The evening inches along. Eddy, Anna and Seb stare at each other blankly, like they’re engaged in some intense poker game. The food arrives, and it is – as promised – magnificent, which is a relief as it gives them something to talk about. Towards the end of the meal, Rosie decides she’s had just the right amount of wine, she’s feeling bold enough to go and talk to Abi. Either she’ll clear the air and find out she was being paranoid all along or Abi can tell her to her face why she’s suddenly stopped messaging her, why she didn’t say anything about the emails she’d exchanged with Seb.
‘Just going to the loo,’ she tells the table as she stands, already looking around for Abi, but she can’t see her. Suddenly, there’s a hand pulling her arm and Rosie turns, hoping it’s Abi but finding Anna.
Anna’s flushed face is staring up at Rosie. ‘Ro, babe,’ she says, her eyes filling with tears, ‘we have to talk.’
Rosie backs away from her, shaking her head because Anna’s unsmiling, so serious, and whatever it is, Rosie doesn’t want it. She feels her heart pulse in her temples as she walks quickly back to the table. Anna is still at her side and Seb’s also staring at her, his face full of sorrow. She realizes it then: whatever it is, this thing, Seb knows it too.
‘You guys ready to order pudding?’ Eddy’s voice is thick with wine, but everyone ignores him. Seb gently pulls Rosie away from Anna, towards the door, grabbing their coats from their hooks. Everything and everyone passes Rosie by in a blur on their way out.
Then they’re outside and it’s just the two of them and Seb is trying to pull her away, further away from the restaurant, but this isn’t what Rosie wants. She doesn’t want to be dragged or pulled any more. She twists her arm, yanking it away from Seb. ‘What the hell is going on, Seb? Why is everyone so strange tonight?’
‘I’m going to tell you, Rosie. I want to tell you everything,’ he says, glancing back to the restaurant like he’s worried they’re about to be set upon by their friends, ‘but not here. Please, we have to go home.’
‘No, Seb. Whatever it is, judging by tonight, it seems Eddy and Anna already know.’
Seb looks to the sky and then to the ground, as though asking the great mystery above and below for answers. He swallows, looks at Rosie. ‘That night, when Abi was at ours …’
Rosie doesn’t say anything, she just stares at him, watches him collapse a little more with every word.
‘We’d met before. Abi and I.’
‘At school?’ Rosie hears herself, a little desperate now.
‘No. We met a few months ago. Twice. In London.’
He can’t look at her and she can feel his shame and suddenly Rosie sees it. She sees it all.
‘You had sex with her,’ she states, her mouth dry and hard.
Seb nods his head, his eyes fixed on the ground.
‘You love her,’ she says, a statement, because she’s done with questions, done with others having control.
At last, he meets her eye. ‘No, Rosie. I promise you. It wasn’t an affair.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘It wasn’t an affair, Rosie. Because …’ He whispers, ‘I paid her.’
Rosie feels the earth beneath her tilt at a new angle and everything goes quiet. For a moment it’s a wonderful relief but then she stumbles, and Seb leans forward to steady her as Rosie hears herself scream, ‘You paid her? You fucking
Somehow Eddy and Anna are there already, disgust twisting their mouths and Anna asking again and again, ‘What? What did you say, Ro? Ro! What did you just say?!’
Seb’s reaching for her now and she pulls her arm away hard, shouting, ‘Don’t you touch me! Don’t you fucking touch me,’ and Anna’s by her side again and she’s crying and screaming at Seb to get the fuck off Rosie and Seb’s saying, ‘Calm down, Anna, you need to calm down.’
Which makes Eddy lurch forward and, pointing a sloppy finger at his friend, say, ‘Back off, Seb. Anna’s just being a good friend.’
And suddenly Richard is standing at the top of the steps, outside the restaurant, and calling, ‘Oi, what’s going on? What about the bill?’
Everyone is shouting and no one notices as Rosie turns and starts to run.
She runs without knowing where she’s running to. Pedestrians step into the road to let her pass, shaking their heads at the unpleasantness, the shock of a middle-aged woman who has clearly lost control, a woman who should know better. Rosie doesn’t care. She runs until her heart screams and her body shakes. She realizes she’s close to the train station. She envisions herself getting on a train, escaping, leaving Waverly and everyone in it behind. It is the only thing she can think about, this need to leave.