ttakeNiall Doyle,’ Tara insisted. ‘You said it yourself, you two weren’t serious.’
‘That’s not the point—’
