Dinner at Mine by Chris Smyth

Stephen breathed out huffily, but found himself wheezing. Perhaps that second helping of crumble had been a mistake. He’d
eaten it too quickly and was starting to feel very bloated. Maybe some wine would help. Soothe his stomach.
    No, in fact it just increased the pressure. Bugger it. He was going to feel this tomorrow. He listened tetchily as Sarah quickly identified Martin Scorsese. Matt was the last to guess,
pretending not to mind at all as Charlotte goaded him.
    Stephen watched Matt with dyspeptic malevolence. After all these years, how had he only just found out? Rosie said he was making too much of it, that it was all so long ago and what did it
matter now? But if that was the case, why had she never told him about it? Why had he only found out by accident from the big mouth of some woman he hardly even remembered from college?
    Of course, Stephen had always known that Rosie and Matt had gone out together. Briefly, they said. It was during the first year of university, and only for a couple of months. Rosie said it was
nothing really, just a fling that clearly wasn’t going anywhere. And that was fine. Sort of. Rosie had told Stephen about it when they first got together and he’d got over it then, even
felt an unaccustomed superiority over his friend: he, Stephen, had made it work with Rosie after she had dumped Matt.
    Only, it turned out, she hadn’t dumped Matt. No, he had dumped her. And Stephen had only just discovered that. Rosie had apologized for not telling him. But it sounded more like she was
apologizing for him finding out. She said she hadn’t wanted it to be awkward at the time, and later, well, there was just never the right moment. Stephen could understand that, he supposed,
not telling the truth when you were twenty-one. But what about the decade since? Yes, it had started as a small lie, but it had been getting bigger every year since.
    Not that he was worried, exactly. If they were going to run off together, then, as Rosie said, they would have done that by now. He didn’t doubt that she loved him. He was angry, yes, but
it was more that . . .
    It was that Matt had gone along with it. That was the really insulting thing. Matt obviously saw it as Stephen taking up with one of his cast-offs, in that egotistical way he had. But instead of
saying so, he decided that Stephen’s confidence was so fragile he had to pretend that he had never wanted Rosie to go. He’d not actually said as much, but he’d definitely let
Stephen think that. It was so bloody condescending.
    And all the possibilities it raised about the break-up. What if . . .
    Oh God, why was there no more wine? Brandy, though. There was plenty of that in the drinks cabinet.
    ‘Darling, could you help me with the plates?’ Rosie asked as Stephen hauled himself to his feet.
    ‘In a minute,’ he mumbled as he moved, more unsteadily than he expected, to the cupboard in the corner. He offered the brandy round and it came back with almost half the bottle gone.
Jesus, how much wine had they got through? It had been good, though, hadn’t it? Must make a note to order more of that next month. What was it called? Don’t put the empties in the
recycling without checking. Better tell Rosie to do that later; he’d be bound to forget.
    He reached out to accept the conveyor belt of dirty bowls being handed down from the end of the table. They clashed against each other loudly as he tried to stack them. ‘Oops,’ he
muttered.
    ‘Darling, do you want me to carry those?’
    ‘No, I’m fine.’
    Rosie laughed nervously.
    Stephen reached out to take the two bowls being offered to him by Barbara. As she bent forward, arm outstretched, he noticed how the thin material of her strappy top clung to the curve of her
breast, while rumpling out in the middle to show an inviting scoop of cleavage. Great figure she had, really. Very pretty all round. Hadn’t said very much this evening, but that was kind of
sexy, wasn’t it? Not knowing