Chapter 18
The first-aid kit put away, Jay leaned against the sink, attitude wary. He appeared to shrink under Dean’s gaze, becoming infinitesimal in the huge jumper. Since when did Jay dress as if he hid out in his clothes like this? He wore a garment more suited to someone off work, ill, staying in on a rain and windswept day. Dean’s visit arose out of a need to move forward, to assess his own feelings, but what was up with Jay? He might as well ask the most important question.
“Are you going to forgive me?”
“I might forgive Dean Chapman, the bright and unselfish man who knew I quoted from Adam Bede when I called him a cock that thought the sun had risen to hear him crow. The Dean Chapman who knew the book was by George Eliot, pseudonym of a woman called Mary Ann Evans. I’m not sure I want to forgive the Dean Chapman who sits calmly by while one of his workmates, one who reads nothing more than the nudie page in the newspaper, takes the piss out of me.”