‘Another?’ she said, making to get up, as they’d drained the first round fast. Laurie was liking being out and hoped when he said one drink he’d meant three to four, as was British tradition.
‘No,’ Jamie said, and Laurie concealed her pang of dismay. He gestured at Laurie rising in her seat, to sit down.
‘I mean yes, but let me. You deserve table service, and I want some peanuts. Or wasabi cashews or whatever it’ll be here.’
Laurie beamed.
With the second round, and then a third, Laurie must’ve had pretty much a bottle of red wine on an empty stomach and she was being a level of candid with Jamie she was going to regret in the morning. Yet she couldn’t stop herself.
‘I’ve never been a vengeful person, but I have fantasies of bringing Dan to his knees. I want him sobbing and begging for me to take him back, even though I know it’ll never happen. It runs through my veins like lava, I can physically feel it.’
‘Yeah I get that. I’ve been that angry at the world, in my time. How would you do it?’
She shrugged, grinned. ‘Haven’t figured that out yet, have I?’
‘It’ll come to you. You’ve got a look in your eye that clearly states you’re not to be fucked with.’
Laurie nodded, pleased. If there was one thing she’d learned tonight, Jamie was easy company. She wouldn’t trust him as far as she could throw him, but he was a good crack. Craic, whatever. Ooh, inebriation felt nice. An escape from herself. Laurie rolled a beer mat on its side, caught it in her other hand.
‘Can I ask you something? Was the rumour true that Salter told you not to touch his niece? What did he say? I can’t imagine how he phrased it.’
Jamie laughed. ‘Oh, that did the rounds did it? I swear Kerry listens at the door, I can’t believe he’s stupid enough to tell her as much she knows.’
‘I’m sure she does. Or she’s bugged the room. She’s our own Wikileaks.’
‘It’s both true and not the whole truth. Am I speaking in confidence here?’
Laurie held up her hand and did a Scouts honour sign. ‘I’ve been relying on that since halfway through my first wine, to be honest.’
‘It was warning me off Eve, but more than that, a whole “get your life together if you want to get on” gruff paternal lecture.’
‘Wow, seriously? Bit much?’
‘I’ve applied to be made partner.’
Laurie did a double-take. ‘Like, third wheel? Aren’t you … quite young for that?’
‘I went to see them both and said I am young, but I’m completely committed and definitely ready.’
Here was the white-hot ambition that put backs up and noses out of joint.
‘Yeah. I want to take on tons more work for a stake. I pretty much pitched them my vision for the future of the firm, for half an hour. They said they’d think about it.’
Laurie swirled her wine in her glass.
‘What was the life coaching about?’
‘When Eve arrived, Salter had me in to say, she is off limits, but also, a major sticking point in promoting me is my’ – Jamie made air quotes – ‘lifestyle. “You’re someone we can’t trust around the wives and girlfriends at the Christmas party.”’ He did a baritone imitation voice: ‘“That matters, young man, whether you like it or not.”’
‘Hahaha. Bloody hell.’
‘Yeah, I mean, they’re old fashioned and conventional, aren’t they. They only understand long-term partners, marriage. Two by two onto the Ark.’
‘It’s a bit much to say they can’t promote a single person! Jesus Christ, is it 1950?’ Laurie would’ve thought this unfair anyway, but in her current predicament she wondered if a spinster would also be ruled out, and her blood heated.
‘It’s not single, per se, it’s my kind of single. Being seen out with someone different every weekend. Playing the field. It could, and I quote this word for word, “leave the company vulnerable to blackmail.” No, I have no idea what that means either.’
‘Oh no,’ Laurie said. Then, indiscreet in drink: ‘Dick pics. They mean dick pics and revenge porn and sex tapes, surely?’
‘Oh jeez … yeah you might be right.’
Jamie looked slightly uncomfortable and Laurie realised she’d been a trifle direct and crude. She’d indirectly referred to his … King and privy council, as Dan’s dad called it. His junk. Argh. She’d not congratulate herself on this moment when she awoke blearily tomorrow.
‘If only they’d asked, I could’ve told them of my strict “no making or sending grot” policy and given them access to my iCloud to prove it. I’m not a lawyer for nothing.’
Laurie laughed.
‘So, either I get myself a steady, respectable girlfriend by their end of year deadline, or no name above the door for me,’ Jamie concluded.
‘They were that prescriptive?’
‘Oh, it was coded. You know. Unless something changes …’
‘Is that likely?’
‘Put it this way. I’m kind of a communist, when it comes to relationships.’
‘You think we should all be state owned?’
‘I think whenever they fail, we focus on what specific people did wrong within the system, overlooking the fact that the whole institution’s rotten and dysfunctional. I don’t think it works – cohabiting, monogamy. I mean, I think it works, practically – halving the cost of living, getting a mortgage, raising kids. I can see why capitalist society wants us to organise ourselves that way. Then the government doesn’t have to find you full-time nursing care when you have the massive stroke, because someone stood up in a church and told a God they didn’t believe in, fifty years ago, they’d wipe your arse.’
‘Wow.’ Laurie said. ‘I wish someone would write their own vows and use those exact lines. I pledge to keep your bum cleft clean. Certainly better than that “I will always make your favourite banana milkshake” BS.’
Jamie laughed, a body-shaking laugh, and she could see he was taking to her, perhaps more than he expected to. She wanted nothing from him, and she was bright, his equal and dry of humour. These things might be a novelty, given who he romanced.
‘But works emotionally, makes you happy?’ Jamie said, swirling his drink. ‘Not so much. It’s usually a fostered dependency on someone you slept with and felt briefly passionate feelings for in your twenties, and you feel guilty moving on once its time has passed. In fact, that guilt is often the trigger for putting the roots down, tying yourself into it, convincing yourself it’s as good as it gets. I’ve best-manned a few weddings where that is the exact description of what’s going on. It’s the least romantic thing imaginable. Yoking yourself to someone you’ve been having the same disappointing missionary with since Fresher’s Week.’
Laurie twinged hard at the direct relevance.
‘Great best man!’
‘Hahaha. I left the part where I think marriage is a grotesque harmful sham out of the speech. No, I mean, I don’t push my controversial views on other people. Live and let live.’
‘But you were in a relationship in Liverpool?’