Chapter Six
Fish, Chips and Friction
Eva hadn’t planned on having dinner at the local pub.
In fact, she hadn’t planned much of anything beyond following a quest sparked by a mysterious green book.
Planning had once been her superpower—the Eva Coleman specialty.
Now she was following breadcrumbs through an ancient city, and strangely, it felt more right than any carefully plotted course she’d ever charted.
“Florence, you’ll never guess what I discovered today,” Eva had announced upon returning to the inn, holding up her Tesco bag like a trophy. “Have you ever had a meal deal? It’s genius. Three items, one price. And this egg and cress sandwich—I mean, who knew cress could be so good?”
Florence had looked up from her book, eyebrows climbing towards her hairline. “You had a meal deal for lunch?”
“Yes! And these chips—sorry, crisps—that’s right isn’t it? Anyway, they’re so vinegary they make your eyes water. It’s fantastic. Is this what British people eat every day?”
“Oh, love,” Florence had said, closing the covers together with a definitive boom. “That’s not a proper meal. That’s what office workers grab when they’ve got five minutes between meetings. You can’t experience British food through a plastic triangle sandwich.”
“But it was so convenient—”
“Convenient?” Florence had looked personally offended. “You’re in York, not some motorway service station. Tonight, you’re going to The Horse and Hound for a proper meal. Fish and chips, done right. None of this meal deal nonsense.”
“I don’t know, the sandwich was pretty good—”
“I won’t hear it, that is a sorry excuse for a meal. The Horse and Hound—that’s where you’ll find real British cooking. Tell Oliver I sent you. And for heaven’s sake, don’t mention the meal deal. He’ll bar you for life.”
Which was how Eva found herself at The Horse and Hound, discovering again that Florence had been absolutely right.
The pub was the kind of place that seemed to have been marinating in beer for centuries, the dark oak floors were sticky underfoot and the low ceiling was stained a deep amber from decades of tobacco smoke before the ban.
Brass fixtures glowed dully in the warm light.
The whole place smelled of beer, chips, and history.
The wooden beams overhead were so low that a sign at the entrance warned ‘DUCK OR GROUSE’—which Eva initially thought was a drink option until she nearly concussed herself on a particularly treacherous beam.
A string of Christmas lights had been half-heartedly tacked around the bar, blinking erratically as if they were trying to send a coded distress signal.
“You all right, love?” the bartender asked when she approached.
“Yes, thanks,” Eva said, rubbing her forehead. “Just getting acquainted with British architecture.”
“First rule,” he said, “everything’s shorter than you think it’ll be. Except the history. That’s longer.”
“Florence sent me,” Eva added. “She said I needed a proper meal.”
Oliver’s face lit up. “Ah, she’s saved another one from the tyranny of supermarket sandwiches, has she? Good woman, Florence. You’ll be wanting the fish and chips then.”
Eva noticed Charlie sitting at the bar when she arrived, nursing what she assumed was a whiskey, his back to the door.
He wore the same navy beanie from their market encounter, but had swapped the wool coat for a worn flannel shirt.
Tilly lay curled at his feet, occasionally lifting her head when the door opened.
Charlie had nodded briefly when Eva entered but made no move to join her, which suited her fine.
After their moment at the Minster earlier, she wasn’t sure where they stood.
He blew between hot and cold far more erratically than the inn’s shower and she didn’t need to concern herself with a man’s mood any time soon.
The menu was a laminated sheet listing items that sounded simultaneously familiar and alien: Toad in the Hole, Ploughman’s Lunch, Spotted Dick.
A chalkboard by the bar announced daily specials like ‘Proper Pie & Mash’ and ‘Gran’s Sunday Roast’, alongside a note that read ‘No, we don’t have bloody sriracha.
’ Eva ordered the fish and chips, as instructed, although she wasn’t entirely sure what ‘mushy peas’ were and whether she should be excited or concerned about them.
“With scraps?” the bartender asked when she ordered.
Eva blinked. “What?”
“Scraps,” he repeated, as if saying it louder would translate the term into American. “The crispy bits from the fryer.”
“Oh,” Eva said, trying to sound like she understood perfectly. “Yes, please.”
“Good lass,” he said approvingly. “Can’t have proper fish and chips without scraps. Criminal, that would be.” Eva nodded solemnly, as if she hadn’t just learned a new culinary term that sounded like something you’d feed to particularly fortunate dogs.
Eva excused herself to the bathroom and noticed a painting of a horse on the toilet seat and paintings of little hounds trotting all over the bathroom walls.
So the pub name made perfect sense. Eva giggled.
She washed her hands under the two taps of the sink, furiously bobbing her hands from hot to cold.
She settled herself into a worn booth in the corner, the dark red vinyl seat patched in at least three places with duct tape.
The table wobbled when she leaned on it, steadied by what appeared to be a folded coaster under one leg.
The wall beside her was covered in black and white photographs of York from bygone eras—flooded streets from the 1950s, celebrations from the end of the war, serious-faced men standing outside this very pub when it was still lit by gas lamps.
Eva sipped a half-pint of something amber the bartender had recommended when she’d requested “something not too beer-ish.” It tasted like bread in liquid form, but in a pleasant way that grew on you, like a first date that starts awkwardly but improves after appetisers arrive.
The pub was filled with locals—not the pressed-khaki tourists from the Christmas Market, but people who looked like they might argue about football (so, soccer) scores and know each other’s grandparents.
An old man in the corner was explaining something passionately to an audience of two, his hands tracing shapes in the air with the precision of someone who has told this particular story many times and has perfected the choreography.
Behind the bar, a shelf displayed dozens of local gin varieties and hand-labelled jars of what appeared to be home-infused spirits.
A pair of men in their sixties were playing dominoes near the fireplace with the intense concentration of chess grandmasters, slapping each tile down with a theatrical flourish and occasional exclamations of “Gerrin!” or “You’re having a laugh!
” Two middle-aged women at the next table were deeply engaged in what Eva could only assume was top-tier gossip, their conversation punctuated with “I’m not being funny, but … ” and hushed “No, she never did!”
The door to the pub opened periodically, letting in gusts of cold air and a chorus of greetings. Each new arrival seemed to warrant a series of nods, nicknames, and inside jokes, creating a symphony of “All right, Dave?” and “Evening, all” and “Look what the cat dragged in!”
While waiting for her food, Eva took in the room. There, right by the fireplace where she sat she noticed a small brass plaque on the wall, partially hidden behind a Christmas wreath. She moved the greenery aside to read:
The Veterans’ Corner Established 1946 by M. Wells “Every soldier needs a home fire”
“See you’ve found our bit of history,” Oliver the bartender said, appearing at her elbow. “That’s from Margaret Wells, she set up a fund after the war. Any veteran could come here for a hot meal and a pint, no questions asked, no payment needed.”
“That’s lovely,” Eva said, tracing the worn letters.
“Still going, too,” Oliver said proudly.
“The fund ran dry years ago, but we keep it up. Got three regulars who come in under Margaret’s Promise, we call it.
Old Dennis there—” he nodded towards a man nursing a half-pint by the window, “—he’s been coming since the sixties.
Says this place saved him when he had nowhere else to go. ”
Eva looked at the elderly man, who raised his glass slightly in her direction.
“She understood,” Oliver continued, polishing a glass that was already clean. “Some hurts can’t be fixed with medicine. Sometimes you just need a place where nobody asks questions and the fire’s always lit.”
Oliver handed her the huge platter of fish and chips, sitting on top of a sheet of newspaper print that sucked in the grease.
The chips were thick and golden, nothing like the skinny fries from home, and the promised “scraps” turned out to be deliciously crispy fragments of batter scattered across the top like savoury confetti.
The mushy peas were exactly what they sounded like—a vibrant green mash that tasted better than their appearance suggested, especially when mixed with the sharp malt vinegar she’d been instructed to apply “generously, love, not like you’re paying for it. ”
This was definitely not a meal deal. This was an experience. Florence had been right—again. Damnit, that woman knew what she was talking about.
She was halfway through her meal, lost in the simple pleasure of proper comfort food and mentally composing her apology to Florence for ever thinking a triangle sandwich could compare, when the pub door swung open, letting in a gust of cold air and a man who could only be described as the kind of handsome that belongs in glossy magazines—the type whose eyebrows appear to have their own stylist and whose five o’clock shadow arrives precisely at five, perfectly distributed like it was applied by a mathematical algorithm.