Thursday 14th November
Steve could just see reception through the doors, and Lydia, behind the desk, if he stood at the end of the bar.
Tonight he had a date with Lydia. While he emptied the dishwasher and wiped the glasses, he dreamt of different scenarios.
Ruby approached, shaking him out of his reverie. “Can you relieve Lydia for me please? She needs to take her break.”
“Yeah, sure,” Steve said, putting the polished glass on the shelf. Any excuse to get a quick chat with Lydia.
He arrived at the desk as Lydia put down the phone. “I’m here to relieve you,” he said like a sergeant, even giving a little salute, making Lydia giggle.
“Oh good because I’m parched.”
“Hello, gorgeous,” Alice said, winking at Steve as she approached the desk. She stood near Steve, but if he moved, would it make it look obvious that he was uncomfortable? “Lydia, an engineer is coming to fix one of the treadmills in the gym. Can you just send him down when he arrives, please?”
“Yes of course. Stuart, you got that too? In case he comes when I’m on my break.”
Stuart gave Lydia a thumbs up.
As Alice left them she gave Steve a flirtatious smile, and Lydia mumbled something along the lines, “She could have just called reception.” Then, she looked at Steve, “The desk is all yours, although it’s a shame you can’t join me for tea.”
“Another time, now skedaddle,” he said, as the phone started ringing again. “Good afternoon, you’re through to reception.” Steve rolled his eyes and Lydia saw, giggled, then walked away, happy he was competent at his job. He’d been doing this for over a month now, and it was very rare he got stuck answering the questions guests threw at him.
Putting the phone down, he noticed Lydia’s sketchpad under the desk – she’d left it behind. Glancing over his shoulder, he watched Lydia disappear through the double doors, leading to the staff canteen. He waited for the doors to swing close. He pulled the sketchpad out, then pushed it back under the desk, knowing he shouldn’t look. He didn’t have permission. Lydia had specifically not wished to share its contents. Yet, he was curious. He pulled it back out, glanced at the double doors – still closed – and brushed his thumb against the pages. Should he? Shouldn’t he? What did she have to hide? If he knew the contents of the pad, he might be able to convince her she was good. Steve internally battled, but his curiosity won and he sneakily browsed through the pages. His heart raced with fear of being caught, worrying she’d return remembering she’d forgotten her sketchpad. Another glance, the coast was clear, and no one came to the desk, so he kept flicking through the pad.
Cherubic drawings. Why couldn’t she show him these? Cherub-like animals too. Then Steve.
He stopped. There, in front of him, were sketches of himself. Side profile of his face mainly. Some of his eyes. When had she been drawing him? There was nothing cherubic about these, yet they were beautiful.
The drawings were brilliant. Portraits in pencil or black ink, or even biro. They were accurate, though he did look boyish thanks to his haircut – he’d gone back to the barbers yesterday morning for another trim.
Is this what he looked like when he smiled? When he was happy? He looked happy in all of them.
How long had they been there, though? When she’d snapped the other week, when he’d gone to look, were his pictures in there then?
Steve’s arms trembled, he glanced again, still no sign of Lydia, so he put the pad back and busied himself behind reception. Ten minutes later, Lydia returned.
“Did I miss anything?” she said, resuming her place behind the desk.
“No it’s been really quiet.” Did he confess? Or would that piss her off? He didn’t want to do anything to jeopardise tonight.
You are stupid; you’ve already done that if she finds out. She’d asked you not to look.
Forget about the damn pictures.
***
Steve showered, gelled his hair, tweaked it and tweaked it some more. His date with Lydia was rapidly approaching and he’d never felt this nervous in his life, not even when auditioning for a movie. Or at least it was a different kind of nerves. He couldn’t decide. They were going for dinner at a local pub, so he donned jeans and a long-sleeved shirt out of his new wardrobe. God, if the press snapped him in this would he have some explaining to do.
They really don’t care what you wear – you’re just worrying over nothing now.
“You look fine,” Ruby said, leaning against the bathroom door. He checked his appearance in the mirror again. Yeah, he looked good. If he did turn up looking more like Steve Mason, Lydia would probably run a mile – or just freeze.
“You don’t mind me borrowing your car?”
“Of course not.”
“Only you won’t let me buy one.” He grinned cheekily.
“What’s the point? You’ll be flying back off to LA before you know it.” Ruby sounded sombre.
“Hey, I’ve got a while yet. And I could let you buy a new car. It could be your choice, and I run around in your old one.”
“No! We’ve talked about this Steve, I don’t need anything.”
Steve opened his mouth to argue, but a vibrating, rumble came from Steve’s bedroom, interrupting them.
“What’s that noise?” Ruby frowned. Steve shared a puzzled expression, then like a light bulb appearing above his head, he realised it was his phone. His cell phone. Not the one Ruby had made him buy which contained all of about six numbers, including a taxi firm, which rested in the pocket of his jeans. He ran into the room and grabbed the phone; he had left it on the desk to charge. He hadn’t liked the idea of turning it off altogether in case people in the ‘real world’ did need to get hold of him. He winced, seeing the caller ID and answered the phone. This was someone from Steve’s very real world.
“Where the hell are you?” Steve’s agent bellowed down the phone. Maybe he should have let it go to answerphone. “You were supposed to be back in LA weeks ago.”
“Karl, I’m sorry, I was supposed to call you. Didn’t Marie send a message?”
“Yeah, she did, and I told her to tell you not to be so fucking ridiculous. I’ve got gigs lined up.”
Steve didn’t get that message. Marie was probably trying to give him more time. His PA had definitely earned a raise. “I told you I needed a vacation, Karl.”
“Yeah, and I said take two weeks, not two months!”
“I need a longer break, I need to spend time with my sister. It’s not like I’m needed or anything…am I?”
“I had a chat show lined up, photo shoot with Celebrity Style. It’s the Oscars in February, remember?”
Steve rubbed the back of his neck, wincing at the thought of being a pain in the ass. He didn’t want to be known as one of those celebrities, and he didn’t want to lose this agent. He was a good agent, and had become a good friend. And would another agent touch him if he got a bad reputation? He wasn’t that big in the Hollywood industry yet. He’d heard of famous actors crashing and burning due to their wrong attitudes. Besides, he liked keeping Karl happy. Karl had been the one to put Steve on the road to success, so he felt indebted to him. They were a team.
“Look, Karl, just this once, please? I’ll be back in time for the Oscars, I promise. But I need more time. I really need this break. What with the split from Erica…And I need to make up time with Ruby.”
“Marie did mention your split with Erica taking its toll, but shit, Steve, you’re a star now, you’re going to have to get used to your heart being broken. Actually, you should be the one breaking hearts. You should be on your third wife by now. It’s Hollywood, that’s the done thing.”
“I don’t want three ex-wives! Look, I want to stay until Christmas. I need the vacation and I haven’t spent Christmas with Ruby in fifteen years. Then, I am all yours in January.” It would mean cutting his time short.
“You’d better be,” Karl snapped, then his tone lightened, “Admittedly, you’ve worked hard these past few years, I don’t want you burning out and ending up in rehab. Okay, Christmas, then I want your ass back in LA. I’ll have to cancel the chat show and the photo shoot.”
He threw the phone back on the desk.
“So?” Ruby stood there, arms folded. “Do you have to go back, or do we get Christmas?”
“We get Christmas.” Steve nodded with relief. Hopefully his guilt for letting Karl down would dull. Yet, the reality that he would have to return shortly after Christmas didn’t make him feel great.
“Right, well, you’d better go. Otherwise Lydia will wonder where you are.” She brushed his shirt, almost motherly, and handed Steve her car keys. “You don’t have long now, Steve, so stop dithering and get a move on.”
With November here, and appearing to fly past, he had just over a month at the most. Steve had to return to LA after the Christmas holidays otherwise he would be kissing his career goodbye, and his agent.
Time to see if Lydia was the one.
***
A roaring log fire greeted Steve and Lydia as they entered the cosy pub, making them forget it was winter outside. Both shivered, rubbing their hands, as they found a table in a secluded corner, close to the fire. If it had been daylight, Steve knew that there was a great view to be seen from their window, looking out onto the Severn Estuary.
“This is nice,” Lydia said, gesturing to the room with its solid beams and open fire.
“Yeah, I used to come here years ago. It’s changed a lot though.”
The Golden Lion in Portishead had once been a regular watering hole for Steve and his pals. He was pleased when Ruby confirmed it still existed and served great food. She’d also said it had been refurbished a couple of times, the managers had changed, and the regulars had moved on. No one would recognise him – he hoped.
“So how are you finding work?” Lydia said, once settled, sipping her wine. He could see by the slight tremble in her hands she was nervous. “Is it hard working with Ruby as your boss?” She timidly giggled.
“Oh, no, not at all. Ruby and I have some catching up to do, so it’s rather nice.”
“Will you be looking for other work?”
“How do you mean?” Steve frowned, thrown by her question. He picked up his lager and took a sip. Had he hinted at leaving? That hadn’t been his plan. Though the time would come eventually when he’d have to leave. And it would be sooner rather than later.
“Well, I get the impression Ruby’s done you a favour, I didn’t think you’d be staying long. What did you do before you went travelling?”
“Oh, well, I’ve been travelling for so long, I’ve lost touch with what I used to do…” Steve realised he hated lying.
“Which was?”
“Oh, Lydia, I kinda bummed around for a while.” Actually, he’d worked his ass off since the day he moved to LA. And before that, paper rounds, working in corner shops, washing cars, flipping burgers, anything to save up for his flight over. “It’s embarrassing what I did before…” He couldn’t meet her gaze, concentrating on the bubbles rising in his glass.
“You can tell me. I won’t tell the others, if that’s what you’re worried about. It can’t have been that bad, could it?”
He looked around shiftily, thinking hard, then whispered, “I was…an estate agent.” Unable to meet her gaze, he chided himself, hating the fact he was lying to Lydia,
Lydia laughed, making him feel at ease.
“See I told you it was bad.”
“Not at all, I thought you were going to say something far worse.”
“Worse? Like what?” Steve grinned.
Lydia shrugged. “I don’t know. Double-glazing salesman?
“Oh, God, that is worse.” They laughed. Damn, he liked her laughter. “And I’m not that good at selling.”
“But you sold houses?”
“Houses sell themselves really. Either a person loves a house or they don’t.” He assumed, anyway. Nobody bought a house they didn’t like. Okay, some hideous looking houses probably gave the estate agent extra work.
“So why don’t you go back into selling houses?” she asked once she’d stopped giggling and sipped her drink.
“Because I hated it.” This in the trade was called improvising. He’d never been an estate agent. Not even played a part as one. All he had was daytime TV and all those property programmes as research, and he hadn’t watched many. Sometimes they were on in the morning whilst he got ready for the late shift at work.
“So where did you travel to then?”
Oh, hell, he really should have thought about some background more seriously. He and Ruby had winged it, and then nobody had really asked further. Where had he been with the film sets?
“Australia.” He did spend a couple of weeks there. Not filming, but when the money had started rolling in, he’d managed to get some trips to places he wanted to see, tying in with a couple of chat shows and interviews. Besides, anyone who travelled usually did Australia. He could have easily been there a year. Australia could explain his now fading tan, too.
“Oh, I would love to go to Australia. Tell me all about it.”
Unlike Alice, who talked about herself and gossiped about others, Lydia liked asking questions about Steve, wanting to know more about him. On the plus side, the conversation flowed, on the minus, it meant Steve found himself telling a white lie here and a white lie there to please Lydia. But he could hardly tell her the truth…yet. Though he had to stop himself spilling his guts. He hated lying to her. Every time she called him Stuart, he wanted to correct her, and say he was really Steve.
If this relationship blossomed…how soon should he tell her the truth? Ruby hadn’t thought this through…neither had Steve.
Lydia put her knife and fork together and pushed her cleared plate away. Erica would have only ordered the salad. But then she wouldn’t have sat in a cosy pub in Portishead and ordered the smothered chicken with chunky chips. One, she was a vegetarian, and two, Erica had to stick to a strict diet thanks to the career she’d chosen.
Lydia wasn’t fat. She had a superb figure, which Steve could not stop fantasising about, imaging her curves pressing into him.
“So, have you seen how Brett acts around Ruby?”
Steve frowned, although thankful Lydia had changed the subject from him to Ruby. “I have wondered, but then I just thought it was Brett being Brett, nervous around Miss Whiplash.”
“He never calls her that. Callum does.”
“Come to think of it, a while back they did seem cosy on the sofa together when the guys came over for a boys’ night in.”
“And Friday night, he stayed with her the whole time I was there.”
“He got her home safely, too.” Guilt stabbed at him again. “I’m sorry about last Friday. I invited you out and then ended up forgetting about you.”
“Not hard with Alice about.”
“I forgot about Alice, too,” Steve said, chuckling, trying to make a joke of it.
“Well…it doesn’t matter.” It looked as if Lydia wanted to forget Friday night as much as Steve did. He was thankful she shook her head and waved it off. Steve enjoyed watching how her hair flicked around her neck. “But anyway, I think he likes Ruby.”
“Alice reckoned you and Brett had a thing…” Steve swallowed down fear that this could be true. Although, Lydia was not on a date with Brett.
Lydia laughed and shook her head. “The gossip in that hotel. All you have to do is talk to someone of the opposite sex and you’re dating. No, Brett and I are just friends, and that’s how I’ve noticed how he is with Ruby.”
“I’ll have to watch out for him then,” Steve said, putting on a stern voice and a silly Popeye pose with his arms.
“Oh, how big brotherly.” Lydia giggled.
“What about you? When are you going to show the world you’re a great artist?” Steve leaned forward, resting his elbows onto the table. He took Lydia’s hand and rubbed her palm with his thumb.
“Illustrator. Soon…I want to send them off to some agents. I want to get commissioned. I’m just putting a portfolio and a website together.”
“What made you want to become an illustrator?”
“I’ve always loved drawing, but I always thought it would be my hobby. Then, never really knowing what to do, I decided I should try to turn my hobby into a living. This would be the perfect day job. Something I enjoy, love, rather than, like at work where half the time, I’m bored out of my brain. But it’s regular and pays the bills, so I have to stick at it for the time being.”
“Illustrating would be your dream job?”
“Yeah, I’d love to do children’s books, but I’m not the writer, I’m no good with words, at least writing them down. Kids’ stories are so hard. Knowing what to write, what they’d understand. I tried having a go, and just couldn’t do it. Ideally, I want to illustrate the stories with my characters.”
“So…” Steve smiled, cheekily, “when are you going to show me the contents of that sketchpad. I want to see your drawings.” He’d seen them, of course, but he wanted her to show them to him, then his conscience would be cleared. “You know, we’ve dated once now. I should see them.”
“Oh, um, one day.” Her gaze dropped, withdrawing her hand from Steve, and she fiddled with the coaster on the table, turning it on the table.
“Lydia, you have nothing to be ashamed of. What you did show me were great. I want to see more. I’m interested.”
“I know. I need to get over this hurdle, but let me do it in my own time. It’s half the reason I haven’t submitted anything yet. I’m worried about the rejections.”
“Rejections toughen you up.” Did he know about rejections. “Your skin will thicken, but they will love your drawings.” He reached out and squeezed her arm reassuringly. “So, shall we get dessert, or just coffee?”
He didn’t want tonight to end, but it was getting late. He’d have to take her home soon.
“Maybe a coffee for me. I’m stuffed. I couldn’t eat another thing.”
Coffee arrived, and Steve wanted to know as much as he could about Lydia. “So, you know my family – Ruby – what about yours?” Steve said, offering Lydia a chocolate mint that had come with the coffee.
“Oh, I’m the youngest of three,” Lydia said, taking the mint, and placing it by her coffee. “I have an older brother – he’s getting married next year and an older sister, the oldest, who is married with two young children – two nieces.”
“Do you see your nieces often?”
“Yes, I spoil them rotten.” Lydia grinned. “I try to help out with babysitting when I can.” Tick, Steve thought mentally. She likes kids. “Actually, I’ve got to babysit in a few weeks – would you like to come with me and keep me company? Oh!” Lydia blushed. “Maybe that’s a bit presumptuous. You might not want another date.”
“Don’t be silly. Of course I do.” He caressed her hand, dying to touch her again.
“We could get in pizzas, watch a film,” she said happily. “It’s Emma’s thirtieth birthday and her husband, Paul, wants to take her out. They don’t get out much together. I agreed to it ages ago.”
“Sounds like a date.”
***
Steve parked up outside Lydia’s house, behind her maroon Beetle. He got out and followed her up the steps to her front door. Keys in her hand, she stood on the top step, and turned to face Steve who was on the lower one. They were the perfect height. He didn’t need to look down, she didn’t need to look up. Lips parallel.
“I’d ask you in for coffee…but…”
“No, no, I don’t want to come in…yet,” Steve said, pushing a strand of hair out of her face. “I want to do this right. You’ll go out with me again, won’t you? I’ve had so much fun tonight, you won’t believe how great it’s been to just talk, and listen.”
She smiled shyly. “I’ve had a great time, too.”
“Good. Plus, I think I’d better see you some more before I meet your sister.”
“My sister?”
“Yes you asked me to help babysit, remember?”
“Oh, yes. I did.”
Steve edged forward, lips an inch away, then gently cupping her face, he kissed her, softly. For a brief moment, she opened her mouth and welcomed his tongue. The kiss was exquisite. Lydia wrapped her arms around his waist, gently gripping his shirt. Blood raced to Steve’s groin so fast it surprised him. He pulled away and sighed, not wanting Lydia to feel his growing erection. She kept her eyes closed for a moment. Everything in the world seemed perfect.
“Tomorrow night, or Saturday?” he asked.
“Does tomorrow sound too eager?” She tucked some hair behind her ear.
“Absolutely not.” He grinned, then kissed her again, this time resisting his tongue tasting hers, because he really would find it hard to go home. He stepped down and walked to Ruby’s car and waved. “See you at work tomorrow, too.”
She looked at him puzzled, and he realised he’d done it again. He was the wrong side of the car. In his happiness, and feeling aroused, dream like, he’d been on autopilot. He slung off his jacket, chucked it inside as if he’d deliberately gone to the passenger side, and then went round to the driver side, trying not to show he was actually cold. It’s November for heaven’s sake. He waited, making sure she was inside her house safely, then drove off, his body thrumming with excitement.