I woke up pretty late the next day and pattered woozily in the direction of the kitchen, noticing only just in time that the place was full of cleaners. I was sure Caspian paid them generously, but nobody needed my unsolicited wang at eleven o’clock in the morning. Diving back into the bedroom, I lurked under the duvet until they were finished. I mean, obviously I could have got dressed and gone about my business, but I didn’t want to be in their way. And also the bed—as I’d previously discovered—was ridiculously big and cozy, probably because the mattress was Swedish, cost six figures, and contained a gazillion pocket springs, and the sheets were Egyptian cotton with a thread count higher than my salary would be. When I had a salary.
Wow. How was this my life? Even just for six months.
Eventually the cleaners left. And, respectably trousered—well, semi-respectably as, actually, they were my rainbow unicorn pajama bottoms—I crept over to the kitchen. The fridge, I discovered, was full of…I guess you’d call it gourmet luxuries? Or to put it another way, food that nobody really ate. Caviar and quails eggs and wild strawberries—oh, okay, I’d eat those. My drinking options were Veen Velvet, which I finally figured out was water, and champagne, which I identified instantly because I was just that classy. There was also a coffee machine, but it looked like a torture device, and I was too scared to use it. Clearly, living the high life was going to be tougher than I’d imagined.
And that was when I caught sight of the flowers on the dining table. I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen a hundred roses before, but there they were: a splash of wild scarlet in the middle of all that muted, designer extravagance. Caspian had sent a note too: Thank you for a wonderful evening.
Well, that was nice. Sort of. I definitely appreciated the thought. Except it seemed more of an I took you to the opera, where your heartfelt response to the music warmed my cynical cockles gesture than an I fucked your arse until we came type of thing. But then, Caspian was inconceivably wealthy: they did things differently on his planet. I guess I was just lucky he hadn’t tried to endow a professorial chair or name a building after me or something. The Guy I Shagged Memorial Library & Ancient Languages Center.
Anyway, it probably meant he’d enjoyed what we’d done together. Despite the awkward beginning. And the awkward middle. And the—well, honestly, the whole thing had been awkward. But hot too. And there were places I could still feel him, a deep, warm ache in my skin, like kisses he had left behind. Better than any other gift he could have given me.
I breakfasted on strawberries and tap water, sitting rebelliously on the edge of the gold-veined marble worktops. Then I swam and did some yoga, feeling somewhere between the Real Housewives of Kensington and Will Smith in I Am Legend. In the sense of being kind of on my own a bit. Not in the sense of fighting any zombies.
But the truth was, I wasn’t used to being alone. My living arrangements in Oxford had been highly prestigious in student terms, and guests had often come by to point and gasp at our genuinely nice sofa, but they’d still amounted to three rooms and a kitchenette I was sharing with another guy.
Plenty of people in our friendship circle had moved to London—either chancing it like me (although most likely without the billionaire backing) or to take up actual positions in investment banks or the civil service or whatever else properly ambitious Oxford graduates did when they finished their degree. But if I wanted to casually socialize with anyone, I’d probably have to arrange it. Which wasn’t to say I couldn’t, but it felt very different to trotting down the corridor with a packet of Hobnobs, hoping someone would put the kettle on.
I knew it was pretty normal. That it was just growing up. That it was just change. But, right then, it seemed more like loss.
Still, there was no point getting all days of wine and roses about it. Speaking of which—roses, that is, not wine—I owed Caspian a thank you. Grabbing my drug dealer phone, I took a photo of the flowers plus my face, whapped a flattering filter over it, and sent it off. A response came back in less than a minute.
I’m glad you liked them. Do you want anything from Japan?
I wasn’t quite sure how to answer. Since I was pretty sure someone like Caspian would have been able to get anything from anywhere just by making a phone call or getting someone else to make a phone call, it was incredibly sweet that he would offer to pick up something for me personally. And so I really didn’t want to say no. On the other hand, my materialistic desires weren’t quite global enough for a challenge like this. On top of which, I didn’t actually want to put him to expense or trouble. After a moment or two, I sent: Some Glico chocolate crush matcha cookie pocky and a photo.
Of me buying pocky?
I laughed. Just you.
Nothing.
Please? I typed shamelessly.
And a second or two later, a Caspian Hart selfie popped into my inbox. He was on a plane—private jet probably, considering how plush it was—and he looked pale and dark-eyed, his tie loose enough to expose the lickable places of his throat.
Did you sleep okay? Oh wow, fussing over him. Very attractive, Arden.
Yes. I just had to get up early.
Suddenly I felt incredibly bad about last night. I’d been so upset about Caspian’s leaving, I hadn’t paid much attention to his—no innuendo intended—coming. When what really mattered wasn’t that he hadn’t been able to stay long; it was the fact that he’d made the effort to see me at all. Most people who were about to fly six thousand miles might reasonably have fancied going to bed early with a cup of cocoa.
Not having sex with an ungrateful dickhead.
Can you rest now? I asked.
I could, but I need to stay on London time.
Wow. The man didn’t even yield to time zones. But I guess it made sense. Given how much he probably traveled, the alternative was probably permanent jet lag. I could help you stay awake.
I need to work. But I think I’d prefer your methods.
I grinned. How do you know? I didn’t say what they were. I might sing a song that’ll get on your nerves right in your ear.
Then I’d gag you.
Yes please.
He didn’t text back. But I felt we’d left the conversation in a promising place.
