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You can tell Janie’s edgy enough to want to break the tension. She’s expressive enough to read from the off.
“I can’t believe we’re going to Hanley Hall. I’ve lived in Malvern my entire life and I’ve never once had dinner there. Not once!”
I know Ant is smirking. I see his eyes checking her out in the rearview mirror.
“I’m sure it won’t disappoint you.”
Janie’s fingers tap her knees, and I give her a friendly smile, keen to put her at ease. It seems to work because she smiles right back at me and takes a nice deep breath.
We pull up at Hanley Hall, and Janie scoots out before I can help her. It’s the girls who take each other’s arms as they walk towards the entrance, and Ant hangs back with me, following behind.
“What do you think of little miss pink, then? Want to get your dick wet?”
I hate it when he talks like this.
“She’s nice, Ant, but I only just met her ten minutes ago. Stop it with the language now, please.”
He laughs under his breath. “Get off your high horse, Ger. She obviously wants you to pound her, since she’s already shooting you doe eyes. Why don’t you stop with your uppity ideals and get your cock wet for once?”
I’m not going to rise to his disrespectful bullshit, so I ignore him and smile nicely at the restaurant staff as they show us to our table. Ant and I take our seats opposite the women and I get to see and appreciate Janie in full lighting. She really is a sweet girl, with a genuine buzz about her, but that’s what she is. A girl. She’s wearing a pastel pink dress that goes great with the blonde of her hair, but it makes the age difference even more obvious. She’s such a contrast to Cass in her deep, dark purple.
“It’s so cool to meet you both,” she says, looking from me to Ant. “I’ve heard so much about you.”
It’s me she turns her focus to.
“You do campaign work for G.A.T.A., right?”
Ant rolls his eyes when I nod, joking with a sneery grin.
“Please, for the love of God, Janie, don’t get him started on that before our starters. We’ll be here until three a.m. before he’s finished his initial monologue.”
Janie gives him a polite little giggle, but Cass doesn’t. She doesn’t laugh at all.
Ant’s grinning at me, and gives me an elbow, humour still rolling.
“We’d best get prepared for your go fix the world ranting then,” he laughs, and summons a waiter over. “A bottle of De Chante for the table, please. And a mineral water.”
“A mineral water for me too, please,” I add, despite the fact Ant gives me a silent scowl.
He wants me trashed enough to get my dick out for Janie, but that’s a long, long way off happening, no matter how many glasses of De Chante I down.
It’s Cass who brings the conversation back to G.A.T.A.
“Janie and I watched a presentation you did on your website. It was incredible.”
“Thank you. The one with the focus on sex trafficking?”
She nods. “Janie did a charity event for G.A.T.A. herself. A few years ago. That’s right, isn’t it, Janie?”
There’s no doubt about it. Cass and Ant both want me to fall in love with her friend, and from the way she’s blushing at me as she looks across the table, I’d say she’s further along the road to signing up for it than I am.
“Yeah, I did an event for G.A.T.A.,” she says. “It was a choir evening when I was still at sixth form college, at Worcester Cathedral.”
I smile, because I remember exactly the one she’s referring to. I was there with Jo, on the sidelines. I’d been one of the key organisers, bringing all of the colleges together.
“Which sixth form college?” I ask her, and she blushes harder.
“St. Margaret’s.”
I dig into my memory, which usually serves me pretty well. Ant says I’d remember how many leaves I’d seen in a summer with a moment’s notice.
“Didn’t you sing The Rhythm of Life?”
Her jaw drops before she answers me. “Yes, The Rhythm of Life.”
I smile at her. “It was good. Really good. Well done.”
Cass is looking between me and Janie in shock.
“You saw Janie sing?” she confirms and I nod.
“Yeah, I was at the event.”
The waiter comes and presents our drinks. I take a sip of mineral water and stay quiet, not wanting to dominate the conversation.
Once again, it’s Cass who directs the topic back to charity work.
“You’re one of the senior ambassadors for G.A.T.A.?”
“Yeah, I’ve been working with them for a while now.”
“Ant says you do really well.”
I shrug. “We all put in what we can.”
“Still,” she says. “You must be doing really, really well to end up on the our team page on the website.”
Ant laughs. “You can try to get Gerwyn to take credit all you like, Cass. He won’t go along with it, so don’t waste your breath.”
