Rebecca excused herself after she finished toying with her pasta salad. It was hardly touched. I guessed she would be going to put the music on, George Michael, her favourite. Instead she went to the bathroom and locked the door with a distinct bang.

When the phone rang again at 9.30pm, I decided to pick it up.

‘Rebecca? Why haven’t you been picking up? I’ve been so worried, for God’s sake.’

‘Hi. It’s Arthur here. Rebecca’s not around at the moment. Can I take a message?’ Rebecca’s exit from the bathroom coincided with my putting the phone back down. She stopped and stared at me, eyes ablaze.

‘Why did you answer my phone?’

‘It kept ringing and I thought it might be important. Sorry. They said they’d call back. No harm done,’ I smiled. I certainly didn’t like her tone of accusation.

‘Who was on the phone anyway?’

‘They didn’t say. They hung up,’ I lied. Mitch. That was his name.

I’m not sure at what point in the evening my girlfriend had planned to tell me she wanted a break. Although I might have been a bit out of line in answering the phone to unknown callers, I soon suspected that she had been planning all along to discourage our advancement. Mitch, or Dracula as I knew him, seemed to have blocked my path.

‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated.

‘Is there someone else?’ I swivelled my cheese knife round in circles, balancing it skilfully on one finger as it spun. ‘Do you like my party piece?’ I grinned as it flew off in the opposite direction. ‘Oops!’

Rebecca looked pale in the half-light and I wondered if she wasn’t feeling too well. She hadn’t eaten and was drinking copious amounts of fizzy water.

‘I’m not ready to settle down,’ she lied. I’d heard that one before; on the night Amber had rejected my advances and disappeared into the night with her fancy man. Dracula had ruined my life once before but he certainly wouldn’t be doing it again.

‘I’ll leave the cheese if you don’t mind,’ I said.

The phone rang again in the background and this time we heard the caller leave a message.

‘Hi. Oliver here. I think we need to talk, clear the air. Mitch is back and I hear you’ve been catching up. Call me. I’m on the same number.’ I made a mental note of the digits as he read them out. ‘Hope you’re well,’ he concluded.

I heard the lock and chain clunk into place as she closed the door behind me. My lover seemed inordinately scared of the dark.

When I reached the street below, I took out a pen and jotted down the phone number.

Oliver. I had a feeling he might be my Incredible Hulk.

60

Rebecca