‘Ish okay,’ she slurs, as he’s still inspecting her lip.
And she’s about to say it’s so funny that they just launched a kiss on each other, and that they don’t even know each other’s names, and how silly everything is, when a voice interrupts everything.
‘Oh my God. Toph?’ cries a clipped, slightly nasal voice. ‘Is that you?’
Chapter Three
They’re still standing in each other’s arms as they’re approached by two people, and Haf has to stop herself from leaping away from him, in case she falls straight into the firepit.
The woman who squealed is alarmingly tall and willowy. She’s dressed in a thick tan wool jacket – the kind that looks a little like dressing gowns unless you are chic enough to pull them off – and brown leather riding boots. Her dark hair is styled so that there’s a very soft curve to the ends, like it’s a fur stole. It’s a style composed of smatterings of ‘Luxury Influencer’ meshed with classic ‘I Wear Pearls Unironically’ in a way that really works.
Haf is so struck by this beautiful giant woman that she doesn’t even realise that the guy she just kissed has dropped her arms and is moving over to greet the new arrival.
‘Laurel? Hi. What are you doing here?’
‘Kissing under the mistletoe, are we?’ she asks with a raised eyebrow, arms folded as she neatly avoids his question.
‘Look, it’s not what you think,’ Haf’s mistletoe kiss says. He rubs the back of his neck with one hand, and his mouth curls in as he worries at his lips.
Oh fuck, thinks Haf,did I just snog this beautiful giantess’s man?
He didn’t say he was single, after all. Just that he wasn’t dating Sallyspecifically. But it would be a weird flex to pretendyou don’t know anyone at a party just so you can have a kiss with a stranger under some singed mistletoe.
Especially given how it just played out. Hopefully, neither of them chipped a tooth.
He does seem more embarrassed than alarmed that he’s been caught with another woman.
‘Come on, Toph, you can’t lie to me.’ She pouts.
Not really the reaction of a scorned lover then. More like someone annoyed they’ve been left out of the gossip.
Also ‘Toph’? Is that really his name? She imagines Ambrose popping up in her head to say that sounds more like a posh person sneezing than a name.
Behind the giant woman is a man drinking straight out of a bottle. His hair is such a pale wheat-blond it almost blends into his skin. There’s an air of rich confidence about him. He’s the kind of hench guy that’s more square than person-shaped. A rugby man, almost certainly.
‘You didn’t even tell us you were coming up to Sal’s do, Chrissy,’ says the square man, who seems to also love nicknames. ‘I knew you were up here for work, but I didn’t think you were hanging about.’
‘Chrissy’ seems to fit him even worse, and he flinches at the use of it.
Christopher.
Christopher must be his name, and the full sharpness of it fits him much more than either of the two nicknames bestowed upon him by these mysterious interlopers.
Whoevertheyare.
Haf flashes her eyes at Christopher, hoping he might introduce her. Being the unexplained fourth wheel in a conversation is her own personal circle of hell at the best of times, but that plus having been caught engaged in the world’s worst kiss really is taking it a bit far.
‘Yes, well. It was quite last minute. I’m just here for work, and Sally said I should swing by. I didn’t know you’d both be here too.’
‘I should hope not, else I’d be very put out that you didn’t drive up with us,’ sniffs the giant woman, flicking a soft curl of hair over her shoulder. ‘Anyway, come on, introduce us to your girlfriend, won’t you?’
Uh-oh.
Girlfriend?
How on earth did they get that from a kiss that resulted in them laughing in each other’s mouths? Unless, they didn’t see that, and only saw the aftermath – standing in each other’s arms in front of the fire, Christopher’s thumb resting on her bottom lip. Oh... Oh dear. That’s a very different vibe.
Next to her, Christopher has frozen and his pale-pinkish face starts to go a little green around the edges. ‘I—’
