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I walk back to my office, convinced that everyone can tell. Sienna from main reception says ‘Hi,’ as I walk past and I jump three feet out of my skin. When I get back to my own corridor, Matt from estates stops me and tries to make chit chat about the weather or the football or the price of petrol or something. I don’t take a word of it in. I make my excuses, telling him I’m in a hurry.
‘That’s all right pet,’ he grins. ‘Be good! And if you can’t be good be careful!’
Be careful? Oh god. Well at least he had a condom. I hear myself laughing as I think that. It could be worse. The laugh turns a bit hysterical. I run to my office, slam the door shut and sit down behind my desk. I pull my emergency chocolate bar from the back of the bottom drawer. This isn’t the everyday chocolate bar that I buy from the vending machine each lunchtime and kid myself I’m not going to eat until about half past three when I give up and inhale the whole thing. This is my emergency big bar of chocolate that only gets cracked open in times of extreme need. This is a time of extreme need.
My hands are shaking as I unwrap the chocolate. This is what I do. I mess up. I break things. I push people away. Dom. He’s so good, and so right for me, and Alex is all wrong. Helen says he has a different woman every weekend. I’m a notch on his bed post, without the dignity of having made it as far as the bed.
There’s a knock at the door. ‘Hold on a minute.’ I stuff the chocolate back in my drawer, and check my face in the mirror on my desk. It’s not too bad. I’m not actually crying, but I’m the brink of it. I can force myself to be business-like. I can check things on the computer for people. I can be Work Emily. ‘Come in.’
It’s Dom. Everything stops. He takes the two paces from the door to the desk. I hold my breath. He’s going to be able to tell. Or maybe someone saw me coming out of the toilet. Or maybe Alex has already told him. Or maybe I stink of guilt. He smiles. ‘Just wanted to check you’re still on for dinner tonight?’
I remind myself to breathe and blurt out an answer. ‘Yes. Of course. Why wouldn’t I be? I said it was fine. Why wouldn’t it be fine?’ I’m babbling. I must stop talking.
He laughs. ‘Okay. Okay. I thought you might be doing wedding stuff.’
I shake my head.
‘Good.’
‘I’ll meet you at the restaurant.’
Wait. No. I’m supposed to be meeting Helen later to go through the charade of sorting out costumes. I’m not going to have time to go home and then out again on the bus. ‘Can you pick me up at home?
‘Fine.’ We arrange a time. He leans across the desk and kisses me quickly before he goes. I start to relax. This is fine. I’ve bought some time to think. That’s all I need. I’ve got almost five hours before we go for dinner. That’s plenty of time to decide what I’m doing with the rest of my life.
I pick up my bag and coat and catch the bus into town on autopilot. Five hours to think, and I spend the first twenty minutes in a daze. I go straight to the shop. The second I walk into the costume room I’m in love. I check with the girl before I start. ‘I can try anything on?’
She nods. ‘Is it just you?’
I tell her that Helen will be joining me.
‘I’ll send her up when she gets here.’ She gestures to the Aladdin’s cave of clothing rails. ‘In the meantime, yeah, try anything.’
I can try anything on. For the next hour I can be anybody I like. Anyone other than myself. Sod making decisions about the future. I’m in a lovely dressing up box cocoon. I’m not Emily the scarlet woman. In here I’m an astronaut, or a genie, anybody but me.