Can You Keep a Secret?

He takes a deep breath and shoves his hands in his pockets.

'Emma, I didn't lie to you. I didn't feed you anything. I was gripped by you the minute I met you on that plane. The minute you looked up at me and said, "I don't even know if I've got a G spot!" I was hooked. Not because of business … because of you. Because of who you are. Every single tiny detail.' The flicker of a smile passes over his face. 'From the way you pick out your favourite horoscope every morning to the way you wrote the letter from Ernest P. Leopold. To your exercise plan on the wall. All of it.'

His gaze is fixed on mine, and my throat feels tight, and my head is all confused. And for an instant I feel myself wavering.

Just for an instant.

'That's all very well,' I say, my voice shaking. 'But you embarrassed me. You humiliated me!' I turn on my heel and start striding across the road again.

'I didn't mean to say so much,' says Jack, following me. 'I didn't mean to say anything. Believe me, Emma, I regret it as much as you do. The minute we stopped, I asked them to cut out that part. They promised me they would. I was …' He shakes his head. 'I don't know, goaded, I got carried away …'

'You got carried away?' I feel a renewed surge of outrage. 'Jack, you exposed every single detail about me!'

'I know, and I'm sorry …'

'You told the world about my underwear … and my sex life … and my Barbie bedcover and you didn't tell them it was ironic …'

'Emma, I'm sorry—'

'You told them how much I weigh!' My voice rises to a shriek. 'And you got it wrong!'

'Emma, really, I'm sorry—'

'Sorry isn't good enough!' I wheel round furiously round to face him. 'You ruined my life!'

'I ruined your life?' He gives me a strange look. 'Is your life ruined? Is it such a disaster for people to know the truth about you?'

'I …I …' For a moment I flounder. 'You don't know what it was like for me,' I say, on firmer ground. 'Everyone was laughing at me. Everyone was teasing me, in the whole office. Artemis was teasing me—'

'I'll fire her,' Jack cuts me off firmly.

I'm so shocked, I give a half-giggle, then turn it into a cough.

'And Nick was teasing me—'

'I'll fire him too.' Jack thinks for a moment. 'How about this: anyone who teased you, I'll fire.'

This time I can't help giggling out loud.

'You won't have a company left.'

'So be it. That'll teach me. That'll teach me to be so thoughtless.'

For a moment we stare at each other in the sunshine. My heart's beating quickly. I'm not quite sure what to think.

'Would you like to buy some lucky heather?' A woman in a pink sweatshirt suddenly thrusts a foil-wrapped sprig in my face, and I shake my head irritably.

'Lucky heather, sir?'

'I'll take the whole basket,' says Jack. 'I think I need it.' He reaches into his wallet, gives the woman two £50 notes, and takes the basket from her. All the time, his eyes are fixed on mine.

'Emma, I want to make this up to you,' he says, as the woman hurries away. 'Could we have lunch? A drink? A … a smoothie?' His face crinkles into a tiny smile, but I don't smile back. I'm too confused to smile. I can feel part of me starting to unbend; I can feel part of me starting to believe him. Wanting to forgive him. But my mind is still jumbled up. Things are still wrong somewhere.

'I don't know,' I say, rubbing my nose.

'Things were going so well, before I had to go and fuck it up.'

'Were they?' I say.

'Weren't they?' Jack hesitates, gazing at me over the heather. 'I kind of thought they were.'

My mind is buzzing. There are things I need to say. There are things I need to get into the open. A thought crystallizes in my head.

'Jack … what were you doing in Scotland? When we first met.'

At once, Jack's expression changes. His face closes up and he looks away.

'Emma, I'm afraid I can't tell you that.'

'Why not?' I say, trying to sound light.

'It's … complicated.'

'OK, then.' I think for a moment. 'Where did you go rushing off to that night with Sven? When you had to cut our date short.'

Jack sighs.

'Emma—'

'How about the night you had all those calls? What were those about?'

This time, Jack doesn't even bother answering.

'I see.' I push my hair back, trying to stay calm. 'Jack, did it ever occur to you that in all our time together, you hardly told me anything about yourself?'

'I … guess I'm a private person,' says Jack. 'Is it such a big deal?'

'It's quite a big deal to me. I shared everything with you. Like you said. All my thoughts, all my worries, everything. And you shared nothing with me.'

'That's not true—' He steps forward, still holding the cumbersome basket, and several sprigs of heather fall to the ground.