What was that old adage again? Treat ‘em mean, keep ‘em keen? Charlie had never been great at that. She could try, and she had succeeded briefly once or twice in the past, but sooner rather than later she’d get scared that her apparent lack of interest would drive whatever guy she was interested in away, and she would revert to her usual type, wearing her heart on her sleeve.

So, although she decided not to reply immediately to either of Jake’s messages, at twelve thirty she suddenly realised if Jake didn’t hear from her soon, he might get booked up for something else and not be able to meet her after all. Immediately panicking, she pulled her phone out of her bag, dropping it in her haste, and then missing it a couple of times while trying to grab it off the floor. Her fingers flying over her touchscreen, she wasn’t even breathing evenly as she typed, but her response came out astoundingly cool. 

You’re quite the smooth-talker, aren’t you? Drinks sound good. Where and what time were you thinking?

She gave herself a mental pat on the back for her own smoothness while she tried to calm down, and then put her phone back in her bag, telling herself an immediate reply didn’t matter, but unable to stop herself checking every minute on the minute. Please still be free, she pleaded to herself. Please.

--------------------------

Several hours later, she pushed open the door to Tabac and looked around with trepidation. With the exception of the work local, she normally wasn’t really one for walking into a pub herself (it made her feel anxious as she felt like all eyes were on her as soon as she walked in anywhere alone)  but she hadn’t wanted to come across as needy by asking Jake if he would meet her outside. Her alternative was to turn up ten minutes early so he would have to find her, and it gave her a couple of minutes to compose herself.

The small but atmospheric bar was fairly quiet so she ordered a glass of prosecco from the bar, and placed her jacket and bag on a chair next to the bar while she was waiting. “Actually,” she turned back to the barman. “Can you make that two proseccos?” She drained the first glass while waiting for the second. The bar guy was nonplussed - this was Glasgow after all. She just felt she needed a little bit of Italian courage before Jake walked in.

Sitting down, she started to feel nervous again and delicately sipped the second glass as if it was her first and like she did things like this all the time. She cursed herself inwardly for not trying the whole internet dating thing more - maybe she’d have a better idea how to behave on dates and what to actually say, rather than blurting out accidental double entendres and asking inappropriate questions. She had to play it cool. Cooooooool.

She crossed her legs - too posed? Then uncrossed them - but then what to do with them? Stretch one out? No, she was now too slumped in the chair? 

She could see the barman looking over at her skeptically now and realised she was muttering to herself. This was so not the epitome of sophistication she was aiming for, she realised. She took out her phone, thinking she could maybe just spend her time on Facebook while she waited. As she clicked into the app she spotted another baby scan picture in one update, another “happy anniversary to my amazing hubby” message, and decided to metaphorically back right back out of Facebook-land. “This is the way madness lies,” she whispered to herself. 

But something gave her pause right as she moved to do so - there was a list of friend suggestions scrolling horizontally across the middle of the page and the first one was . . . you’ve guessed it - Aaron.

There’s many a rumour about Facebook friend suggestions, one being that a lot of suggestions are generated as a result of the suggested person having a wee stalk of your own profile. Whether that was actually true or not, Charlie had no idea, but the suggestion could also just as likely popped up due to the several work friends they had in common. Weirdly, she had never thought to look Aaron up on Facebook before but now . . . Her forefinger paused over his profile . . .  and then she couldn’t help but dive in.

On account of not actually being his facebook friend, she couldn’t see his whole page, but there was enough there to give her a taste of who Aaron actually was, rather than the two dimensional office lothario she had got to know. She already knew some facts she found there - that he was 32, and had grown up on the other side of the city from her. She could also now see that he actually climbed Munros on a regular basis ,that his favourite author was Tolkien - and that he was a massive Friends fan like herself. (Could she be any more turned on by that, she wondered? Promptly giving herself a mental kicking because she wasn’t meant to be liking the prick anymore…) 

She flicked through the limited photos she had access to, pictures he had been tagged in by other people -  she might be about to have a date with someone else, but unwillingly she felt like she needed a hit of him. Or, rather, maybe looking at his handsome traitorous face would remind her why she needed this date to go well, she told herself.

She stared for a minute or two at a photograph of him sitting on a mountain with an incredible view behind him, his arm around another guy, both of them looking unbelievably happy and wholesome, like something out of some sort of outdoor pursuits catalogue. Peering at the date on that, it seemed to have been taken that weekend so matched up with his story about scaling a Munro. “He’s not completely full of shit then,” she surmised. 

She flipped through photographs of him proudly holding a medal after clearly having completed some sort of run (they definitely didn’t have that in common; Charlie couldn’t even run for a bus); one from what was clearly a posh night out where he was looking ridiculously gorgeous in a suit and the glasses he very occasionally wore; and one of him on some sort of lad’s holiday with a bunch of guys who she would never be able to pick out of a line-up because all she could see was his face. 

It was the last one she came to though that made her feel like her heart had dropped into her stomach - she found herself carefully touching the screen and zooming in on it. It looked to have been taken at a wedding and featured Aaron and a beautiful dark haired girl, arms looped around one another, smiling into each other’s eyes. And he looked so bloody enamoured with her it just wasn’t fair! 

She felt her insides pinching together as she spotted the date on that and did some mental calculations - him and this Carmel O’Connor had clearly been together right around the time that he had been flirting it up a storm with her and making her think she was the only girl for him. She clicked out of the picture in case she was tempted to press the angry reaction face on it, and scrolled back through the others she’d already examined in great detail. 

You’d easily think he was the nicest guy in the world looking at the other pictures, one of those rare good looking but actually sweet guys. Those big brown eyes might urge you to trust him though, and the dimply smile might engage you straight away, but now more than ever she knew what he really was.

The prosecco had obviously hit her harder than she had thought - “Can I have another two glasses of prosecco please?” she requested, opening her phone’s camera and taking a snap of the two drinks, side by side. She shared it to facebook with a mysterious “Tuesday dates ;-)” caption . . . and then, before she could think about it any further, she requested Aaron as a Facebook friend. He might think it was odd that she wanted him as a Facebook friend when she barely tolerated him in real life, but wasn't that really the point of Facebook, she reasoned? Less Facebook friends, more Facebook frenemies.

Anyway, the whole point of both the befriending and the post was to let him see she wasn’t pining around waiting for him to come to his senses!

In the meantime, speaking of good looking but actually sweet guys . . . the door swung open and there was Jake, who smiled brightly the second he spotted her. “Hitting the prosecco hard?” he asked, looking at the two full glasses in front of her and the one nearly finished in her hand.

She thought fast. “One is for you - let’s celebrate the Tuesday working day being over!” she laughed, passing one of the glasses to him. He shrugged, laughed himself, and clinked his glass against hers. She slipped her phone in her bag, determined to concentrate on her date, but she couldn’t help but notice it had already lit up with a Facebook notification to say that Aaron Ward had accepted her friend request.

-----------------

"Okay…. First … kiss?" Charlie giggled, passing a shot to Jake and holding her own aloft. They both downed the tequila, shuddered, and then Jake rested his clean-shaven chin on his hand and looked thoughtful.

"God, it was so long ago now," he mused. "Jemma Day?"

"Are you asking me or telling me?" Charlie asked, deliberately brushing her hand against his free one.

"Give me a break, I was about nine." He winked at her and she felt herself go a bit dizzy. Whether it was the copious amounts of alcohol she had imbibed, or the effect this man was having on her she was unsure.

"Nine? I was like fifteen for mine," she rambled nervously.

"Wow, that's a late starter right there," he laughed, gesturing to the barman to pass them another shot. After a slightly awkward start to their date as they hadn't really spoken that much during their previous encounter, they had decided a getting-to-know-you drinking game was in order and it had rapidly descended into hilarity. 

Most embarrassing experiences, worst dates, drunken escapades had all featured and, to be honest, she actually had sore stomach muscles from laughing now. Of course, it also helped that Jake was just as hot as she remembered.

When he fixed her eyes with his steady grey gaze, she felt slightly helpless with lust - how could a guy this hot like her? She couldn’t help but wonder as she picked up her next shot. 

“So . . . where are you getting married?” he asked after they’d downed the next shot.

That one threw her off a bit, she kept forgetting she was effectively betrothed. And she couldn't for the life of her remember where Thea had decided the fictional wedding would take place because, truth be told, she hadn’t quite realised that in fact the hen night plan would have actually worked.

Think, Charlie, think! She scrolled through the last few weddings she had attended . . . Seamill Hydro, Bothwell Bridge Hotel . . . House for . . . “House for an Art Lover” she blurted, already feeling her face heating up with the lie, especially as she remembered a second after the words left her mouth that she was actually meant to have been eloping to Cuba. Oh well, he didn't know that, and she had bugger all knowledge on Cuba anyway if he'd decided to quiz her further.

“Good venue” he said, not missing a beat. “I’ve been to a couple of weddings there myself, it was really nice.” 

She looked at him closely, not really sure what else to say. He seemed so cool with the fact she was apparently close to being married, in fact, it practically seemed to just be small talk like you would have with your neighbour or colleague, not a girl that you'd slept with just days before, and had now asked out on a date. 

“Yeah . . .” she said hesitantly, with no idea how to finish her sentence.

He caught on to the pause. “Are you okay?” he asked immediately. “Are you having second thoughts? You seem a bit . . . unenthused.”

She shrugged. Was this her chance to try and get out of her lie? To maybe convince him that actually she thought she might be able to make a go of it with him rather than the fictitious Paul?

“Don’t all brides have second thoughts?” she asked facetitiously. “There’s always that thought that maybe settling down isn’t the right thing, that maybe you have taken yourself off the market too quickly.”

Oh. Was that panic she sensed in his expression?

“I’m sure second thoughts are par for the course,” he responded, quickly rallying. “You’ll be fine on the day though. Another drink?” He turned to the bartender then swung back to wink at her. “We’ve still to cover first sexual experience after all!” 

She laughed at that, but she also couldn’t help but notice how quickly he’d turned the conversation away from her upcoming nuptials and possible doubts.