The lady returns with two menus. “Drink please?” she asks with a lovely soft Oriental voice.
“I’m driving later,” I tell Nathan then turn to the lady. “Just a lemonade please.” I look back at Nathan and he appears sympathetic but orders a Singha Premium Thai Lager. The lady smiles and leaves us to it.
“Are we having starters and mains or mains and dessert?” I ask, hoping for the former as the starters look really interesting and an ‘assorted fresh fruit plate, tea or coffee’ isn’t overly appealing as a latter. I love fruit but my mum keeps loads at home, and I like to go for something I’d not normally have when I’m out.
“Starters and mains? I’m not really a sweet person.”
I laugh. “Oh, I don’t know…”
Nathan grins and blushes.
We spend a few minutes looking at the menu and thank the lady as she brings our drinks. My glass is a standard size but Nathan’s lager looks huge. The label professes it to be 630ml, so about twice mine. I drink slowly so we’ll probably be about the same speed.
“I love the names,” I gush, returning my attention to the menu. “Ped Ron, Goongthalay, Pla Murk Yang. Ooh, it’s calamari. I love calamari.”
“I’m more of a Goong Hom Sabai fan myself. Or Pla Goong.”
That’s next on the menu. He said it like a native. “You come here often?” I say then twig the corniness.
The corners of his mouth crease. I thought he looked a bit geeky earlier but only now I realise, because he’s slim. Without an ounce of fat, though not gawky thin or gym-bunny buff like James, Nathan has a very good figure, if you like football rather than rugby build. I go with the latter every time and lovely though Nathan is, he’s so not my type. Not that I’m looking. Yeah, like that stopped you with James, my brain tells me but I ignore it and look back at the menu.
“You could say that,” he says.
The lady returns with a notepad and pen at the ready but when it’s clear that we’ve not chosen, she turns to leave after flashing a brief half smile – a be-pleasant-to-all-customers smile rather than a recognising Nathan, so either she’s new or doesn’t work very often.
As if reading my mind, Nathan says, “She’s always like that; not really dour, just not much either way.”
“Oh. I’m not sure I could be like that but she must see so many customers that we all blur.”
“I like that: blurring customers. It’s quiet so she’ll be back soon. She’ll be spying behind a curtain somewhere.”
I smile. “We should get on and decide then really.”
“We should,” Nathan agrees and when the lady returns he does indeed go for the Goong Hom Sabai (‘prawns with a sash’, he tells me) and Pla Goong (spicy Thai shrimp salad, the menu tells me), clearly a fish fan.
I love chicken so go for the Lab Gai Yang followed by the Ped Yang. I probably shouldn’t mix chicken with duck but it looks like they don’t come with much sauce so I’m keeping the calories down. The project hasn’t officially started yet but it doesn’t hurt and I could always cheat and use it if I need a spare.
It’s not actually going to be as easy as I thought. Maybe snack lunchtimes are the way to go. I don’t suppose readers really want to hear purely what I thought of the food but more my overall experience, especially the people I meet and anything funny. I should have spoken more to Izzy. Of course I read her articles but it’s been a year and I’ve forgotten the finer detail. I know, I have a good memory but even so.
I laugh as I think of Nigel the Day-Glo cyclist.
“Penny for them?” Nathan says, not quite as sultry as James but it reminds me nonetheless.
“I was thinking about something a friend, my best friend, back in Northampton did last year.”
Nathan leans forward. “Ooh yes… tell Uncle Nathan.”
Nathan’s slightly younger than me, and while he could technically be my uncle, in a soap opera kind of way, had we been related, he’d never feel old enough to be so.
In between bites of Lab Gai Yang, which is even more delicious than it looks, and less spicy hot than its redness would imply, I tell him all about Izzy’s project and I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone with eyes wider. He claps and I look around the room. There’s another couple almost as far away as they could be to us and they seem engrossed in their conversation.
Nathan leans in and whispers, “What fun.” I’d not noticed his aftershave before but I recognise it.
“Is that Guilty?”
His eyes dim a little. “Sorry?”
“Your aftershave. Gucci Guilty?” I cover aftershaves in my column occasionally but the last time was a while ago. I then realise how personal I’m being and can feel myself blushing. I go to apologise but he smiles and the brightness returns to his eyes.
He nods and stabs an errant prawn that had fallen out of his Goong Hom Sabai and pops it into his mouth, swallowing it whole. “You’re a dark horse, Miss Donna.”
No one’s called me Miss Donna, other than my doctor and that’s always superseded by my surname, before but I love it, Nathan’s version. Miss Donna to Uncle Nathan. Part of me doesn’t want this evening to end, and having ordered, we’re still waiting for our starters so it’s not going to finish in a hurry. I feel more relaxed because there’s no romantic spark between Nathan and me so there’s no pressure. It makes me realise what Izzy must have gone through during her forty-something dates. I laugh as I think of the speed dating, where I met Duncan, Izzy’s first date initially and he’d been as lovely as she’d said. I sniff as I realise I’m welling up. I’m such a baby. Oh god. Why does everything come back to babies?
“Donna?”
I look up.
“Are you okay?”
I smile, marginally matching his but it’s nowhere near as genuine and I’m sorry for that. “Sorry. Just missing–”
“Ooh… do tell.”
So I do as I’m told. I start with Izzy’s project and how she’d met Duncan the first night and really liked him but he wasn’t for her but she felt strongly enough for him to then compare everyone else.
“Didn’t she mind you having him…? So to speak.”
I cackle. It’s been a while since I’ve done that. Nathan’s such a tonic.
“She’s delighted. She has her own man so…”
“Ooh, one of the forty-something?”
I should shake my head but instead I tap my nose as if it’s a state secret.
Nathan laughs and we tuck into our main course.
Nathan’s Pla Goong does look scrummy for a ‘salad’ while my Ped Yang appears more innocent than it is; I finish my lemonade before I’m halfway through the dish.
Nathan, like the gentleman he is, orders me another drink and the rest of the evening is spent chatting about more general things; current affairs (not that kind!) and the like, without resorting to the weather. We do chat about writing and we both like pretty much everything so that’s an easy topic to talk about.
We’ve eaten all the food when it dawns on me that I’m supposed to be making notes on at least one course. Or rather will be from tomorrow. Tonight would have been great practice. I can remember what it looked and tasted like but not in enough detail. Writing articles doesn’t faze me but… Pull yourself together, Donna.
“Dessert or shall we head off?” Nathan asks.
I’m torn, not about dessert; I have no space, even for fruit which is mostly water anyway, but if we head off it runs the risk of the evening ending. My mum’s at some club or other so no rush to go back to her house.
Nathan clearly senses my hesitation. “Guided tour of our lovely town?”
“That would be fabulous!” I say a little too eagerly.
Nathan catches the eye of the lady who had let us in and taken our order. He rubs his fingers together indicating he wants the bill.
I get my bag and go to fish out my purse but Nathan tuts. I look up and he’s shaking his head. He goes to speak but I butt in. “I can’t let you. It’s far too generous.”
/>
“Don’t worry. Billy’s paying.”
“He is? I er…”
“Oh yes. He’s paying for the whole thing, the whole month. He didn’t tell you?”
I shake my head, although William, my William, said something about covering expenses.
“Yep. Up to a certain budget but I know what that is and Frank’s approved it all so you’ll have no worries, especially on his night, which is… tomorrow, right?”
“Yes. You, Frank, Greta, then Billy Thursdays. Hazel did say Phil was doing Fridays but I’m going home then or Duncan’s coming here. Maybe Izzy but I’m not sure. She’s rather engrossed with moving in with William so it’s all a bit up in the air.”
“No problem. And Duncan sounds lovely.”
I must admit that I had gushed about him, how I really feel, and all’s right with the world again.
Chapter 24 – Chats Like This
Bill paid, receipt taken to include a small tip, and we’re on our way.
We head back through the town centre, wandering and chatting, little faster than the proverbial snail but I’m in no hurry. I’ve still not remembered what club it is my mum belongs to on a Monday. It’s only courtesy of Frank that I know she’s at chess on a Tuesday.
As if reading my mind, Nathan asks about my mum.
“She’s lovely,” I gush. “I’m very proud of her. As soon as she retired, she filled her life with so many things. She loves evening classes so she’s always out and about, although she does get time off for good behaviour: bank and school holidays and the weeks in between each ten-week block. You know.”
He nods. “What kind of thing does she do?”
“Pretty much everything. Sewing, pottery, darts, d–”
Nathan laughs. “Darts as in the sport? Arrows?”
“Yep. For a while anyway. And dancing, ceroc, ballroom, anything that moves.”
“And pottery. That’s useful.”
“She’d done some really nice pieces. Her house is full of things she’s made, in the lounge mostly, but she spends most of her time in her kitchen diner as it’s warmer and she has the table to prop her books on. She’s a bookworm, reading much more than me. We used to swap before I met Duncan and got a life but knowing all the stuff she gets up to, she’s probably never around to read.”
“I love books.”
“Me too, although… Book. Book club. That’s where Mum’s at tonight. They’re doing Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader. Her suggestion so she wouldn’t miss it. It’s one I’d lent her, Izzy having lent it to me yonks ago.” Greta and I had mentioned it so I’m not sure why the penny didn’t drop.
“I love Alan Bennett. I’ve read…” Nathan’s eyes head to the top-left of his brain to retrieve the information. “Pretty much everything he’s done. All the books certainly, less so the plays, although I love dialogue more than description so I’ve read a couple. The History Boys… I didn’t know that was his until I spotted it in Waterstones.”
“Me neither… until the film.”
“Ah, yes.”
“And the other one?”
“Sorry?”
“You said two plays.”
Nathan laughs. “The Lady in the Van. Book, film and play. Read, seen, read.”
“Me too, although not the play. Just the book and film. Once and several times. I have it on DVD.”
“And of course his Talking Heads are genius. So so funny.”
“They are. And really clever. And how they remember all the words. I have a really good memory but don’t think even I could remember however long it is that they have to monologue for. Of course in the TV version they can cut whenever they want to.”
“I don’t think they do though.”
“No. And not on stage, of course.”
“He can come across as dry, Alan, but The Uncommon Reader is so funny, and while he’s probably met the queen on a few occasions, it’s an insight that likely no one but Prince Philip really knows. Not that The Uncommon Reader is real of course.”
I laugh. I really like Nathan and it’s sad that I’ll only get to chat like this four times while I’m here. Maybe he could sneak a lunch or two. There are likely to be times when James or Leah aren’t available. Hazel won’t know… or mind, I’m sure. I still can’t get over how kind she is, and everyone else is being. I don’t know that my colleagues back home would do the same; sacrificing not only their lunch breaks but their evenings too for a ‘newbie’, as James called me… and I called Greta. Newbie. I don’t use it often enough.
Nathan and I find ourselves outside Asda. I’m about to ask why when Nathan explains.
“I forgot to get some milk and the one I have at home is probably full of blobs.”
He cracks me up. Duncan’s the same, although he’d still use the blobby milk. Men.
“No problem,” I say and we head inside.
“Do you want to come with or wander?” Nathan asks.
I don’t want to be a pest so say, “Wander’s fine.”
“Cool,” he chirrups. “See you at the tills in ten or thereabouts?”
“Cool,” I repeat, actually feeling quite cold as we’re by the refrigerators with bagged veg, and the store has air conditioning so it feels almost arctic.
As he wanders along the dairy aisle, it’s a great opportunity for me to see what low-calorie dishes there are available. I head back to the fresh vegetables and fruit.
Most of the salad boxes are less than 500 and the ‘Meatball Marinara’ makes me laugh. It’s like Subway all over again without the bread ‘sub’. At 405 calories, it’s near the top end… well, four-fifths, but that’s fine. If I have a Diet Coke or something with it, that’s okay, but Diet Coke’s minimal so I can have that anytime. So it leaves me with 95 calories, 94 if I’m sticking to the letter of the ‘less than 500’ for a packet of crisps.
This is probably taking it all a bit far but it’s supposed to be a meal, and a salad on its own is a tad dull. Not that a salad and crisps equates to a meal. Ooh, Spicy Butternut Falafel, Rainbow Grains and Houmous. That’s certainly not dull. It’s a meagre 268 calories so I could have a fat Coke. There are 139 calories in a standard 330ml or 210 in a 500ml bottle – I did all this for a project a few months ago and I don’t suppose they’ve changed since then – so I’d be pushing it to have the latter and a bar of chocolate or crisps. Being a health and beauty columnist, I shouldn’t really have crisps, chocolates, or any kind of fizzy drinks but I do a fair amount of exercises… and sexercise. I can’t help but grin, and a man standing a few feet away, on the opposite side of the aisle, having too good a feel of a melon, stares at my chest.
“Hello…” I say and he flushes red, puts down the melon and shuffles along to the sliced meats and fillers. I shake my head but can’t help laughing. “Venus and Mars, Venus and Mars,” I say not too loudly. The thought of a Mars bar makes me hungry. The meal was lovely but seems ages ago. 229 calories in a standard Mars so I could have the Butternut salad and a Mars but a bit of a waste.
I have all these figures going around my head when I hear a voice.
“Ready?”
I look up from the salad box I’m holding – this time a chicken and bacon pasta salad, coming in at a whopping 505 calories so that goes straight back, and I nod to my companion. He’s already holding a carrier bag, clearly containing more than milk.
“No queue?” I ask and he smiles. “What else did you get?” I realise that’s not only nosey but rude. I feel we’ve hit it off but I’ve known him less than twelve hours so not enough to be that personal.
He opens his bag and moves it towards me.
At the invitation, I peer inside. “Ooh.”
“I know,” he says.
Accompanying two plastic containers of green topped, semi-skimmed, milk is a huge bar of Galaxy chocolate, my favourite. It could only be bettered if it were fruit and nut but I don’t know whether Galaxy does that. I should. I’m such a slacker.
I can’t see the weight of it but
it’s probably about three times the normal 100g. “Do you mind?”
Nathan, who shakes his head, and I retrieve the chocolate. There’s a receipt in the bag and we’re miles away from the confectionary aisle so I know we won’t be accused of shoplifting. That wouldn’t go down with either William.
I turn the bar over and my heart sinks, albeit not too far as I’m familiar with the breed, as I read the nutrition content: 2275kJ per 100g, 545 kcal per 100g. So less than a third of the bar and I’m over my meal’s allowance. Not that I’d be doing my readers a service by suggesting that anyway.
I buy a couple of the salads, a six-pack of Walkers Light Ready Salted crisps (although my favourites are a non-light cheese and onion, these will go with anything) and an eight-pack of Nestle Pure Life still spring water. The tops are in four different colours so they look like flavoured water but this pack features ‘their favourite DC Super friends characters’, whatever they are. I don’t have time, or inclination if I’m really honest, to look as I’ve kept Nathan waiting long enough. So plain ordinary water. At less than 20p for a 250ml bottle, that can’t be bad.
The walk back to the office car park is filled with chat, more about my mum and Duncan. I can talk for the whole of the UK, not just England, and again we’ve covered my nearest and dearest but I know nothing about Nathan. We’ve only talked generally about him, work mostly, and putting the world to rights.
It’s too late to ask him anything new as we get to the car park barrier so we wind down our conversation, currently about Donald Trump’s latest spats with Russia and North Korea. We took all evening to get there so that’s not bad. Neither of us is really interested in politics; it ends up being a fairly short topic.
“Where are you?” I ask, meaning Nathan’s car.
He looks around him, pats his body and laughs. “Sorry,” he says and points ahead. It’s the same direction as my car. I’d gone green – literally – at a green BMW Z4 convertible next door but one to mine when I parked up this morning. I only know it’s a Z4 because every time we drive past the Wollaston BMW showroom near the junction of Cliftonville and the Bedford Road back home, Duncan drools. I’m not sure what he’d make of this one as he’s a blue boy whereas this is a slimy green. I was letching at the car rather than colour… which is very unlike me, or most girls probably. The first question we tend to ask about cars is ‘what colour is it?’, unless you’re Izzy; she’d want the spec first.
The Serial Dieter Page 9