Page 10 of Forever, Maybe
He grinned, far too pleased with himself, and ruffled her hair. The over-familiarity made her jaw tighten, but she forced a polite smile as he smirked and sauntered inside.
“Tadgh?” Stephanie asked, turning to the man still seated beside Nell. He spelled it out, his voice carrying that slight lilt of the Western Isles, and explained that his mother was from Skye.
His appearance fit the islander stereotype. Freckled skin, bulbous eyes a washed-out blue, cropped dark-red hair and a sharp triangular jawline that gave him an almost pixie-like quality.
Now left alone with Nell and Stephanie, Tadgh wasted no time bombarding them with questions. What were their names, jobs and what had brought them to Lock Down this fine spring evening.
“Saturday night fun,” Stephanie replied. “What about you?”
“It’s my birthday,” he announced with a grin. “Thirty-four today. Is it ungentlemanly o’ me to ask what age you are?”
“Guess,” Nell challenged.
Stephanie shot her a look, one eyebrow raised, as if to warn her of the potential danger. The ‘guess my age’ game was a risky one at their stage of life, when the answer could sting more than a slap.
Tadgh shifted, turning fully toward Nell, his expression one of mock concentration.
His gaze swept her face, lingering on her brow, eyes and nose before settling a beat too long on her mouth.
Then, without warning, he leant in and pecked her on the lips.
The kiss was soft, fleeting and entirely presumptuous.
“Twenty-one, of course!” he declared with a wink.
“Whatever. I’m forty-two—or I will be at the end of May. And I’m married.” Nell raised her left hand, waggling her finger so the eighteen-carat white gold diamond wedding ring caught the light.
She wasn’t sure what irritated her more. The ridiculous over-familiarity of these two, or the fact that Tadgh was flirting with her and not Stephanie. She cast a sideways glance at her friend. Did it bother Stephanie that the birthday boy seemed more taken with Ms Unavailable?
But Stephanie didn’t appear to notice. Her attention was focused on Tadgh’s friend, who had returned to the table carrying a fresh ice bucket with another bottle of Prosecco and two more flutes.
He set the bucket down, poured drinks for all four of them, and introduced himself as Grant, insisting on a birthday toast for Tadgh.
Grant’s thick, dark hair was peppered with grey at the temples, and his suit—while shiny and worn—did little to hide his physique. He was slim and wiry, with broad shoulders and upper arms that strained against the seams of his shirt. Someone who worked out a lot.
Stephanie, ever observant, would have clocked all of this in seconds.
She often lamented how many men let themselves go in their thirties and forties, making it nearly impossible to meet anyone remotely appealing.
Grant, however, was exactly her type. Far too attractive.
Big eyes, a square jaw, and well-proportioned features.
The kind of guy who’d always had his pick of women and yet still prowled Glasgow’s bars on a Saturday night, hunting for a casual shag.
He reminded Nell of Danny’s youngest brother. He called it ‘sharking’—complete with a little hand-waggle above his head to mimic a dorsal fin—laughing off his family’s remarks about settling down or starting a family.
Grant’s smirk was identical to the one Danny’s brother wore when he thought he was being charming. The kind of smirk that made women swoon but left Nell fighting the urge to roll her eyes.
Another glass down, she tossed aside her concerns.
Grant and Tadgh were entertaining company, cracking jokes left, right and centre, and verbatim quoting from films. They knew the entire Top Gun script and recited the film’s cheesiest lines—“Take me to bed or lose me forever!”—with Tadgh as Stephanie McGillis to Grant’s Tom Cruise, the latter howling with laughter when Stephanie, a better mimic than either of them, joined in.
Nell stood up to use the toilet, teetering between the line of tipsy and drunk. There was no sign of the extra food she’d requested Grant order, and she made her way inside and down to the basement toilets on shaky legs.
The toilets stank—the city centre’s sewage system too overwhelmed to extinguish the stench of so many thousands of people pissing and crapping in a small geographic area. As she peed, she rested her head on the side of the cubicle, the cool wall soothing.
By the time she stumbled back up the stairs, Grant had slung a casual arm around Stephanie, fingers brushing the exposed skin on her chest. The three of them were staring at Tadgh’s phone.
As Nell sat down, Stephanie, wide-eyed, pushed her phone across the table.
“Oh my God, Nell. Look at that!”
The image on the screen shifted in and out of focus as Nell adjusted it. A teenager with deep, Bournville chocolate-coloured hair grinned at the camera. The shape and curve of his lips were unmistakably familiar.
“Isn’t that weird?” Stephanie said, her voice tinged with something Nell couldn’t place. She shot her a look—pointed, searching—which sailed right over Nell’s head.
“Why do you have that photo of Danny?” Nell asked Tadgh, confusion pooling in her chest. Why would a stranger have a picture of her husband as a teenager on his phone?
“Nell.” Stephanie’s voice softened, her usual lightness replaced with something more tentative. “That’s not Daniel.”
“What are you talking about? Of course it is!” Nell leant closer, studying the photo again.
Danny’s mother, Trish, kept a treasure trove of burgundy faux leather-covered photo albums filled with snapshots of her children growing up.
Nell had seen countless pictures from Danny’s childhood, and while this one was unfamiliar, it could have easily belonged among them.
It reminded her of a family photo taken in Uncle Shane’s garden one sunny afternoon in the late ’80s.
Stephanie bit her lip, her expression a mix of worry and anticipation. Tadgh, still seated across from them, reached for his phone.
“This,” he said quietly, “is Ryan. He’s my nephew.”