The Curves of Your Lips Rewrite History
By S. Faith, © 2007
Words: 8,733
Rating: M / R (language, adult themes)
Summary: What more might have been said and done if a certain discussion had not been interrupted at a crucial moment.
Disclaimer: Not my characters. My story, though.
Notes: The seed of this was really born way back during the "Five Things…" story, but it took a prompt by another friend to spur me to write this (I asked her if it was okay if I took the idea and ran with it, and she said that it was my story that prompted her to ponder it in the first place, so…). And, um, it kind of got out of control.
No, I like you very much… just as you are.
The silence that follows this very simple, very profound statement, one that in an instant changes her perception of this haughty, unpleasant man, echoes more painfully than any sound could. She is too stunned to immediately respond in any way but slack-jawed silence, and even then the most she can manage is, "Oh."
"I must say," he continues after another stretch of quiet, "it's unsettling, seeing you speechless."
She realises he is actually attempting levity. She feels the corner of her mouth turn up in an imperceptible smile. "You have a very strange way of showing it," she says.
He furrows his brows.
"That you like me," she explains.
"Ah."
The door buzzer sounds again. With his little disclosure she has forgotten all about the taxi. He puts his hands into his pockets. "Taking the taxi home?"
"Actually, was going to meet my friends for a post—" She stops, biting back the word 'post-mortem'. "For a drink."
He looks down. "Oh. I—" He stops suddenly. "Never mind."
She is intrigued. "No, what?"
The buzzer sounds once more, this time longer, stuttering impatiently.
"I was going to ask you if I could offer you a lift instead, but…."
Her eyebrows shoot up in surprise, and she asks, "What about…?" She glances to the second floor, nods her head in the direction of the upstairs room where the other guests are still drinking coffee and talking, obliquely indicating the dark-haired woman monopolising his attention that night.
He closes his eyes, shaking his head as he looks down. "We brought separate cars. We're not together."
"She seems to think differently," she muses.
He looks at her again with that impenetrable gaze he has. "Maybe she'll think otherwise if you let me take you—"
And then she hears it: the loudest walk she's ever heard that didn't involve broad expanses of marble and giant collections of gold-framed art. His eyes squeeze closed momentarily, his lips purse, as if to say fuck. From the top of the stairs she calls his name, snaps her fingers three times in rapid succession as if he is nothing more than a lap dog, and spews some obvious lie about working on a case. What a bitch, she thinks.
She plasters the brightest smile she can muster into place and directs it to the brunette harpy. "He can't, Natasha. He's just invited me for a nightcap."
There's a quick moment where surprise washes over his face. Her reaction is about equal, looking faced for about a millisecond before putting her nastiest cloying smile back into place. "Oh. Well, Mark, call me when you're through." Although not spoken, with this charity case is strongly implied.
"I'll see you at the office tomorrow," he says drolly, not looking to Natasha at all. She can barely believe it even as she watches it happen: one moment he's looking serious, the next he's smiling broadly. She realises she hasn't seen him smile before, and more's the pity. Never has a smile transformed someone's features quite so completely, even after it fades.
He steps forward as Natasha's even louder retreat sounds across the upstairs floor. He pulls his overcoat from the coat rack and puts it on, then extends his arm towards the door to indicate they should leave.
When they get downstairs, the minicab is nowhere to be found. Obviously the driver grew impatient of waiting. "Great," she says with a sigh.
"Well, the offer still stands." He walks towards a silver car parked along the street, unlocks the passenger door, swings it open for her. She smiles to herself as she climbs in.
They sit in the car, take care of the mundanities of buckling safety belts around their coats. "So. Where am I heading?" he asks.
She thinks about what he was poised to ask before Ms Family Law appeared. "Do you know where 192 is?"
He looks momentarily surprised. "Do you live near there? I thought you—" he begins, then breaks off. "Oh, right. Your friends."
"My friends aren't at 192," she says, drawing her brows together. That was precisely the point.
He is as plainly confused as she is, and asks, "Then why do you want to go there?"
They stare blankly at one another for a few moments.
"Where are you taking me?"
"That's what I'm trying to establish."
"Let me rephrase. Where did you think I was going?"
"Home. Then I remembered you said you weren't going home."
She feels heat flood her face, admits, "I was thinking of a third option."
"Was there a third option?"
She goes silent again, facing forward. Bollocks.
"I thought you were going to ask me out for a nightcap," she admits sullenly as he turns the key in the ignition, starts the car.
He turns to look at her, surprise on his face lit by the surrounding streetlights. "I thought you were just trying to get Natasha out of my hair."
She feels like the biggest idiot ever.
"Which, incidentally, I appreciate," he adds, relief evident in his voice.
He puts the car into gear, slides away from the kerb.
"So." His eyes are on the road as he drives, then glances to her. He's got a smile playing on his lips again. "192, then?" he asks.
She smiles, nodding. "Seeing as you didn't ask me, and all."
It's a Sunday night, so it's kind of quiet. They take one of those high bar tables and he orders a scotch and soda. She slips her coat over the back of the chair, opts for a bloody Mary. While they wait for their drinks, she faintly hears her phone begin to ring. She's forgotten about her friends, which is understandable since she's suddenly on a date of sorts with Malcolm and Elaine's son.
"Excuse me one moment," she says as she digs through her handbag, flips open the purse, brings it to her ear.
"Bridge!" It's her friend Shaz. "Where the fuck are you?"
"192."
Before she gets a chance to explain Shaz shouts out, "I thought you told us the bloody Moroccan restaurant! Fuck."
"No, no, last minute change of plans. I'm having a…" Her eyes turn to him. She can't tell if he is amused or not; his face is masterful subtlety. "Nightcap."
Shaz is silent for a few pointed seconds. "Reeeeeeally?" she asks. "Who with?"
She feels her face heat up again. After all of her bitching and moaning about what a prick he was, she hardly wants to get into this discussion now. "Can we talk about this later?"
"We're coming to 192! We have to see your mystery stud."
"No, Shaz. Please."
There must be something very pathetic and plaintive about her voice because Shaz is quiet again. Blessedly she says, "Fine. Call me tomorrow." Then she hangs up.
She folds the phone closed, tucks it away again, then looks back up to him, fully expecting to find a disapproving look. Instead she finds a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
Before things start to get awkward, before she feels pressured to say something stupid for the sake of saying something, the drinks arrive, thank God. The server places them both near Mark's elbow, and he hands her drink to her. He lifts his scotch and soda as if to toast, waits for her to do the same, and they clink glasses.
"What are we toasting, exactly?"
"Let's drink to the bright side of being wrong about something." He raises his glass to his lips, draws the pale liquid in, not taking his eyes from her.
She takes in a long swallow, probably more than she should at once, and begins to cough as it dawns on her precisely what he's toasting to. "Sorry," she sputters as she covers her mouth, hopes she hasn't sprayed him with tomato juice. Classy, she thinks, rolling her eyes.
"Don't be sorry," he says with an air of gravity. "Not a whole lot of oxygen in a bloody Mary, after all."
She bursts out with a laugh as her coughing fit winds down. When her body calms down at last, she takes a more modest sip of her drink.
"Anyway. It was wrong to treat you the way I did," he said. "I feel I owe you an explanation. An apology."
"If your mother is anything like mine…" she begins. She understands. She'd been feeling a little resentful that day, herself.
He holds his hand up as if to stop her speaking, shaking it as if he were shaking his head no. "It wasn't all my mother, though that pressure didn't really help." She can see the muscles in his jaw tensing momentarily. "That time of year… really gets to me."
She's about to make a quip about him having something against Father Christmas, but realises the tone has changed subtly; he's not kidding around. "It gets to a lot of people. It's okay."
"I can guarantee you it doesn't get to most people in the same way it gets to me," he says, forcing a stiff smile. He looks down to the drink he's swirling, takes another drink, as if for courage. "I came home on Christmas Eve for find my wife in bed with another man."
Her hand flies to her mouth. "Oh my God. I had no idea. I'm sorry."
"No, I'm sorry." He meets her eyes again.
She stares at him. "You're apologising to me for that?"
"She was with Daniel Cleaver."
Her mouth drops open. She tries to say something but can't get the air into her words at first. When she does she stammers, "He told me you… with his fiancée…"
He shakes his head. "I'm sorry that I didn't say something sooner. It isn't something I like to talk about, but I thought with your prior…involvement with him, you had a right to know, and that you might understand better where I was coming from."
She's had time to breathe a few times, feels a little more composed. She doesn't doubt his words for a moment, because the behaviour, the lying, is so typically Daniel. "Not exactly the sort of thing to bring up in polite conversation. 'Hi, nice dress, and by the way, don't go out with that bastard; he shagged my wife.' Besides. I probably would've just thought you were being an arse."
She sees a genuine smile play on his lips again.
She struggles to think of some small talk that doesn't seem forced or pointless—she knew he was a barrister, he knew she was working in television, and asking after his parents was stupid as her mother gave her updates about them against her will. She sees her drink's almost gone. So is his.
"Would you like another?" he asks. "Since I have to be in court fairly early tomorrow and I still have some driving to do, I shouldn't, but…"
"Yes, thank you." She's suddenly curious about the mention of court. "Is it anything you can talk about, the case?"
As he flags down the waiter, he says simply, "Aghani-Heaney."
She stares at him like a third eye has randomly opened on his forehead, wonders if he's begun speaking another language.
He looks confused, too. "You work in television, on a current events program. Surely you've heard of this case."
Again she feels like the world's biggest idiot, blushes furiously. "Sorry, no. I'm afraid I'm consigned to the smaller stories, like… sliding down fire poles," she finishes up reluctantly.
He chuckles, tells the waiter to bring another for the lady. "My client is fighting extradition back to his home country. If he's sent back there, he'll surely be killed."
She gasps.
He continues. "What we're fighting against is the accusation that he and Eleanor, a British aid worker, only got married so that he could stay in the UK." He clears his throat. "Which is not true. If she didn't love him she wouldn't still be fighting to free him five years later."
"Wow," she says, a little awed. "When's the decision due?"
"We're scheduled to be done with proceedings on Wednesday. The decision could come as soon as Thursday."
"Wow," she says again. She sits back in the chair as her second drink appears. "Are your cases always so dramatic?"
"Human rights issues do tend to be a little on the dramatic side," he admits.
"That must be difficult."
"It's worthwhile work, but yes. It is difficult." He drinks the last of his cocktail. "Not a subject I like to delve too deeply into over drinks with a beautiful girl."
She doesn't know if his tongue's a little looser because of the drink or what, but she is surprised to hear he thinks she's beautiful. Her own opinion of him has changed quite radically since earlier that evening at the dinner party, between his admission of liking her, his disclosure of what really happened to fracture his friendship with Daniel, and his more relaxed manner, and she has to admit he seems even more good-looking than when she first saw him on New Year's. She wonders if she's been staring too long because he says, "Sorry if I've overstepped my bounds. Now I see how easily one can be afflicted by verbal diarrhea."
She looks away, chuckling.
"I meant it though."
She looks back to him. He has a very content look upon his face. "Thank you," she says with a smile.
"Will you have dinner with me on Thursday night?" he asks abruptly.
She blinks. "Thursday?" she repeats stupidly; Thursday is her birthday and she's already planned to cook for her best friends.
"Monday through Wednesday promise to be long days and I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to give you my full attention, but if the ruling goes the way I expect it to, it would be nice to celebrate with you. I know it's your birthday so you may already have plans, but I thought I'd ask."
She coughs on her drink yet again. "How did you know it's my birthday?"
He smiles slyly. "It's a date that's stuck in my head since the earliest days of our acquaintance."
She looks for any signs that he might be teasing her, but he's not.
"I do already have plans," she admits. Her thoughts fly a million miles a minute; thoughts of canceling dinner, or of inviting him to come over to join the party, but then the scrutiny by her friends would be unbearable…
"I understand."
He actually looks crestfallen, and she realises she did not suggest an alternative, as if she were dismissing him. "Oh, but I would like to." He smiles with relief. "I was only going to cook dinner for my friends. They won't mind if we just do it the next night or something."
"Cooking on your own birthday?"
"Why not?"
There's that gaze again, thoughtful and intense, and she wonders what's so odd about having one's friends over for birthday dinner. He then explains. "It's quite minor in the grand scheme of things, but I can't think of another woman I know who wouldn't expect to be taken out and pampered for her birthday, if she even deigns to acknowledge she has a birthday anymore."
She chuckles.
"If not Thursday, then maybe Friday…?" he says. She's kind of flattered that he is so keen to get a yes from her, which, when she thinks of her first impression of him, really amazes her.
"Yes." She has no problem with trying to rearrange dinner with her friends, and knows he would probably prefer Thursday, else he would have just asked her out for Friday. "Either would be nice."
He reaches into his suit jacket, into the inside left breast pocket, and pulls out a very expensive-looking pen. He pulls out the cocktail napkin from beneath his tumbler and writes something on it. "Here," he says, handing it to her. "I keep my cards in my attaché case, don't have any on me."
She looks at it. It's obviously a mobile number.
He continues speaking. "So you can call me when you know which night you prefer."
"Oh, right. Here, lend me your pen." She gets her own serviette, takes his pen (which is still warm from his own grip), jots down her own number, then hands both of them back to him. "In case you don't hear from me because I've lost your number."
He laughs. If he'd only been laughing, or even smiling, on New Year's Day, even something as appalling as the reindeer jumper could have been overlooked.
As she finishes her second drink, he speaks again. "Well, it's getting late. I should probably get you back to your flat."
She nods, remembering what he said about court the next day. "Yeah. We have our production meetings first thing in the morning on Mondays."
They both rise at once. She dons her coat, slips her handbag over her shoulder, slips the paper napkin into the safety of the handbag. He puts money down on the table beneath his empty tumbler, more than enough to cover their cocktails, then touches her upper arm to guide her forward, so that she might precede him out.
Even after he takes it away she can feel it.
"You're okay to drive?" she asks as they reach his vehicle.
He nods, opening the door for her again. "It was a fairly weak drink. Kind of misleading for them to have called it a scotch and soda. 'Soda that we waved a bottle of scotch over' would have been more accurate."
She laughs. "You should sue for false advertising." She then turns to look up at him, the car door between them. The look of affection in his eyes is one that she decides she really likes. "Thanks for the drinks."
"The pleasure was all mine."
He takes a step back, and she sits down in the car. He closes the door, and shortly after appears in the driver's seat to her right.
"So where am I heading?" he asks, then a grin tugs at his mouth. "And by that I mean, where do you live?"
She tells him where her building is, the name of the pub on the ground floor, and he immediately recognises it. The car lurches forward and they're on their way.
Too soon, it seems, they are directly in front of the Globe, and before she can say anything he's out of the car and opening the door for her. It's the sort of thing a girl could really get used to. She stands, digging her hands into her coat pockets, realising he's doing the same thing, universal body language for unsure and awkward.
"Thanks again," she says.
He nods. It's nice to see a smile so persistent on his face. "You're welcome."
"See you Thursday. Or Friday."
"I look forward to hearing from you. And seeing you again, of course," he adds quickly.
"I'll see you then. Oh. And good luck this week. I hope your client gets to stay. Love should win out, after all." Taken by impulse, she gets up on her toes and plants a peck on his cheek. "Good night."
He looks stunned, still looks stunned when she turns back to look at him as she unlocks her building door. "Good night," he says back to her as she enters the building.
As she scales the stairs, she is struck by the realisation that if his drink really was that weak, then the booze had nothing at all to do with his loose tongue. As she programs his number into her mobile phone, she hopes very much that her friends won't mind if they have dinner another night.
………
"Let me get this straight," says Shaz the next evening, in her best condescending voice, folding her arms across her chest. "You want to ditch us for a prick?"
She gives Shaz her sternest look. "He isn't a prick." She proceeds to explain the whole thing to her friends, especially why he'd been such an arse on New Year's, and the nice things he'd said to her after the dinner party.
Jude scoffs. "'Just as you are'? Seriously? Who says that?"
She turns that stern look on Jude. "He said that."
Tom puts his arm around her, pulls her to him and kisses her cheek in the manner of a tender big brother. "Well, my darling Bridgeline, it's your birthday and you should do whatever—or whomever—you want to."
She laughs. Friends.
"So what's the prick's name again?" teases Shaz. "Mark something, right?"
She tells them. Jude and Shaz share a look she can't quite define.
"What?"
"The lawyer guy? The one we saw on the telly today?"
"On the telly?" she asks stupidly.
"Oh, yes, defending this absolutely magnificent Kurdish bloke," begins Tom, his eyes glazing over with lust.
"For someone who works in the industry, you can be completely clueless, Bridget," teases Jude.
In a very small voice, she says, "Yes. That's him."
"Ohhhh," says Jude approvingly.
"By all means, then," says Tom. "And then when you make us dinner on Friday night, you can tell us all about it."
"If Bridget's Friday doesn't turn into a shagathon, that is," Shaz teases, smirking devilishly.
"Oh, please," she says haughtily, but has to admit to herself that it isn't the first time it's crossed her mind. If she tracks back, she thinks it first occurred when she brought her lips to his slightly bristly cheek, the fading scent of his cologne, aftershave, or whatever he had on immediately cementing her attraction to him. "Besides," she adds absently, "I have to work on Friday anyway."
The way her friends begin to laugh… honestly, with friends like this, she thinks.
………
She hears via the chatter on the studio floor that the Kurdish bloke gets to stay in England, and she's thrilled, because it means that Mark will be in an exceptionally good mood for their dinner together. She managed to avoid going to the courts to try to get an interview with Aghani, Heaney, and his lawyer, citing to her boss Richard conflict of interest. When he asked why, she hemmed and hawed and simply said that they were friends, because she didn't really want to get into the whole story with Richard. His eyes went momentarily wide with thoughts of using her to get even closer to such a big story, but she stood firm and refused to do it. Deflated, he stalked away and got someone else to do it.
A few minutes after she hears the good news, she digs her mobile out of her pocket and calls him to offer her kudos.
He says his full name by way of greeting.
"Hello, Mark," she says with a smile on her face. "It's Bridget."
There's a beat of silence. "Hello, Bridget." He seems very formal. Her heart sinks. He's changed his mind. He's going to cancel. She just knows it.
Uncertainly, she says, "Congratulations. I heard the good news."
"Thank you," he says cordially. "We're very pleased, obviously." He pauses to clear his throat. When he speaks again his tone is quieter. "I saw your people there trying to interview Kafir and Eleanor. I rather hoped… well, I was looking for you."
"Oh. I asked not to do to it. I didn't want you to feel obliged to give me an interview. Plus I didn't think I could be… um. Impartial."
There's another pause. "Oh, I see." She hears some rustling. "We're still on for this evening?" he asks.
"Of course," she says brightly. "What time should I expect you?"
"How's six-thirty?"
"Perfect. I'll see you then."
He's quiet again. "Thank you for calling."
"It's a big victory for you. Of course I was going to call."
"I appreciate your good wishes. I'll see you at six-thirty." After another pause, he says, "Happy birthday."
She smiles. "Thanks."
………
At precisely six-thirty, as she's finishing pinning her hair off the side, the entryphone buzzes. She grins. She had a feeling he'd be the sort to be punctual, so she made a point to be ready on time. Still in stocking feet, she races to answer it. "Hello?"
"Hello," says the deep voice on the other end. "Are you ready?"
"Just about. Come on up." She presses the buzzer to release the lock. A few minutes later, she hears a knock on the flat door.
She slips into her low heels, then goes over to let him in. "Hi. Come on in."
She can tell he's trying really hard to keep his eyes focused above her shoulders, but he slips and his eyes flicker down to the blue-black silk dress she's chosen for the evening. She smiles; he looks absolutely dashing in his dark blue suit, fine pinstripes running vertically from his shoulders down. He steps forward, breaks his gaze to turn back to the door to close it. She heads back up into the flat; she can hear by his footsteps that he's directly behind her.
She grabs her purse, puts her mobile and her keys in it, then looks around for her coat. She realises he's standing in front of where it's resting over the railing.
"Excuse me," she says, reaching around him. She looks up to him as she retreats, catches his eyes raising up from looking directly down the front of her dress. This amuses her beyond measure.
"You look stunning," he says in that understated way he has, watches her struggling to put her coat on. "Do you need a hand with that?"
"Yeah, sure." She turns around, feels his hands pull up the collar and settle the coat where it needs to be on her shoulders. "Thanks." She turns around to look at him. "Shall we?"
He's considering her as he seems fond of doing, then snaps out of it. "Yes, of course." He does that thing again where he touches her upper arm, as if to guide her forward and direct her towards the door.
As if practised habit he opens the car door for her, then closes it for her when she's seated. She watches him cross in front of the car to get into the driver's side, and it strikes her once more just how attractive he is, especially with the way the light from the building across the street highlights the planes of his face, the edge of his smile.
He settles in, buckles the seat belt, then turns to her, concern on his face. "Everything okay?"
She realises she's still looking at him, and turns away in embarrassment, bringing her hand up to shield her face. Realising it must look exactly like the nervous gesture it is, she instead brushes an imaginary strand of hair out of her eyes. "I'm fine. Where are we going?"
Nonchalantly he rattles off the name of a restaurant she's only ever dreamt about seeing the inside of, tries to keep her mouth from gaping open like a landed fish. "I presume that's acceptable?" he concludes, smiling a little bit.
"More than acceptable. Wow. Will they let me in dressed like this?"
"If they don't, I don't want to eat there anyway." She sees his eyes flit down again. She fights the urge to smirk.
They're there within a few minutes, time enough to catch the seven o'clock reservation. As he speaks in a low tone to the maitre d', her curiosity builds; she has heard this place is very hard to get into. When he turns back to her, she asks quietly, "When did you make this reservation?"
He looks thoughtful. "Whenever it was you told me today was okay for you. Late Monday, must have been."
"They had an opening on such short notice?"
"I find that my reputation precedes me," he says almost like he's apologising; it dawns on her that maybe he's kind of shy at heart, maybe even aloof, and she had only assumed him to be arrogant.
The maitre d' calls his name, leads them to their table. It's in the corner, lit indirectly by elegant wall-mounted lamps and a small candle on the table. Once they're alone, he explains, "I explained I didn't want to be in a high traffic area, or near the windows. It's been a very trying week and I could do with the privacy."
"I totally understand," she says. She looks down at the menu, knows she's in a really expensive restaurant when she sees there are no prices listed. "Have you been here before?" she asks.
"Once or twice," he replies. "Their food is quite good."
She stares at the offerings, wishes she hadn't gotten such a poor grade in French. "What do you recommend?" she asks, feeling quite lame.
"Hm. I've quite enjoyed the escargot in the past, but I'm not sure snails are your cup of tea." She's not so sure it's the candlelight alone that's making his eyes twinkle. "What sort of thing do you usually like to eat when you go out?"
She feels the flame of humiliation creep up her skin, feels decidedly low-rent as she answers. "Um. Hamburgers and chips. Pizza. Chinese food."
He chuckles. "There's nothing wrong with a good pizza now and again. So meat is all right?"
"Yes, absolutely."
"Any food allergies or intolerances?"
"No."
He pauses to consider. "Would you object to me choosing from the menu for you?"
Secretly she thinks it's a thrilling idea, but doesn't let her composure ruffle. "You don't even know what the prices are."
His expression changes such that he looks like he thinks she's gone mad. "What does the cost have to do with what I choose for you?"
She reminds herself that if he couldn't afford it, he wouldn't have brought her here. "Sorry. Yes. That'd be very nice. Thanks." She smiles.
The waiter comes to take their order, and she is enraptured by the sound of Mark's sonorous voice as he speaks French. A few minutes later the sommelier brings the wine, a pinot noir so scarlet it's almost black, and she finds it extremely delicious.
"I'm sorry if I was a little cold to you on the phone earlier when you called," he said. "I had this notion in my head that you would be there with the press, and—well, this sounds kind of foolish in retrospect, but I thought maybe you didn't come because you didn't want to see me."
She laughs lightly. "Why wouldn't I want to see you? After the Turkey Curry Buffet, maybe not, but certainly not now."
He's being serious. "I thought maybe you were having second thoughts about having dinner with me."
"If I didn't really want to have dinner with you, I would have said so on Sunday. I'm not that cruel."
She wonders if he's always so contemplative. "This is going to take some getting used to," he says at last.
"What will?"
He opens his mouth to explain but their meals arrive. He has ordered what looks like fish, salmon even, with a thin ruby red sauce. She begins to eat, discovers it is salmon, in fact the most tender salmon she's ever eaten, slightly sweet with a hint of lemon and cinnamon. She doesn't think she's ever eaten anything so delicious in her entire life. She's sure she looks fairly orgasmic. However, she hasn't forgotten he didn't answer her question.
He hasn't forgotten, either, or so she thinks: "I'm used to artifice, is all."
"In what sense?"
As he cuts into his salmon again, he's obviously thinking about how to word what he's about to say. He meets her eyes, then begins to speak. "In the sense that a lot of people aren't honest with me. They say what they think I want to hear and try to get or stay on my good side by any means necessary because they think I might be able to do something for them. To an extent I have to play the game as well, working with the people I do, being in the social sphere I occupy, but I buffer myself by putting up walls, keeping up my guard. You, on the other hand—I cannot say that you have ever been anything but honest and open with me, you don't really expect anything of me—not even an interview that would have been career-making—and I feel very at ease in your company."
She does not quite know what to say to this, looks down to her plate, overwhelmed not only by his frankness, but by what he has said.
"I'm sorry," he says. "I've made you uncomfortable."
"No," she says, looking up again, reaching across to place her fingers on his. "I'm really flattered, just a little stunned. We haven't really spent that much time together on what I would call friendly terms."
"No, we haven't, but even if I was being kind of a prat, I was paying attention during our conversations. To you."
The heat blooms across her skin again, takes her hand away lest he feel it on the pads of her fingers.
"Sorry," he says, returning his attention to dinner.
"What?"
"I seem to make you blush a lot."
She chuckles. She has the distinct impression than when he decides to open up to someone, he does so all the way, and he's decided to do so with her. It's both refreshing and unsettling. She's never had a first date with so little meaningless chatter in her life.
"I'm glad you like what I've chosen for us," he says, a grin on his face as he meets her eye again.
"It's very good," she says, swallowing the bite she's just taken.
"I can tell you think so."
Heat races across her skin again.
She notices her wineglass is low, and as if by telepathy the waiter is back refilling it for her. She mutters a shy "thank you" as she picks it up and takes another sip.
As he finishes the last of his salmon, he says to her, "Are you in the mood for dessert?"
"Oh, yes, that would be very nice," she replies.
"Any preferences?"
"Um. Chocolate?"
"Obviously," he says, grinning.
Shortly thereafter the waiter comes to clear away their plates, then says something to Mark in French. He nods and rattles off something that has chocolat in the name. The waiter bows at the waist and is gone.
She watches him gazing into the depths of his wine with a not uncomfortable silence, thinks about the day he has had, wonders about his client, and asks, "So what are they doing to celebrate?"
"Who?"
"Your clients. Aghani and Heaney."
He smiles. "There's a victory dinner being thrown by the partners at another restaurant. They're probably working on dessert right now."
Her mouth forms an O. "Oh, Mark. We could have done this another night, or we could have gone to the dinner there. You must have worked exceedingly hard on this case. You shouldn't have felt obligated—"
She stops speaking when his fingers brush along hers. "I'd much rather be here, with you, with peace and solitude and no façade required. I know how much Kafir and Eleanor appreciate what I've done for them. I don't need the public display."
She drops her eyes.
He wraps his fingers around hers and squeezes them gently. "You're being far too modest," he says tenderly, sweeping his thumb along her knuckles. He doesn't let go. "I'm just being honest."
She laughs lightly, feels her pulse racing. He hasn't been anything but honest with her, either. "That's something I need to get used to, I guess."
She looks to him again and he so thoroughly captures her gaze she can't even breathe. He's leaning towards her, slowly but surely, giving her a chance to object if she did, but she doesn't. She waits for the feel of his kiss with an anticipation she can't quite logically comprehend, but then suddenly, cruelly, he sits upright again, turns his eyes to…
The waiter has returned. She clears her throat, sits back in her chair, and sees what he has brought: two plates, both with chocolate cake, smothered in luscious chocolate glaze. One of the slices has a very small, very tasteful candle in the center of it, lit and flickering golden yellow flame. She can't help but chuckle.
"I'll spare you the song," he says. His voice is different, deeper, thicker, though he has a genuine smile playing on his lips. "Happy birthday."
"Thank you," she says. "It's the nicest one I've had in a very long time." She thinks for a moment, making the requisite wish, then with a short puff of air the flame is extinguished. Given what was just interrupted, what to wish for is rather obvious.
She picks up the fork and cuts off the corner only to hear him say her name. She looks up just in time to see him mere inches from her, then closes her eyes as she feels his lips on hers. She drops the fork against the china plate with a loud clink, is about to part her lips and kiss him back with no regard for their location or the few other patrons there when he pulls away.
She opens her eyes, which he looks deeply into. He reaches and grazes his thumb along her cheek. "Enjoy your cake," he says in that same throaty voice, sitting back again.
She regains her equilibrium. Slowly, with an unbelievably steady hand considering, she takes her fork back between her fingers, brings the cake to her lips. It's amazing, the best, richest cake she has ever eaten. She closes her eyes as she chews. "Mmm. God. That's got to be the best—"
She looks at him just in time to catch him looking down to his cake, taking off the corner in a fiddly fashion, and she swears he has flushed crimson. He brings the fork up, puts it in his mouth.
"What do you think?" she asks.
He swallows. "Exquisite." He sets the fork down, takes another small sip of wine, looks at her at last. His colour is returning to normal; however, he brings his fingers to his forehead. "I'm sorry. I think the day is catching up with me all at once."
"It's all right. You've had a rather hard day, I wager." She has another bite of cake. It really is exquisite.
The waiter appears and Mark says something quietly to him. He nods, walks briskly away as Mark has another bite. He then returns a few minutes later with a small black leather folio, sets it beside Mark, who thanks him. He reaches into his inner jacket pocket for his wallet to pull out a card for payment. "Whenever you're done, we can leave," he says, slipping the card into the folio.
"What about your cake?" she asks. He's only eaten about half.
"Don't have the appetite to finish it," he says.
They step into the cool night air, begin walking to the car, when he pushes his hands into his coat pockets. She thinks he's looking for his keys, but he seems to find something else instead.
"I almost forgot," he says, stopping. He draws out a small wrapped gift.
"Mark, really. You didn't have to."
"Please." He hands it to her.
It's about the size of an index card, a centimeter thick, wrapped in simple gold paper. She tears it open. It's a small framed photo, yellowed with age, of a young dark-haired boy, eight years of age at best, with a younger blonde girl sitting on his knee. He's wearing a suit and a shy smile; she's in a pretty floral party dress, toothy grin bright on her face. She starts to giggle. "Do you really remember us playing together naked in your paddling pool?"
"Yes."
She looks at it as closely as she can given the poor lighting conditions between streetlights, sees hints in the boy of the handsome man he will someday be. "I must have been too young to remember. Anyway, this is very sweet. Thank you." She looks back to him and is immediately concerned. He looks very weary, a little pallid even, though his gaze is just as intense as ever. "Are you okay?"
He's silent for a moment. "Better with the air out here." He looks around; almost, she thinks, as if making sure no one else is there watching. He then steps forward, slips his arm about her waist, draws her close, enfolds her in his arms. "Better now."
Without hesitation he kisses her, and she welcomes it with a soft sigh. She gets the chance this time to kiss him back, parting her lips, and when she does so the fierceness with which he claims her mouth surprises her as much as it stirs her blood. He's holding her ever more tightly as the seconds pass, as the kiss becomes ever more ardent; she can't help but press her little framed photo into his back as she returns the embrace, if only for support.
He breaks away from her, breathing heavily.
After a moment, he says quietly, close to her ear, "I shouldn't have done that." She wonders if there was something about her response that indicated she objected, but doesn't get a chance to actually say anything, because he continues, the tone of his voice more vulnerable than she'd ever heard it: "Once I did I couldn't think of anything else."
She realises he doesn't mean that kiss, but the first.
"It's all—" she begins, turning her head to look at him.
"It's not all right," he interrupts in a tone more like the one she'd grown accustomed to hearing before his admission of liking her. He steps away from her, looking down the street to the car. "I should take you home."
She thinks his half a glass of wine through dinner probably doesn't constitute legal insobriety, so she doesn't object and walks again just as he does. As they arrive at the car, she looks down to the framed photo in her hand. "It is all right," she says quietly.
"What?" he asks as he reaches for the door handle, turns around in time for her to grasp his hand.
"I said it is all right," she repeat, lifting her chin defiantly. "You aren't the only one who gets to decide, you know." With the heels on she has a little extra height, so it takes less effort to get up on her toes. Returning the favour by kissing him gets to be a little more of a surprise that way.
He says her name between kisses, and she pauses long enough to hear what he so obviously feels the need to say. "I don't want to sleep with you," he says in a rough voice.
She stops dead in her tracks, stepping back onto her feet. He opens his eyes, clearly realises his faux pas immediately. She's surely looking at him with a wounded expression.
"Yet," he amends quickly; she can see the bloom of embarrassment flooding his face. "I don't want to sleep with you yet."
She blinks, then smiles, then begins to chuckle. "Nice save."
Thankfully he does the same.
They take their seats in the car. As he drives, the silence is easy; she places her hand over his as it rests lazily on the gear shift. In short order they are approaching her building. "It's just as well," she says resignedly.
He slides in along the kerb, puts the car in park. "What?"
"That you don't want to sleep with me yet." She looks to him with a devilish grin. "I'm not that kind of girl, anyway, sleeping with a man on the first date."
"Well. We have to have our standards, I suppose." He turns his hand over, entwines his fingers with hers, but he's smiling. "And you have to work tomorrow, don't you?"
She nods. "See? Wouldn't work out."
"Shall I walk you upstairs?"
"Better not." Because if he does she can't be responsible for her actions. Logically she knows it is too soon… but with the night she's had, the connection they've formed, and the kisses they've shared, she really, really wants him.
"Probably right. May I call you tomorrow?" he says.
"Yes," she says in a ridiculously demure voice.
"Well. To tomorrow then." He leans forward and kisses her goodnight.
When she gets up to her flat, she looks out onto the street, sees he's still parked down there. She pulls out her mobile and calls his number. Out of sheer habit, she supposes, he answers with his full name.
She giggles. "I'm safe and sound in my flat."
"Oh. Good night, then."
"Good night."
They disconnect almost simultaneously, and the car glides soundlessly from the kerb and off into the night.
She's still holding the little frame with a death grip, and she walks directly into her bedroom, setting it on her nightstand along with the phone, because it's the sort of picture she wants to see first thing in the morning and the last thing at night. She feels like she ought to call Shaz or Jude or even Tom and gush about the evening, but an even stronger feeling wants her to keep it all to herself, to cherish it like the precious thing it is. So she does.
As she takes off her makeup, brushes out her hair and puts on her pyjamas, she catches her reflection in the mirror. She's smiling without conscious thought in such a way that if she saw it on someone else she would think it was insufferable. She takes comfort in it as much as it she finds it alarming, because it would seem her mother was right, after all.
She sets her alarm for the morning, switches off the lamp on the bedside table, then settles in to sleep, holding the second pillow close to her chest, imagining what it might be like to curl up to him, to drift off to sleep in his arms. Soon afterwards, due in large part to these thoughts, she falls into a very contented slumber.
………
She awakes to the sound of a buzzer, and for a panicked moment thinks her flat must be on fire. She glances to her clock. It reads one-fifteen; she knows she hasn't grossly overslept because it's still pitch black around her. She tries to blink her eyes into focus as she switches on the light, crawls out of bed, trips into her slippers and stumbles out of the bedroom, waiting for the sound to return.
It does. It's her entryphone.
She picks it up, clears her throat. "It's after one. You'd better be bleeding out of your eyes, or George Clooney," she grumbles in a sleep-drunk voice.
There is no reply at first, then a tentative, "Neither."
Her mind races. "Mark?"
"I'm sorry, obviously I woke you," he continues penitently. "But I couldn't sleep and my feet brought me here."
"No, don't worry about that. You must be freezing. Come on up." She presses the buzzer to let him in before remembering she's dressed in sheep-print flannel pyjamas and not wearing a lick of makeup. Shit.
She finds the robe she hasn't worn in months, a plain but rich brown (though very warm) overly-large chenille one she received as a gift from a well-meaning aunt who had no concept of either fashion or what size she actually wore. She hears a quiet knock at the door, and she goes to answer it.
"Hi," she says, smoothing her hair down with her fingers as she moves to allow him into the flat, then wrapping her arms tightly around her own waist to keep the ridiculous pyjama print hidden. "I guess I should have been a little bit more specific about saying you could call me 'tomorrow', you being a lawyer and talented at finding loopholes and all."
He smiles, even chuckles a little. "Everything about today… well, as tired as I should be, my mind is wide awake."
"You can come in, take off your coat…" She passes him and heads up into the flat. He follows. "Want something to drink? I have Bailey's, wine…"
"Thank you, no."
She turns back to see he's shrugged off his coat. He's wearing casual trousers and a burgundy jumper, both of which are slightly disheveled and don't quite match each other. He puts his hands in his pockets, looks up to her slightly shyly with an expression for all the world like that eight-year-old boy's from the nightstand photo. "And as my brain was racing and happily churning thoughts a million miles a minute, it occurred to me. Another loophole, if you will."
She raises her eyebrow.
"Tonight? Not technically a first date. We went out for drinks after the dinner party."
He's right. She swallows hard, thinking it was something of a miracle that he still wanted her despite the unkempt hair, blotchy, makeup-free skin and the opposite-of-sexy pyjamas. "I thought you didn't want to sleep with me yet," she says, her voice straining to be light.
He comes up near to her. "Well, someone wise once reminded me that I wasn't the only one who got to decide. Far be it from me to be selfish." He puts his hands on her shoulders, presses his nose into the hair at her temple then feels him plant a kiss there. Her eyes close; she releases the front of the robe to put her hands on his arms. Softly he says, "And seeing as I still couldn't get you out of my thoughts some three, four hours later, I also thought it best to follow the advice of Oscar Wilde." His hands reach under the folds of that robe, steal around her waist.
"Which is…?" she whispers, bringing her trembling hand up, drawing her fingernails over the short hair at the nape.
"'The only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.'"
She has a flippant reply on the tip of her tongue about the undoubted genius of that venerable writer, but he steals it away before she has a chance to say it.
………
The alarm rings for the fourth time that morning. A solitary hand emerges from beneath the duvet and slaps hard down on the top of the clock, silencing it, before retreating back under the covers accompanied by indistinct grumbling. She feels the bed beside her move. A hand slips over her bare hip to rest on her stomach; he curls up to her back, places a kiss on the back of her shoulder, the scratch of morning stubble pleasantly rough against her skin.
She closes her eyes, sighing softly. This is much better than the pillow.
"Do you actually plan on going to work today?" he says quietly, teasingly. "Because I think I can make a pretty strong argument for playing truant." She can feel that strong argument against the back of her thigh as his thumb brushes across the skin on the lower side of her breast.
"There's a bit of a problem," she says.
"Hm?" he asks, nuzzling into her neck.
"I can't call in without a phone. And the phone—"
"You will find beside your clock, next to the framed photo," he says without missing a beat.
She looks up. He's right again. Sharp, this one.
She turns over to face him, and though he looks scruffy, not nearly as nicely groomed as he usually is, the sweet, lopsided grin on his face more than compensates for those social niceties. She thinks of the day stretched out ahead of them as she leans in to kiss him, and wonders if she can beg off with her friends again. She hasn't bought a single ingredient for dinner, and she doesn't foresee much shopping in her future.
Millimeters from meeting his mouth, he says, "Don't you want to call?"
"They're used to me being late," she replies.
She arches forward, takes his mouth while he's chuckling. He's not chuckling for long.
………
Her mother being right is not nearly as bad as when her friends are right, and when she finally talks to them, they're intolerable.
The end.
Notes:
The full quote is: "The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history."—Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray, chapter 20. The portion I used for the title made me think of this story being alternate universe, and of how Bridget reacted to seeing him smile for the first time in it. By the way, Mark's quote comes from the same book, chapter two.
The name of the recipe found online for their dinner is fried fillet of salmon in red-wine sauce, and dessert is largely based on fondant glacé au chocolat noir. I can't post URL references here, though.