Day 7! We've reached the halfway mark! Only a week to go until the big V-Day. If you're on your own, it's not the best time of year. And yet, it's always when one is looking in the other direction, the Prince Charming shaped bus turns up. Just for you...
Something Old Something New © Billy London
“We’re
engaged!” Skye’s voice over Lou’s mobile, sent screams of joy through the air.
Spontaneously, her friends began a conga line at Norbury station: “Skye is
getting married! Skye is getting married! Nananana! Nananana!”
They were
on their way to a singles night in Waterloo, in an underground disused rail
station. Skye had been patient in locking down Charlie. Through his career
change, moving briefly back home to cover his debts and putting up with his
clearly shagging flat mates, Kath and the gorgeously bearded Alex. Despite
being labelled a waity-Katie, Lou was especially happy for her friend.
“Lou!”
Skye yelled. “Still there?”
She took
her off speaker-mode to answer the phone. “I’m here, my darling! I’m so happy
for you, I could burst!”
“Listen
Lou, take me off speaker.”
“You’re
off bloody speaker, woman!”
With a
pause, Skye confessed, “You’re going to be my maid of honour. No one’s stuck by
me like you. Love you Lou-Lou.”
Lou’s
throat thickened. How sweet! “Absolutely! Love you too! Go, go and enjoy
Charlie, before you’re swept up by wedding shit.”
“I’ll
call you tomorrow! Have fun tonight.”
Well
fuck, nothing could top an engagement. With a smile, she followed her friends
to the party. It’d been a while since Lou had found the energy to talk to men.
Not after her own relationship had broken down eight months ago. People kept
telling her to get back on the relationship bike, but God, if men weren’t hard
work. Lou had an idea that her Prince Charming wouldn’t wander up to Waterloo
for a singles party and she was proved right. It was filled with screeching,
inebriated women and aged, balding pot-bellied men.
Finding
her limit with men her father’s age asking her if she wanted a drink, she
escaped to the smoking area for a cheeky puff. Having sworn through January she
was about to give up, it was slowly becoming one more thing she accepted she
was addicted to. She really wanted a burger as well, but her dress was too
tight for food.
In the
cold night air, her mind went automatically to her ex. Where she’d be if they
hadn’t broken up. What they’d be doing tonight. Oh, she’d know exactly where
they’d be. The Bella Donna for dinner and the Tropicana after.
Nothing changes, and yet… Skye was getting married. Everyone was getting
married. She was sure he was out with someone, or at least out with his
friends. People he’d known since he was born and could never imagine not seeing
every single day. Remember how
that frustrated you, she told herself, looking at the thumbnail picture of
him, named under Don’t You Dare Call Him. Her thumb hovered
over the phone symbol. If she called him, she was back to square one.
“Don’t do
it.”
Lou
looked up to see where the hell that voice had come from. Oh. Oh my. Prince
Charming had arrived. Perfect hair, chiselled jaw, tall, oh god, so tall and
she was Amazonian herself. “Don’t do what?” She asked, cigarette dangling from
her perfectly MAC lipsticked mouth.
“Call
whoever you’re going to call. Can I borrow one?” He nodded to the packet of
cigarettes braced under her phone.
She held
it out to him and he graciously took one. Yum? Tick. Yum? Super tick. Yum? God
please don’t let him have a small dick.
He gazed
at her underneath lashes so long, they were practically weaponised. “Who were you going to
call? An ex?”
“How’d
you guess?”
He
gestured to her face. “I recognise that look. Who just got engaged?”
“Oh my
god, have you been following me?”
He
laughed. “Paranoid much? Listen, in the last eighteen months, four of my
friends have got married. Three of them got engaged one after the other. Boom,
boom, boom. Like an infection. And two just had a baby. I just escaped a first
birthday party. Today. After all of that crap, someone had to give me a solid
chat just so I wouldn’t do what you were about to. Call an ex. It won’t make
you feel any better. Trust me.” He lit his cigarette with a heavy looking,
chrome lighter and exhaled. “Am I right?”
“Unfortunately,”
she admitted, tucking her phone back into her bag.
“So who
got engaged?”
“My
oldest London friend.” Lou admitted. “I thought her boyfriend would keep her on
the hook for another two years at least.”
Prince
Charming grinned. “Is that all you need? Two years?”
“Thereabouts.
I can’t marry someone I don’t know. A year’s not long enough to know someone.”
“But do
you ever really know someone?” His Hotness enquired, pointing the glowing end
of the cigarette at her. “Take the ex you were going to call. Why’d you break
up?”
“He
wanted to stay in our home town. Forever. Never leave.” The thought of staying
somewhere so quiet to live like hermits until her head turned white made her
soul scream for escape. “What about you?”
“I think
my ex and your ex should date. They probably are dating right now. Double
dating with our cousins. And sheep.”
“Stop.”
She chided, fighting a smile.
“I love
this city,” he breathed out into the crisp February air. “I couldn’t imagine
ever going back. Not for anyone. Well,” he cast her a sidelong glance. “Maybe
for you.”
Exsqueeze?
“Why would you say that?”
“You have
the swag of London, purple hair, cool clothes, legs to the roof... But and
don’t take this the wrong way... You remind me of everything I love about home.”
Not
today, Satan. Don’t present a man in front of me, who’ll clearly do what I did
to my previous.
“So if we
got together, you know that’ll be the first thing to piss you off about me.”
“Nah,
it’ll be your hair.” He nodded to the shaved side of her head. She cracked up.
“Sounds
about right, yeah. What’s your name?”
“Morten.
Small town escapee.” Taking one last drag of the cigarette and held out his
hand to her. “Come on. Let’s brave this farce for a few minutes and then we can
go and get a burger.”
Lou the
cynic, Lou the practical, Lou who always looked a gift horse in the mouth, at
that moment, fell hellishly in love.
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