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‘He must.’ Paula shook her head. ‘It’s pretty bloody obvious. We’ve never actually talked about it, right enough; that’s as much my fault as his. I suppose you fall into a pattern after a while and forget it’s supposed to be different.’

‘I know what you mean.’

Paula’s eyebrows stood to attention. ‘You do?’

‘Yeah, I’ve been there loads of times,’ I said. ‘Never in a marriage, obviously, but I’ve hit the point where you know it’s over but you’re too scared to admit it plenty of times.’

‘What did you do?’ Paula asked.

‘Same thing all guys do, I waited to see if she would chuck me. Sometimes she did and that was that, sometime she didn’t and I eventually worked up the courage to end it.’

‘But you always wanted it to finish?’

‘Eventually, yeah.’

‘Why?’

‘Because they weren’t you.’

‘Feck off!’

‘It’s true.’ And it was. Every relationship I’d been in for the past twelve years had ultimately met that one test, and failed. I always, after the first flush of lust and gratitude was over, found myself comparing my current partner to Paula and how I’d felt with her. I’d come close a couple of times, I don’t deny that, but none of them ever quite made the grade. I had, more than once,
cursed
the memory of Paula Fraser for rendering me incapable of finding happiness with anyone else.

Until last night, that was.
Now,
I was almost willing to believe in Fate, or God or Zeus or whatever, some force in the universe that had a plan and a purpose for me. Maybe I’d had an
actual
epiphany, after all. Terry would be thrilled.

‘
Yer
arse!’ Paula sat back in her chair.

‘True.’

‘
Jaysus
, you’re serious aren’t you?’

‘Yep.’

‘What if I hadn’t come back?’

‘No idea. Hopefully I’ll never know, now.’

‘That’s a lot for me to live up to, you realise.’

‘I’ve a feeling you’ll manage.’

‘Feck.’ Paula drank the last of her coffee and stared at me from across the table. ‘Are we really going to do this?’

‘It’s looking that way.’ I stared right back, holding her eye.

‘How?’

‘That’s up to you. I’m single.’

‘I
know
that. I just ... I can’t … I wouldn’t feel right doing … I need to …’

‘Here’s the deal,’ I said, making what I felt was an admirable and assertive (whilst also potentially self-destructive and worryingly masochistic) decision. ‘I hope we’ll spend every minute we can together; but I won’t be an affair, not with you. We can talk, we can make plans, and maybe we can even hold hands now and then. But, until you’re single, that’s as far as we go.’

Paula gave me a look that said more clearly than words ever could just how much she didn’t believe me. ‘Do you mean that?’

‘You’re getting nowhere near my boy’s bits, hen. Deal with it.’

Chapter 18

‘No you did not,’ Terry said, passing the ashtray over.

‘Did.’

‘You are a stupendous twat.’

‘Having slept on it I won’t pretend a wee bit of me doesn’t agree. It’s for the best, though; it takes the pressure off her. Incidentally, I never told you any of this. Paula doesn’t want anyone knowing anything until it’s all sorted.’

Terry spat out a mouthful of
lorne
sausage (we were having a late breakfast in his flat). ‘Right, so you’re not allowed to tell anyone you’re
not
having an affair with your ex-girlfriend?’

‘Exactly,’ I said.

‘And this was your idea?’

‘Not having an affair was my idea, not telling anyone is down to Paula. I’d happily tell the world.’

‘That you’re not having an affair?’

‘Yeah, I’m chuffed as fuck.’

‘The older you get the less sense you make, Jim. I worry about you.’ Terry looked as condescending as is possible while trying to lick brown sauce from your chin.

‘What about you, though? Ronni, last night, bit of a saga, no?’

I’d left it as long as I felt capable before turning up at Terry’s door. Strange things had happened to both of us the previous night, and, after another poor night’s sleep, I’d finally accepted at half-eleven that morning that I was up for the day. After a hasty and less than thorough shower I headed straight for Terry’s place, as fast as my bus fare could take me.

My head was full of Paula, but I hadn’t forgotten about Terry’s predicament. He seemed cheerful when he opened the door to me with a quick ‘what the fuck are you doing here?’, but, having spent almost an hour telling him my news, I felt compelled to now search for the truth of his matter.

‘A gentleman doesn’t comment on such things,’ Terry said. His nervous formality could mean only one thing.

‘Was it horrible?’ I asked.

‘How
d’you
mean?’ Terry looked confused.

‘You know, when it came to the crunch?’

‘What are you talking about?’

Poor guy, he was still pretending. ‘Do you think she’ll tell her uncle?’

‘Tell her uncle what?’

‘Sorry. So it didn’t come up, then?’

‘Jim, I’m getting slightly scared now. Tell me you’re not talking about my penis.’

‘What? Why would I want to talk about your penis?’

‘I have absolutely no fucking idea, but that appears to be what you’re doing.’

‘No, no,’ I said. This was getting away from me. ‘I mean the gay thing.’

‘What gay thing? Are you gay?’

‘No! Not me.’ This wasn’t going quite the way I’d envisaged.

‘Are you saying
Ronni’s
gay?’

‘What?’ I’d lost track now.

‘Is Ronni a lesbian? Is that what you’re saying?’ Terry looked distraught.

‘No!’ Christ, I was perplexed. If Ronni
was
a lesbian, would that make sense? Did two gay people of opposite genders cancel each other out? I was pretty certain it didn’t work that way but could I be sure?

‘Well what the hell are you going on about?’ Terry asked.

‘You!’

‘Me?’

‘You’re a poof!’ It wasn’t my finest moment.

Terry wiped the sauce from his chin. ‘Take a breath, James.’ I took a breath. ‘Good man,’ Terry continued. ‘Now, in words easy for you to say and remember, is there any chance you could tell me what the fuck it is you’re trying to say?’

‘Poof,’ I said, deflated.

‘Okay, I’m getting that you think
I’m
gay, would that be right?’ With the brown sauce gone from his chin Terry seemed
extremely
condescending, but I suppose I deserved it.

‘
Mmhmm
.’ I nodded.

 
‘Right, we’ve established that, so we have some progress. So, my next question would be,
why
?’ He said
why
really sarcastically, the prick.

‘The Nile,’ I mumbled.

‘Pardon?’

‘You’re in denial, have been since I met you.’

‘And what are you basing this on, exactly?’ Terry didn’t sound angry, more amused with a hint of baffled. I was having serious doubts about my theory.

‘You’re always talking about girls but you never go near them. You keep telling me about all these women you’ve slept with, but in two years I’ve never seen you even attempt to chat someone up. It’s pretty obvious you’re lying to yourself, mate.’

Terry shook his head. ‘Jim, I’m not gay, I’m fat.’

‘Huh?’

‘Look at me, I’m a fucking walrus. Do you think I don’t know that? Do you think I need an insane Irish psychologist to point it out? I see it in the mirror every day.’

‘So you’re a wee bit overweight, what’s that got to do with anything?’

‘I have a 48 inch waist, Jim. I’m more than a
wee bit
overweight.’

Yes, Terry was big, but you stopped seeing that after a while and I didn’t know what he was going on about. ‘So?’

‘
So,
I wasn’t always this size. I was only twelve stone when I was thirty. Women can bang on all they like about looks not being important, but it’s a lot of bollocks, believe me. Eventually I gave up trying, it was too embarrassing.’

‘What happened when you were thirty?’ This was all news to me. I’d assumed he was always a
chubber
. ‘Was it glandular?’

‘Hah, I wish,’ Terry said. ‘It was the
pies,
Jim, just the pies. Well, not
just
the pies, the chips didn’t help. And the crisps and chocolate biscuits, they’re certainly a contributing factor.’

‘So all your stories about girls …?’

‘All true, mate, just not recently, sad to say. I’m afraid my glory days were over long before I met you. Or at least I thought they were until I got to know Ronni. Honestly, your leaving Combined Utilities is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. She’s a bloody demon!’

‘Happy to help.’ I needed some time to process this. My best friend had just told me he was
straight
. That’s not the kind of news you can simply accept without thinking it through. ‘Are you
sure
you’re not gay?’

‘Sorry.’

‘But you’re always eying up guys,’ I said.

‘Pardon?’

‘In the pub, you’re always checking out fit young guys, I’ve seen you.’

Terry’s face went pink. ‘No I’m not.’

‘Yes, mate. You are.’ I held his gaze and nodded.

He took a breath. ‘
If
, and I’m not admitting anything here, but
if
I might occasionally have …
appraised
… the appearance of a couple of guys now and then, it had
sod
all to do with lust, believe me. It was jealousy, pure and simple.’

‘Jealousy?’

‘Yes, Jim. I don’t want to
shag
them, for Christ’s sake, I want to
look
like them.’

‘Right, wow.’
Come on
, I told myself. This didn’t change anything; he was still Terry, still my mate. Just because he was a bit
different
from what I’d thought shouldn’t be allowed to get in the way of our friendship. ‘Okay, okay,’ I said. ‘I can deal with this, it’s not a problem.’

‘Glad to hear you don’t think it’ll come between us.’ Terry wasn’t even trying to disguise his amusement at my confused state, but I barely noticed.

‘No, no, of course not,’ I said. ‘I’ll just have to get used to it.’

‘Let me know if I can help you with that at all.’

‘Yeah, thanks. First Paula and now this; a lot’s changed in the last few days. So you and Ronni really got it together?’