Well and truly Cumberbatched (To be revised)

Chapter 20

Friday.

Me and Phoebe are in my office near where the poet John Keats once resided;  making headway on the edit for the first half of my thesis presentation for the Oxbridge fellows.

“Rosie, can I ask you something? After this question of course.” Phoebe says, spinning in her chair. I look away from the piles of research papers I’ve been highlighting through the last hour and look up.

“Of course Phoeb’s, what’s up?” I replied.

“Are you and Ben okay? I had a drink with Bridget when I had the day off and she told me everything when I asked why I hadn’t been able to reach you on Monday. Sorry if I wasn’t meant to know.” She says going through a few draft prints we’ve been mulling over.

“We’re okay, I don’t mind if you know Phoebe.” I warmly reply. I can tell she wants to hear more.

“Well he’s still coming over on Sunday to meet my family so we’ve not totally crashed and burned.” I continued as she smiled.

“Does Finn know about this?” she enquires.

“No, it’s definitely not something he needs to know, it wouldn’t be fair to throw Ben under the bus and involve anyone else. That'd be a pretty shitty first impression to make” I replied as she nodded in understanding.

“I suppose it’s best they don’t know. I think my girlfriend would be dead if I had something like that happen to me and Hugo and Chloe (her sister) found out, well if I was in a relationship I mean.” She added.

“Amazing what life throws at you sometimes. Fancy heading out for some lunch?” I asked, dropping a highlighter on the desk; we’ve been tirelessly working non-stop for the last four or so days, this thesis paper on feminism meeting computer science in the 21st century has been challenged on every possible angle, it has to be an eye opener and really influence future publications.

“Sure, my head’s about to explode.” Phoebe replies as she buries her head in her hands and I laughed a little. “Your choice where we go.” I said as I grabbed my phone and purse, letting her out the door before me. My phone vibrates and I have a look. It’s a text.

‘Two more sleeps xxxxxx’ it read, from Ben. I warmly smile and head to lunch with Phoebe…

Evening...

I make it home at about 9PM and decide to take Merlin for a walk around Golders hill park having had dinner first, fed Merlin and given him a bath. I let him off his leash as he calmly trots ahead of me. I think I spot Joe sat in the park with Mary. Merlin barks and runs over to Joe. I catch up a moment later; “Hey guys, sorry about that- I didn’t expect him to run up to you.” I quickly said as Mary embraced me for a hug and Joe followed suit.

“Rosie, it’s so nice to see you, it’s been ages.” Mary beamed.

“It really has been, me and my boyfriend are heading to a performance of the catcher in the rye in a few weeks, you two should join us? Tickets are still selling.” I said. “I’m up for that if you are Joe?” Mary asked.

“Sounds good to me, I told Rosie ages ago that we needed to sort some sort of double date out and meet the new man.” He winked, popping a mint in his mouth.

“Rosie, have a seat.” Mary said as she moved her bag from where it was sat on the table bench.  Joe left us to it and decided to go off and keep Merlin entertained with a game of fetch.

“Cig?” Mary asked as I placed my keys on the table.

“I’ll pass, but thank you.” I replied.