Just You (4 page)

‘:-) Sorry, no.’

‘:-) No matter then, but if you think of anything to make me laugh…’

‘I’ll text you :-)’

‘Yeah.’

Why did it feel so good talking to him? I had this warm sensation in my belly.

Probably because I was sad–in the pathetic sense of the word–and I was heading toward becoming one of those old women with a cluttered house and a hundred cats. I was friendless and lonely. Yeah, I had Becky and Crystal at work, but we didn’t get together much outside work. We were not BFFs, we were just girls who got on okay in the office. I didn’t even know if they really liked me…

Whatever, I’d been on my own for a year, I could cope with being on my own.

‘What are you thinking about?’

I looked up and saw Justin standing, diagonally to me, on the other side of our block of desks. He lifted his phone a little. Probably telling me to answer.

I smiled, then looked down to text.

‘My boring day in the office.’

‘:-) Cool as long as there is nothing wrong.’

‘There’s nothing wrong.’

The guy had a sweet streak. How come I had never seen that before? I’d watched him befriend the new starter, Jason, back in the summer, and while Becky, Crystal and I were on good terms, he and Jason had been really thick… Like always talking…

He went over to the kitchen, probably to get a coffee. I watched him again. I loved the way he walked. Was that a crazy thing? To like the way a guy walked…

Watching how he walked had the quivering feeling tickling in my belly too.

‘Do you want a coffee?’

He texted me. I couldn’t see him. He was in the kitchen.

‘Yeah, thank you.’

‘It’ll be with you in a moment. Ma’am.’

‘Fool.’

‘:-) Just thought it might make you laugh.’

My lips lifted in a closed lip smile and a chuckle of amusement tickled in my throat. I really liked him now. How come that had happened?

~

I set Portia’s coffee down on her desk. It was the fourth day I’d made her coffee. She looked up at me, giving me one of those tight-lipped smiles of hers that implied she still knew I was way beneath her on the social ladder but she was thinking about letting me climb up the rungs a little. I went back to the kitchen for Becky’s and Crystal’s coffee. Yeah, I had started making them all drinks, so it didn’t stand out that I made Portia one. They thought it was my New Year’s resolution; to suck up and make them coffee. ‘Course they hadn’t actually picked up on the fact that I always gave Portia hers first. ‘Cause she was the hottest girl and the one I was chasing. Mildly. It was no big deal if our texting and coffee-making went nowhere at all–but equally, if it went somewhere… Well, I’d quite like to have another New Year’s Eve pool moment with her.

And she did keep texting me. Only about stupid stuff but she wasn’t cutting me.

“Hey, did you see this?” I caught sight of Becky dropping a magazine on Portia’s desk, folded back, to show Portia something on a particular page.

When I came back with Becky and Crystal’s coffees, all of them were clustered around Portia’s desk, jawing in catty voices about some celebrity gossip in the magazine, cutting some poor famous woman down to shreds for having put on a few pounds, laughing at the before and after picks.

I don’t know. I mean, I liked Portia, physically. She was seriously attractive. But her bit-of-a-British accent and her tipped-up-chin-and-nose, saying I’m-better-than-you-back-off, gave her a hard edge that was cutting. Maybe there was something there or maybe there wasn’t. She was brittle really. She had a personality that was like stone. Was she really interested in me? Would I be interested in that?

She glanced up before I could turn away and caught me staring at her. There was a really tiny twitch at the edge of her lips. Then she looked back down.

Shit, that little twitch in her lips made me feel a little twitch in my cock, running through my nerves. Lust gripped hard in my middle, as if a sudden punch winded me. Yeah. I could overlook her similarity to stone. Maybe it would be fun to go up against such a hard edge in a bed anyway.

I caught Justin’s eyes widening, and his lips tipped sideways just before he turned away. The smile that had involuntarily come at the side of my lips spread. There was something going on. I was sure he was making a play for me. Every day he made me coffee, but he made it for Becky and Crystal too. Yet he always brought my cup back first, put it down, and then went back for theirs. He was up to something. Becky said something and Crystal laughed. I laughed a little too, though I hadn’t heard what she’d said, my eyes and my attention were on Justin; watching him as he walked around to his desk.

I loved the way he moved. I mean, he had this relaxed way of walking but as he walked, you could see the strength of his character coming through. It was the way he carried himself. Justin was confident–comfortable in his own skin. He wasn’t afraid of being judged. He didn’t seem to care what anyone thought of him. If someone didn’t like him; I think he would just shrug it off. He wasn’t interested in impressing anyone. He was just who he was. No complications.

The main editor walked over to talk to him. It gave me more time to watch as he stayed standing.

While he talked with Keith, Justin’s hand came up and gripped the back of his neck. Something trembled low in my belly as I remembered those long fingers touching me.

I still liked the shape of his head, the curve of his jaw. I don’t know. Justin was just perfectly proportioned; it was like he’d been airbrushed in real life.

Keith said something and Justin nodded, his hand falling. Then Justin turned as Keith walked away. Justin’s gaze didn’t lift, he didn’t catch me watching. He was looking at his computer screen as he sat down, his lips parting to let out a short sigh as he sat.

That meant he was working on something complicated. I’d started really noticing the sound of his little sighs that drifted across the desk. It meant he was thinking, working something out in his head.

The thought of his broad lips parting, of how they’d just opened a little as he sat, had my blood heating, sensations teasing me between my legs. Had someone turned up the heater in the air-con?

“Hey. What do you think?” Becky hit my shoulder with the back of her hand.

I didn’t know what she was asking; I hadn’t been listening to them.

“Girls!”

Keith saved me anyway. He’d seen we were just talking. Becky and Crystal immediately turned away.

I sat back down; my mind spinning with unvoiced questions I wouldn’t admit to, my imagination fixating on Justin’s lips and his hands.

I don’t remember fixating on anything about Daniel, my ex. Daniel had always just been Daniel. We’d known each other for years before we got together. Our parents were friends. They’d pushed us together.

At the time, I thought I’d wanted that.

I looked up, but I couldn’t see Justin around my computer. The way he moved played through my head; his confidence, his simplicity. No secrets. No games. No disguises and false fronts.

God how refreshing was that.

Daniel had been too like my dad in personality. But then I hadn’t known what Dad was really like at the time I’d started with Daniel. I’d been blind still. Seriously, it was as if I had never opened my eyes until the night everything had gone wrong.

How had I not known Dad was cheating; and how had I not seen how self-centered and pathetic Daniel was. I wasn’t even sure he’d loved me at all. He’d loved himself, and he wanted to look good, and have the sort of influence my dad had. I was just part of that package. The girl who would look right on his arm. The girl whose inheritance would help fund the political career he was aiming for. The girl who knew how to act in that world… Except, I wasn’t going to play any part in it. I hadn’t even known everyone else was acting until my eyes had been ripped open.

I’d had to wake up and grow up quick.. I’d cut my ties with my parents’ wealth and their world and just walked away.

Dad hadn’t cut me off. My trust fund money was still sitting in an account. Untouched. It felt like blood money. I didn’t want it. I was making my own mark on the world. Doing what I wanted, not what they wanted. As far as I was concerned, I had no obligation to them. They’d lied to me, pretended they were something they were not. Just like Daniel.

There was another whisper of a sigh from the other side of the block of desks. I saw Justin’s arm lift and his palm settled on top of his head as he stared at the screen, clearly trying to work out in his head how he was going to do something.

Not like Justin.

Justin was different from any guy in my world back home. The world that now seemed like I’d dreamt it in a nightmare. Then I’d arrived in New York alone; determined to do stuff my own way. I’d armored myself with the sort of confidence Justin had naturally. It had not come naturally to me. But I think I’d managed to convince everyone that I could do this–that I could make it by myself. Yet beneath the person who tried to con everyone else into believing I was a thick-skinned, unknockable, independent girl without a care in the world, there was still that girl who had arrived in New York, alone and terrified of how she’d cope.

Justin was just Justin…

I was starting to really like him.

I looked down at my phone, my fingers itching.

I picked it up.

‘Stop sighing, you’re distracting me.’

I saw his hand fall from his head. Then there was a little amused grunt.

‘:-) I’m concentrating.’

‘Well concentrate quietly :-)’

‘Ha. Ha.’

I had on the sort of smiley face I’d texted as I looked back at my own screen, and tried to get my brain to focus on work again; not on the guy across our block of desks.

~

I sat on the bed looking at Justin’s number on my cell for about the twentieth time. I was so bored–and lonely. I was fed up of my own company Crystal and Becky weren’t free and… and it was my birthday. Mom and Dad hadn’t rung but then they were in Europe.

They were in Europe every winter, and always too busy to remember the day they’d had me. But why did I care?

Because a part of me was still the child they had rejected for half my life, and then scarred irreparably when I’d discovered why.

My thumb hovered over the call icon again. Should I call him? What would I say if I did? I’d sent him a text first, after we’d swapped numbers, a picture of a stupid looking dressed up dog in the park that I’d seen as I walked home, just to break the ice. We’d sent a few texts since, all just conversational. It was a huge leap from that to calling and saying do you want to come over. But I needed some company.

I slid the call screen off my cell and selected messages, then typed: ‘I’m bored.’

I sat waiting for five minutes, gripping my cell in my palm, staring at the thing. It rang out the first couple of notes of One Republic’s,
Counting Stars
, as it vibrated.

‘Are you :-)’

Shit, what did I say? ‘I want someone to talk to, and no one’s free.’

‘Are you hoping I’ll be that person?’

I breathed out, not even realizing I’d been holding my breath. Anyone would do today. I just wanted some company. ‘Maybe? I want someone to come over.’

‘Portia. Are you asking me over or what?’

My stupid stomach did a somersault. Did I care that much if he came? No. It wasn’t him. I just needed someone to spend my birthday with. ‘If you want to come’… I didn’t finish the sentence, I just sent it.

The reply came back immediately. ‘If you’re asking me’…

I didn’t reply; my courage failed.

A moment later there was another text. ‘Are you? Or aren’t you?’

I took a breath. My fingers were actually shaking as I answered. ‘I am. Will you? I’m lonely.’

‘Ha. Ha. That, I don’t believe.’

My hand was still shaking and I didn’t know what to say. At work they all thought I was a stuck-up bitch. I knew I sounded like that. I could hear myself… But… they didn’t know me.

My thumb lifted and hovered over the letters. I wanted to type,
please come
. But that sounded too needy. Sad and needy was the bit of me I hid from people. ‘Are you coming over or not? I’m not asking again. Do you want to watch films here?’

‘I’ll come. Yes to films. I remember where you live. I’ll be there in about an hour :-)’

‘Okay.’ God, I couldn’t believe how much lighter the pressure on my shoulders was, or how much my heart lifted, when I had no business giving a shit whether Justin came over or not. But I was twenty-two today. I deserved some company.

He arrived almost an hour dead from our last text, and even though I was expecting him, when the buzzer rang, telling me he was down at the front door. I jumped and then my stomach quivered with anxiety. God, this was madness. But it was Justin’s company or no-one’s, and no-one’s was a far worse choice.

I had no idea where he’d come from–where he lived.

My fingers were stupidly shaking as I pressed the intercom. “Hi.”

“It’s Justin.”

I pressed the button to free the door. “Come on up, I’m in the attic flat.”

Shit I didn’t even know if he knew that. Maybe he knew that? Maybe I’d let him up here New Year’s Eve.

My heart was going mad, I was so nervous; it pumped away with the pace of one of those crazy house music baselines like it was going to leap right out of my chest any moment. I twisted the lock and went out. I’d rather be in control of this–
this time
.

On the landing, which was decorated in a modern eclectic style of peeling paint and mold, I leaned over the banister, looking down. “Justin!” He was on about the third flight of stairs. He stopped and looked up.

“Portia! What’s up?”

I smiled. God, it felt so good to have someone here, I was such a sad case. My fingers gripped the wooden rail as he looked away and started jogging up the stairs again. I’d worked with him for a year, I’d never considered him anything other than a work colleague before a few days ago, but now my eyes seemed to be seeing something else.

He didn’t look any different though. His hair was cut dead short so he could hardly style it a new way, and he always had such a relaxed manner at work, he wasn’t going to be suddenly more laid back. Justin was Justin. But I liked what I saw. I mean, he didn’t have the obvious looks his friend Jason had had but he wasn’t at all bad looking and as he rounded the corner of the flight of stairs that would bring him up to my landing, his brown gaze caught mine. The guy had really nice eyes, like light shining through a glass of cola. He was kind of close to a young Will Smith when he smiled and definitely Jason Derulo standards when he didn’t.