Page 4 of The Fallback

‘I don’t know Rosie, it’s just really got me down this time.’ Rosie pushed her uncharitable thoughts to the side and tried to concentrate.

‘I know I don’t have a great track record of committing to relationships,’ he said, ‘but I’m starting to feel that I’m getting something wrong, that I’m not meeting the right people. That maybe I’m missing something.’

Rosie picked her glass up, trying to think of something to say that wasn’t too judgemental but was also constructive. If Mitch really did want to meet someone then he needed to stop messaging other girls while he was already seeing one, was what she wanted to say. But she knew he already knew that. And she knew that he knew that if he had met the right girl, he wouldn’t be doing that. And to be honest with herself, she dreaded the day when he did meet the right girl.

She took a long drink of her wine, thankful that Mitch knew her well enough to order her second-choice wine when her first choice was unavailable. The wine was cool and refreshing and Rosie savoured the tartness of it. She looked past Mitch, back to the wisteria-covered wall of the pub. It was long past flowering but still covered much of the back of it. The beer garden was relatively empty for a sunny Sunday afternoon. Evidently, the residents of West London had decamped to their villas in Italy, or country houses in the Cotswolds for the summer.

Rosie thought enviously of that way of life – where one could just leave on a whim for your weekend place. Or leave London entirely for the summer, leaving the smog and humidity behind. But if she was to be stuck in her middle-class existence, without the hope of regular exotic escapes then this wasn’t so bad: a quiet pub garden in the sunshine with her best friend. Her broken-hearted best friend, she was reminded, as Mitch let out another dramatic sigh.

‘I feel like being single is so much harder for me than it is for you,’ Mitch said.

Rosie rolled her eyes in exasperation. ‘How do you figure that out?’ she protested.

This was such a well-worn conversation between the two of them that Rosie could barely be bothered to contradict him anymore. Maybe Mitch actually had a point. Dating was difficult enough if you were doing it half-heartedly. It must be even harder if you took it as seriously as Mitch did. And yet, Mitch never seemed to have any problems finding dates, even starting relationships. It was when those relationships reached the point of discussions about the future that they faltered for him.

‘Because I’m always meeting the wrong women and you never seem to meet the wrong men!’ Mitch exclaimed, crossing and uncrossing his long legs.

Rosie looked across the table at him and narrowed her eyes. ‘You don’t think that it might have something to do with the fact that I never meet any men in the first place?’ she snipped, taking a glug of her wine.

There was a silence. ’Look,’ Rosie said in what she hoped was a more conciliatory tone, ‘I know you’re heartbroken right now and also I don’t really feel like arguing, but you have to admit that you have more luck than I do in actuallyfindingpeople to go on dates with.’

Mitch shrugged, his dark hair flopping across his eyes. Rosie watched the familiar movement. She liked it when he didn’t add product to it; something that only happened when he was in the throes of a break-up. Rosie liked his more natural look, preferred it when he didn’t style it. Not that she would ever tell him, because that would make it look like she actuallythoughtabout how he did his hair. She pursed her lips and took another sip of her wine. And she definitelydidn’tthink about that, she told herself sternly.

Ever since she had known Mitch, well over ten years now, he’d had a plan. First it was a two-year plan, to get out of academic life alive. Then it turned into a five-year plan, getting enough promotions to have his own flat. But his overarching plan had never changed in all the time Rosie had known him, and despite everything, he had never stopped believing it would happen. Mitch was certain that at some point he would meet someone, they would fall madly in love, get settled, get married and have babies together. Rosie had lost track of the number of times he had told her how important marriage and children were to him. It was actually rather sweet, if it wasn’t being permanently forced down one’s throat.

And if one didn’t find it too irritating how his everyday decisions didn’t exactly tally up to his long-term goals. Mitch seemed incapable of commitment and had never yet stayed with the same girl longer than a few weeks. But he was constantly falling in love.

Rosie had always viewed Mitch’s plan in a rather detached manner, as something that might work for other people, but maybe not for her. While she was sure she would enjoy the part of meeting someone and falling madly in love, she had never focused on marriage, and was largely ambivalent on the subject of children. Something she tended to keep to herself, because people got weird when faced with a thirty-something woman who wasn’t desperate to procreate. She certainly didn’t understand the allure that babies held for Mitch who was always first in line to hold any baby that visited the office and was on speed dial for babysitting duties for several of their friends.

‘Anyway,’ he said with a sigh, ‘I wanted to tell you all this before we got to my mum’s because she’s going to kill me when she hears about Tessa. So I was wondering…’ He gave Rosie his best beseeching look. ‘If we could try and steer clear of the subject of my love life tonight?’

Rosie broke into laughter. Sunday evening dinners at Jackie’s were a regular occurrence in both Rosie’s and Mitch’s calendars. Mitch had been going back to his mum’s for a Sunday dinner ever since he moved out and, back when he and Rosie were flatmates, Jackie would insist Rosie went, too. Now Rosie would go every so often, just enough to keep Jackie happy and plenty enough to know that the chance of keeping Jackie off the subject of Mitch’s love life was impossible.

Jackie had been a single mum after Mitch’s dad walked out when he was a baby. She doted on Mitch and was as fiercely protective of him as she was exasperated by his continued failure to find a girlfriend and settle down, regularly complaining about Mitch’s single status. Rosie just knew that Mitch wouldn’t hear the end of it if his mum found out that he’d been dumped by Tessa, and that the reason for it was because he was messaging other girls.

‘What’s it worth?’ She poked his knee under the table with her unpolished toes.

‘I’ll get you another glass of wine?’ he offered.

Rosie shook her head. ‘Not good enough. Keeping your mum off the subject of your love life for an entire evening is a tall order. You need to come up with something better to reward me with.’

Mitch reached under the table and grabbed her foot in his hand. ‘Mitch!’ she shrieked, twisting her leg to try and get her foot free but he held it fast.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Were you trying to blackmail me?’

‘Please don’t tickle me,’ she begged. This was a definite downside to having a best friend who knew the real reason she had to paint her own toenails. ‘Mitch!’ she said more insistently.

He tweaked her little toe and then carefully put her foot back down. ‘Sorry Rosie.’ He grinned. ‘What was that you were saying? I think you were agreeing not to tell my mum about Tessa, right?’

‘Right,’ agreed Rosie scowling across the table at him and trying to ignore the butterflies that seemed to be having a party in her stomach.

‘Oh, and your toenails need painting by the way.’ Mitch gave her a wink which just encouraged the butterflies to party harder. She shot daggers back at him.

Mitch laughed at the expression on her face and then looked down at his watch. ‘Mum’s not expecting us for another hour so you have time to distract me from my heartache.’ He leaned lazily back and stretched which made the rickety wooden chair creak with protest at his tall frame. ‘What’s been going on in your world?’

’Not much,’ Rosie began, irritated by how quickly he seemed to have got over Tessa. It wasn’t that she cared who he was seeing, he went through them at a rate of knots after all, it was the amount of energy she was expected to expend offering him sympathy when it all went wrong due to something stupid he had done.

Mitch looked at her expectantly and she realised he was waiting for more. ‘Erm…’ She wracked her brain for anything interesting to say and came up lacking.

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