Chapter fifty seven

Adam

Adam’s mouth felt like sandpaper. He was vaguely aware of female voices talking in the next room. Not wanting to have to deal with that and feeling as if he needed at least another 24 hours sleep, he reached for a spare pillow and covered his head with it.

He lay there for another few minutes before he realised that this pillow didn’t feel like the one’s he usually had. The female voices were now laughing and he began to realise that this was odd. Why were there female voices in his flat? He peered out of a corner of the pillow and realised that he wasn’t in his room. Instead, he was looking at beige walls with paintings of cherubs and scantily clad women frolicking in meadows.

Shit. He thought. Where the hell am I? He emerged further from his little place of hiding and saw that the door to the living room was ajar. He spotted the stance and flicking of hair of a woman that he unfortunately was all too familiar with, he appeared to be in Robin’s bedroom.

“Shit!” He said out loud to himself.

He quickly checked under the covers and saw that he was shirtless but still had on his jeans. He threw a quick prayer up, hoping above anything that that meant nothing had happened. He sat up quickly and began searching for his missing shirt, ignoring his thumping head and the fact that there was a large chunk of the night missing from his memory. He would deal with that later. Right now, he needed to get out of there.

He spotted his shirt hanging over a nearby chair and bolted out of bed, throwing it on. As he was buttoning the shirt, he heard Robin say goodbye to the mystery woman she had been talking to and close the front door.

This wasn’t good. He had been hoping to make his quick getaway whilst she had company so as to avoid any form of awkward conversation. Robin entered her bedroom and gave him a surprised look.

“And he finally awakes.” She said, her tone light and teasing.

“Yeah,” Adam replied. “Sorry about that. Alcohol makes me comatose for ages.”

He stood there awkwardly as she ran her eyes up and down his body, appraising him with a small smile on her face. When the situation got too much for him, he cleared his throat and took a step forward.

“Well, I better… you know, head off.”

“So soon?” Robin asked. “Don’t you want some breakfast?”

“I’ve got loads of food in my place, don’t want it all going to waste.”

“Oh I’m sure it will keep,” Robin said, waving his suggestion away and making her way to the kitchen. “Anyway, I’ve already began to cook.”

Adam sighed. It looked as if he wasn’t going to get away as quick as he had hoped. Reluctantly he followed her to the kitchen and tried one more attempt to get away.

“I really should be going,” he said. “I’ve got a load of things to do before my shift starts.”

“Stop stressing yourself,” Robin said. “You’ve got plenty of time.” She pulled out a stool from her island. “Sit.”

Adam did as he was told and was immediately met with a continental style spread of croissants, jam, ham and cheese. It was like the whole thing had appeared out of nowhere.

“It’s been so long since I’ve been able to cook a breakfast for someone,” Robin said. “I mean I cook occasionally for Amara but she’s such a tiny thing, she barely eats any of it. At least with you I get to serve a proper man’s breakfast.”

She dashed to her oven and started up her grill.

“Eggs, bacon and sausage okay?” She asked.

Adam opened his mouth to protest but she interrupted before he could get a word out.

“I tell you what, I’ll just make a whole bunch of stuff and you can pick and choose what you want.”

Adam realised that to try to stop this from happening was futile, so he grabbed a croissant and decided that he might as well eat. By the time he had finished off his second croissant, Robin had replaced his plate with a full English breakfast, complete with beans, hash browns and mushrooms. He tried to remember Robin even making half of this stuff but came up blank. She handed him a knife and fork and he started to eat. Robin then grabbed her mug of coffee and took a seat opposite him, watching him eat.

“Aren’t you having anything?” Adam asked.

“Already eaten,” she said. “Some of us prefer to have our breakfast at the start of the day as opposed to midday.”

Adam shuffled uncomfortably in his seat, “So, you’re just going to watch me eat?”

She laughed at that. “I’m just waiting for you to ask me the question.”

Adam stopped what he was eating, mid-bite.

“What question?”

“The ‘what happened last night?’ question.”

“Oh. That question.”

“So?” She asked.

Adam put down his fork and cleared his throat again.

“I was pretty wasted.” He said, eventually.

“We both were,” she added. “But yes, you were particularly bad.”

“So… did we?”

She smiled widely.

“You can rest easy, Adam Gammon.” She said. “I believe the exact words you gave me last night were, ‘if you weren’t on the rag, I would totally hit that.’”

Adam cringed at Robin’s report and threw her an apologetic look.

“I’m so sorry,” he said. “I’m not exactly my most tactful in that state.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “Depressingly enough, that isn’t the worst way someone has propositioned me.”

Adam had officially lost his appetite. He felt so embarrassed and wanted nothing more than to get out of this flat as soon as he could. He was impressed about how cool she was being about this however, he had not expected Robin to be the type to take a drunken fumbling lightly, whatever it was that had happened.

“Perhaps when I’m not ‘on the rag,’ we might be able to try it again?” She asked.

And suddenly it was worse. All hope that she might dismiss this night under the ‘never happened’ category seemed to disappear and all was left was this awkward silence as she waited for Adam’s response. The longer he left it, hoping that she would give him an out by taking a hint from the lack of response, the more he realised that his previous impression of how she was, was probably correct. She raised her eyebrow at him, clearly not allowing him to let that suggestion go.

“Er,” he said eventually, “sure, why not?”

“Awesome,” she said. “Then I guess I’ll see you in about four to five days’ time.”

“Well, I’d better be off.” He said quickly.

“Sure,” she said. “No doubt you’re eager to pop in on that little friend of yours.”

“I’m sorry?”

“You know, the genius kid who you were talking to on our first night here. The one that mysteriously disappeared shortly afterwards.”

“Daniela?” He asked.

She nodded.

“She didn’t mysteriously disappear, she went to the research lab on the other side of the building. You know that.”

“Well regardless of where she was, she’s back now.”

“How do you know that?”

“Amy told me.” Robin said, tidying up Adam’s plate. “And apparently she’s in a pretty bad shape. Amy said that when she saw her in the clinic, she looked really thin and was coming across all crazy.”

“When did Amy see her?”

“She was having her vaccine this morning and there Daniela was, all pale and crying with a bunch of people around her. And apparently as she left, that therapist woman you’re so fond of came in and demanded everyone to leave. Looks like she’s completely lost it, poor thing.”

“I’d better go,” Adam repeated. “Oh and Robin, is there any chance that you and Amy could keep this to yourself?”

Robin looked offended by the request. “But of course!” She said. “I would never spread any gossip about something as clearly serious as that!”

“You told me.” Adam reasoned.

“Well, only because I thought you would have already known. Given that she was your friend.”

“And you’ve based that on what? One night, ten months ago, where you spotted me talking to her for a while?”

“Well excuse me for trying to be helpful.” Robin said.

“Just don’t say anything to anyone else.” Adam said. “And ask Amy to do the same.”

Robin didn’t answer but gave Adam a clearly upset look. Crossing her arms, she looked at him levelly.

“I’m going to take that as a yes.” Adam said.

And with that, he dashed out the door, heading towards the clinic.