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Chapter two

Human failure (e.g., in chemical plants): a cause of accidents attributed to human factors, including accidental errors of action or thinking, or intentional violation of protocol.

I reach the bistro a few minutes early, so I hide in a charity shop a few doors down, pretending to browse while I check my reflection in a second-hand mirror.

The quiff looks… passable. I've got my best (read, only) slate grey sport coat on, paired with a royal blue shirt and charcoal trousers which are just a tiny bit tight around the rear.

I look my best, which is actually surprisingly decent.

Great, some snooty lady has just spotted me checking my arse out. I leave with the weight of her judgmental glare hot on my back.

It's now one thirty, so flustered or not, it's time. I enter the bistro, and someone shows me to our table. Luke Irons is waiting, and he stands to greet me.

Okay, wow. So he doesn't look much like my vague memories would suggest, but I guess it's been a decade and I've changed a little too.

As I remembered Luke is pretty tall, and a fair bit broader than me in the shoulders. His dirty blond hair is now cropped short, and he has a faint hint of stubble over a strong jaw. His eyes are a lovely shade of green. There's a friendly smile on his face as I approach.

He's wearing a dark blue suit with a crisp cream-coloured shirt and royal purple tie, which all look well-tailored and expensive. Bastard. My own getup looks pedestrian in comparison.

He's exactly the type of man whose attention I've always craved. And I've always felt an undercurrent of resentment for the way they made me feel.

"Charlie," Luke says, and his voice sounds surprisingly gentle for his stature. "It's lovely to meet you again." His voice is refined, hinting at years of expensive education and mingling amongst ‘the right kind of people’.

"Is it?" I horrify myself by saying, and I backpedal furiously. "I mean, thanks. It's lovely to meet you again too. Sort of." He looks a bit taken aback. "No - I mean it is lovely to meet you. It's the 'again' that I meant. I'm not sure we ever properly met."

He frowns a little as we take a seat. "Well. I suppose we weren't close, but I'm not sure I would say that."

Is he kidding? I'm pretty sure we barely crossed paths. "Well, I know we have mutual friends," I say tentatively.

He regards me for a second. "Ah," he says quietly. "You definitely don't remember then."

"Remember what?" I'm distracted by the waiter passing us fancy drinks menus.

When I look back up, he actually looks faintly upset. "It's just that we've actually talked, for a bit. It was just the once though. It's not important." He glances down for a second, and when he looks back up the smile is back on his face.

"Oh." Crap. It’s awkward already. Clearly I’ve had a conversation with him at some point, probably during some event in our college while we were at uni.

And I've forgotten it completely, so he must think I'm an arsehole. Well, that’s my chance at a good first impression well and truly gone now. “Um. Sorry?”

“It’s genuinely not important.” He picks a drinks menu up, the picture of composure and calm.

I, on the other hand, am conscious of the beginnings of a spiral.

I’ve always had this tendency, to some extent, when important things aren’t going well.

When living circumstances meant that my mum and I had to move halfway through Reception year at school, when I was only five, from Burnley in Lancashire proper to Crumpsall in the northern part of Greater Manchester, I distinctly remember my first day in my new school.

After agonising for ages over a colouring task that I was convinced I was completely messing up, I’d eventually approached my teacher and burst into tears.

Turns out I’d been doing it completely fine.

My spirals since then haven’t ended in floods of tears, of course. Well, mostly not. But when I’m worked up about something, when it’s high stakes, and when things aren’t smooth sailing to begin with - common sense shuts down and panic sets in.

I’d tanked a few job interviews this way, in the past. And more recently, dates. One misstep, and disaster ensues. It’s gotten worse the more I’ve struck out.

So, quite likely unbeknownst to my date, I’m now simultaneously mad at myself for already fucking up, worrying about how little I can afford to keep being such a disaster, and, very unfairly, annoyed at Luke Irons for daring to be the sort of person whose approval I care about at all.

I might be a bit of a mess.

“Any idea what you’d like to drink?” Luke asks breezily.

“Um,” I say eloquently, realising that I’ve been burying my nose in the drinks menu for the past couple of minutes without reading a single word.

I flip through it again. The bloody thing is pages and pages long, and I…

I just want a fizzy drink. But then I’ll seem unsophisticated, and that’ll be another strike against me, and…

“Charlie.”

I look up. Luke’s staring at me. Shit. I probably look sweaty and unappealing. I definitely feel it.

“Charlie. Are you alright?” His sea green eyes catch my gaze. It’s hard to look away.

“I’m fine.” I’m not fine. This is quite literally the worst first impression I’ve made on a date, ever.

Before I realise I’m doing it, I’m standing, pushing my chair back under the table.

“Sorry,” I tell Luke, who just looks bewildered.

“It turns out I’m not really feeling so great.

I should go.” I pull some money out of my wallet, place it on the table, and hightail it out of the stupid posh bistro.

I know the city centre well enough that it’s no effort to duck into a tiny alleyway behind a few cars that are probably parked there illegally, even though my vision is blurred by sudden tears. At least no one gets to see me wring my hands and wipe my eyes.

“Charlie.”

“Holy fucking fuck!” I say, in a very manly voice that doesn’t at all resemble the screeching of a fishwife. I turn, heart pounding. Bloody Luke Irons has just crept behind me.

“Sorry,” he says. “I just thought… I wanted to check if you were alright.”

I laugh breathlessly, running a hand through my hair. Oh good, I’ve knocked it out of place now as well. “I’m fine. Shit. I’m really sorry.”

Luke appears concerned. “I’m worried that I’ve done something to upset you, but I’m afraid I’m not sure what it was.”

I quickly wipe my eyes once more, and blink at him. Does he really think that it’s something he’s done? “No. I mean, you haven’t. I… I don’t even know. I’m just really bad at dates. Don’t blame Will - he doesn’t know that I’m this much of a disaster when it comes to dating.”

“I’d say that Will has no leg to stand on when it comes to dating performance,” Luke says curtly, startling a laugh out of me.

He’s right. Will, up to the point where he started dating Priya, had had an absolutely tragic dating record.

“And anyway, while I know we don’t know each other that well, I think it would be impossible for you to be bad at dating. ”

“That’s… kind of you to say.” That’s bullshit, is what I actually want to tell him. “They’re never going to let me set foot in that bistro again, are they?”

Luke chuckles lowly, and the sound sends a tingle down my spine. “I don’t think they’d mind all that much. After all, you did tip them twenty pounds to sit down for three minutes.”

“I did? Wow, I’m a big spender,” I joke weakly, and he smiles.

He reaches into his jacket pocket, and produces a twenty pound note. “I believe this is yours.” I frown, and he explains. “I did ask you on the date, after all. So I left the tip on our behalf.”

I take the note from him. “You didn’t have to do that,” I protest. I’m not fully sure how I feel about having my money returned to me - maybe I should feel offended at his high-handedness?

“I wanted to,” Luke says simply. He grins, and for some reason, I can’t help but smile in return. “Besides, I should probably have chosen a better place for our date.”

“Good god, are there posher places than that?” I demand without thinking, and he snorts.

“I would hope not. I thought the host was going to get a neck spasm, from how intensely she was looking down her nose at everyone.” I stifle another laugh.

“You probably know I’ve not lived in Manchester for very long.

I should have done a bit more research on where I was taking you.

I was just hoping for a quieter, low-key place where we could talk and get to know each other.

” He coughs. “And it’s also possible that I wanted to impress you a little bit. ”

“Impress me,” I repeat slowly, very aware that I must seem completely thick.

He seems to get it, which must be a minor miracle in itself.

He actually looks mildly abashed. “That’s right.

I’m not sure if you realise this, Charlie, but I’ve only ever heard nice things about you.

Not just from Will.” He names a couple of people I’d known in university, people I’d have called friends back then, with whom I haven’t kept in touch.

It feels odd, thinking back and realising that I may have let important friendships fall by the wayside in my efforts to distance myself from the person I was in university. Maybe I’ll reach out. Maybe some of them will be happy to hear from me.

Luke’s still there, waiting patiently for me.

Crap. I’ve been in my head for ages. “I’m not sure what to say,” I confess, because I feel I owe him some honesty.

“You’ve been really nice and I’ve made a terrible impression.

” I square my shoulders. “Could I… could I buy you a coffee? Maybe show you a few places that I like around here? That way, when you next ask someone out, you’ll have a few more options to work with.

” This might be a lost cause, but Luke’s been so decent that he deserves to gain something from today’s shitshow.

He smiles. “I’d like that.”