Rachel took care not to let the anger burning in her belly make its way up to her face. She smiled gently at Laurence’s message, decided it was pointless to reply and plopped her phone back into her bag.
‘Big plans tonight, then?’ Jack asked her, without looking up from his computer screen. He didn’t want to meet her eyes, it seemed – and his evasiveness amused her.
‘Oh yeah,’ Rachel replied, ‘absolutely.’
Again, not a lie, as such. RewatchingTo All the Boys I’ve Loved Beforeon Netflix had been on her to-do list for weeks. She was genuinely looking forward to it.
For the rest of the afternoon, Jack was quiet. Chastened. Perhaps even a little sulky. Rachel couldn’t help taking pleasure in his prickliness – revelling in the knowledge that his ego had been bruised.
Not only did his discomfort feel like divine retribution for all the time she’d spent pining over him during their uni days, it also sharpened the outline of their relationship, which had become increasingly fuzzy since that Friday trip to Bourton.
Rachel had already realised that while Jack thought she had a boyfriend she felt safer – though from what, exactly, she wasn’t sure. Maybe from his flashes of flirtatiousness, which, in truth, his own marital status really ought to prevent. Maybe from her own feelings: her growing awareness that she was no safer from fancying him than Kemi’s gaggle of ‘Hot Harper’ obsessives.
They met to chat through their presentation, trying to ensure they’d anticipated all the awkward questions Humphrey might ask and then taking Isaac, Toby and Greg through the slides. Jack didn’t mention the flowers again, or the plans he thought she had. She deliberately didn’t ask him what he was doing, though she assumed he’d be having dinner with his pretty wife. In which case, she wondered why he seemed so morose.
At 5.30 p.m. precisely, Rachel shut the lid of her laptop, unplugged it and packed it away. She’d worked hard enough that she didn’t need to stay late, but she was also keen for Jack to observe her exit from the office – even if, under the weight of a hundred roses, this was less graceful than she’d have liked.
His ‘Have a good night’ was half-hearted, and Rachel tried not to interrogate why that made her so happy. Only when she was walking from her bus stop back to the flat did she feel her good mood begin to wobble. She was staggering, struggling to manoeuvre her gigantic box of blooms – the sight of which was making other pedestrians point and stare. To many, she knew, she was a Valentine’s Day success: one of the lucky women who’d received gifts symbolic of deep, sincere devotion.
The truth was that Rachel had almost dumped Laurence’s bouquet in a skip halfway between the R/C office and the nearest northbound bus shelter. In the moment, though, she couldn’t bring herself to do it. It wasn’t the flowers who’d insulted her.Theydidn’t deserve to die unloved, carelessly thrown away amid old vinyl flooring, broken light fittings, empty beer cans and the mouldering remains of kebabs.
Laurence himself was another matter, of course. If Rachel could have casthiminto a pit packed full of rubbish and dubious days-old meat, she’d have done it in a heartbeat. It was curious, she thought, that he could claim to adore her at the same time as making it so abundantly clear he believed she was a charity case. How else could she interpret his certainty that, without him, she’d wind up alone? She’dratherbe alone than with Laurence: that much she knew for sure.
Rachel dropped the hatbox onto the doorstep of her building, searched for her keys and pulled them from the bottom of her handbag. As she pushed her way inside, dragged the flowers down the hall and opened the door to the flat, she tried to ignore the voice inside her head that was saying:Surely you’d prefer secret option number three, though? Being with someone great?
The voice seemed to grow louder and stronger in the silence of the empty flat. Anna had plans with Will tonight, and she was obviously already gone. There was a faint whiff of her heady date-night perfume in the air.
Rachel sighed, shucking off her coat and scarf and setting her laptop bag down on the kitchen floor. She wandered over to the fridge to assess her dinner options. Two-day-old mac and cheese would do, she decided – and there were enough leaves left to make a decent side salad, even if the avocado and cherry tomatoes lurking in the crisper had seen better days.
In the door of the fridge was a mini-can of G&T – train-picnic leftovers from a couple of months ago, when she and Anna had taken a very windy day trip to Brighton. Without pausing to muse that slurping gin from a tin was definitely somewhere towards ‘pathetic’ on the spectrum of solo V-Day behaviours, she opened it.
It was only when she turned away from the fridge, having resolved to wait a while before microwaving her supper, that she saw it: a package on the table, wrapped in brown paper, her name on the outside in huge Sharpie’d letters.
What now?she wondered.
After several enthusiastic pulls on her can, Rachel sat down and began to strip the sellotape off the join between folds of parcel wrap. Once the package was open, she laughed aloud. Inside was a DVD ofThe Blair Witch Project– the only horror film she’d ever watched, and which only one person in the world knew had given her nightmares for a fortnight. With it was a packet of what looked like dog mess. Its label informed her that it was in factPremium Chocolate Poop. Written on the back of the packet was:Because I think you’re The Shit.
There was a card too, which she opened eagerly. It was disgusting: an A5 glitter-covered pastel monstrosity with a cuddly bear clutching a sign that saidHappy Valentine’s Day. The wordsValentine’s Dayhad been crossed through, however, and the wordTHURSDAYwritten in black marker across the bear’s snuggly stomach.
Rachel giggled as she opened the card to read the message inside. There were more crossings-out – a sentimental cookie-cutter message struck through in favour of something more personal.
Because it’s just another unromantic day, and I know how much you hate it. (Also because I’m hilarious.) T x
Later that evening, Rachel messaged Tom.
Rachel:So Valentine’s Day blows, as ever. But it turns out dog poo is surprisingly tastyThanks x
She added a photo of her half-eaten packet of chocolate.
A moment later his reply arrived.
Tom:Glad to hear itYou ok?
Rachel:Yeah, despite another grand gesture from Laurence …
Tom:WTF???!!!
Rachel:I’ll explain next time I see you … Headlines are: he sent an embarrassingly huge bunch of flowers to me at work, but at least didn’t turn up himself.
