Undeniable (10 page)

Spencer jumps down and then grabs my hand and pulls me down too. ‘Let’s go out.’

My heart lurches.

‘You mean like boyfriend and girlfriend?’

He’s still holding my hand, but his eyes have gone quite wide. ‘Er, I meant to a bar.’

‘Oh, I thought so.’ I try to sound casual but it comes out all squeaky.

He raises an eyebrow. ‘Did you?’

‘No.’

‘Brilliant.’

He’s got a very amused expression as we head away from Trafalgar Square and towards Soho. I drop his hand and fold my arms and keep telling him to shut up, even though he’s not
actually saying anything, just looking at me in a really annoying way.

My heart is thumping against my ribcage. As certain as I am that I don’t want to be someone’s girlfriend, at this moment all I want is for him to kiss me.

We go to a bar where some of Spencer’s housemates are and it’s next to a place where I think I spot some actual naked women. Spencer tells me to stop ogling, but I reply that
I’m not ogling, just curious. You don’t get much nudity back home, except sometimes at the outdoor swimming pool, but that’s usually accidental.

There’s Ravi and his brother Ajay, and Sam with his girlfriend – also called Sam and who wears massive glasses that might not have glass in them too. They are all ordering shots and
because I’m hanging out with a load of twenty-year-olds with beards (except for girl Sam), I don’t get asked for ID.

I only remember to call Granny and tell her I’m staying at Spencer’s when we are inside the bar and I can’t really hear her properly. I’m sure it’s fine though
– Granny’s really laid back and knows how it is. She moved to London when she was eighteen.

Spencer’s friends seem impressed with my crazy dancing. We dance as a group, but I’m always close to Spencer and we keep brushing against each other. I catch his eye and it’s
like there’s a charge between us. An unspoken, uncertain thing that’s pulling at my chest.

Max and I had our first time all planned out. It was going to be perfect. My parents and sister were away. I had made my bedroom look all nice with candles and the nearest I
could get to rose petals (feathers from the feather boa I wore at my sixteenth). Mia and I had been on a highly secret mission to the supermarket to buy condoms and Maltesers. The Maltesers
weren’t anything to do with it – we just didn’t want to only be buying condoms – although I did wonder if they might be useful for regaining our strength afterwards. When I
said that to Max, he looked worried and told me not to expect too much.

Almost as soon as my family had gone, Max (who had been hiding behind a tree) was at the door. I opened it nervously.

There he was. Holding a cuddly pig. He looked more nervous than me, even though he’d sort of done it before with his previous girlfriend, Fiona who I don’t like.

‘I had a bit of time to kill so I went to the arcade and won you a pig,’ he said.

I grabbed him by the T-shirt and pulled him towards me. From that moment I wasn’t nervous at all. I wanted him as close to me as possible. Our lips met and we were kissing against the
wall in the hallway. His hands were tangled in my hair and mine were running over his chest. I traced my fingers down over his stomach until they reached his belt. And we stopped. His forehead was
on mine. The pig had fallen to the floor.

‘Shall we go up to my room?’ I whispered, trying to keep my voice level.

‘Yep!’ he laughed, breathing as quickly as me.

I led him up. His hand felt warm. My heart leapt at the thought that this was all happening with the person I got on with best.

We got into my room, and had the chance to do a bit of kissing and for Max to say, ‘Why are there feathers on your bed?’, when the doorbell went.

My Aunty Jill had popped round to see how I was getting on and I had to hide Max in a cupboard. Some of the feathers had stuck to him, so if she’d found him it could have looked really
weird.

Back at Spencer’s house, the drinking continues and I really don’t think I can keep up. I also keep breaking the drinking rules by using forbidden words such as
‘drink’ and ‘the’ and so have to down some of my mug – they didn’t have any wine glasses – as a forfeit.

Spencer sits over on the other side of the room to me. I’m sure I catch him looking over a couple of times. When our eyes do meet, it feels like the air fizzes between us and I’m
sure it’s not just me.

When we need a new drinking game I suggest Articulate because I’ve played it round Mia’s loads and am a total pro. But they don’t have it. Sam (boy) suggests Trivial Pursuit
and Sam (girl) says she’s really good at it. My heart sinks.

When we play that at Mia’s house I always make sure I pair up with her brother, Matthew, because he is freakishly clever and knows where all the countries are. But he’s not here now.
Maybe I could secretly text him? I don’t have his number, though. And he probably doesn’t have a phone because he’s only ten.

Me and Spencer are a team and it is awful. We only get bits of cheese because of him. Obviously that’s what happens when I’m on a team with Matthew too, but Mia’s family
wouldn’t care if I thought Beirut was a sort of vegetable or if I got some centuries mixed up. And some of the questions that the other teams get – like the name of Charles II’s
most famous girlfriend – I definitely do know. But when I say I knew it was Nell Gwyn, no one looks like they believe me. I have a book of royal scandals that Granny gave me and hers was one
of my favourite stories. She was just someone who sold oranges (and maybe did a bit of prostituting) and she ended up going out with the King. Maybe if I get a box of apples and stand outside
Buckingham Palace I could end up going out with Prince Harry.

Sam (girl) says that they don’t teach dates in history lessons in schools any more and shakes her head, which is quite annoying as she can’t have left school that long ago.

‘History is just one damn thing after another,’ says Spencer and he gives me a friendly shoulder bump. I want to hug him for rescuing me, but he undoes it when a question about Greek
gods comes up and he says, ‘You should know this – aren’t you Greek?’

Sam (boy) pipes up, ‘Oh! I thought you looked a bit . . . you know.’ And he points to my face.

‘Foreign?’ Ajay grins and then Sam goes bright red.

‘Oh, no, no I didn’t . . .’

But Ajay slaps him on the back and tells him he was joking. It is a bit like when Dad first met Nish and asked her where she was from. Nish told him she lived down the road and Dad said,
‘Oh no, I meant where are you from originally?’

Nish said, ‘Luton.’

‘So you’re Greek?’ says Sam (girl). ‘It’s such a fascinating place. I’ve always thought Ancient Greece was a culture dominated by a prevalence of
dichotomies.’

I stare at her for a moment. I’m sure some of those words aren’t even real. ‘My granny’s Greek,’ I say. ‘So I’m only a bit. The only things I know about
it are from watching
Mamma Mia
.’

She gives me a pitying look. I probably know a bit more than that, but I want her to stop asking me history questions. And to shut up.

‘I think,’ says Spencer, ‘what would be
really
interesting is a game of I Have Never. I’ll go first. I have never fallen down the gap between the platform and the
train.’

He grins at me. I smile at him, do a little salute and take my drink.

The whole room lurches.

This is much more fun, especially as Sam (girl) is much more open than Sam (boy) about their relationship and keeps embarrassing him. I probably let on a bit too much about myself.

I catch Spencer’s eye a few times. He drinks for quite a few things. It’s weird not knowing someone’s past. Around his friends Spencer seems like he just spends all his time
partying. You wouldn’t know he took anything seriously.

And they keep talking about his ‘moves’ and all the girls he’s got with. He laughs along with most of it, but a couple of times I see his eyes flick over to me, like he’s
checking for my reaction. I throw myself into the game and just laugh at the things they say about Spencer as well. But underneath it all I wonder.

I suppose at uni it’s not really a big deal, which is weird because at home whether a couple is going to do it is something that gets talked about for ages and planned and you have to go
through the whole mission of finding a bed, or bush (Nish), to do it in.

The funniest bit of the game is the way Ajay and Ravi rinse each other because they each have so much dirt on each other. ‘I have
never
,’ says Ajay, looking right at Ravi with
a gleam in his eye, ‘farted in front of the whole school while playing recorder and then run out of assembly crying.’

Ravi narrows his eyes and glares at Ajay as he drinks.

‘
I
have never been
engaged
,’ he says.

Ajay takes a swig. ‘Man, that’s a low blow,’ he says, laughing but sounding a bit annoyed.

And then everyone looks at me. Because I just drank.

I was trying to pack for New Zealand. It wasn’t going very well because Mia kept taking stuff out of my suitcase and saying things like, ‘You can’t take
that much make-up,’ and ‘Where on the bus are you planning to plug your hair straighteners in?’

It was her fault I was going on this holiday of danger and most likely death. I had been planning to make a will but Mia said I would probably have to go somewhere and sign things, rather
than just fill in something on the internet like I thought, so in the end I couldn’t be bothered. I sent Max a text saying that when I died I was leaving everything to him and I put
GABI
MORGAN
at the end so it would be a bit like a signature. I told Mia she was my witness and she agreed. Well, she said, ‘Hurry up and pack!’ but she did nod a bit while she said
it.

Then my sister, who had been listening outside, put her head round the door and asked if she could have my clothes because Max wouldn’t need them. So I said, ‘You haven’t
seen him on Thursday nights,’ and she ran off saying she was going to be sick. Max does look surprisingly good in a bikini.

Eventually I bunged all my stuff into a backpack (and sneaked my make-up back in when Mia was on the loo – and my heels) and we were ready. Jamie was going to give us a lift to the
airport in his fancy car and he phoned to say he would be round in half an hour. I made Mia put him on speakerphone so I could ask him if he was excited about the playlist I’d made for the
journey entitled It’s Gabi, Bitch. He said, ‘No,’ so I told him that would only make me sing louder.

There was a tap on the door and Max’s head appeared.

‘MAXIE!’ I was about to leap on him, but he interrupted me.

‘Um, can I speak to Mia for a moment?’

I eyed him suspiciously. ‘Okay, as long as you’re not having a steamy affair.’ I think I saw Mia try not to laugh. So I went out of the room and left them alone. Obviously I
listened at the door. Max was giving Mia something for me to open on Christmas Day. I smiled to myself at the thought of the stocking I’d given his mum earlier.

I went back into the room to give Max his goodbye kiss, but it went on a little longer than I planned and Mia went and waited downstairs because she felt uncomfortable.

On Christmas Day we were with my cousin in Auckland, enjoying a hot tub. We Skyped our families and then I did Skype stocking opening with Max. I told Mia she could be there
too if she wanted, but she said we might do something gross. When she’d gone into another room I realised she’d left a wrapped up shoebox next to me.

When Max appeared on the screen I held the box up.

‘Oh my God, you got me some shoes!’

He froze.

‘Max?’ Then I realised it was the screen that had frozen and he was talking.

‘Errr . . . just wait.’

He started moving again and he opened his presents first. I got him a Jay-Z album, a PlayStation game and a hat to replace the one that got ruined in Paris.

‘Thank you, baby!’ He leant over and kissed the camera.

‘I’m sorry it wasn’t the same as your old hat – they’d sold out!’ They hadn’t – this hat was just much nicer.

‘Your turn,’ he said. He looked really nervous.

I tore open the wrapping paper and lifted the lid. Inside was a load of shredded tissue paper. And a stone.

‘Um, thanks?’

‘No! That was just to make it heavy.’

I’d thought Mia looked a bit grumpy dragging her rucksack around.

‘Oh!’ I chucked the stone away and started digging around in the tissue paper. And found a little red box.

I looked up at the screen and Max was holding up a piece of paper.

MARRY ME?

‘Joking! Obvs,’ I say. They look at me like I’m a bit weird. Spencer is peering at me like he’s trying to tell if I really am joking. ‘Unless you
count the drunk man who proposed to me outside Tesco,’ I say quickly. ‘But he did say I was a beautiful lad. And he’d wet himself.’

Everyone laughs and turns to Sam (boy) for the next one. Spencer keeps looking at me for a second longer than the others.

I’m having trouble focusing and feeling like I might fall over, even though I’m sitting down. I also want to move on from the engagement moment quickly so I turn to Spencer and I
politely ask him to remind me where the bathroom is. Well, that’s what I say in my head. It comes out of my mouth as, ‘Can you take me for a wee?’

I don’t think I really appreciated last time that their bathroom is absolutely massive. I wait until I hear Spencer get to the bottom of the stairs and go back into the living room. Then I
sit on the loo, get my phone out and call Mia.

It is quite lucky that I do actually call
her
and not someone random because I am sort of just jabbing my phone with my hand.