Virgin(22)

I closed my eyes and quickly walked over before I had a chance to convince myself not to. The blood pounded in my veins as I approached him.

I smiled. “Hey, I’m Ellie.”

He looked up at me suspiciously. “Hey. I’m Jack.”

“Hi! So, how do you know Amelia?”

“Who’s Amelia?”

“Oh, um, she lives here and it’s her party. I thought maybe you’re a friend of hers.”

“No, I’m just here with a friend, Eric.”

“Oh right, I don’t know him.”

“Yeah, he’s dating a girl who told him to come. Hannah Fielding?”

Of course he was dating Hannah. Fucking typical. “Yeah, I know her. We both study English together. How do you know Eric?”

“We work together.” He shrugged.

I smiled. “Oh, cool. What do you do?”

“I work in graphic design.”

I winced. He was giving off strong leave me alone vibes and the monosyllabic responses suggested he definitely didn’t want me here and was about to reject me. Come on, Ellie! You’re beautiful and brave, I yelled at myself inwardly. I gave it one last shot.

“Graphic design, cool. What kind of stuff do you do?” I asked optimistically.

“Well, I really hate the idea of working for the commercial side of things, so I’m working for a small start-up in Shoreditch.”

Typical. This guy was a total cliché and I was ready to bail. Then my new mantra popped into my head—What would Emma do?

I opened my mouth and a stream of words fell out. “Right, and you like underground music, you hate girls who wear fake eyelashes or nails, and you secretly want to be a millionaire—but in the meantime, it makes you feel better to say you hate capitalism or whatever.”

He stared at me in silence with his mouth slightly open, looking like a confused goldfish. Fuck, why had I just done that? I was an idiot. Emma never would have said all that.

I tried to undo the damage. “No, wait, I didn’t mean it like that. Sorry, I got carried away. I’m sure you’re nothing like that. It’s just that a couple of people here are, and I kind of assumed you would be too, but that’s just me being stupid. Ignore me, really.”

Why did I have so much verbal diarrhea? I cringed at what I had just said and hoped he wouldn’t think I was deranged. I thought about trying to explain what I meant, but at the last minute his face broke into a half grin. I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Yeah, you’re right. I guess I am a bit of a pretentious twat. I bet capitalism and commercialism would look pretty fucking great if I was a millionaire,” he admitted. “Especially because I’m definitely not a millionaire, and just had my wallet stolen today—which is why I’m in a shit mood. Sorry. I don’t normally go to parties and stand alone in a corner being unfriendly.”

Okay, so he knew he was being unfriendly before and he didn’t normally respond with less-than-five-word sentences. This was positive news. I figured he wasn’t rejecting me, so I asked him what had happened and let him tell me his ten-minute sob story about getting pickpocketed on the 176 bus to Penge. We sat down on the sofa together and carried on chatting.

It turned out Jack was twenty-six, originally from Nottingham but lived in South London, loved philosophy and art, hated all the music I loved and kind of was the Shoreditch stereotype I had guessed he was. But we still ended up talking for hours, and he laughed at all my jokes, even the ones I didn’t realize I was making.

“Do you want a drink?” he asked suddenly.

“Sure, I’d love another . . . erm, vodka and orange?” I said, looking doubtfully at the pale, sickly looking remnants of the drink left in my glass.

“Is that what that is?” he asked, nodding his head wisely. “Wow, I’d forgotten the crap that students drink. Luckily, I bought a bottle of Beaujolais before my wallet got stolen, so shall I pour you some of that instead?”

“Uh, yes, please,” I said, impressed by the fancy bottle of red that he pulled out of a canvas bag.

He had started pouring the wine into two cups when Emma swooped up, a cup in her hand. “And one for me please, thank you very much.”

Jack looked a bit taken aback but went along with it when he saw Emma envelop me in a bear hug. “Sooo, are we having fun, Ellie? Oh my God, I met the nicest guy. He is so much fitter than yesterday’s barman, who still hasn’t texted—what a wanker. Anyway, so Mike, the new guy, is a total cutie.”

“I saw,” I said, raising my eyebrows at her. “There was some major flirting going on there.”

“Not just over there,” she added, grinning, and looked pointedly at Jack.