Although it felt almost painful to move to sit beside her, feeling everyone’s eyes burning, I overcame the awkwardness, and was rewarded with the faintest hint of a smile.
‘Hurts to watch sometimes, doesn’t it?
‘Yep.’ Her tiny features disappeared again into her glass.
Inwardly delighted that for once in my life I was right, I launched into several other Christmas cracker platitudes.
‘It will happen for you Claire..I’m sure it will’
‘Yeah right’
‘Of course it will. Just look at you’
She shook her head, but still managed to cast me that familiar sideways glance that says ‘Go on then. Tell me some more’
‘For what its worth, I think you’re the most beautiful girl here. It’s not even a contest’
‘So that’s why I’m sitting here on my own then is it?'
She did have a point. Even though I knew her frostiness to be the problem, getting her to thaw was
always going to be a much bigger one.
‘Perhaps I’m just able to see what no one else does’
‘And what is it you see exactly?'
I offered one last cast, praying it would catch my little fish.
‘Oh I don’t know.. It seems to me that you’re always trying to show how tough you are, but it just doesn’t come naturally to you. Its just an act. Inside you’re just as lonely and vulnerable as the rest of us’
I wasn’t really sure whether I believed a word of it, but it sounded quite good at the time. I left it at that and wandered back to the others, but my eyes never really strayed far from her as she finished her wine.
As the landlord began to usher people away, I lost sight of her in a crowd that seemed to be twice as tall as she was. I could feel a panic sweep over me, until I felt a tiny little tug on my shirt.
‘Would you..er…like to go for a coffee or something?
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