“Poor Hannah,” Alex said, and he sounded genuinely sad. “I think the guy is bad news. In fact, do you think he’s dangerous? Maybe he’s a serial killer and tonight she’s his victim.”
June raised her eyebrows. “I was going for tragic romance and you want grisly horror.”
Alex laughed out loud and June grinned. She’d never played the game with anyone else before.
“No wonder you were so good at those creative writing assignments. I always got a C because I added zombies and monsters. Do you still write?”
“Not really,” June said, and she took a sip of her wine.
“Oh, that’s such a shame. I always thought you were going to be a—”
“Do you have any hobbies, Alex?” June said before he could finish his sentence.
“Sure, I have hobbies, June,” he said, and she thought she could see a faint smile on his lips. “I like to go climbing, and I play football on a local five-a-side team: we’re rubbish but the drinking after is fun. I love going to the cinema—there’s an amazing independent one near my flat in London that plays old sixties and seventies horror movies. And on Tuesday nights I go...”
June listened with growing amazement. She’d expected him to say one or two things, but how could one person be so busy? It sounded exhausting.
“What about you?” Alex said when he got to the end of his list.
“I read,” June said. There was a pause as Alex waited for her to carry on. “And I like walking.”
“Cool. Do you ever go hiking? I used to do a lot with Dad when I was younger.”
“Sure,” June said, and she took a gulp of her wine to cover up the fact that the only walking she did was to and from work.
“Do you like traveling?” Alex said. “I went backpacking every summer while I was at uni; it was amazing.”
“What was your favorite place?”
“Ooh, the million-dollar question. India is brilliant, and I also loved Vietnam. Have you been?”
June shook her head. The farthest she’d ever been was to Weymouth with her mum.
“You should go; it’s amazing. There’s such a rich history, and the food is...”
June nodded as she listened to Alex, but inside she was squirming. This was exactly why she hadn’t wanted to come tonight. She had nothing interesting to say, no exciting hobbies or exotic travel to talk about. All she’d done for the past ten years was work in the library and read books. June closed her eyes, wishing she could run out now and spare herself the humiliation of him realizing what a pathetic little life she led.
“June?”
She opened her eyes. “Sorry, what?”
“I said, do you still see many people from school?”
Oh god, this was it. The moment she had to tell Alex that she had no friends, no hobbies, and no life. “Well, the thing is...” June stopped as a thought occurred to her. “Actually, I’m going to Gayle Spencer’s hen do in a few weeks.”
“Gayle? No way, how is she?”
“She’s good. She got engaged in the Maldives at New Year.”
“Nice,” Alex said. “I never realized you and her were close at school.”
“We’ve been friends since primary school.” This wasn’t a complete lie, but June could still feel her cheeks coloring.
“Wow, I had no idea. You two always seemed so different,” Alex said, and June cringed at the reminder of what a loser she’d been at school.
“I know, Gayle was a lot cooler than me,” she said, taking a despondent swig of wine.
“Actually, I thought you were the cool one,” Alex said. “All those girls ever talked about was boys and parties, while you were reading all these amazing, interesting books.”