I am a walking example of what happens when you marry your childhood sweetheart and never learn how to flirt properly as an adult. The words are out of my mouth before I can shut it, and Hugh looks taken aback. Of course he does. Inside my head lives a lawless train of thought that charges right out of my mouth.
He’s about to answer me when he sees his friend across the cafe, coming towards us, saving us from ourselves. Jonesy hasn’t even reached our table before he makes me smile. He’s taken the relaxed spirit of this town and made himself the epitome of it. Surf shorts, faded neon T-shirt, thongs, shaggy brown hair, creases around his eyes. He and Hugh, who is always immaculately dressed, look so different that I struggle to imagine them as friends.
‘Mate!’ he says, hugging Hugh and pounding him on the back. ‘Good to see you!’
They turn to me.
‘This is Kate,’ Hugh says. ‘My colleague and friend—’
Just in case I wasn’t clear on the labels.
‘Kate!’ Jonesy says, warmly. ‘It’s so good to meet you at last!’
At last?
He pulls me into an enormous, enveloping hug that lifts me off the floor. When I surface from it, slightly breathless, Hugh is giving him an incredulous stare.
We sit down, Hugh opposite me in his white open-necked shirt and jeans, looking a little bit spectacular, and more nervous than I’ve ever seen him. Jonesy sits to my left and I feel like I’ve known him for years. He’s infectious.
‘Well, this is nice,’ Jonesy says, winking at Hugh, who shifts uncomfortably in his seat, looking like he’s rethinking this entire social event.
‘Hugh tells me you’re a screenwriter,’ I say politely. Writing. Safe, common ground.
‘He tells me you’re a writer, too.’
He does? ‘He exaggerates. I do love writing, though. Nothing published.’
‘Nothing yet,’ Jonesy answers, and I like him even more.
‘Do you go by a name other than Jonesy?’
‘It’s Andrew.’
‘And you two met at uni?’
‘First year,’ Andrew confirms. ‘We were eighteen-year-olds, living on campus.’
‘But not doing the same course, presumably?’ Hugh did economics as an undergrad. Explains all the spreadsheets.
They look at each other like they’re about to run a prepared script.
‘We met through a mutual friend,’ Hugh explains. ‘Shall we order coffees?’
Interesting.
‘Are you writing at the moment, Kate?’ Andrew asks.
I feel exposed. ‘Actually, Hugh is trying to convince me to write something based on my . . . recent personal experiences. I don’t know how much he’s told you . . .’
It’s awkward, every single time. I don’t want to make everything about the fact that I lost my husband, but if I don’t mention it early in a conversation, people invariably ask me some question that lands us all in excruciating discomfort, with me breaking the news as gently as possible while they feel horrendous about having put their foot in it and I’m forced to comfort them over my loss.
‘I told him about Cam,’ Hugh says.
‘I was sorry to hear it, Kate. Writing about it could be a good idea. Some people sit on their grief for decades. They let it close in their lives completely.’
I nod. Hugh turns a page in the menu sharply.
‘Sometimes they become such a slave to their grief,’ Andrew continues, ‘they won’t take risks. They pass up opportunities that are right in front of them.’
‘The eggs Benedict looks good,’ Hugh observes, conveying this fact to Andrew in particular, as if it’s imbued with a secret code. ‘What are you having, Kate? Smashed avo?’
‘Am I that predictable?’
He shakes his head. ‘Only where avocado is concerned.’
‘I’ll have the granola,’ I say.
‘To prove me wrong?’
Andrew sits back and watches us as if he’s taking mental notes for his screenplay.
‘Are you going to the festival?’ I ask him.
‘Yeah. You?’
‘Definitely. Can’t wait. I’ve never been. I’m so excited!’ I sound like a thirteen-year-old, rambling about seeing her favourite pop star, but I don’t care.
They’re both smiling at me.
‘What can I get for you?’ a waiter asks us, looking at me first.
‘I’ll have a latte thanks, and, hmm. Actually I think I’ll have the—’
‘Smashed avo,’ Hugh says under his breath, while I say it aloud. I ignore him. ‘He’ll have a double-shot long black, no sugar and eggs Benedict with a side of field mushrooms. Andrew?’
‘Short black and the granola, thanks,’ Andrew says, and the waiter walks away to organise our cutlery. ‘You two have breakfast out a lot at work, do you?’
We look at each other. Not really?
‘I supervise the young graduate who processes all of his business expenses,’ I explain.
‘And you forensically analyse them and commit Hugh’s breakfast preferences to memory?’
No. Actually, I can’t explain how I know this. I just know it. ‘This mutual friend,’ I say, diverting the conversation. ‘The one you met through at uni. Who was it?’
They both sit up straighter in their seats.
‘She wasn’t so much a mutual friend as a girl we were both interested in when we met,’ Andrew says.
‘Jonesy.’ Hugh’s warning is low, but clear.
I lean forward in my chair and smile encouragingly at Andrew.
‘It was years later when we met her again, volunteering for an NGO in East Timor. Well, she and Hugh were volunteering. I flew in to do a photo essay,’ he explains.
‘And?’ I press.
‘And . . . There’s not much to say. Hugh won.’
I glance at Hugh, who stares at the salt and pepper shakers like they’re the most fascinating objects in the world and plays with a long packet of sugar, evening up its contents like he often does out of nervous habit. I didn’t know he volunteered in East Timor. For starters.
Then Andrew delivers an innocent question that seems to hit me with the full force of a sniper’s bullseye.
‘Hugh’s told you about Genevieve, surely?’
32
He has not. This is her. The one who broke his heart. It’s written all over his face. And I’m wondering where she is now, and if she’s married and has kids, and whether they keep in touch, and why I’m hot and prickly just thinking about her. Am I jealous? Of the girl Hugh fell for two decades ago, when he was technically a teenager?
He looks straight at me, willing me to change the subject, and something in his expression makes me want to rescue him. I think it’s the way he’s chosen me, here. He and I are the team, not he and his friend of many years.
‘I met Cam at uni too,’ I tell Andrew. ‘What about you? Have you ever married?’
He laughs. ‘Twice. Both disasters.’
I smile and touch his arm comfortingly. ‘They say third time’s the charm, don’t they?’