Page 48 of It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas
‘Any luck finding somewhere for your Christmas do?’ I ventured.
‘That’s a negative. We’ve decided just to have some drinks in the office tomorrow evening instead, Wernham Hogg-style.’
I smiled atThe Officereference, took a long swig of Prosecco and topped up my glass to replenish the void. Tom cleared his throat.
‘So, umm, I wanted to say sorry for how last night ended.’
‘Argh, no, I’m the one who should be saying sorry,’ I replied.
‘Whatever for?’
‘For saying such insensitive stuff about your upbringing and everything. It came out all wrong.’
‘Yeah, maybe it did, but my reactions came out even worse. I hurt you, and I’m so sorry about that. I barely slept last night thinking about it, but I didn’t even have your number to apologise. So, yeah, thought I’d swing by here to grovel in person.’
Before I knew what I was doing, I squeezed his forearm gently. ‘Thanks, Tom. That really means a lot.’
‘So, can we just forget about the tail end of last night, then?’
‘I think “forget” might be a bit of a stretch. How about we chalk it up as part of our mutual and ongoing personal development?’
‘Deal.’
We clinked glasses again. I started heading back to the table but Tom gently tugged me back to the bar by my elbow. ‘Hey, who’s that guy sat next to Ryan?’
‘You don’t know him? Someone called Darren – works at the garage, I think.’
‘Oh right. Christ. Yeah, I’ve heard of him, but I’ve never met him in person. Think he’s only worked there for the last six months or so.’
‘Yeah, he’s not exactly covered himself in glory so far tonight.’
He let out a long breath. ‘That doesn’t surprise me. Just know that he isnotmy friend, okay? He’s not even an acquaintance, to be honest. Look, how long are you planning to stay tonight?’
‘Gotta be honest with you, my instinct in these types of big social situations is always to escape as early as possible. But everyone seems to be having this rare child-free night out in my honour, so I feel like it’d be rude for me to leave anytime soon.’
He did his hair-rub-watch-check thing again. ‘Okay, so how about we stay for a couple more drinks until the quiz gets going…’
I felt my cheeks flush at the notion of me and Tom being grouped together as ‘we’.
‘I thought you needed to head off soon?’
‘Yeah, well, that’s before I realised Darren Chambers was here.’
‘I don’t need a chaperone, Tom. But it’d be nice if you stayed anyway – if only to convince Ryan to change our team’s name from Quiz In My Pants.’
‘Oh no, he didn’t?’
‘He did.’
We made our way back to the table, where a heated debate was taking place about the picture round that had been distributed to each participating table. Each of the ten images featured an obscure still from a classic Christmas movie. Or at least, obscure to anyone except fellow Christmas movie geeks.
‘I’m telling you, Gem, there’s absolutely no way thatGroundhog Dayis a Christmas film,’ Amy said.
I glanced down at the fuzzy yet indisputable image of Bill Murray.
‘Ah, that’sScrooged,’ I said. ‘Probably the most eighties movie ever made. An underrated classic.’
‘Told you! Here you go, Milly, see if you can fill in any of the other blanks.’
