If I Never Met You(106)
‘Why?’ Laurie said under her breath.
‘Because Nadia is the epitome of herself,’ Emily raised her voice. ‘Laurie wants to know why you got banned from the book group?’
Nadia was in her usual cloche hat, today a pleasing salmon shade.
‘Firstly, I rejected the central tenets of Eat, Pray, Love,’ Nadia said, as Emily pushed a glass of wine towards her, and she wriggled her duffle coat off. ‘Then we were required to produce “Gratitude Lists” to discuss what we were thankful for.’
‘Oh really?’ Emily said, swinging a and how did that go look at Laurie, who tried not to laugh.
‘I said I was not grateful for my life, I had worked for it, and my sister’s friend Amy said I was “too centred” in my own privilege’ and I told her to fuck off and then my sister said I had to go.’
‘We won’t ask you to be grateful for anything this evening, Nads,’ Emily said, handing the menu over. ‘Not even lobster tacos. Can I tell her your latest news?’ she looked to Laurie.
‘Knock yourself out,’ Laurie said.
‘She’s no longer with the hot lad she was pretending to date. It turns out that messing women around and then saying he hadn’t was kind of his thing, he got sacked for it.’ Emily gave Laurie a ‘fair?’ questioning look and Laurie nodded.
‘Ugh,’ Nadia said. ‘I’m sorry. I mean I am sorry for any pain. While not being sorry you gave him his marching orders, if he is a shit.’
‘Thank you,’ Laurie said. ‘I’m not in pain. Well, I’m in some pain over it, but I know that it will pass and I’ll feel happier again, at some point. That will do for now.’
‘Like that poem “to the girl crying in the next toilet stall.” Listen I love you, joy is coming,’ Emily said.
‘Yes. Joy is coming. If maybe not here,’ Laurie said, glancing around. It was the kind of poseur’s bear pit that would’ve scared Laurie, pre-Dan’s bombshell, but not now. Her fling with Jamie had given her that confidence back, at least. Sigh. Who would ever measure up to … STOPPIT.
‘Can I propose a toast,’ Laurie said. ‘To what happiness looks like, to us.’
‘Yes,’ Emily said, picking her glass up so fast she spilled some. ‘To deciding what our happiness is, and being happy that way. Rather than having some bunch of bastards tell us what it is.’
They clinked glasses and drank.
‘Are you girls ready to order?’ said a waiter with a goatee, appearing at their side with a touch screen pad. ‘Need me to explain anything?’
‘We’re not girls,’ Nadia said. ‘So you can explain your mode of address.’
‘Hey y’all look pretty young to me,’ he said, chewing gum and grinning in what he thought was a flirtily winning manner.
Emily said: ‘Oh, you dear sweet fool, she will now verbally decapitate you.’
Laurie felt it was a poorly advertised part of kitten owning, that they were absolute sodding hooligans. If her new twelve-week-old black longhair mix breed with white whiskers, Colin Fur, was in the magistrates court, Laurie would be advising the short sharp shock of a custodial sentence for sure.
‘Only language he understands, sadly,’ she’d tell the bench, while removing another shredded pair of Wolford tights from the little beggar’s jaws.
She’d impulsively picked him up from the PDSA at lunchtime, on her way home from work, Christmas Eve of all days, thinking how nice it would be to have a tiny friend around on her solo Christmas Day. She was now realising it would mean spending the whole time extracting said tiny friend from re-enacting Touching The Void on the curtain rails.
Laurie wasn’t daunted by Christmas Day alone, not one bit. She was going to dress up, only for herself, make a giant lunch, only for herself, and share some smoked salmon with Colin Fur. Finding out she could manage on her own was great.
She didn’t mind the time off work, either. It had been wild lately. After Jamie’s sacking on Friday, Monday had felt like a peculiar limbo period where she had no idea what her status was. In the end, she took the initiative and asked to see Mr Salter, late on Monday afternoon. He said yes, he and Mr Rowson would see her, suggesting an unprecedented both-partner bollocking designed to strike fear into her heart.
Laurie went in with armour, however. She knew how strong she was. She’d lost Dan, and coped, she’d lost Jamie, and coped. She’d drawn a final line with her dad, and coped. And if she lost her job, she’d cope.
So much of her life had been about being scared of not being wanted by people. If the news was that this law firm no longer wanted her, well fine. Plenty of others would.
She’d spoken honestly about the manner of Dan’s leaving, the devastation she’d been in, and how seriously she took her responsibilities.
‘In conclusion, I badly regret the “relationship”’ – she made air quote marks. She still couldn’t believe the way it had been fake, real, then fake again, – ‘with Jamie Carter, but I was not my usual or best self when I made that decision. Given he didn’t get the partnership and has left, it seems sensible to put it behind us. I feel as if I’m on the back foot now. I like working here and will look elsewhere for employment if you think it’s necessary, but I’d rather stay.’