by Neal Bircher
Tonight was one of those occasions. It was Saturday night and she and Barry were in their local, the Lemon Tree, with her sister, Ruth, and Ruth’s boyfriend, Karl. Ruth, two years younger than Gail, was also a mother to two teenagers, but had divorced her husband some years before, and had since got through quite a few new partners of varying suitability. Gail wavered between being sympathetic and being envious of her.
Gail went to the toilet. Her loo trips were sometimes genuine, of course, but always an opportunity to text. Not this time though as she’d left her phone on the table. She was quite drunk; she called herself a “stupid bitch” and returned quickly to her party.
“You left your phone behind,” said Barry, sliding it across the table to her.
Gail grabbed it, and only caught his eye for the briefest instant as she slipped the phone into her handbag without looking at it. There had of course been a time when Gail used to enjoy going out with Barry, but it was hard for her to imagine that now. At one time he had been the centre of her life, but now he was just a hindrance. Karl was talking about QPR’s prospects for the rest of the season, and Gail quickly joined in. It was another ten minutes before the next round was due, but fortunately it was Barry’s turn. Once he was engaged in conversation with the barmaid (Barry was always getting engaged in conversations with barmaids) Gail took a quick look at her phone. There was a message from SP.
Are you OK?
She wasn’t sure how long the message had been there, but she did know that it meant that Nick was wondering why she was being “quiet”. She couldn’t reply; she had to wait another half hour before slipping off to the loo again. Then she replied.
GNX
Gail and Nick exchanged “GNX” texts – or often “GNX, SP” and “GNX, hun!” – at the end of every night, but Nick would know that she wasn’t going to bed, at least not going to sleep, as it was Saturday night, and it was only ten-thirty. He replied almost straight away.
GNXXXX
Gail deleted his and her messages, and returned again to her table, much more at ease than she had been before. Some other locals had joined the party. Gail got a round in; she had a quadruple vodka and Coke, with no ice or lemon.
The bar shut at midnight, but it was an hour later by the time she and Barry left to take the three minute walk to their house. Each stumbled up the stairs, changed into their night clothes, and climbed into bed. They settled, back to back with one another.
“Night,” said Gail.
“Goodnight,” returned Barry.
And then he added, “…So, who is ‘SP’?”
Somewhere Suitable
Gail and Nick had no particular destination in mind in the Lake District, but they followed Nick’s suggestion of turning off the motorway at rural-looking junction, and then driving until they came across a suitable place to stop. And such a place, they were in agreement, would be a B&B or a small hotel in a quaint little village, overlooking some water. The first part – turning off the motorway – was accomplished easily enough, but busy A-roads and traffic-clogged towns that weren’t quite on a lakeside were more in prominence than Gail and Nick’s imagined pretty little villages. So, by about one o’clock, his stomach having been reminding him for a number of hours that he hadn’t yet had breakfast, Nick swung the Celica into the near-empty car park of an inviting-looking pub that advertised “Good pub grub” on a chalk board outside.
Inside, the pub was as homely as it had appeared from the road: a low-beamed ceiling, lots of polished wood and brass all over, and a real fire spitting out cinders that set their faces aglow. It was like being on the cover of a Val Doonican Christmas favourites collection; Nick felt that he should have been wearing slippers. The landlord too was a comforting stereotype (and he quite clearly was the landlord, not merely a barman). Standing behind his bar, cleaning out a beer pipe, he was a big man in all dimensions. Big bushy grey sideburns adorned a big ruddy face, sitting atop a big grey, clean but holed, woolly jumper, covering a very big stomach. Nick observed the man’s big chunky sausage-like fingers already clutching a big old-fashioned beer mug in anticipation, and he readied himself to hear a big booming welcome in a broad northern accent.
“Afternoon, folks! What can I get you?” The voice was big and booming, but was West Country – more Cornwall than Cumbria.
Nick studied the selection of taps, which included five real ales, a cider, and a token lager, of Heineken. Nick didn’t tend to drink at lunchtime; he would normally have Coke. Unless that is that it was Christmas – and it certainly did feel a bit like Christmas at that moment – in which case it tended to be cider, not his usual evening drink, of lager … such as Heineken.
“Well?” asked the farmer-like voice, but in a jolly – not nagging – kind of way.
Nick looked up from the taps to the man’s smiling face, “A pint of Best, please.”
It wasn’t just that he felt that the man’s demeanor would rapidly change if he’d asked for the lager, it was also a semi-conscious further recognition that the old rules no longer applied. It would also feel right drinking proper beer in such a pub, more right than anything else that was on offer.
“Good choice, sir! And for the young lady?” He was looking in Gail’s direction, but Gail was busy making herself comfortable at a big round table for four, and didn’t hear him.
Nick opened his mouth, and was about to make an assumption – Gail always drank vodka and Coke in pubs – but then stopped himself. He turned.
“Gail!” She looked up. “What would you like to drink?”
Gail frowned briefly before going through a similar thought process to Nick. She placed her forefinger to her lips and looked upwards for a moment.
“A Baileys, please, with ice,” and she gave Nick a knowing smile.
“Coming up!” The landlord had already finished pouring Nick’s pint, and now turned around to collect his bottle of Baileys. He took down a glass from a shelf above head height, held it up to the light to inspect it for cleanliness, and then scooped in a generous helping of ice cubes. Any thought that Nick might have had (he didn’t) that the quantity of ice was planned to disguise a short measure of the drink would have been quickly dispelled by the landlord then sloshing in an unmeasured, but decidedly large, helping. He placed it on the bar in front of Nick, wheezing a little with the effort. Nick was just taking a swig of his beer.
“Good?” the landlord enquired.
Nick nodded appreciatively.
“Good,” replied the landlord, and, perhaps sensing that Nick didn’t want to enter into a relative-merits-of-different-types-of-real-ale conversation, left it at that.
“That’s four-pounds eighty five, please. Or are you eating?”
“Yes, please.”
“I’ll put it all on the same bill then if you like.”
That was fine by Nick, who turned away with the two drinks.
“Menus on the table,” informed the landlord (Gail was already looking at one), “and specials on the board”, towards which he gestured.
“Soup of the day’s oxtail, and we’ve got a very nice home-made apple pie on.”
Gail looked up and smiled. “Thank you.”
They both ordered roast beef and followed it up with the recommended apple pie, and then coffee. It was a leisurely lunch break, lasting near to an hour and a half, and in that time not many other customers entered the pub. At first they had the place all to themselves, then, at the same time that the two roast beefs were being served up, arrived the ubiquitous man and his dog. Both were large, old, scraggy, grey, and hairy. One was an Irish Wolf Hound, the other wore a Mac, said “Afternoon, Tom”, and nodded to Gail and Nick on the way in, before taking up residence on a stool at the bar, where, without having to ask, he was served up a beer in a pewter tankard that had been hanging with half a dozen others above the bar. He embarked upon sporadic conversation with the landlord – Tom – and over the course of the next hour or so had his mug filled with fresh beer two more times. He di
dn’t attempt to engage Gail and Nick in conversation, nor they him.
When the time came to go Nick paid in cash, including a generous tip that Tom was pleasantly surprised to receive. Gail shivered at the relative cold of the outside, and she and Nick both half ran across the car park. Inside the Celica, with the doors slammed, Nick turned and kissed Gail. Her lips were cold, but the kiss was long and lingering enough to warm them up again.
“That pub reminded me of the one we went to on our first date,” said Gail questioningly.
Nick thought for a second and then nodded. They kissed again, and then Nick pulled on his seat belt, fired up the engine, and drove back onto the road, whistlingThe Great Escape once more.
After only a couple of minutes they were passing through an apparently unnamed hamlet when a hanging “B&B” sign on the right-hand-side of the road caught Nick’s eye. The quaintly, although unoriginally, named “Rose Cottage” was a slab-sided three-story end terrace painted all over in pale blue. It didn’t perfectly fit with the image that they had in mind, mainly because it overlooked the road rather than a lake, but it appeared pleasant enough, and they decided to give it a go. Nick pulled in the Celica at the side of the road, and they both got out. Having waited for a large lorry to thunder past, followed by a couple of repmobile cars, they crossed hand-in-hand. Nick rapped hard on Rose Cottage’s big round brass door knocker. After a minute or so the door was answered by a hippyish woman – called Helen, it transpired – who was much slimmer and, at late thirties, quite a bit younger than your B&B-owning stereotype. Unlike Tom the pub landlord though, she did have an authentic northern accent. And in that accent, delivered through a smiley face, she explained that she did indeed have a double room for the night, but that she hadn’t yet cleaned it. She led them up three flights of polished, creaky, dark wood stairs. Gail followed her, and Nick brought up the rear. The room was on the top floor, and it had just one dormer window that protruded from its slate roof and faced out across the road. The room was on the small side and was characterised by lots of dark polished wood of the same hue as the stairs. It contained a mirrored dressing table, a chest of drawers, a couple of chairs, a door leading to – presumably – the bathroom, and, most importantly, a big (soft looking) bed. The room didn’t look dirty or untidy, but Helen had by now mentioned that it hadn’t yet been cleaned no less than four times, and Nick could tell that she wouldn’t be leaving them alone there until it had been. He looked enquiringly at Gail, and she nodded back.
They agreed to take the room and then left to give Helen her opportunity to clean it, leaving her in charge of their possessions. The nearest town was Kendal, and Nick drove to it and parked the Celica in a near-empty pay-and-display car park close to the town centre. A cold wind had blown up, and Gail put her arm around Nick for warmth as well as comfort as they walked in the direction of Kendal’s main shops. Nick stopped and they kissed for a full minute, oblivious to the many Cumbrian shoppers passing by, heads down battling against the weather. There was no specific purpose to their shopping trip, but two hours later they walked hand-in-hand back to their car, having invested in ten new CDs for the Celica’s pre-iPod connectivity stereo, nearly £400 worth of clothing each, a pay-as-you-go mobile phone, coffee in a café, and a bottle of beer each in very old pub. Nick pointed out that it was nearly time to knock off work, and Gail laughed. Then they ran the last two-hundred yards back to the car, hand-in-hand once more.
Besotted
Gail was sitting at a table for four, with three of her female colleagues. As was always the case with this crowd a few drinks into an evening, the conversation was raucous, at times shrill, and heavily punctuated with laughter – mostly dirty. But it was all passing over Gail’s head. She twirled her drink around in her hand, gripping it unnecessarily tightly. She was aware of tears welling in her eyes, and knew she would need to disappear to the toilets soon to dry them and patch up her make-up.
The night out was a let’s-just-go-and-get-ratted-as-it’s-close-to-Christmas evening arranged by some members of the year’s graduate intake. As the grads were spread around all departments at CountrySafe, and each invited their own day-to-day colleagues, it was an occasion that afforded Gail and Nick an excuse – as if they needed it – to socialise at the same place and same time. And there in lay Gail’s problem: Nick was there, and so were lots of other people that he knew … some of whom were female!
She tried not to, but she couldn’t help but glance across to Nick’s group, as she had been doing every thirty seconds or so. There were eight or nine of them, all standing. There was a lot of loud talking coming from the group … and a lot of laughter. Nick was in the middle of the group, and he had been talking to that pretty little Indian girl; Gail didn’t know her name but she wanted to strangle her. But now it was even worse: he was talking to that bitch Annette! She hated Annette even more than she hated Alyson – whom she had never met. If looks could kill, Gail would have found that a useful weapon. There was strong eye contact between Nick and Annette, and too much laughing … she was hanging on his every word. Too much laughing, too much eye contact, too much hanging on … and much too much flirting. Gail got up quickly and went to the toilets. She locked herself in a cubicle and used a tissue to wipe away the tears that were running down her cheeks. She was angry, mostly with herself. Nick could just be being friendly with Annette. Or he could be just making a point, as it irritated him when Gail got jealous. Or of course … well that didn’t bear thinking about, and she knew that it wasn’t the case, but, well, she didn’t actually know; she was just 99% sure, and as long as that other 1% remained she would keep getting cut up about it. Somebody else came in and went to the wash basins. Gail kept quiet and made sure that she didn’t sob. “Stupid cow,” she said to herself, taking care not to say it out loud. She so didn’t want to annoy Nick, but she knew that it was too late, as he would already have noticed. She wiped away another tear; her make-up would be all over the place. She told herself, as she always did, that she was being irrational, especially as it wasn’t just Annette, it was, well, it was any woman that Nick spoke to.
Gail composed herself and determined that this time would be different. What would Nick do in such circumstances? He would have a plan. Gail devised a plan. It had two parts: the rest of the evening in the pub, and the journey home. If she could stick to it – and she was determined that she would – then she would be very pleased with herself by the end of the night, and, more importantly, Nick would be even more pleased withher. Time to get back. The other woman had left the toilets. Gail wiped her eyes once more, and left her cubicle to re-apply her make-up at a wash basin. She was there for only a couple of minutes and was pleased with her handiwork. She was also pleased that nobody else had come in while she was doing it. She returned to the bar in determined mood.
Part one of Gail’s plan consisted of not drinking too much, relaxing and enjoying herself, and letting Nick get on with his socialising without butting in on him. She returned to her table where her three colleagues were still in deep raucous laughing conversation, and a fresh double-vodka and Coke awaited her. She picked up the drink before sitting down, and took a large swig. Then she allowed herself a quick glance in Nick’s direction. He was still in conversation with Annette, and only Annette. They laughed together at something that he said, he touched her on the shoulder, and then she took over leading the conversation. Gail tensed from hair to toe, and she felt the tears attempting to return as her lips went thin and bloodless. She gripped her vodka glass tightly, and took another large swig. She was determined; she knew just what she had to do: look away, relax, sit down, and above all, don’t even think of barging in on Nick and Annette’s conversation.
“Hello!” Gail slurred. She arrived awkwardly between Nick and Annette, giving them both something of a shoulder barge as she did so. Then followed a brief silence as each of the three looked at one other. Nick didn’t ever tend to look displeased to see Gail, but this time he certainly wasn’t please
d either. Gail was making a bigger fool of herself than ever; she wanted the floor to swallow her up; she needed to recover ground fast. She didn’t.
“How are you?” she asked Nick, unconfidently. A justifiable response would have been, “Exactly the same as when you last barged in and asked that question about half an hour ago”.
But Nick just said “Fine. You?”
Nick wondered how much Annette and everybody else noticed the familiarity between himself and Gail. Did they notice how he never called her by her name – a preserve of people who are very close? Could they detect her annoying envy? He didn’t really care that much if they did, and anyway the matter in hand was to deal with a drunken woman in distress.
Gail’s tears were back and about to spill out. Had they done so then she might have run out and thrown herself under a bus. But then Annette made her excuses and left them: a small lift on the misery scale.
Gail was now talking to Nick alone, and she had ached so much to do that that the facts that she had pissed him off and made a complete fool of herself in order to get to that situation seemed less important than they might have done. Nick made polite conversation as she knew that he would. He wouldn’t tell her off now when she was emotional and under the influence of vodka and Coke; he would wait and gently rebuke her a few days later. All the same, she knew that she was skating on thin ice; one day Nick was going to get fed up. She had failed with part one of the evening’s plan; she would have to make sure that part two would more than make up for it. And she even allowed herself a little smile as she thought of how she was going to do just that.