Rosaline Palmer Takes the Cake (Winner Bakes All #1) - Alexis Hall Page 0,119
that.”
“I’m not sure that’s entirely consoling?”
“I just meant, yeah, there’s always someone worse off than you, but you’re not helping ’em by ignoring your own problems.” He started tidying up the remains of his Whopper meal. “’Cos the thing is, I’m feeling like a bit of a cock for not having got this sorted out years ago. And I guess I couldn’t because I didn’t have the, like, words to think about it until you sat me down and was like, ‘There’s something wrong with you, mate’—”
“I did not say that.”
“In a nice way. Point is, if I had known, I could have done something, spent less time worrying and more, you know, being there for people. Being a better mate and a better brother and a better son and things. It’s not selfish to work on your problems. It’s selfish not to. Even if hearing you’ve got a problem makes you yell at a nice girl what’s trying to help you.”
Rosaline squirmed, feeling that she didn’t deserve quite as much credit as he was giving her. “I . . . I didn’t . . . I’m not the one who fixes people’s electricity and drives halfway across the country to pick them up from a sex party they hadn’t consented to be at.”
“Leave it out, mate. It’s just different types of things, init. And from where I’m standing, I reckon we’re even.”
Maybe he was right. Or maybe even wasn’t the point at all and you didn’t have to keep a constant record of who owed what to whom. Because most people, at least most people you wanted in your life, wouldn’t be out to use it against you anyway.
It was a strange thought, but a comforting one.
It was close to three by the time they got back to Rosaline’s house—which stood at the end of its terrace, with the lights off, and a strange air of emptiness about it.
“You going to be all right, mate?” asked Harry as she hesitated on the doorstep.
“Um. Probably? This is really silly, but I’m not used to sleeping in the house on my own.”
“Are Lauren and Amelie not there?”
“No, Lauren’s wife was in town, so Amelie’s staying with them.” She dug her keys out of her bag. “It’s probably for the best. I wouldn’t particularly want to explain this to, well, anybody.”
“I’m sure they’d understand. Well, Lauren would. Amelie’s a kid.”
“Oh, Lauren would understand, but she’d have opinions about it. And Lauren’s one of those people who are sometimes on your side in a very unhelpful way.”
He nodded. “Yeah, Terry’s like that. Like, I was going out with this girl last year and she had to go to Jersey to be with her sister and so I rang Terry up and I was like, ‘Emma’s dumped me ’cos she’s gotta go to Jersey to be with her sister.’ And he’s all, ‘Aw, mate, how dare she, I never liked her, you’re too good for her.’ And I’m like, ‘Her sister’s got cancer, mate.’ And he’s like, ‘She still shouldn’t have led you on like that.’ And I’m like, ‘She didn’t know her sister was gonna get cancer.’ And so for the next half hour I’m defending Emma from my best mate when all I wanted was for us to go out and have a pint.”
“Yeah, and when I tell Lauren about this, because I will inevitably tell Lauren about this, she’ll go immediately to, Roz darling, that’s exactly what you get for messing around with straight men. And then I’ll have to defend them as a class to my best friend after one of them has just been a complete wanker to me.”
“You know,” he went on thoughtfully, “I can’t tell if your Lauren and my Terry would get on real well or fucking murder each other.”
Rosaline pushed open the door and stared into her shadowy hall. “So . . . um . . . you want to come in?”
There was a pause. And then Harry put a hand to the back of his neck. “You’ve just had one really bad experience with a bloke off the show. I’m probably not the person you want hanging around.”
“Why? Are you going to sit on my sofa and suggest a threesome?”
“I wasn’t planning on it. I just mean . . . you still don’t know me very well. It’s an empty house. I know you don’t want to be on your own, but I don’t want to make you feel . . . worse.”