I was trying not to burn the coconut rice and slightly worried that this Ofada stew wasn't going to make it on time. I'd tried my best to make everything romantic all things considered, Sade or "My friend Helen" as my mum called her was belting her greatest hits in the background

I'd put some candles and flowers around the dining area, setting the place with my most chic cutlery and plates as I practiced exactly how I was going to explain everything that happened today to Luna. This was a reconciliation effort, all I had to do was explain that I didn't know Lucas was going to be there, that he didn't have anything to do with my firm except for the fact that I now had to work on the commission with him.

The door bell chimes, pulling me out of my thoughts. I lower the heat on the rice and rush to open the door, only to find mum standing there with a wicker basket and a bottle of what looks like champagne

"Heeeeeeh! Is that my friend Helen!" Mum chimes loudly pushing into the loft to dance,

She places the basket on the floor and the wine on a console before dancing around my living area.

"Hi mum." I chime smiling at the beautiful woman who'd raised me

"What do you know about smoothness?" she chides rolling her hips at me

She pulls me into her arms and we sway along to smooth operator in the most dramatic way possible. Someone's been watching too much dancing with the stars and I was about to pay for it.

"Tell me Chupsie, you've forgotten how to move your hips? What would my friend Helen say seeing you dance like a cardboard to her music?" She teases as we twirl around the room in each other's arms

"Auntie Helen, that I've never met that doesn't even know I exist?" I wonder back lightly

My mum's best friends were Princess Diana and Sade if you allowed it.

"Heeeh! Ever since you became a billionaire Architect your hips have gotten so stiff!" Mum says rolling my hips for me now as I chuckle

"Speak it to the universe please, minus the stiff hips part." I offer, kissing her cheek as I sway my hips slightly more enthusiastically

"I will only be speaking more dinners in your house where you put flowers and candlelight for me too. Not every day Luna, Luna, sometimes remember I almost killed myself giving birth to your beautiful head and its genius billionaire architect thoughts ehn." She says, dipping me so precociously I'm sure we're about to fall

"Yes mom!" I vow, closing my eyes and waiting to fall when miraculously she lifts me right back up

"What's that smell?" She suddenly wonders and I can assure you it's the burning of my coconut rice

"Here we go, the London fire during Brexit." She sighs shaking her head as she walks to the kitchen.

She was right of course, the rice had started burning but it was salvageable. She'd brought the ofada stew, some prosecco and some vegetables and I did what I always did when my mum got into the kitchen, I found myself a counter to sit on and listened to her talk, about her day, the project and her hopes for me, Aunty Simon and Boyd.

"But you're passionate about this, yes?" Mom finally asks as she stops me from filling up her glass again

"Yes. It's not that I'm ungrateful to Luc, I just want my own firm...or at least to try and fail at it you know?" I shrug as she smiles at me

"Then she'll just have to support you." She asserts

It was a lot to ask of Luna, and I was starting to feel like I was always asking her to sacrifice, to adjust, to be OK with me and my career and my hopes and dreams.

"If that white boy who is 678th to the throne can tuck his balls in and support you who is she to refuse ehn?" Mom challenges just as the door bell chimes

I slurp the last bit of my prosecco and rush to the door, hoping it's Luna, hoping we can discuss this over dinner, hoping my mother rests a bit. I open the door to Luna, not at her most patient and I smile and try to lean in and kiss her hello but she swerves.

"Have you thought about what I said?" She asks glaring at me

"Yeah, I have babe. I've been thinking about it all day." I assure her as she pulls out her phone

"Have you? Because my find my friends says you were at a restaurant in Knighstbridge and then you were at Lucas' office and then here. So if anything you might just have been canoodling with your new boyfriend all day!" she says flashing a screenshot of what looks like a map in my face

There's a red line waving through London. I really wanted to turn off find my friends but my mum wouldn't let me. Ever since my dad died...

Anyway, I move out of the doorway to give her access into the loft and a view of the music and the table setting, obviously I'm hoping this shifts the conversation to something else. She steps in, but it's not a dainty step and her face doesn't change, so I try my best to assure her that I didn't know Lucas was going to be at the meeting.

"I can show you all the emails of Lord McLeod and I planning this meeting and nowhere did he mention Lucas being present." I say as she removes her coat and hands it to me

"I'd like to see them." She says, still pouting at me

"Of course." I shrug, having nothing to hide.

I put her coat in the coat room and then fish out my tablet, open it up and hand her the email chain. She stands there, going through the emails as if Lucas would pop out of the email chain and reveal that we were actually having an affair this entire time!

LOL

Like that would ever happen!

"Then why was he there?" She finally asks, at this point I can smell the glorious Ofada stew and I'm grateful mum is putting a miracle together in the kitchen for me.

"They're brothers-in-law, he just flew in for breakfast. I didn't know." I reiterate as calmly as possible, smiling for great measure, to remind her how buff I am and that she loves me

"Then what were you doing at Lucas' office?"

I still work for the man, love, innit? He's still my boss.

"He wanted to see my architectural plans for the project...to see how it'd fit into his." I shrug, grateful that find my friends didn't indicate that I had been smoking earlier today

"Sweetie... I need you to believe me here. I'm doing this for us." I coo as soothingly and earnestly as possible, moving towards her now

"Why would he want to see the plans?" She inquires stiffly

Because his brother-in-law is making us work together on the project?

"If I have my own firm then I don't need to work for Lucas. This project is the key to having my own firm." I assure her

"La Concha de tu Madre! Why... did he want to see...the PLANS?" She hisses at me

"To see how they'd fit with his." I shrug as casually as possible

Maybe if I made it seem routine she wouldn't flip out on me

"Why would they need to fit into his? If it's your project where does his idea come in? if it's advice why didn't you come to me for it?" she investigates, a fire in her beautiful dark eyes now

I struggle a little, I suppose, to find a way of properly explaining everything, so instead I offer to do so over dinner, wine, Sade, candlelight, the works.

"Let me ask another question then since that one's hard. Why is there an email from Lord MacLeod here saying he's glad you and Lucas have decided to work together on this?"

First off I had no idea such an email existed! It must've come in while I was burning the coconut rice or something and secondly...

"Did you even think about what I said? Or was it that easy for you to choose between us and this job?" She wonders as I try to explain the dilemma before us

"Luna...I think we can talk this through over dinner..." I start to offer but she was visibly shaking now

"Vete a freír espárragos!!" (Go Fuck Yourself/fry asparagus) She yells, proper vexed now

"babe, please..."

"Don't! You've made your choice" You'll always choose yourself over our relationship and I'm done! I'm done! Que te Folle un Pez! You and that Pendejo tienes la cara como una nevera por detrás!!" (I hope you get fucked by a fish) (Asshole who has a face like the back of a fridge)

She cries, pushing the tablet into my chest and grabbing the nearest thing (a cushion) and flinging it across the room.

She pushes past me towards the coat room and grabs her coat all while cussing me out in Spanish. I try my best to explain that Angus was forcing us to work together, that neither Lucas nor I wanted to collaborate on this, that Lucas Roland DID NOT want to fuck me, but she won't listen. She's screaming about how I always choose myself over the relationship, I always put myself first and never listen and if my job was so important to me than she'd be out of the way.

"You think I like this? You think I enjoy having to look for you on find my friends? You think it's fun for me?!" She cries as I consider that I'm the monster in this situation

"I... I'm sorry..." I stammer, so fucking apologetic I didn't even know how or where to start

"You're sorry? Sorry? Me Importa un Pepino!" She screams at me, throwing another decorative pillow at me (I don't give a fuck/cucumber)

"I've had just about enough of your screaming!" Mum announces from somewhere behind me

"Well I've had just about enough of your daughter so!" Luna retorts, turning for the door and slamming it shut behind her

And that was it. That's how she broke up with me. That's all you really needed to know about me, I am so cruelly selfish and ambitious that I'd in one day stabbed both my boss and my girlfriend in the back for a project.

Mum had dinner with me instead of Luna, and she tried her best to cheer me up but all I could think of was calling Lucas or Angus or anyone and turning the job down, calling Luna and begging her to take me back. I could email Angus I suppose, but the way he'd threatened to give the gig to someone else entirely meant that Lucas would have lucked out twice on the same project and I'd already stabbed him once today. Mum offered to sleep over, but all I wanted was wine and some space.