the same ring to it when you’ve just been arguing the toss with a Sevillian pony and trap driver over five Euros.
‘Honestly, you shouldn’t,’ I murmured, clutching at his arm and feeling very feminine all of a sudden. Maybe they put something in the air conditioning to make you more susceptible to romantic gestures, I thought to myself.
‘But I want to,’ he said, pointing the sale girls towards a delicate silver ballpoint pen. ‘And I’m going to.’ The girl nodded and took the pen away.
I looked away, smiling happily. And slightly tipsily. I could really get used to this kind of treatment quite quickly, but before I did, I really really had to talk to him about slowing things down. It wasn’t fair to accept expensive gifts and lavish dinners when I was still feeling guilty about having slept with him. But I didn’t want to offend him.
‘I just need to nip to the ladies’ room,’ I whispered as the sales girl appeared with my beautifully wrapped parcel. Oh, the white ribbon against the stiff eggshell cardboard bag. It made my heart leap right into my mouth.
Tyler nodded and took the gift bag. ‘I’ll wait outside, I have a couple of calls to make.’
The bathroom was every bit as beautiful as I had expected, but I was so desperate, I would have taken a hole in the ground. Oh the relief. Washing my hands, I took a moment to think about the Tyler situation. I didn’t know if it was the pheromones I was convinced Tiffany were pumping into their store or possibly the champagne that was still raging around my system, but it struck me that I was taking the Tyler/Alex thing altogether too seriously. Jenny was right, we were just having fun, Tyler had bought me a pen, not an engagement ring, and Alex and I had only been on one date! There was no need to say anything to Tyler right now except thank you very much. I would have to be crazy to knock back a generous, thoughtful (rich, hot) man like him for no reason. Besides, he had seemed very comfortable in Tiffany’s, maybe he bought a lot of gifts for his friends. It would be rude of me to make a big deal out of it. After all, it was just a pen. My mind made up to ask Tyler out for dinner for Thursday night, I went back downstairs. It would be totally straight forward, I told myself. I would ask him if he would like to go out, and if he were to ask me if I’m seeing anyone else, I’d say yes. We’re just dating, just a notch above friends really. Friends with benefits in fact, I’d read all about that and it seemed fine.
Resentfully, I left Tiffany’s and looked for Tyler. For some reason, the sun didn’t seem to leave him hot, sweaty and lobster red like everyone else, but glinted off his hair and accentuated his tan. He was the Kentucky Derby racehorse to my Black pool seafront donkey. Eeyore.
‘There you are,’ he said, handing me the bag and kissing me on the cheek. ‘Real sorry but I’ve got to get back to the office. Something’s come up that I have to deal with.’
‘Oh, I hate when that happens,’ I joked feebly. Now or never, time for me to propose my first ever date. ‘Do you want to go to dinner with me on Thursday?’ I garbled.
‘Sorry?’ he asked, sliding a pair of expensive-looking sunglasses out of his jacket pocket.
‘Thursday night?’ I tried more slowly. ‘Would you like to go for dinner with me?’
‘Oh, I can’t make Thursday,’ he said, looking around for a cab. ‘What about Wednesday?’
‘I can’t make Wednesday,’ I said, really hoping he wasn’t going to ask me why. ‘Tomorrow?’
‘How about Saturday?’ he suggested. ‘My week is pretty crazed. We could do a picnic in the park? It might be a little busy but it’s always fun.’
Before I could really give a yes or no, he pecked me on the cheek (it was definitely only a peck) and jumped into a taxi slowed by traffic, whilst making the universally acknowledged ‘I’ll call you’ sign. I waved goodbye and watched him pull off, already on his phone.
‘I don’t think that’s a bad sign,’ Jenny said through a mouthful of lasagne. I’d demanded we stay in and cook that evening, much to her disgust, but she seemed to be packing away the meal ‘we’ had made fairly quickly. ‘He offered Wednesday, you couldn’t make it. Five days isn’t really that long between dates, especially when you’ve only just started seeing each other. Now make with the pen!’
I’d refused to show Jenny the pen until we’d discussed the million different interpretations of Tyler’s actions. The invite to lunch–good. He could have asked anyone but he’d invited me. The trip to Tiffany–very good whichever way you looked at it. The picnic suggestion–sweet, definitely a date thing, not a friend thing. The distracted goodbye–probably just concerned about work, I was reading too much into it.
‘I just thought maybe, I don’t know, he’d want to see me before the weekend,’ I shrugged, stretching the mozzarella between my knife and fork. ‘After last night and everything.’
‘What, you’re so hot in bed you thought he couldn’t wait for a second helping?’ Jenny smiled, shovelling her pasta.
‘Technically it would be his fourth.’ I stuck my tongue out and brought the Tiffany bag out from its hiding place. ‘And no, I don’t think that, I just, I don’t know. Maybe it wasn’t as great as I thought. I suppose I’m really rusty.’
‘You can’t be that freaking rusty!’ Jenny squealed, ripping the tissue paper out of the bag and holding up a gorgeous white gold lariat chain with a diamond-studded star on one end.
‘Where’s my pen?’ I gasped, staring at the chain, not daring to touch it. ‘Did I steal someone else’s bag? I wasn’t that drunk!’
‘The pen’s in here too,’ Jenny said, emptying the bag out onto the counter with a clatter. I winced, watching the pen crash out of its pouch and onto the work surface. ‘There’s a note, read the note, read the note!’
I took the slip of paper and started to read.
‘OUT LOUD!’ Jenny shouted, giving me a drum roll.
‘A shooting star for my shooting star. Tyler,’ I read. It was so romantic. He must have—
‘Stop thinking, start talking!’ Jenny yelled, grabbing the note.
‘He must have gone and bought it when I was in the bathroom,’ I breathed. I had been completely bowled over by the pen, but this? ‘I can’t believe he did this. I should call him.’
‘Text,’ Jenny said, still holding the necklace. I felt that if I took it from her it would melt away into thin air. ‘You don’t want to overdo it, you’re not seeing him until Saturday, you should text. Keep it short and flirty, “Thank you, can’t wait for you to unwrap your present on Saturday,” something like that.’
‘Jenny!’ I said, still transfixed by the sparkles. ‘I can’t say that. It’s too much, I should just say thank you or something.’
Jenny pulled a face.
I pulled a face.
Jenny pulled another face, snatched the phone out of my hands and sprinted into the bathroom.
‘Jenny, you cow, give me my bloody phone,’ I shouted through the door.
Emerging triumphant, Jenny handed me the phone. ‘What would you do without me, doll?’
‘Tell me you didn’t?’
‘Now is so not the time to be coy, honey.’ Jenny sauntered back through to the living room and dropped onto the sofa, dipping into an open bag of Doritos.
I hardly dared look in my sent messages, but since it was done … ‘Hey, loved my present, maybe I’ll have a surprise for you to unwrap soon, Angela xox’. I shook my head while Jenny giggled, peeping over the back of the sofa.
‘Honestly, it’s not nearly as slutty as I thought it would be,’ I sighed, setting down the phone and shoving Jenny up the sofa.
Full of food and vicarious romance, she eventually