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The girl – whoever she was – had walked off now, waving at Dom over her shoulder, leaving him, drunkenly swaying, alone. This was my chance.
I sidled up to him, touching him lightly on the elbow. I thought I’d play it neutral – I wouldn’t lie about having seen what happened, but I wouldn’t make it my opening gambit, either.
‘Hey,’ I said quietly.
He whipped round, his eyes glassy.
‘It’s only me,’ I added, holding out my hands, taking a step back. Bloody hell, what was wrong with him?
He squinted, as though he couldn’t quite believe that I was there. That was the thing with London, you quite often bumped into people you knew in the most unexpected places and scenarios. I’d seen my old voice tutor from LAMDA drinking a can of Guinness on the back of a night bus once. I’d even bumped into my dad in an itsu in City Road.
Dom put his hands over his mouth, breathing heavily into the palms of his hands.
‘You OK?’ I asked, worried now. Was he having some kind of psychotic episode?
Then he dropped his hands, brushed down his suit and smiled at me. ‘Wow, Jack. Didn’t expect to see you here.’
‘So it seems,’ I said.
We both looked in the direction the girl had staggered off in, although she’d seemingly disappeared into the tube already, out of sight.
‘Who was that?’ I asked him.
‘What?’ said Dom, looking as though I’d just crawled out from a hole. ‘Oh, you mean her? Just someone from work. No one special.’
‘That’s why you were kissing her, then, was it?’ I said, stepping to the side so that I wasn’t blocking the thoroughfare.
Dom laughed hollowly. ‘Just being friendly, that was all.’
This was ridiculous, I wasn’t blind and I wasn’t going to let it go like I knew he wanted me to.
‘So Theresa wouldn’t be bothered if she knew, then?’ I asked.
‘Mind your own business, Jack,’ said Dom, straightening his jacket. ‘What are you so interested for, anyway?’
I shrugged. ‘No reason. I was just thinking that if you are shagging around, you might just want to be a bit more subtle about it. Anyone could have seen you; you’re right by a busy train station.’
‘You know what, Jack?’ said Dom, walking off. ‘Why don’t you try taking a look at your own life first, yeah? When are you going to get a relationship of your own, eh, instead of constantly interfering in mine?’
I crossed my arms, looking at him, fascinated. He really was an arsehole. And in some small way, it made me feel better that I’d witnessed that, that I’d seen for myself that his life wasn’t the bed of roses he made out it was. I felt sorry for Theresa, of course, but she was a smart girl, she’d eventually work out what he was like, if she hadn’t already.
‘You going to Mum and Dad’s at the weekend?’ I shouted after him, unable to resist the opportunity to wind him up even more.
He waved his hand in response, refusing to look at me. He had the air of someone who’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t have been. Of a man who’d showed a side of himself he’d previously pretty successfully kept hidden. And all of a sudden it dawned on me why it made me feel so weird: I’d seen Dad like that before, all cagey, like he was covering something up. And it felt familiar and it felt wrong and it was clear to me now why Dom and I clashed all the time: he and Dad were too alike. And although it was a terrible thing to say about your own flesh and blood, I didn’t particularly like either of them.
