Best of 2017

I finish up my drink and she follows my lead.

“I’ll give you the tour,” I say.

She holds out her hand and I take it.

MELISSA

THIS IS SO much harder than I thought.

My heart is pounding despite my easy smile, so worried I’m going to give the game away with some silly oversight. Like knowing the way his dog barks.

Knowing where his bathrooms are.

Knowing the names of his kids when he unavoidably points out their pictures on the mantelpiece. I ask about them as though I don’t know.

“Thomas and Matthew,” he says. “They live with their mother in Hampshire.”

“That must be hard.”

“Very,” he admits, and I see a flash of pain in his eyes. “But it’s for the best. They’re thriving. Happy.”

“They must love the dog,” I say, and that makes him smile.

“They do, yes. And he loves them.” He lifts one of the photos as though he’s looking at it new. “My ex-wife isn’t quite so fond of him.”

I don’t think it’s my place to ask about his divorce, so I don’t.

The pressure of acting ignorant is building up behind my eyes, but I don’t show it. I keep my questions light and vague, oohing and ahhing over the place as though I’m seeing it all for the first time.

“I love the smell of orchids,” I say, and a shiver zips up my spine as he angles one to my face for a sniff.

“My cleaner gets them,” he admits. “She’s excellent. They’re a nice touch.”

She’s excellent.

My smile feels ridiculously bright on my face, but he doesn’t seem to notice.

I don’t know if I can really go through with this phase of my master plan, not now it feels so personal in here. Not now I feel so… overwhelmed.

As we step past the entertainment unit I’m forced to make my decision.

I make it in a heartbeat.

I spin so quickly towards his selection of CDs, my expression one of pure fake-shock as I pull out an album from the pile.

“Oh my God! You like Kings and Castles?!”

My fake-shock has nothing on the surprise on his face. “You know them?”

“Do I know them?! Hell yeah, they’re my all-time favourite band!”

I hate this even as I’m doing it. Hate the shock in his eyes. Hate the fact I feel so obliged to perform like a circus monkey to make him fall in love me.

“That’s extraordinary,” he says. “Hardly anyone knows they exist.”

“Crazy, right? I’m always saying it. I mean take Casual Observer, that song is my all-time favourite. How it doesn’t get more radio airplay I have no idea. Criminal, don’t you think?”

“Criminal, yes.” He stares right through me. “That’s my favourite too, actually.”

I put a hand on my heart. “Wow. What are the odds?”

“Slim,” he tells me, and he’s not kidding.

I rattle off my imaginary history with the band, how my dad loved them, how I knew the singer dedicated a song to his dying grandmother, how I think their first album is seriously underrated, and how terrible the first mainstream music journalist who tore them to shreds in his column was for destroying their chances before they’d really started.

He listens. He nods.

I tell him how I love the lyrics in Casual Observer. How deep they are. How well they capture the loneliness of being surrounded by people and yet feeling so utterly misunderstood. So alone.

He’s barely even nodding now. Just staring. His eyes piercing and raw.

“Sorry,” I tell him. “I get a little carried away. I just love them so much.”

“That’s ok,” he replies. “I do, too.”

I slide the CD back in the collection and hold out my hand for the rest of the magical mystery tour.

He shows me his office, and the conservatory, and the dining room he barely uses. He tells me he has a bit of a gym set up downstairs, but doesn’t take me down there.

I comment on the little things, the innocuous things, being so careful and considered.

And fake.

I’ve never felt so fake in my entire life.

My heart is in my throat by the time the downstairs tour is finished, choked up with guilt and the crazy desire to tell him I’ve already been here. That I really do like Kings and Castles, but it’s because of him. Because I heard them here.

To tell him that I already know him.

But he’s no longer awkward or guarded, not like he was when I first pulled out that CD. He looks relaxed, even excited now the shock has left his beautiful face.

And I don’t want to risk it. I can’t risk it.

He takes my hand at the bottom of the stairs, and all thought of a confession zips out of my mind.

“Let me show you my collection,” he says.

ALEXANDER

KINGS AND CASTLES. They have a hardcore following, but to say it’s on the small side would be generous.

Barely anyone even knows they exist.

But Amy does.

I’m not sure this shit could get any more fucking weird if it tried.

I’m no bloody sap. I don’t believe in happy ever afters, or soulmates, or twin flames or any of that other mumbo jumbo shit they use to sell dating site memberships and Valentine’s Day cards.

I don’t believe in anything other than two people deciding they can tolerate each other enough to make it through life in the same building, with maybe a bit of mutual affection along the way.

And sex. I believe in sex.

My heart is racing ten to the fucking dozen. My throat feels dry as I lead this girl upstairs, and there’s a tickle in my gut driving me insane.

A tickle that daren’t hope. That would be insane to even fucking hope this crazy connection between us could mean something.

Yet she feels so fucking real. The soul in her eyes is so fucking real. The way she wants me feels too insanely right to be wrong.

I’m terrified how much I fucking want this.

I lead her straight through to the crystal room and flick on the light.

Nobody has ever seen my collection, nobody that would give a shit about it anyway. Barely anyone finds these wonders of the natural world as beautiful as I find them.

But Amy does.

Her eyes widen as I input the cabinet code, she gasps as the light hits the gemstones and makes them sparkle in all their glory.

“My God,” she whispers. “This is insanely awesome.”

I stare at her as she surveys my collection open-mouthed, and I’ve misjudged her by thinking of her as a new-age hippy type. Of course I have.

Nothing about this girl any longer surprises me.

“You have poudretteite! I’ve wanted to see one in the flesh for years! I read about it when I was a kid, how they found it in Mont St. Hilaire!” Her fingers dither in the air. “And musgravite! From the Musgrave Ranges in Australia! This is crazy!”

Yes. Yes it is.

I listen to her in awe. Her knowledge of rare gemstones is incredible, better even than some of the hardcore collectors I go up against in auctions, those trigger happy types who take the listing details as gospel and care nothing for the actual stones themselves.

“You can touch them,” I tell her, and she gasps.

“I couldn’t!”

I take out the musgravite and place it in her hand, and her fingers are trembling.

I’m taken aback to find that mine are too.

“I had no idea you were so…” I begin, and I struggle to find the words without sounding like a condescending cunt.

She giggles. “Serious? It’s alright. I have a couple of cheap stones in a little velvet bag. It hardly reeks of sophistication.”

I feel like an asshole, but she looks at me like I’m the greatest man alive.

“You amaze me,” I tell her, and she takes a breath.

“You amaze me, too,” she whispers, and then she giggles some more. “I can

’t believe this. I can’t believe any of this.”

Neither can I.

I can hardly breathe. Hardly think. Hardly fucking speak as I watch that girl hold the musgravite up to the light.

She puts it back so gently on its display stand, and her fingers drift down to the empty space where the fire opal once rested.

“It was one of your favourites,” she says as she runs a finger over the plinth.

“I have a new favourite,” I tell her, and take the quartz from my pocket. I place it on the plinth and even though it looks so thoroughly out of place amongst the others, I love it more than any of them.

Her cheeks flush pink. “You need a new display card.”

“You can write me one,” I tell her, and dig around on the shelf for a piece of card. I present her with a fountain pen and wait for her to fill in the details, but she hovers. Dithers.

“My handwriting will be messy,” she says. “You should really print one.”

But I don’t want a printed one. I want her to pen it by hand.

I tell her so.

“Your handwriting will be neater,” she protests, but I shake my head.

“Please, Amy.”

Her fingers are still shaking as she writes out the description. It’s hardly what I was expecting. No weight, or mining location. No crazy new age properties.

Instead there is a simple description.

Angel Hair Quartz. From me to you, Alexander, with love.

With love.

She seems embarrassed as soon as she’s written it, placing it front of the empty plinth with a shrug.

I can’t stop myself as my hand reaches for hers, can’t fight the urge as I pull her into my arms.