Kat’s boys grew up with two dads. It wasn’t always easy between her and James but they made joint custody work and for the most part kept the boys out of the occasional skirmishes. B’s godson, Conrad, loved Rupert to death but Jonathan remained loyal to James. That made James happy, and was a small consolation for losing Kat to The Hairy Biker. He never fell head over heels in love, but he did meet and marry a nice woman a decade after he and Kat split up. For James, friendship was enough.
Faith’s journalism career went from strength to strength at The Guardian and later, at The Independent. She and Fred moved to a bigger flat and set about filling it with children. Her experience in the delivery room with Clare, though, had convinced her that adoption was the way to go. Neither of them were exactly the DIY type.
Mattias’ salsa sweetheart turned out to be the real deal. When they married, B. sang their first song. It was ‘But For You’.
B. and The Grandson continued to spend Saturdays with Marjorie and The Colonel, building their friendship into one that would last into their own old ages. When The Colonel’s heart gave up a few months before B’s CD was released, of course Marjorie was terribly sad but, typically, she chose to think about the time she’d had with him instead of the time she’d lost. The optimism that had carried her through a world war, three husbands and two continents never left her. B. and The Grandson celebrated her hundredth birthday with her. She clapped her hands in excitement at the cake and pronounced the event ‘Marvellous!’
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The Single in the City Series
Single in the City (Book One)
Take one twenty six year old American, add to a two thousand year old city, add a big dose of culture clash and stir
Misfortune Cookie (Book Two)
Would you move 6,000 miles to be with the love of your life?
The Twelve Days to Christmas (Book Three)
What if his proposal had an expiration date?
Read on to begin the Single in the City series
Excerpt from Single in the City copyright © 2010 Michele Gorman
Single in the City
1
Every other storefront is a sandwich shop without a low-carb advertisement in sight. Are Londoners really willing to embrace the doughy delights of an Atkins-free world? It’s a thrilling prospect for a girl raised in a culture plagued by cellulite boogeymen.
The customers are directing the deli man with the unnerving efficiency of Starbucks regulars babbling coffee instructions.
‘Next.’
That stuff in the metal bowl is unrecognizable beneath all the mayonnaise.
‘Next!’
‘Tuna fish sandwich, please.’ Is that corn mixed in there?
‘Bap?’
‘Sorry?’
He’s pointing to a roll.
‘Okay,’ I shrug.
‘Butta?’ he says.
‘What?’
‘Butta!’
But a what? ‘Oh, no thanks, no butter.’ Who puts butter on a sandwich?
‘Salad cream?’
Now what? ‘Uh, no.’
Carefully he arranges a tablespoon of dry tuna on the roll.
‘Um, can I have mayonnaise?’
‘Tsch. I did ask,’ he huffs, reaching for the salad cream bottle. A pea-sized blob lands judgmentally on the flaky filling. ‘Salad?’
I don’t see any salads. ‘No, no salad.’
He closes the sandwich and starts wrapping it.
‘Uh, can I please have some tomatoes?’
The lady next to me is staring at me like tomato is a dirty word.
‘You didn’t want salad,’ he accuses.
‘That’s right, no salad. I want tomatoes.’ There she goes again, like I’ve said hairy penis.
‘Tamaydas?’ he mimics. The lady sniggers.
‘Yes, please.’ I can feel my face going red. Red as tamaydas.
Congratulations, Hannah. You’re an expat.
What am I doing? I’m living in a room too small to open the closet without standing on the bed, in a city I’ve never set foot in before, whose language I obviously don’t speak, 3,000 miles from everyone I know.
ex·pa·tri·ate
1: (noun) A person living in a foreign land.
2: (verb) To withdraw oneself from residence in or allegiance to one's native country.
That makes me a noun with slight verb tendencies.
Thinking about it now (admittedly a little late), I probably got carried away with the idea of starting afresh. Perhaps Stacy was right; a new haircut would have done the trick. But sometimes we’re swept up in a seemingly unstoppable tide of events. Or we do something impetuous and very very stupid. The verdict could go either way in my case, given that I’ve just landed upon England’s gentle shores without the faintest idea how I’m actually supposed to build myself a new life. I’m not an expat in the traditional sense. I haven’t just finished school, with a network of associates to beg for a job. This was no overseas posting, with the usual electronics allowance to buy my flat-screen TV and flat iron whose voltage won’t set my hair on fire. I don’t have British cousins or a long-time family friend in the city. I arrived at Heathrow with a freshly minted passport, 5,000 dollars and a vague idea that an adventure awaited me in London.
You know how, in any group of friends, there’s always one who organizes the nights out, the holidays and surprise parties? That’s not me. I’m the one most likely to arrive at the wrong theater/restaurant/airport and miss the whole thing. So here I am, jetlagged, with no clear plan beyond dinner.
‘Stace? It’s me.’
‘DO YOU LOVE IT?!’ Stacy’s been my best friend since we were seven. Being at least 50 per cent responsible for my being here, there’s hope in her question.
‘I haven’t even unpacked yet.’
‘How’s the hotel?’
It declared itself ‘charming’ on its website. Translation: last habitable during Queen Victoria’s reign. Its rooms are perfumed with Eau de Oodles of Noodles and there are dust bunnies in the corners from the Thatcher era. Evidently this is what a hundred bucks a night buys you in London.
‘I hate the owner.’ Not just because she looks like a slightly less feminine Mrs. Doubtfire and has sofas that need flea-bombing. ‘She asked me if my husband was joining me. When I said I don’t have one, she made that face. You know the one.’ Like I’d just confessed to an STD.
‘Brutal. What'd you say?’
‘Nothing. You know me.’ I’m wittiest in retrospect.
‘You’ll come up with something eventually. Have you seen any royals yet?’
‘Between Terminal Five and the hotel?’
‘Right. I guess it’s still early. You could go see them now.’
‘Stace, you can’t just drop in on them, you know.’
‘Well then, what do you plan to do?’ She sounds disappointed by my unwillingness to stalk the Queen.
‘English stuff, obviously.’
‘So?’
I made a list on the flight. ‘So, have a pint at the pub, go for tea, try fish and chips, ride the double decker buses, uh . . .’ I guess it was more of a doodle.
‘Call me when you get back. I want all the details.’
‘Will do.’
‘And Han, I just know this is going to be great.’
‘Sure.’ Stacy’s confidence is legendary, if sometimes rather premature.
She wasn’t like that when we were little. She was painfully cautious, hanging back till she worked out whether a situation was likely to hurt her or not. Ever the compliant friend, I was her canary in the coalmine. Then fate blindsided her where I couldn’t help. Her dad skipped town, leaving them a note propped on the kitchen table. That was the last anyone saw of her vulnerability. Eventually she believed her own bravado and the confidence became a natural part of her. Being the world’s cheerleader must get exhausting but I’
m constantly grateful to have her on my team. And I think she’s happy, as long as she doesn’t think too much or dig too deep. As her best friend, it’s my job to keep those shovels out of reach. It’s remarkably easy ‒ I’m not exactly the poster child for careful reflection. I did, after all, move 3,000 miles out of spite (well, spite and a realization) . . .
Sometimes small events can have long-lasting consequences. A simple conversation about my sister’s weekend plans a few months ago set the wheels in motion for me. She’d told me she was running errands, maybe renting a DVD. She’d done the same thing every weekend for at least two years. This was a woman who used to get arrested more often than she got her roots done. She seemed constantly to be chained to something in protest. What had happened to my cool, slightly felonious sister, the one who was interesting?
‘I don’t need to be interesting,’ she’d said. ‘I’m past all that.’
Chillingly, those were Mom’s words. How did that happen? We’d made a pact to be vigilant against the creep of Momness, not to let it insinuate its way into our personalities. And yet Deb believed that her life didn’t need to be interesting. And yet, who was I to cast stones? I hadn’t met any new friends, or tried anything new (or anyone for that matter), or even gone to New York in months. They call it a come-to-Jesus moment when people face their own mortality and realize that things haven’t turned out as they’d hoped. I’m lucky I didn’t have the same epiphany from a hospital bed. In that moment it dawned on me: my life wasn’t a dress rehearsal. At twenty-six I was cruising into a lifelong holding pattern. Is that inevitable? Do we march methodically towards middle age, shedding our sense of adventure, our desire to spread our wings as we go?
It was then that I realized something even worse, something I dreaded more than running into my ex and his model girlfriend at the supermarket while wearing pajamas after a three-day ice-cream binge. I was becoming my mother. I once had exciting plans for my life. Suddenly I didn’t even have exciting plans for my weekend. Knowing me, I’d have cultivated this vague sense of doomed future, dying a bitter old woman in Stacy’s basement, if fate hadn’t intervened one morning a few weeks later. But that’s a story for another time.
It’s taken less than a week for me to be sick to death of my own company. I wake up in the mornings and there I am. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, just me. Entire days have passed without saying more than ‘excuse me’ and ‘sorry’ while walking into people. Soon I’ll lose the ability to form whole sentences. I’ve got to do something.
A few streets away from the hotel I spot a perfectly nice-looking pub with an ivy-overgrown sign above the door. Red velvet curtains are drawn across the bottom of the little leaded glass windows, so I can’t see inside. I can hear a noisy crowd though. They’re laughing, sharing stories and jokes while I skulk out here in the drizzling afternoon. They’ve probably been friends for years, safe in that cocoon of companionship that I took for granted. I should be in there, not standing out here letting my hair frizz.
But what am I supposed to do when I get inside (after scanning the room meaningfully as if searching for my friends)? I’d feel as conspicuous as a third nipple. Have you ever gone alone into a bar, or sat by yourself in a restaurant? I don’t mean fiddling with your phone to look busy while waiting for someone. I mean when they clear away the other place setting and leave you to stare at your cutlery. Having a built-in friend like Stacy meant I never had to. I didn’t even go through those first days and weeks of junior high, high school or college worrying that I wouldn’t have any friends. God, I may have just moved to a country where I won’t speak to anyone who doesn’t give me a receipt at the end of the conversation.
Maybe this isn’t a good idea. I can’t see inside without going inside. What if it’s a biker bar? Or a gay bar? Or they’re in the midst of a Nationalist Party rally? It’ll be dinnertime in four hours. I should save this adventure for tomorrow. Besides, it’s raining, and cold. And I have a pimple on my forehead . . .
And my jeans are baggy at the knees, and it’s a Tuesday, and, and, and. Could I be more self-defeating? Think of the great pioneers of our time. Amelia Earhart flew solo all over the world. She disappeared doing it, but that was probably just bad luck. Walking into a bar alone can’t kill me. At worst, it’ll maim my self-confidence.
Okay, pimple or not, I’m going in.
It’s dimly lit by the kind of wall sconces you see on the fronts of garages, except they look original, possibly installed by Edison himself. The ceiling is ornately plastered, deep red walls and dark wooden paneling envelop us. There are video games along one wall and tables scattered with a few patrons. The spindly wooden chairs don’t match. At least there aren’t any obvious rally meetings, or bikers. The room hasn’t ground to a silent, suspicious halt at this stranger’s intrusion. In fact, it feels quite familiar. Happy groups of young professionals? Check. Heady blend of pheromones and beer soaked into the carpet? Check. Requisite loner propping up the bar? I don’t see anyone alone. Okay, maybe that’s me. Free barstool and a cute bartender to ply me with drinks? Check and check!
‘I’d like a beer, please.’ Cute bartender nods expectantly. ‘Er, I’ll have an Old Speckled Hen.’ It sounds more like an entrée than a drink.
‘A pint or a Hoff?’ he asks.
The Hoff makes beer? ‘Uh, the pint, please.’
This isn’t bad at all. Safely seated, with a half dozen magazines to give me purpose, I’m insulated from the glare of unwanted attention (read: pity). In fact, it’s perfect. If they haven’t noticed me, then I’m free to observe them in their natural environment. I’m like Jane Goodall living with chimps.
It may have seemed like home at first, but now I see there are important differences. Living here may be like staring at those Where’s Waldo? books – the more you look, the more you see. The first thing I notice is that everyone is drinking beer from a glass. How civilized. I vow never to drink from the bottle here. Aside from the obvious hazard of chipping a recently whitened tooth (my Christmas gift to myself, and they do look fabulous), it’ll mark me out as a foreigner. I also notice that most of the men are wearing suits, so either they dressed up to come here or they’re drinking on the job. Even in my Michael Kors black wool belted trench coat that I got half-price last year, I’m a little underdressed. Or, to be more accurate, I’m overdressed. Because the third thing I notice is that the women are showing a lot more décolletage than I’m used to. Having come from possibly the most preppy part of the United States, a place where Ralph Lauren and Lilly Pulitzerare spoken of in reverential tones, this display of chesty flesh is unsettling. Tugging my top down in the vain hope that it won’t look so nunnish exposes an inch of skin below my collarbone. Sex-y.
Within an hour, a more urgent mission cuts short my field observations. I have to go to the bathroom. This is unfortunate because the pub’s designers showed no concern for their clientele’s coordination. The ladies room is down a dim, narrow flight of stairs way at the back of the bar.
I’ve never seen such stalls. The toilets are fortressed with six-foot walls, real walls, not flimsy barriers with big gaps where they’re bolted together. Here, there’s absolutely no risk of spotting a stranger’s nether parts between the cracks or standing up only to make eye contact with the girl waiting in front of the sinks. I’m sure it’s a superb experience inside, and I’ll enjoy knowing that it’d take a commando abseiling down the wall to get to me.
‘Sorry!’ shouts an occupant as I push the stall door into her.
‘I’m sorry,’ I shout back. ‘It wasn’t locked.’ Hang on. Why’d she apologize to the woman who just kneecapped her? Come to think of it, that’s the second apology I’ve had from someone I’ve physically harmed. At the airport, I accidentally ran my suitcase into a woman’s heel and she said she was sorry, as if she’d carelessly left her foot on the floor to be run over.
Back upstairs, my cozy little spot has been invaded. I’m not gone five minutes and some man has piled his coat on my ch
air. His coat! On my chair! The nerve. He and his friends must have seen my pint there. It doesn’t matter that it’s empty, it’s obviously still holding my place. And my magazine is clearly – well, I put it in my bag to go downstairs. But even so, he must have seen me there. I will not be intimidated. No, sir. ‘Um, excuse me. I was using that chair.’
‘I’m terribly sorry!’ he says. And I can see that he really is, terribly. He practically throws his coat on the floor to make room for me, shuffling his friends back a few feet in the process. Wow, he’s good-looking.
Now I feel bad about saying anything. It was probably an honest mistake, and it is their country. ‘Um, you’re welcome to use my chair, for your coat, if you want.’
‘Cheers.’ He carefully arranges his coat over the back of the chair. There’s a slightly spicy aroma coming from the wool. He keeps turning around to look at me. Maybe he’s afraid I’ll steal from his pockets. Or perhaps I’m better-looking here than at home. I’m not saying I’m ugly or fat or anything. In fact, thanks to genetics, I’ve got boobs and hips without having to shop in the curvy department. People describe me as ‘at-trac-tive’, with that little dip in the middle of the word that makes it sound like there’s a ‘but’ coming in the next breath. That’s probably because of my hair. It’s fuzzy dark blond if you’re being generous and fuzzy light brown if you’re not.
‘Are you waiting for someone?’ he finally asks. I shake my head. ‘Good. Hello, I’m Mark.’
It’s happening. Someone outside the service industry is talking to me! He’s got amazing dark-blue eyes and black eyelashes. And full, Brad Pitt lips. He looks older, in his thirties, which is perfect because everybody knows that men need a big head start in the race for emotional maturity. ‘I’m Hannah. Why’s that good?’
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