Читать книгу Pear Shaped - Stella Newman - Страница 11

James and I are three lightning hours in to our second date, stretching out our meal, the last ones in the restaurant. We are in Curry Paradise, my local, my treat. The manager is hovering, the waiter is hoovering. I wish we’d met earlier; I don’t want to go home. I want to keep talking, and keep looking at the way this man smiles at me when I do, with pure delight in his eyes.

‘So, how on earth is a girl like you single, Sophie Klein?’

I’ve made bad choices. I’ve been unlucky. Because it’s really hard out there.

‘I don’t know.’ I say. ‘Why are you single, James Stephens?’

Tall. Charismatic. Good at your job. Such a thick head of hair. Manly: strong features – strong nose, strong jaw. That look in his eye that says ‘take it or leave it, but you’d be better off taking it’. Why has no one snapped this man up in the last twenty years?

He shrugs quickly. ‘Just haven’t met the right person yet.’

‘You’re not secretly married, are you?’

He chuckles and his hand comes up and rubs his cheek. ‘No.’

In poker that would be a tell. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Quite sure,’ he laughs, but his fingers pause briefly near his mouth.

‘Ever been engaged?’

He picks up his beer and takes a long sip, then nods slowly.

‘Who to?’

‘A girl called Lacey Macbride.’

Ironic. ‘How long ago was that?’

‘I was nineteen. She grew up round the corner from me in Wanstead. My first true love. Broke my heart, the Jezebel,’ he laughs.

‘What happened?’

He shrugs and picks up his glass again. I imagine classic childhood sweetheart territory.

‘Any other ex-fiancées knocking about?’

A tiny flicker of discomfort passes through his expression. He nods very slowly. ‘Celine.’

‘Engaged to her as well? How many ex-fiancées do you have?’

‘Just the pair, don’t need a hat-trick,’ he says.

Better than two ex-wives, I suppose.

‘Long relationship?’

‘Three years. Can you pass the spinach?’ He smiles softly, trying to change the subject.

‘How long ago did you split up?’

‘Four years.’

Okay. Definitely beyond statute of limitations for a rebound.

‘Are you on good terms?’ Are you still in love with her?

He pours us both more beer, filling his glass almost to the rim. ‘She went back to Paris, married an Argie. She’s a Wolford model….’ He turns to the waiter, ‘Could we get two more beers, please?’

‘Wolford tights?’

‘And stockings …’

The news that his long-term ex is a French hosiery model has put me right off my chicken balti. I put my fork down.

‘Why do girls always have a problem with that?’ he says, his face crinkling in confusion. I don’t like that word ‘always’.

‘I don’t. It’s just … a man who dates models is … a certain type.’ The type who likes women with abnormally tall, slim bodies. Not my type. Mind you, he’s the type taking me out to dinner.

‘Celine was lovely but totally insecure. Anyway, I’m over beautiful women, they’re all mad.’ He grins, but I do not like those sentences at all. ‘I’m looking for a soul mate. A woman I can talk to.’ That’s a bit better. ‘A wife,’ he says, fixing me with an intense look. His pale blue shirt is making his eyes a deeper blue than usual tonight. I catch myself staring.

‘Tell me something else,’ I say, picking up my fork.

‘What do you want to know?’

Why you’d mention that your ex is a leg model? Was that information strictly necessary?

And how a sock-seller procures that type of trophy girlfriend anyway?

Maybe her legs were perfect but she had a face like a monkfish. I make a note to google her.