Читать книгу The Island Escape - Кэрри Фишер, Kerry Fisher - Страница 18

When Octavia had an idea in her head, she was impossible to resist. Before she came over the following evening, I was determined that I wasn’t going to let her bamboozle me into looking for a man online, but she breezed into my apartment with a bottle of fizz ‘to celebrate a new beginning’.

Before I knew it, we were sitting at the tiny breakfast bar, poring over the pictures on the Just Clicked website. Octavia was drawn to the skinny guys, whereas I could never envisage going out with a man who could fit into my jeans. I preferred men who looked like they could take on a bear and win if the need ever arose. She liked dark, broody men, even though she’d ended up with Jonathan, who was gingerish. I leaned towards men at the Scandinavian end of the spectrum.

Octavia pointed to a man who epitomised the word ‘ordinary’. ‘He looks nice. Friendly eyes. Shirt’s quite trendy.’

‘Trendy? He looks like he buys his clothes from Topman. Bet he reads Angling Weekly. How about this one? He’s rather attractive.’

‘No. Too serial killer. Look how pale he is. Looks like he’s been living in a cupboard under the stairs.’ Octavia scrolled down. ‘What about this one?’

‘I’m not that desperate. Forehead like a skating rink. Too thin.’ As we dismissed whole chunks of the male population on their hairline alone, I dreaded to think what they would say about me if I ever dared to put my picture out there into the brutal world of internet dating.

I trailed my finger down the page. ‘Bet he’s called Quentin.’

‘Cuthbert.’ Octavia laughed into her champagne.

‘Cuthbert’ was the name we used to give to any boy we didn’t want to dance with at the school disco. ‘Nick’ was for the ones we liked. For a moment, it was like being fifteen again, judging a man on his haircut and shirt. If I’d messed up the first time around when I was approaching life optimistically and open-minded, I didn’t rate my chances with bitter baggage, teenage daughter and a ring-fenced heart in tow. But Scott appeared to be getting on with his life, so I’d have to do the same. It might even do me good to meet someone new, someone I could be myself with, the self I was now. Not the self I was when I was twenty.

Octavia picked out a guy who looked Slavic, with high cheekbones and slightly protruding eyes.

‘A bit amphibian-looking. Like his jacket though. And he’s got attractive hands. OK, let’s put him on the possibles list. He can be my middle-aged Nick,’ I said.

‘OK, let’s choose one more, then we’ll set up your profile.’ Octavia filled our glasses again. ‘What about him? He looks a bit Mediterranean. He’s got gorgeous hair. Reminds me a bit of Xavi.’

‘Everyone reminds you of Xavi. About time you blew out that ancient torch for him. Never let it be said that Octavia Shelton is fickle. I wonder where he ended up. Maybe he finally came back to Cocciu after all that travelling, married a girl in the village and is now a staid old man, out on his fishing boat at weekends.’

‘Doubt it. I can’t imagine a tiny island containing him for the rest of his life.’ Octavia’s hard edges still softened when she talked about him.

‘Do you ever think about contacting him? You must have Googled him at least?’

‘Nope. It just seems so disloyal and a bit slippery-slopey. Even if I found him, what would I do? I’ve got the life I’ve got now. Anyway, I’m probably a distant shag he can barely remember.’

‘Don’t be stupid. You broke his heart. He absolutely adored you. If your dad hadn’t died, you’d have gone travelling the world with him.’

Octavia threw up her hands. ‘Can you imagine Mum if I’d have dropped out of university and gone tazzing off to New Zealand with Xavi? Mind you, might have learnt more there than wasting my time finishing off a stupid French degree. Not essential for running a nursery and teaching two-year-olds Humpty Dumpty. Anyway, do you want to include this bloke or not?’ She drained her glass.

‘Go on then, I’ll have the Xavi lookalike in homage to that flame – or should I say that bonfire – you never quite managed to snuff out.’ I dutifully wrote his name down.

‘It would never have worked. He was far too wild for me.’

‘Fibber. You were waxing lyrical about him on New Year’s Eve. Anyway, back then, you were rather wild yourself.’ I dug a couple of bottles out of the bijou wine rack and waved them at Octavia. She went with the Rioja.

‘Maybe I was, but you’ve got to grow up eventually. You can’t keep travelling aimlessly. I couldn’t have dragged the kids all over the world. Xavi was just a mad fling before I found Mr Right.’ Octavia sighed. ‘Let’s sign you up. I’m going to use Cuthbert as your password.’

I recognised Octavia’s closing-down tactics. She was absurdly defensive about Jonathan. If I ever dared to point out that he didn’t seem very exciting, she would get all snippy, saying he worked so hard to support three children, as though one child didn’t require a moment of effort. It would be interesting to see if Jonathan became a powerhouse of football/rugby/netball match attendance now he didn’t have work as an excuse. I didn’t know how she stood all his fussing about, running his fingers along the banisters checking for dust.

Her calling him Mr Right brought out the devil in me.

‘I bet Xavi would be on Facebook. You could have a quick peek without him even knowing.’

‘Yes, I could, but I’m not going to. I’m very happy with my life, thank you. Let’s fill in the questionnaire about personality.’ Octavia immediately started laughing. ‘God, this is sophisticated. Tick the boxes that apply to you. ‘I like to converse at an intellectual level.’ Big fat tick. ‘I enjoy luxury.’ Huge double tick. ‘I get discouraged easily.’ Think that’s another tick.’

‘I don’t get discouraged easily.’

‘You do at the moment. At the New Year’s Eve party, you told me every time I spoke to you that you’d never meet anyone.’

‘Pardon me for being a bit depressed. I’d only left Scott six days before.’ No doubt Octavia would have led them all in the conga and a burst of the hokey-cokey.

Half a questionnaire later, with my imperfections glittering in cyberspace, I needed a break. ‘Come on. Let’s see if we can find Xavi.’

‘We’re supposed to be finding a man for you,’ Octavia said, but her protest was weak.

I shuffled her out of the way, logged on to Facebook through Alicia’s account, and typed in Xavier Santoni. No results.

‘He’s probably living in the Corsican mountains and working as a shepherd,’ I said, preparing to click back onto my dreaded dating profile.

Octavia put her hand on my arm, ‘Try just putting in Santoni – might bring up one of his rellies.’

I nudged her. ‘I thought you weren’t interested anyway.’

‘You’ve only got yourself to blame. You’re the one who’s let the genie out of the bottle. I’ve spent years telling myself “Step away from Google”.’

Forty-six results for Santoni. I scrolled down. She pointed to the screen.

‘Click on that one. I think that’s his cousin, Magali.’

I went into Magali’s photos. We stared at the pictures, trying to ascertain whether they were taken in Cocciu or not.

Octavia squinted at the screen. ‘That might be Xavi’s mother. Or maybe Xavi’s aunt. Ooh look, I bet that’s Magali’s daughter. She looks just like her. I think that’s his parents’ garden – I’m sure that’s the view down the hill, where we saw those wild boar with their babies when you came to visit me.’ Happy memories were lighting up her face in a way I rarely saw any more.

She then insisted on clicking on every Santoni who lived in Corsica, searching through their friends, looking into the crowds in party shots, peering at children for any resemblance to Xavi. I felt as though I’d taken a bit of fun and turned it into something desperate.

Eventually Octavia sighed. ‘He’s not there. Probably living in a yurt in Ulan Bator. Anyway, let’s stick to the task in hand.’ She pulled out her mobile phone to take my picture. She’d lost some of her playfulness. I knew I’d touched a nerve.

Xavi had been special in a way Jonathan wasn’t.

Xavi had such energy, approached life with such gusto. He was the perfect match for Octavia’s whirlwind of ideas, her zest for the zany. Though now I reflected on it, it was a long time since she’d made us wash our faces in the dew on the first of May for eternal youth, or read the Tarot cards. Little by little, her quirkiness had descended into something more pedestrian. Maybe it was age. Maybe it was having three kids and a demanding job. Maybe it was Jonathan. I hoped I wasn’t going to become one of those bitter women who saw faults in everyone’s marriage because my own had imploded. I pulled a face at the camera.

‘Stop it, or you’ll only get the boss-eyed axe murderers emailing you.’ Octavia was zooming in far too close for my liking.

‘I won’t date anyone, anyway.’

‘Of course you will. When they start telling you how gorgeous you are, how you look like a young Audrey Hepburn and that they’ve got a holiday home in Andalucia, a yacht in Antibes and by the way, you’re going for dinner at The Savoy, you’ll be dying to go out with them. Anyway, you’re not looking for a husband, just someone to go to the cinema with.’

‘I’ve got you for that.’ I nodded as Octavia showed me a photo that didn’t make my complexion look like a piece of ageing Stilton.

‘You’re not going to meet a bloke toddling off to the Odeon with me to watch a rom-com, are you?’

‘You sound more excited about this than me.’

‘If I was in your position, I’d go absolutely wild. Fill my boots. Shag myself silly. You might get married again in a few years’ time and be stuck with the same bloke for half a century.’

I heard something in Octavia’s tone that made me swing round to look at her.

Envy.