tongue feels it’s made of leather.
I swirl the concept of Mark’s Greek holiday around in my brain for a few seconds, to see if a night’s sleep will have given me a different perspective on the whole thing. It still feels slightly wrong, for some reason I can’t quite put my finger on. I try to put myself in a similar position.
I meet Melissa, a friend from university, whom I haven’t seen for ages. She and her friend – we’ll call her Sue – are planning a holiday in Greece. There are two guys going with them, as well. Unfortunately, Sue breaks her leg and can’t go. I bump into Melissa and she says hey! Why don’t you come! It’ll be fun! I agree and go home to tell my boyfriend that I’m going off on holiday with Melissa and her two man friends (or manfriends, if you prefer).
The most reasonable, laid-back boyfriend in the universe would say ‘Hey! That’s great! Hope you have a great time! Enjoy yourself! Don’t worry about all the plans we’d made. Can’t wait to see you with an all-over tan.’ and he’d mean it.
But most boyfriends wouldn’t take it like that, I suspect. In fact, the most reasonable, laid-back boyfriend in the universe sounds like a bit of a jerk, doesn’t he. Sounds like he doesn’t care about you or what you do one way or the other.
I think a normal boyfriend’s jaw would hit the floor if you announced something like that.
I get up and have a shower. Should I be nonchalant about the whole thing, or would that make it look like I don’t care about Mark or what he does? Who knows? I tell myself that it can’t be that bad. I’m just over-reacting. If anything suspicious was going on, Mark wouldn’t have mentioned it to me in the first place, or at least he wouldn’t have mentioned the girls. Wait. That doesn’t make sense. I’ll be seeing the other three when I drop him off at the airport tomorrow. I could hardly fail to notice that two of them were girls. And besides, he could hardly slip away for a week’s holiday without me noticing. Sorry – not a week – five days.
My brain plainly isn’t working properly at the moment. I get out of the shower and dry myself off. Before I start to get dressed, I look at myself in the mirror. Not bad. Without meaning to seem like an egomaniac, I think I’d look pretty good in a skimpy bikini. Has Mark ever seen me in a skimpy bikini? I don’t think so. We’ve never been on that sort of holiday.
After I’ve had breakfast and four cups of coffee to bring my leathery tongue back to life, I hear Mark calling for me.
‘Chloe? Come and have a look at this!’
I stroll into the living room, where Mark in tapping away on the computer. I peer over his shoulder to see what he’s looking at. I hate doing this. Standing up while bending over almost double to look at a screen which is positioned for a person sitting down in front of it. Personally, I think that the person showing you something wonderful should stand up and let you sit down. Maybe I should write a book on PC etiquette.
‘This is the hotel I’ll be staying at. Fab, yeah?’
I lean forward and take a look. It looks like lots of other place you see in all the world’s various holiday resorts. There’s a picture of an enormous blue swimming pool, but it’s also got those scary-looking flumes that kids like to slide down. Big, long, winding ones. The whole thing looks like it was built about two weeks ago, though I’m sure it can’t be that recent.
There are photographs of spotless rooms with twin beds and bland prints, beautiful, white-sanded beaches, perfect couples sharing a glass of Champagne at some restaurant or other and people strolling down secluded coves. As you’re reading, a slide show of various tourist attractions drifts past. I feel rather light-headed looking at it all.
‘The girls will be in one twin room and me and Danny will be in another. I can’t imagine what it’ll be like sharing a room with Danny. He was quite a big drinker, so hopefully he won’t be up all night talking or anything. I guess we’ll go and check out all the bars and then come back to the room and pass out!’
‘What’ll you be doing in the