Alphabet Weekends - Elizabeth Noble [86]
‘And second?’
‘I remembered that despite your escalation of what I admit was a bit of a dastardly M into a downright unpleasant N, this is not an episode of that Japanese game show Endurance, but a rather sweet game being played between great friends. I thought it was up to me to bring honour and morality back to it.’
‘And you couldn’t face it.’
‘And I couldn’t face it.’
‘Thank Christ. I’d better ring Rose. I told her to text me with some plumbing crisis at ten o’clock.’
‘You bugger.’
‘Me genius. You’d have escaped too – we came in one car, remember?’
‘What a pair of Philistines we are.’
‘Hurrah for us. What shall we do instead?’
‘Well, let’s see how much we can get for the tickets and then decide. Maybe McDonald’s, maybe Le Gavroche…’
Tom was rubbish at touting. He looked shiftier than a pimp on a street corner, standing on the steps, whispering to passersby, most of whom looked considerably less likely even than he was to want to sit through the Ring Cycle. Natalie’s attack of giggles didn’t help. In about five minutes, when the doorman of the theatre had started giving him regular hard stares, Tom lost his nerve and bundled Natalie round the corner.
‘McDonald’s it is, then.’ She was still laughing.
‘Hardly Bonnie and Clyde, are we?’
‘Makes for a longer life…’
‘Rose and Pete are at the pub.’
‘Let’s go.’
‘What shall we tell them? This looks a bit pathetic – showing up ten minutes after the thing has started.’
‘Tell them we got thrown out for singing along.’ Natalie put her arm through Tom’s and they marched off, still laughing.
P for Paris
‘Don’t go mad – it’s just for the day, Tom. Thought we’d avoid any hotel-room horrors.’
‘But April in Paris, Nat, your best letter yet, without a doubt.’
‘Worth getting up this early for?’
‘Absolutely.’
It was horribly early, and still quite chilly at Waterloo. Natalie was dressed for Paris In Spring Sunshine (inspired by a section in last month’s In Style magazine entitled exactly that, and which Google Weathersearch had promised); she shivered as they waited for the ubiquitous security queue to subside. The night before they’d stayed with Casper: Susannah was away overnight at an audition. Casper had been smoking dope with friends before they arrived, and fell asleep on the sofa in front of Coronation Street. He hadn’t been awake when they left this morning, surprise, surprise.
Natalie had persuaded her dad to buy her a day return on Eurostar as a birthday present. Actually, he hadn’t taken much persuading. He’d gone a bit misty. Apparently he’d taken her mum to Paris for their tenth wedding anniversary. Natalie didn’t remember that. She and her sisters had been left at home with their grandmother and chickenpox. ‘Your mum didn’t want to leave you.’ He smiled. ‘You were the worst – Susannah only had a few spots, and Bridget, well, she was always a Stoic, but you were absolutely wretched. You had spots where we didn’t know you had places. And you made a hell of a fuss. I had to practically drag her to the airport, and she cried half-way there. It was probably the first time she’d left all three of you for more than day or so, bless her. But, oh, we had such a good time, her and me.’
He’d been doing a bit more of that lately, Natalie had thought, as she’d left with his cheque. Talking about the past. It made her inexplicably sad. Maybe her parents would never go back to Paris. Getting old was horrible. Having to think about all the things you wouldn’t do again, or were doing for the last time. She remembered her granddad, who’d had the scruffiest old suit to wear to funerals, weddings and christenings, because from about the age of sixty-five, he’d refused to buy a new one, claiming that he’d never get enough wear out of it to justify the cost. How bloody sad.
Natalie had found the cash for the second seat, but if Tom