a kindly voice, prompting me to begin.
I nodded. ‘It’s sort of both—’
‘She’s talking,’ pointed out Arjun in an accusatory tone. ‘You told me we couldn’t do that,’ he said, turning in his chair to glare at Luke.
‘You can’t.’ Luke laughed, swigging at his drink.
‘Cheat!’ Arjun said with a low rumble.
My mouth snapped shut and I felt strangely exposed, sweat dampening my palms.
It was horrific. I went through torturous motions, desperately trying to make Howard and Geoffrey understand what I was getting at. How hard was it to act out Pride and Prejudice, which I soon realised was a book, film and TV series? I tried to add TV series halfway through but they just kept shouting ‘Square’ at me. I felt sweat bead in my hairline and it was only after a ridiculous amount of time that Luke quietly came to the rescue, whispering the correct answer across to Geoffrey.
‘Hey, that’s not fair,’ shouted Arjun, suddenly absurdly competitive after his High Noon success.
Grandad had got up to get more drinks and I was simply glad to be moving away from the rug and all the eyes following me, back to the pouffe, taking a grateful gulp of gin, the tonic flat and the ice melted. I had to get out of there. I needed to look over the brief for the next day in court. I needed to think about how to fix things for Amy.
My phone vibrated in my pocket as Luke got up to have the next go. I looked down at the screen, feeling a renewed wave of sickness swell up inside me.
It was from Amy. Thanks sooooo much for today. You’re a total lifesaver.
‘Film, film . . . ’
‘Four words.’
‘First word.’
‘Film.’
‘We’ve already said that, Teddy. Keep up.’
Oh God, what was I going to do? I hated myself. I hoped for all the bad things I normally wished on others to happen to me. I should step on every upturned plug. I should lose all my teeth bar one and that one should be the tooth that gets the toothache. I was a shit friend, a shit person.
Luke was gesturing behind him, the others calling out answers. They were arguing over his use of two fingers to denote the word ‘to’.
‘I thought we couldn’t do that.’
‘It’s just a preposition, don’t sweat it.’
‘It’s vital. It’s a quarter of the whole thing.’
The answer was clearly Back To The Future but it took Luke’s team about fifteen minutes to get there, by which time I had collapsed into an even deeper gloom, the gin long gone, shoulders drooping, my body slumped on my pouffe.
Luke, returning to his seat, stopped by me, noticing my expression. Placing a hand on my knee he leant down. ‘Everything all right? Worried you’re losing?’
‘God, Luke, don’t be so obnoxious,’ I snapped, shoving his hand away, redirecting all the anger I felt at myself and firing it at him like bullets.
He stepped back quickly as if I really had shot him, mouth pursed, eyes dark. The room fell silent, just the quiet tick of the carriage clock, the odd muffled cough. There was shuffling in the room as Howard, Geoffrey and Arjun’s eyes flitted, never resting, Arjun inspecting his nails as if there was something under one, Geoffrey scuffing at the carpet and Howard blinking at the ceiling lights, window and mantelpiece, eyebrows twitching.
Only my grandfather was looking at me, the expression on his face making me feel even worse. His eyes sad, his mouth turned down: a look of utter disappointment.
‘I’ve got to go: work,’ I explained, standing up quickly and stumbling towards the door, not even bothering to apologise as I opened it, feeling hot, shamed tears filling my throat.
Luke didn’t follow me out as I moved down the corridor, fishing my coat off the hook, thrusting my phone in my bag.
Grandad emerged in the corridor, the room still hushed behind him, aware his voice was carrying.
‘That wasn’t like you,’ he said, moving towards me.
I stayed turned away from him facing the rack of coats, feeling the same anger, tiredness and confusion swirl in me. ‘I’m tired,’ I snapped, clutching my bag to me. ‘I just need to get back and work.’
‘Not everything can be about work, you know,’ he said.
‘God, Grandad, I don’t need a lecture from you now, all right?’
‘I’m not, that’s . . . ’ He tailed away.
‘I’m heading home.’
Grandad didn’t reply, just watched as I opened the front door. Rain had created a misty sheen on the pavements and the