The Meet Cute Method, page 19
‘That’s horrendous,’ he says. ‘What a bastard. Frankie, I’m so sorry.’
‘The best part of the story is that, afterwards, I never heard from him again,’ I say. ‘I wondered if this was just what he did, lulled women into a false sense of security, had weird sex with them, and then never called them again, or if he was ashamed of how he treated me, because he got carried away, and so he just couldn’t face me any more. I imagine the reality was something in the middle.’
‘It’s so hard to trust again, after something hurts you,’ Max replies.
‘Tell me about it,’ I say. ‘He’s the last person I was with-with. My last proper boyfriend before that cheated on me. I don’t need to tell you about that, though, do I?’
‘Seeing as we’re in a sharing mood,’ he says. ‘If you’ve bared your soul, then so can I. My last two serious girlfriends have cheated on me – I suppose I thought the relationships were more serious than they did. At this point, I’m starting to think it might be me who is the problem. With Fran, it was pretty standard stuff. I was suspicious, I watched her a little closer, I saw the signs, the dodgy behaviour, hiding her phone while she was in the shower kind of thing. So I confronted her, she admitted it, and that was that. With Paige…’
Max’s voice tapers off. He doesn’t say anything for a few seconds.
‘I thought being cheated on once was bad, but twice,’ I say, filling the silence with sympathy. ‘I honestly don’t think I could stand trying again if it was me. Sometimes I wonder whether that’s why I’m so cautious, because I need the next time I fall in love to be a love that lasts forever. I know, that sounds kind of corny, but another heartbreak would be another failure, another reason to give up altogether. I’m starting to think that’s why I tank my chances with anyone I meet. I’m scared everyone is going to hurt me.’
I wonder, just to myself, of course, whether that’s why I’m so keen to stay single, and why I’m always too willing to try out things for the articles, because I know that nothing real can ever come from them. I get to have a love life, of sorts, without running the risk of being intimate with someone again, only for them to hurt me one way or another.
‘I can’t even imagine what it must be like for you,’ I continue. ‘Paige being with your brother, the two of them being married, having to see them together all the time.’
Max chews his lip thoughtfully.
‘Can I tell you something?’ he eventually asks. ‘It’s something I’ve never told anyone before.’
‘Of course,’ I insist. ‘I’ve never told anyone what I just told you, so you know your secret is safe with me.’
‘Paige is with Lee now, and I do honestly believe they’re happy together, and right for each other, but Paige hasn’t always known what she wanted,’ he explains. ‘Or who. Can I interest you in a little childhood trauma to frame what happened between us?’
‘Of course,’ I say with a jokey enthusiasm. ‘I’ve offloaded my baggage on to you. Please, feel free to do the same.’
‘Albi and I were in the same year at school,’ Max explains. ‘The same class, we even hung around in the same friendship group. Albi realised, pretty early on, that he could… I don’t know, leverage the fact he was my uncle, to gain street cred. He thought it was hilarious. So did everyone else, to be honest, it’s an impossible thing for kids to wrap their heads around. He used to say he had authority over me, as my uncle, and that I had to do whatever he said. I was his little punching bag, the butt of all his jokes, the person he made look small to try and make himself look big. That story Lee told when we were playing Convince Me. Albi was the one who made my face bleed when we were all wrestling – absolutely on purpose, it wasn’t a rogue trainer, it was the one on his foot – and he was the one who started the godawful Maxi Pad nickname that followed me all the way through my A levels. As we got older, Albi couldn’t stand to see me with anything he didn’t have. Better grades, cooler clothes, girls. He stole my girlfriend a week before our prom, just to show me that he could, I suppose, and then he dumped her a few days after. I hadn’t been with her long, and I was a teenager, so I got over it, obviously. But then, with Paige… I suppose she was what you would call a bit of a social climber back then.’
Max takes a breath. I’m tempted to tell him to leave it there. That he shouldn’t dwell on the past. But honestly, I feel so much lighter for sharing what I carry around with him. I think telling someone is something I’ve needed to do for a long time.
‘It’s awful when someone cheats on you, of course it is,’ he continues. ‘The hurt, the betrayal, all the questions. The only thing that makes it worse, as if it could be, is when you catch that person cheating on you. When you walk in on them in bed with someone else, you see them so wrapped up in this other person, so lost in the moment, yourself so far from their thoughts until their eyes accidentally meet yours. That’s how I found out Paige was cheating on me. Albi was the person I caught her with.’
‘No!’ I blurt.
I knew Albi was a bit of a playboy, but I honestly thought he might be all talk, to a degree. Lee might be the kind of guy to marry his brother’s ex, but for Albi, his uncle, to sleep with his girlfriend! When will I learn that just because people are nice, good-looking, funny and charming, that none of that speaks to their character at all?
‘I’m not making excuses for anyone, but she knew I was wondering about my role in the company, I wonder if I wasn’t serving as the right kind of step for her any more,’ he says. ‘Albi probably seemed like a more viable option but, as I said before, he would want what I had, take it and then quickly discard it. Lee doesn’t know any of this. Neither does anyone else in the family. I don’t think Paige is the same person she was back then. Maybe she accidentally genuinely fell in love with Lee or maybe she decided to change. No one ever needs to know. And look, I know we’re not really engaged, but Albi doesn’t, so maybe watch yourself around him, I know it’s been a while, but I wouldn’t put anything past him.’
‘Thanks,’ I say softly. ‘He paints himself as such a charmer. I’ve chatted to him a few times… He told me about his girlfriend, who broke her back skiing.’
I don’t tell him about us going snorkelling together because I don’t want him worrying about the two of us hanging out.
‘Well, I wouldn’t have ever called her his girlfriend in the first place, more just the girl he brought on one of the family skiing holidays, and even if that weren’t the case, she definitely wasn’t his girlfriend after she had to obviously cut the holiday short, so he never contacted her again.’
Wow, what a prick.
‘I do wonder if it’s me,’ Max continues. ‘Whether I’m just so damn easy to cheat on for some reason. I don’t know. Maybe I should give up, but I suppose I’m a tragic romantic at heart.’
He laughs his way through the second half of his sentence. Then we fall silent for a second.
‘Well, we’re ruining Secret Cove,’ I eventually say.
‘We really are,’ he replies. ‘What a couple of losers. Who is sad in Maui?’
I laugh as the mood lightens again.
‘I really don’t want the memory of here to be me spilling my guts on the beach,’ I say.
‘Oh, I’ve done that before in Maui,’ he says. ‘Come on holiday with us a few more times. Spilling your guts on the beach on holiday is one of the great British pastimes.’
‘You know, an actual Secret Cove sounds like a great place to bury all this rubbish,’ I say. ‘We could leave it here, so to speak.’
‘Okay, deal,’ he says. ‘I’ll let go of it if you will.’
I dig a small hole in the golden sand, pretend to fill it with something, and then fill it back in. I do all of this with my free hand because I desperately don’t want to break contact with him.
‘Well, now that’s out of the way, fancy a dip in the sea?’ Max suggests.
‘Now that’s a memory for the day I’ll be happy with,’ I tell him.
‘As nice as that would be, don’t get ahead of yourself,’ he warns me. ‘We’re going somewhere else later that might just top it.’
I smile. Max really is going all out today, to give me a day that resembles a normal holiday, and I couldn’t be more grateful. Screw the meet cutes. Even if it is just for a day.
29
Have you ever found yourself in a moment that is just perfect?
After spending time at Secret Cove, and visiting one of the most popular beachfront diners on the island, Max has brought me to Haleakala National Park to see the sunset. It’s taken us a while to drive the twenty miles up the winding road that takes you up 10,000 feet, but Max promised me it was worth all the potential car sickness, and a brief break from the hot sunny weather up at the top. It was worth it for the car trip alone. We’ve been chatting the whole way up here, about anything and everything, laughing, joking, getting on like a house on fire again.
‘People make reservations way in advance and get up early to see the sunrise here,’ he tells me. ‘Not everyone realises that the sunset is just as beautiful.’
‘The beginning is usually more beautiful than the end, I suppose,’ I reply. ‘But this… this is… thank you so much for bringing me here. Why do I want to cry?’
Max takes his AirPods from his pocket. He puts the left one in his ear and the right one in mine. He places an arm around me and pulls me close as he messes with his phone.
‘I once came here on my own and I listened to this James Bay album as I watched the sun set,’ he explains as he searches for what he’s looking for. ‘And as I did, I decided what I wanted to do with my life, and that was to move back to the UK and take the job at ByteBanter.’
‘What a place to do it,’ I reply.
‘Somehow, as I watched the sky and listened to the music, everything fell into place. I figured out exactly what I wanted. Here, try it.’
Max gives his phone one final tap, and the music starts playing.
As though it weren’t beautiful enough up here before sunset, looking out across the island from above the clouds, now, watching the day turn into night, it’s really a sight to behold. As the sun reaches the carpet of clouds, it sinks into a bright yellowy-orange sky, taking every last bit of warmth with it, so Max holds me closer still, and as ‘Let It Go’ fades into ‘If You Ever Want to Be in Love’, I finally feel that wave of clarity Max felt before he moved to London. I know exactly what I want. It’s him. It’s Max.
In a moment that is so unlike me, I turn to Max to kiss him. In an even less likely event, considering this is my life we’re talking about, Max’s lips are already on the way to find mine, and as the last part of the sun finally disappears, we share our first kiss, 10,000 feet in the air, thousands of miles from the real world, and I couldn’t think of a more perfect way to describe how it feels. Like he’s the missing piece of the puzzle. The broken bit of something that, when it comes together with the pieces of me, makes something fixed. Something whole. This is the last thing I expected to happen today, but it’s the best too. I don’t ever want to come back down.
30
After a day like yesterday, and the sunset that followed, I couldn’t have imagined anything that could possibly ruin something so perfect. What about the fact that it’s the next morning and Max is acting like it didn’t happen? That really takes the shine off things.
I’m not mentioning it either, of course. Well, if he isn’t going to, then neither am I. Two can play at that game… it’s just a shame, because I thought my days of playing games might finally be over.
Eva came over relatively early, to see if Max wanted to play tennis with her. She invited me too, but I said I had work to do. This made her laugh, because she couldn’t imagine how a spinal surgeon could possibly work from a hotel room on holiday, but she didn’t question me on what it was. I suppose I could always claim patient-doctor confidentiality if she did.
I’m out and about, in the resort, trying to trigger some meet cutes, because reality is coming for me any day now. I’ll be back home before I know it, fighting for my job, desperately searching for somewhere I can afford to live, while still being stuck somewhere that has bugs in the bath and Stuart’s latest fella trapped in the shower.
I’ve tried angling for men to buy me drinks at the bar again, except it’s the same bloody barman (Ori, who is genuinely a really nice man) so he keeps just giving me free drinks and telling me to pass my regards on to the rest of the Rays. I didn’t waste my time trying to drown myself in the baby end of the pool, I’ll keep that ace up my sleeve for when I have no other options. Now I’m walking through the gardens, where I’ve just spotted a marquee full of people. It looks like a party. Now that’s a great place to meet people.
I sneak up to the entrance to the marquee before slinking my way inside. I weave in and out of people, until I’m more in the centre of the crowd, trying to blend in a little more.
I find myself next to a table where a forty-something man is eating a very colourful piece of cake.
‘That looks delicious,’ I say, breaking the ice.
‘It’s not bad for a kids’ cake,’ he replies. He has an American accent that I can’t place and I’m also very much aware of the fact that he said it was a kids’ cake. I glance around the room. Colourful balloons, a clown, a piñata – yep, this is totally a kids’ birthday party. ‘Where’s yours?’
‘Oh, I’m not having any,’ I reply.
‘Huh?’ he says, confused.
‘I’m not having any cake,’ I say.
‘I mean your kids,’ he says with a laugh.
‘Ohhhh.’ I chuckle awkwardly. ‘I don’t have any kids.’
‘You want some?’ he jokes, gesturing at the crowd of screaming children behind him, all yelling at the birthday boy, who is smacking the piñata with a scary amount of strength.
‘Hey, buy me dinner first,’ I joke – imagining that’s what Addison would say if she were in my shoes (or what she would tell me to say now if she were watching), because I have to keep my mind on my job, even if I really don’t want to. ‘Calm down, mister.’
Oh, God, he does not look impressed with that.
‘It’s my son’s birthday,’ he reminds me. ‘If you’re not one of the moms, who are you?’
‘Oh, is that the time?’ I say, looking at my watch, except I decided not to wear it today because I’m starting to get a huge white patch on my wrist where the sun hasn’t managed to tan. ‘I’d better go take my medicine.’
I stand up and hurry my way out of the marquee, heading back in the direction of the suites. It’s no use. I officially suck at meet cutes. And it’s not like a romantic encounter is just going to drop from the sky and fall at my feet, is it?
Right on cue, a balled-up piece of paper lands on the floor in front of me. I pick it up and straighten it out. It reads:
I love you.
I quickly glance around and eventually spot Ronnie Ray, sitting at a table alone, with a pen, a pad, and enough screwed-up paper to explain a missing rainforest.
‘Frankie, sorry,’ he says. ‘I didn’t mean to throw that at you, I just lost my temper.’
‘That’s okay,’ I say as I return the piece of paper to him. I set it down on the table, message side up, so he knows that I’ve seen it. ‘Is everything okay?’
‘Between you and me, not really, no,’ he replies. ‘It’s this stupid vow renewal tomorrow. Not that the renewal is stupid, it’s just the vows, I can’t write a thing to save my life.’
I take a seat at the table next to him.
‘Perhaps I can help you,’ I suggest. ‘I’m pretty good at this stuff.’
I am a writer, after all – not that I can tell Ronnie that.
‘You’re welcome to try,’ he says. ‘But I’ve got nothing. Nothing but I love you.’
‘That might sound bad when you say it like that, but if we put the right spin on it, we can use it,’ I tell him. He raises a curious eyebrow. ‘Why don’t you try and tell me why you love Eva, or why you think you’re still together, after all these years.’
‘Well, she was with me before I was a billionaire,’ he starts off, rather unromantically. ‘And all my friends, they’ve all got girlfriends on the side, one, two, sometimes even three. But not me. Never have, never will.’
I didn’t think Ronnie could get any less romantic than ‘she’s not a gold digger’ but he proved me wrong with ‘I don’t cheat on her like all my friends do with their wives’. Impressive.
‘Okay, so not traditionally things you would say at a vow renewal,’ I say, allowing myself a slight chuckle. ‘But, what about this: Eva, you’ve stood by me since the day we met, through the ups and the downs.’
Ronnie’s eyes widen.
‘Hang on, let me write this down,’ he says eagerly. ‘Okay, what else?’
‘Next…’ I think about his not-cheating line. ‘In all the time we’ve been together, I can honestly say I’ve never even looked at another woman, no one has ever come close. No one can compete. No one could have given me such endless support, such a beautiful family…’
Ronnie laps up every word I say. It’s as though he can’t believe his luck.
‘Anything else?’ he asks.
‘To finish, I’m thinking…’ I think for a moment. I don’t just want to write any old romantic mush, he could have searched for that on the internet, Eva would spot it a mile off. ‘Of all the things I have to say, the only thing that matters is this… I love you.’
‘Fucking beautiful,’ he tells me. ‘Honestly, absolutely perfect. And you’re a doctor? You should be a writer!’
‘It’s been said before,’ I joke, entirely for my own amusement.
Ronnie has no sooner raised his hand than a waitress is standing alongside him.
‘Yes, Mr Ray?’ she says.
‘A bottle of champagne, please, for me and my daughter-in-law-to-be,’ he says. ‘The most expensive one you have.’
