Page 54 of Five Gold Rings

‘I don’t want to ask but how did I get into these?’ she says, pulling at the fabric of her pyjama top.

‘Upstairs. You started undressing and I may have helped you so you wouldn’t wake up naked and think the worst.’

‘Oh,’ she says, blushing.

Again, it wasn’t the stuff of high romance. More like dressing a small child who isn’t fond of the outfit you’ve picked out for them. There was a point when she kicked me and flashed me a boob. I’m pretty sure Austen never wrote a scene like that.

‘Well, from where I’m sitting it looks like someone had an excellent night,’ Gabriel comments, trying to lighten the mood, gesturing at both of us to sit down with him. ‘Merry Christmas,’ he says, raising his mug to her.

‘Merry Christmas. I think I did,’ she says, glancing at her dress hanging up. ‘You washed it?’

‘I did.’

‘Joe, I can’t remember much of the car ride home. Was I a nightmare? I’m so sorry,’ she tells me, tucking her hair behind her ear.

I look at her as she sits there forlornly, her bare feet curled up on the seat to avoid the cold of the laminate flooring. I want to dissect everything from yesterday. The flat rejection, the drunken kiss. But my better side tells me no one needs that sort of discussion when they’re hungover, in somebody else’s house on Christmas Day. I’m not a Grinch.

‘We got you home safely, that’s all that matters,’ I say shrugging. ‘Look, I don’t have much of a Christmas spread but we have coffee, juice… We need to rehydrate you. You resemble a very sad raisin,’ I tell her, a little too truthfully. She doesn’t argue with that. Gabriel heads to the kitchen as Eve leans over the table, whispering.

'I didn’t yack on anything, did I?’

I shake my head.

‘I also…’ She holds up one of her hands where there’s a plaster on her palm.

‘That was from when you got bitten by that reindeer.’

‘You what now?’ she says, eyes widening.

I grin. ‘You scraped your hand on the pavement when you got out of my car. It was a very graceful move, like a cartwheel but not.’

‘Oh. So you did this?’ she enquires, looking at my handiwork.

‘I didn’t want it to get infected,’ I explain. ‘It was bleeding a fair bit.’

Gabriel returns with coffee, juice and paracetamol, looking a little smug. It’s a bandage and antiseptic, I didn’t sew her hand back on, but I know what that smile also means. It means he knows I still care about her. Well, I’m not a monster. I used to hug him in the hospital lift, he knows that much. But it’s also Eve. You don’t turn off feelings like that so quickly.

‘Well, that was very kind – thank you,’ she says, still trying to catch my eye.

‘He’s good like that,’ Gabriel adds, watching the both of us. I see him trying to salvage this. He’s a mate for trying. ‘So, where to today?’ he asks.

‘Dropping in on a wedding in Kilburn and then another ring in Hammersmith,’ I explain, watching Eve’s face grimace as she downs her juice. ‘I can do this solo if you’re suffering?’ I tell her.

She shakes her head meekly. ‘No, I should see this through… I must… I might do this one dry, though,’ she says, holding her hand to her mouth to burp lightly.

‘That would be my medical recommendation,’ Gabriel says.

She takes one of the pastries from the table and puts it to her mouth, sugar sticking to the side of her mouth and chin. I throw her a napkin.

‘I see Santa’s been?’ she says, looking at the ripped pieces of wrapping paper on the table.

‘Oh yes. I needed to show my man some love,’ Gabriel explains.

‘Who got the air fryer?’ she asks.

‘Me!’ Gabriel tells her, hugging it. ‘It might be the best thing I’ve ever received, and I got a lightsaber when I was ten. Shall we try it?’

Eve giggles, sipping at her coffee. ‘If you like. It’s made me realise, though… All I got you were those stupid Xmas pyjamas, I should have got you something else,’ she says to me.