Chapter 3
3
NADIA
As Tom fills us in on his very romantic ten-year wait for Lola, I can t decide whether I m worried that something bad has happened to her (that would be such terrible timing for them both) or whether, yes, she s just stuck underground due to all of this (although she would already have been several minutes late before the alert happened) or whether, maybe, she got cold feet. We re heading towards quarter to eight now, and you would really think that she could have got in touch with him if she wanted to.
Maybe I m just being negative, though, because of Dougie s blatant no-show.
I wonder, actually, whether I should let him know that I m okay.
I murmur an apology and pull out my phone to send a message to him, but then realise that, no, if he s nowhere near the station because he never came at all (highly likely), it s far too embarrassing. And if he s nearby, he ll know that there s no panic going on and everyone seems fine and that nothing bad will have happened to me.
Yeah, no, I m not sending him a message.
She s tall and slim, with long, straight, blonde hair, and very beautiful, but most of all funny, kind and amazing company, just an all-round wonderful person, Tom s saying.
Our chorus of Aw is interrupted by an announcement over the loudspeaker.
False alarm? Ruth says, when it s finished. All free to go?
Except, any excuse for a train delay, so we won t be able to leave. Roger has reappeared.
Carole has been looking almost cheery, but she immediately tenses.
Roger. Please leave us, says Bea.
Don t come back to the house tonight, Carole says.
Well, where am I going to stay?
Samantha s? Carole suggests sarkily.
Roger begins to speak and Carole says, No. Enough.
Could I make a suggestion? Bea asks. Perhaps, while all the train delays die down, the five of us could go somewhere together? Continue talking, Carole? About whatever you like. You might perhaps even like to stay with one of us tonight? We could go somewhere local, Tom, in case you make contact with Lola.
I d like that, Carole says decisively.
I would too. I mean it. I instinctively really like this little group of people and somehow it feels as though we ve formed a bond. I d love to talk more to them. Plus, I am of course all dressed up and I d rather not have nowhere to go.
That would be great, actually. Tom shoves his phone back in his pocket, clearly still not having received any kind of response from Lola. Presumably he s very worried and would like to continue to be distracted.
There s an excellent tapas place a few minutes away. We could go there? Ruth suggests. Our treat if anyone s hungry; we d love to have dinner with you.
We would. And I love the sound of our and we , says Bea.
Me too. Ruth smiles at her and, honestly, it s gorgeous.
I glance at Tom and see that he can t help smiling at the sight of them, just like I can t. I really hope he gets his happy ending this evening.
That sounds perfect, thank you, Carole says.
Roger s eyes swivel between the five of us a few times, and then he just turns round and shuffles away.
The rest of us (after realising that, amidst all the drama, none of us had reassured loved ones who might have heard that there was an issue at Waterloo, and shooting off a few messages to say that we re okay) join the large crowd of people heading out of the station.
There s already this sense between us – well, I feel it, and I think the others do too – that we ve become a little group. It feels similar to that thing you see on a reality show where there s an initial group that arrive and bond really fast and then if anyone else gets introduced to the group, even only a few hours later, it s like they re interlopers. I think we ve bonded very quickly, just like that.
We re jostled a lot and make sure we stay together; we match our pace to Ruth s (she s apparently had a knee operation fairly recently and isn t back to her top walking speed yet); we laugh together about a couple of small incidents on the way out; and, honestly, it doesn t feel a stretch to say that I ve made four unlikely new friends under the clock this evening.
About fifteen minutes later, we re seated at a table towards the back of the tapas place. There s a man on a little platform halfway up the back wall playing a guitar, the air s buzzing with chat, tantalising smells are wafting their way over to us from neighbouring tables, Tom s phone has reception so he doesn t have to worry that he ll miss a call from Lola, and even Carole s smile looks less forced now.
Basically, it s looking like a way better evening for me than a blind date would have been.
Do you all drink? asks Bea. I d love to order a bottle of champagne to celebrate our news. If that s alright, Carole. I don t want to be insensitive.
Okay, let s get this out immediately, says Carole. You re lovely people. I m very lucky to have met you this evening, because I needed – need – some loveliness around me right now. I m happy for you. I want to be distracted. Please don t feel that you re being insensitive towards me. You aren t. I d love to help you celebrate. In fact, if I may, I ll celebrate on my own behalf too. It s the start of a new life for me, one that I hadn t expected, but if I m honest, there are downsides to living with Roger.
We all nod, because, well, yes. Roger and downsides. Not difficult to imagine.
And then Ruth orders the champagne and some tap water, and we all start looking at the menu.
Tom glances at his phone – there s been no reply to the message he sent to Lola telling her in great detail where we are – and I quickly check mine too.
Obviously , there s no word from Dougie.
Are you worried too? Ruth asks me.
No. I take a lovely big, long sip of the champagne the waiter s just poured for us and as it goes down feel myself warm inside. And then (it cannot be because of just one sip of champagne; it must be the strange bonding thing we ve had going on), I find myself doing what the others have all done, and splurging my thoughts.
Basically, this evening I was supposed to be meeting a blind date, as I mentioned. I have a terrible record with blind dates and meeting people from apps. Terrible . They always go very badly. So I had actually decided to stop doing them, and wait for love if and when it hits. Except it never does, and I would like to meet someone. So when a colleague said that his flatmate would be perfect for me, and I d be perfect for him , I was too easily persuaded into agreeing to meet this evening. And the flatmate clearly either didn t turn up at all, or he did and saw me and scarpered.
Logically— Tom takes a piece of bread —he did not turn up, see you and leave, because he couldn t have seen you before you saw him. So he obviously just decided not to turn up and didn t let you know. So he s obviously a rude arse and you ve had a lucky escape and it s no reflection whatsoever on you.
Hmm. I consider this for a moment. But it feels like a reflection. Maybe the way my colleague described me put him off.
I mean. Tom s phone pings and his eyes slide to it and then back to me. Clearly not Lola. No. That just isn t likely. The most likely thing is that he got blind-date cold feet, as in he didn t want to go on a blind date at all. A lot of people don t. I ve never been on one.
Really ? I am so envious. I would love never to have been on one. And never to go on one again. (I need to develop better willpower.) But how do you meet people? Do dating apps work for you?
No, I ve always just kind of met people in real life. Uni. Work. Barbecues. The usual. Apart from the odd weird one.
Okay, I have two comments on that. I dip some bread in olive oil. One. Based on my friends and me I really didn t think there was a usual place to meet. And two: what was your weirdest one ever?
That s a good question.
We both pause to join the others in thanking the server as he fills the table with plates of enticing tapas.
Weird meets? I prompt when we ve finished exclaiming with the others over how extremely delicious everything looks.
I once met someone while we were both vomiting from food poisoning, in adjacent toilet cubicles, and then dated her for six months. Tom takes a spoonful of patatas bravas.
I nod, satisfied. Definitely weird. You must have really liked each other if you were attracted despite the vomiting and the misery.
Yeah, no, the funny thing is – not really. I think we thought we d bonded because we were so miserable and no-one else had been through that with us but as time went on it became apparent that you can t build a relationship on mutual gastrointestinal issues.
I laugh. This is making me feel better about my own disastrous love life. Give me some more.
Let me think. Tom hands me a plate of ham and cheese croquettes. My mouth waters just from the smell of them. Okay. Not to big up my own weird dating experience but this is a good one. Car crash. Both of us equally at fault. We reversed into each other.
No, no, no. I shake my head sorrowfully. Clearly you don t read or watch enough romcoms to know that that s a huge cliché. In fiction it happens all the time. Actually, I say it happens all the time; that is not in fact true. It used to happen all the time. It s gone out of fashion recently; I m guessing because it got overused.
I see. Tom narrows his eyes. I didn t realise you were so judgemental. Fine. I assure you that I have better ones than that, that you will not be able to say were clichés.
I laugh again and savour a garlicky prawn as Tom thinks for a moment, before he begins to tell me some more of his frankly ridiculous stories.
You did what ? asks Carole as Tom s description of beginning to date a woman he met landing in a cow pat after diving over a wall to escape a stampeding herd of cows (that were not in fact stampeding) falls in a lull in the other three s conversation.
Soon they ve joined in and have begun to swap their weirdest first-meets too.
Honestly, I say eventually, wiping actual tears from under my eyes after a truly stunning story from Ruth involving going to the wrong wedding. Why don t I have any insane meet stories? Are these all true ?
Apparently they are.
Did you refer to some disastrous first dates, though? asks Tom, like he s trying to comfort me about my lack of weird first-meets.
Well, I mean, yes, obviously. Billions.
How many exactly? asks Bea.
Tonight s no-show was the seventh bad first date this year. A combination of being set up by friends and a dating app.
My goodness. Carole s fully joining in with all the conversation now, and she s great . Roger is not just a philandering arse, he s an idiot. He will be worse off without her, I m sure. What was wrong with all the others? Did you go for any second dates?
We ve moved on from the slightly awkward if-you-feel-happy-to-share qualifiers on all our questions now, like we ve reached proper friendship level already. I genuinely feel like I m sitting at a table with a group of close girlfriends (okay, Tom s a man, but he s so easy to talk to he could genuinely be an actual female friend).
Okay. So. Number one. His actual first line to me was: I ve never met a girl with hair like yours who wasn t hot in bed . I walked out.
I begin to tick them off on my fingers.
Number two. I liked him. I thought we were getting on well. We were getting on well. Then he showed me a photo of his last girlfriend and I discovered it was a colleague of mine. Who had told us all a couple of weeks before that she d dumped her boyfriend because his sexual fetishes were too weird for her.
Number three. We got as far as a kiss and it was bad . The first one missed. His lips landed on my cheek and mine were kind of fish-like kissing air. Then we made contact and there was no chemistry. And kissing is weird when you ve realised that you don t want to be kissing that person.
Bea nods a lot. Tell me about it.
Ruth nods too.
Number four? Carole asks.
Hang on. I think back. Oh, yes. We were meeting in a bar and I got there before him. I d told him I d be wearing a green top. He arrived and went straight up to a woman in a pink top, with a huge smile on his face. When we established that I was his blind date, not her, his face fell several feet, and then he spent ages telling me that he was colour blind and that was why he got pink and green confused. Totally missing the point that I could not spend an evening with someone who had beamed at another woman and looked like he was going to cry when he realised that I was his date.
He was an idiot, states Tom.
Aww, thank you. I almost believe him. He s very good at that, I ve already realised: making people feel better.
Number five? asks Ruth.
Your bog-standard recently divorced man who wanted to tell me all about the ex. I was free therapy, basically. Even freer when at the end of the evening I said that I was so sorry but I wasn t sure it had worked and that I didn t think we should necessarily meet again, and he walked straight out without paying his half of the bill.
That , Carole says, is classic Roger-style behaviour.
Tosser, we all chorus, because that s where we re up to now on the Roger situation: every so often, Carole throws in a comment about him and we all agree that he s a tosser.
Number six? asks Bea.
Another classic, I say. Because I am an idiot. We had what seemed like a lovely evening together in a restaurant and then I went to the loo but turned back because I hadn t picked up my bag and wanted to reapply my lipstick, and he was making a quick call to his wife to say he was late at a client dinner and might have to stay in a hotel overnight.
Tosser, the others say automatically.
Oh dear. Ruth leans over and squeezes my hand briefly. I don t think dating strangers is working for you.
That s an understatement.
I m not going to be dating for a long time, Carole says. You re welcome to join me.
Thank you, I say. I think I should.
Love will find you when you least expect it. Bea smiles at me and then at Ruth, and I swallow at the gorgeousness of their evident happiness.
I see Tom check his phone again.
Still nothing, he says when he sees me looking.
She is okay, I m sure of it, I say.
Tom s face falls a little and I realise that I ve kind of said the wrong thing. In that he clearly doesn t want to think that anything bad s happened to her, but also he doesn t want to think that there s no good reason she hasn t turned up. And we know now that the whole bomb scare was just a scare and no-one at all was injured (thank goodness).
What I mean, I amend, is that there was clearly a good reason that she hasn t come this evening. I d like to point out that he is apparently excellent at meeting people in weird ways, so if this doesn t work out he ll probably meet someone again soon, except I don t think he d like to hear that, because obviously he s been waiting for Lola for ten years. In fact, maybe the reason that none of the rest of his relationships worked out in that time was that he subconsciously didn t want them to because of Lola. You will see her soon.
He perks up. Think so?
Definitely. If I m honest, I wouldn t totally put money on it.