At the end of the speeches I stand up, I don’t know where I’m going but I want to move.
There is a hand on my shoulder, it’s Sophie.
“I’ll forgive you for not coming over and saying hello if you kiss me now.”
I peck her on the cheek and she seems happy, well never happy, but she’s not annoyed with me.
Sophie, leans into the gap of me, her arm across my back, hand on my shoulder. It’s like she owns me.
She makes it look like I’m the only person in her world, unless you are paying attention. She’s asking me questions, but every thirty seconds she is scanning the room for Ian. Ian isn’t looking over.
“So who are you here with?” she asks.
“Nobody.”
She looks surprised, “a nobody, or really nobody?”
“Actually nobody, Audrey isn’t well.”
“Oh, Audrey, yes… I met her once.”
“Yes, she said you two got on.”
“But I didn’t talk to you about her then, and I’m not going to now.”
If she’s going to do that to me…
“How’s Ian?”
“Let’s not do this. Let’s go in here.”
We head from the main room in to a side room, there are large empty couches here. It’s quiet in here but we can be seen from the main room. She picks a couch carefully and has me sit down. She sits next to me in a way that makes it seem like I am a chaise longue.
“How are you?” I ask.
“Shut up.”
“I just wanted to check.”
She hisses and flicks her tongue into my ear. I move my head in surprise and she laughs.
“Sorry,” she says, “can’t we just sit for a while.”
She snuggles back in and we sit for a while. It’s not uncomfortable, we’ve known each other long enough we don’t ever need to talk again.
“I HATE him”
“No you don’t, if you hated him you’d be doing something, instead of pretending to do something with me.”
“I hate you”
“You want him to care about you, the way you care about him. That’s the problem.”
“That is the problem.”
“What do you want to do? He’s not going to notice you in here.”
“Let’s go back in,” she says.
We get up to begin heading back to the main room. I stop her, “Sophie, you care more about him than you care about yourself. You should fix that.”
“I don’t need you to tell me that, I need you to get me a drink.”
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