Page 23 of A Class Act

‘You fell in love?’

‘Sorry?’

‘In France, when you were there in your early twenties, you met someone…?’

Fabian smiled, but there was the same sadness, regret almost, on his face as he placed Caesar salad in front of me. ‘Parmesan?’ he asked. ‘Black pepper?’

8

I knew I’d fallen irrevocably in love with this beautiful, intelligent and seemingly sensitive man. I’d had two previous long-term relationships back in Manchester – one particularly we both thought would end in commitment, but were simultaneously relieved when we realised we were going nowhere, neither of us wanting the same things in life.

But this thing with Fabian was like nothing I’d ever experienced before: I felt I was drowning in those eyes of his, wanting to touch him constantly when I was in his presence, desperate to see him again the minute I wasn’t.

That first evening, after we’d eaten the clams and the Caesar salad, we stayed at the table, drinking coffee and just talking, getting to know everything about each other: he was Taurus to my Capricorn; favourite colour navy blue to my mauve; couldn’t be without French cheese, whereas I had withdrawal symptoms if there was no Marmite and peanut butter on my one shelf of the shared kitchen cupboard.

And all the time, our fingers would accidentally touch as he poured coffee, passed the milk jug, opened the exceptionally expensive box of chocolates from Harrods his grandmother hadsent over for his birthday. I was waiting for a repeat of the ice-cream kisses but none was forthcoming and I was both relieved and disappointed. I didn’t want the evening to end in sex on his cream carpet – that would have been too obvious. If this was going to be worth anything, have any future, then sex on the second date was not happening.

At midnight, Fabian called an Uber, took my hand and walked me down to the street where, while we waited for the cab, he threaded his hands through my hair, pulling his face down to mine and kissing me so thoroughly I was a quivering mess and debating whether it wouldn’t be a good idea to walk him all the way back up again and ravish him on that cream carpet after all.

Just a few days later – it was a Wednesday evening; I remember it so well – Fabian asked if I’d like to meet him after he’d finished work for the day. We could walk along Regent’s Canal from Little Venice as it was such a beautiful evening, and stop for a drink at one of the cafes and pubs along its length. I’d spent all day at The Mercury theatre, signing contracts, and insurance documents, being fitted for outfits and completing a hundred and one other tasks. I met the cast as they trooped in and along to the dressing rooms, some with only half an hour or so to spare before curtain-up for the mid-week matinee, and I marvelled, wondering would I ever appear as sanguine as these performers. I knew on my first night’s performance the following week I’d be impatiently ready to go, poised with my make-up on, as soon as the stage door was unlocked.

I watched the whole performance, singing along and acting out the steps in my head as well as with my restless tapping feet, from the safety of the side stage. My excitement and delight were only slightly marred when the girl whose part I was about to take shoved past me, deliberately knocking into my shoulder as she came off stage.

One of the leading men had seen her actions and, still smiling at me, said, ‘She assumed she’d have maternity leave rather than being thrown off the production. You can’t really blame her for taking it out on you.’

I wanted to retort tartly, ‘I think I can,’ but I was the new girl, I didn’t need to be ruffling any feathers, and instead nodded with, ‘I get that,’ and a smile.

After that little altercation, the thought of a walk in the evening sunshine and a drink with Fabian was music to my ears. After all, how many other evenings would I have free once I was committed to seven performances – possibly eight, including two matinees – every week?

‘You look tired,’ I said, noting the dark shadows around his eyes.

‘Been working on a very difficult case.’ He nodded, taking my hand. ‘Not left chambers before 10p.m. since I last saw you.’

‘Even at the weekend?’

‘Saturday, I had a family commitment I was expected to be at but, yes, Sunday was spent going through indictments.’ Fabian sighed, pulling a hand through his hair in a gesture I’d come to recognise very much as his own. ‘You can’t imagine how much I’d rather have spent the time with you, Robyn.’ He stroked the area between my thumb and finger as he led the way to his parked car at Marylebone, and just that simple touch sent a spark through my whole body.

Fabian drove quickly to Little Venice, the affluent residential district in West London that sits on the junction of the Paddington arm of the Grand Union Canal, the Regent’s Canal, and the entrance to Paddington Basin, before parking up. We walked and we talked, stopping for a drink at two waterside pubs – Coke for Fabian, white wine spritzer for me – and when he bent his head to kiss me, and the kiss went on and on and twokids on bikes doing wheelies shouted, ‘Oy, mate, get a room,’ Fabian pulled away and groaned.

‘Christ, Robyn, if I don’t make love to you soon, I won’t be held responsible for anything else…’

‘I don’t want you feeling responsible foranything,’ I managed to get out once we both came up again for air.

‘Shall we go?’ he asked almost brusquely, before grabbing the attention of the waiter to pay for drinks we’d hardly touched. We set off back to the car and had only been gone thirty seconds when his phone rang.

‘Sorry,’ he eventually said after a short conversation to whoever was on the other end of the phone. ‘I’ll have to make a detour and call in for a file I need.’

‘Call in?’

‘At chambers.’

‘I’ve always wanted to see where barristers hang out backstage.’

‘Backstage?’ He smiled and we carried on to the car, which, in the time we’d been away, had accrued a parking ticket. ‘Shit, that’s London for you,’ he said, peeling it off the windscreen and throwing it into the car before driving us off – in a manner guaranteed to end up with another motoring offence – towards the Royal Courts of Justice.

‘Handy,’ I said, once he’d parked the car in its allotted spot. ‘You know, your apartment, chambers and the courts all within walking distance of each other.’ But Fabian didn’t reply, intent on retrieving the file as quickly as possible. He pushed myriad security buttons to enter a large domed building. Several flights of marbled stairs, as well as an imposing amount of framed-photograph-covered cream painted walls, stretched ahead of us.

‘Through here,’ was all Fabian said as we walked the length of classically decorated corridors.

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