‘No, of course,’ he says, echoing exactly what he’s just said repeatedly to Tash. (It’s an odd phrase, actually, now I come to think of it. I mean, isn’t yes the more usual companion to an of course? Still, it’s not for me to analyse it. It’s between them.) ‘Tash is just … well, she’s a little bit fed up with us never seeing each other, that’s all.’
‘Oh, Olly, I’m really sorry. Look, you should go home right now and Skype her—’
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he says, rather sharply. Then he inhales, as if to reset himself, and picks up his champagne glass again, gripping the stem. ‘Sorry, Lib. I just mean that me going home and Skyping her isn’t really going to address the issue. It’s much more about the fact that we live three hundred and fifty miles away from each other and we both work all the hours God sends.’
‘No,’ I say. ‘Of course.’
‘I mean, she’s worked weekends the last three weeks in a row, and obviously I’m always busy too …’
‘Sorry, Ol. Long-distance is hard, I know.’
‘It is. But it shouldn’t feel this …’ He thinks about this for a moment, sadness passing over his face. ‘Impossible.’
He looks so wretched that, even though the cause of it is his missing Tash, I shunt my own pain to the side for a moment.
‘I think you probably just need to find a way to make more time, Ol, to be honest with you. I mean, I know how busy you are, but is there any way you can take a Saturday night off and go up to Glasgow? If you left straight after the lunch service, you’d only miss dinner, and then you’re closed on Monday night and Tuesday lunchtime, so you wouldn’t even have to come back until early afternoon on Tuesday—’
‘Woah.’ Olly holds up a hand, looking slightly surprised. ‘Have you been thinking about this already, or something?’
‘No, it just seems kind of obvious, doesn’t it?’
‘Not really. It’s not just that I need to be at the restaurant for actual service, Lib. There’s quite a lot more to it than that! I have the accounts to keep on top of, and all the staff paperwork, and you know I always prefer to supervise the deep clean after Saturday dinner, and then I have all my supplier meetings, and visits from the wine merchants … and all that’s even without adding in the fact that I do like to actually come up with new menu items occasionally!’
‘OK, well, you’ll have to persuade Tash to come down here more often.’
‘She’s a junior hospital doctor, Libby. It’s not really that simple.’
‘Then the two of you have to make it that simple.’ I feel a bit like a bulldozer on full power, but now that I’ve gone down this route, I can’t seem to stop. The only good news, I guess, is that maybe the effort I’ve been putting in to disguise my desire to cover every inch of Olly’s body in kisses is actually paying off. I’ve faked it and now, apparently, I’ve made it. And hopefully he won’t actually notice how massively I’m overcompensating for something. ‘I mean,’ I go on, heartily, ‘you love her and she loves you, right?’
Olly has reached for the champagne bottle and is topping up both glasses, which is why he takes a moment to reply.
‘No, of course.’
That bizarre (and bizarrely infectious) phrase again.
‘So put yourself on the line. Tell her how much you want to see her. Ask her if there’s any way she can get a couple of days off work. Or, I don’t know, meet halfway. That might actually be really romantic. You could book a lovely hotel, somewhere you can have drinks at the bar beside a roaring fire, and amazing room service so you don’t even have to get dressed to go for dinner, and—’
‘Libby.’
Olly, thank heavens, has stopped me before I can divulge any more of this detailed hotel-trip fantasy that’s really one I’ve often played out in my head for the two of us, on the long nights this past year when the alternative has been crying into my pillow.
‘Sorry, sorry, that was probably a bit too specific—’
‘Is that the mystery cheese?’
This is why he’s stopped me. He’s staring at the cheese plate that’s been sitting between us for the last few minutes.
‘That one, right there,’ he’s going on. He points at the plate. ‘I think it is. I honestly think it might be.’
If this sounds a slightly intense tone to take about cheese, I should probably just fill you in on exactly why this is.
Years ago – when I was eighteen and Olly was turning twenty-one – he and I took a trip over to Paris on the Eurostar for a hedonistic day of drinking, eating, and (this being Olly, a foodie to end all foodies) trudging round various destinations in search of highly specific types of Mirabelle jam, or spiced sausage, or premier cru chocolate. And cheese. So much cheese, in fact, that we ended up digging into it on the Eurostar home, whereupon we discovered that one particular cheese – a creamy white goat’s cheese, rolled in ash, and tart and lemony to the taste – was in fact the exact definition of ambrosia. (This might have had something to do with the amount of vin we’d imbibed on the day’s trek; also, possibly, something to do with the fact that we were deliberately trying to divert attention from the unexpected snog we’d found ourselves having in a bar on the Left Bank at some point in the afternoon, and waxing absurdly lyrical about a cheese seemed, at the time, as good a way as any of achieving this.) We didn’t know the name and – despite many years of searching, or more to the point, Keeping An Eye Out – neither of us ever found that Mystery Cheese again.
‘Well, you’ll have to taste it,’ I say, in an equally intense tone. ‘We won’t know until you try.’
‘We have to taste it,’ he corrects me, picking up his knife and dividing the portion of white, ash-flecked cheese into two with a chef’s deft movement. ‘Come on, Libby. Close your eyes. This could be the moment.’
We both fall into a reverential hush as we each take a half of the cheese, close our eyes, and put it in our mouths.
‘What do you think?’ Olly asks, in a hushed voice, after a moment.
‘I don’t know …’
‘First impressions?’
‘First impression was that it’s definitely not the one … but second impression … I’m not sure. It might be?’
‘The texture doesn’t seem quite right.’
‘I agree. But the taste was pretty much bang-on.’
‘Do you think? I thought the Mystery Cheese had a bit more pepper to it.’
‘Wasn’t it ash?’
‘No, no, I don’t mean pepper in the actual cheese, I mean a peppery taste.’
‘Oh. Right. No, I think you’re right. I mean, you’re the expert.’
‘I’m not the expert!’ He looks faintly annoyed. ‘We were both there!’
‘Yes, OK, but you’re the one who takes this kind of thing that seriously.’
He looks, for a moment, wounded to the core. ‘I thought you took the Mystery Cheese seriously, too.’
‘I do!’
‘I mean, I know it’s only a silly thing, obviously. I’m not that stupid! It was always just … our thing. Wasn’t it?’
‘Yes.’ My voice has got stuck in my throat. I reach for my champagne glass. ‘I’m not saying I never took it seriously, Ol,’ I say, after a long drink. ‘I’m saying you’re the cheffy, experty, foodie person. You’re the one who remembers the precise