Chapter 10

Friday 27 August to Thursday 22nd October 1970

Harriet had always been going with Kieran when we were playing Bridge with Colette and Zena. She and I never actually interacted very much. She always seemed rather aloof. Now I was sitting in a pub at six in the evening waiting for her to turn up.

I had been set up, or rather we both had been set up by our two friends. I wondered if she would resent it. I had no idea what sort of TLC was wanted. My plan was to let her take the lead this evening. We would do what she wanted to do, talk about what she wanted to talk about.

She was late. I had been told five thirty. Perhaps she would not turn up at all. As that hopeful thought crossed my mind she arrived, and made straight for where I was sitting. I stood, we embraced quite naturally as we always had – somewhat stiffly, hips kept apart.

“Sorry I’m late,” she said, but gave no reason.

“What will you drink?” I asked by way of forgiveness.

“Rum and Coke please,” she said as she doffed her raincoat and sat next to my place on the bench seat.

As I went to the bar it struck me that because she had always been distant with me, I had not really seen her. There was always Colette and Zena to ogle. Yet she was very pretty facially, one of those women who are naturally very lightly built.

I hadn’t really noticed how much like a catwalk model she was. She had gentle understated curves as I noticed when she took her raincoat off, and everything fitted together perfectly, but she was thin. Her hair was a rich shiny curly auburn and fell over her shoulders in ringlets. As I walked back I saw her face as if she was new to me. She was beautiful! Her bone structure was perfect; she would always have that beauty.

I sat down and gazed at her, turning towards her. Large hazel eyes, small nose, wide mouth you could imagine would want to engulf you, and a long sinuous neck. How could I have missed all this?

I took all this in for a split second, but my gesture of turning slightly towards her was misinterpreted. The eyes flashed.

“Save it, Graham,” she snapped. “I don’t want to talk about it; I don’t want your sympathy. I’m here because Zena would not let up until I did.”

Wow! Some opening. This was why I had always kept a distance. She didn’t really like me at all! So why had she come? I was irked because I hadn’t wanted to come either, annoyed, but I suppressed it – not!

“OK, so you’ve come, fulfilled your obligation to Zena, now you can drink up and go,” I said testily. “I didn’t need to be here either, I was badgered into it as well.”

She was shocked, I could see it in her face; it was the last thing she expected. She had clearly been handled with kid gloves after her break up, and this aggression confused her.

“I’m sorry?” she said with a worried frown. It was not an apology, but a quest for understanding.

“Sorry? Yes, you’re sorry, you’re hurt; so am I,” I snapped, deliberately misinterpreting her query. “D’you think I came here to enjoy raking up all the trauma of breaking up with Penny? For once in my life I can say something I never say to someone else: I know how you feel. So don’t take it out on me; I didn’t dump you. I won’t stand for it.”

I paused for breath. She was about to react in shock, so I preempted her. Now I was much more gentle.

“Now, do you want to call it a day and go home? Or shall we do something else?”

She was startled. Again my change of tone disconcerted her. She was on the back foot (a cricketing term meaning she was now defensive).

“Graham, I apologise. I resented being pushed together with you. It’s not you, it’s their well-meaning help. They think I’ll feel better if...” she stopped.

“We go to bed together,” I finished it for her. “Well, that’s certainly not going to happen, is it?”

Again she was disconcerted; she was not used to being turned down at the start. Did I see disappointment cross her face? She said nothing.

“Well?” I asked quite gently, “What are you going to do?”

She flinched. “Er, I – I don’t know...”

“Have you eaten?” I asked. She relaxed, the tension draining out of her.

“No.”

“Would you like to go for a meal? I promise not to mention ... that topic.” I smiled. She smiled.

“Yes, I’d like that.”

“Well,” I said, “I booked a table at Orchards for seven. I don’t mean people – seven o’clock. I was going to eat there regardless, though I would have cancelled if you didn’t like the idea.”

She smiled more broadly and finished her drink quickly.

We took a taxi to the restaurant, which as I have mentioned was one of the best in the city, and she was impressed. Over the meal we chatted and I found that she was quite an athlete. She went running, not jogging, liked jazz and classical music, and enjoyed clubbing, so we had quite a lot in common.

At the end of the meal I asked if she wanted to go to a club, or a pub, or a late film, or home.

“Could we just go to your flat?” she asked. “I don’t feel like noisy places tonight.”

I forbore to enquire who was partying at her place that night.

The restaurant ordered a taxi for us, and we ran to it through the pelting rain, and laughing, piled into the back seat. At the other end we ran through the still pelting rain into the hallway of the flats, and stood laughing and giggling as we panted, catching our breath. Then we walked quite sedately up the stairs and I let her in, asking what she would like to drink as I took her coat.

After a month of heavy rain throughout the country, that last week had been bone dry – except for two hours that evening when it pelted down – a local shower. Perhaps the weather was sympathising with her distress.

“Could I have a rum and coke, just a measure of rum and a full can of coke.”

“Diet?” I asked, though looking at her, an ordinary can might have put some flesh on her.

“Ooh, yes please,” she said with a smile.

I brought her a glass tumbler, the bottle of rum, two cans of diet coke, a glass filled with ice cubes and a dish with sliced lime.

“Here,” I said, “You can make it to your own taste.”

She smiled and set to creating her drink, while I poured a generous measure of malt whisky with a wee splash of water. I put on some quiet jazz, Brubeck I think it was, and sat in the nearest armchair to the sofa.

“This is nice,” she said, relaxing into the sofa. We sat in silence, and then she began to speak.

“I can’t understand him,” she said, and I knew of whom she was speaking.

“We were so...” here she searched for the word, “easy-going with each other. So comfortable, he was always telling me how much he loved me for God’s sake, how well suited we were. He said it, not me!”

She paused, then “Well, I said it too.” She smiled. “He practically moved in with me. He always went back to his place when we all met for bridge, but otherwise he stayed at my place.

“Hell, he had more of his stuff at my flat than his own. You know, I never noticed that he had been taking his stuff back to his own place. He planned it in advance! How nasty is that? No warning.

“To take me to that really exclusive Restaurant, then he says he had something special to say. I was so excited, Graham, what else could he be going to say? Then he said that this was his way of saying thank you for all the months together. He was building up to it.”

Here she began to weep.

“He thought it was too early for him to be settling down, and we ought to ‘call it a day’. Call it a day, Graham!“ She broke down into sobbing.

I did not know what to do. Should I sit by her? Put an arm round her? Hold her? She had always been so stand-offish, There was a good chance she would resent it. I sat tight, and waited until she calmed.

“A dreadful shock,” I said. “Coming totally out of the blue.”

“Yes,” she said, calmer now. “He was so perfect, handsome, kind, gentle, passionate. He would say we were perfect for each other. Over and over, Graham, he’d say things like that. The night before he had made love so sweetly, said how beautiful I was, how perfect I was. I know I’m skinny, but he said he liked that. Then to tell me he was dumping me! In public Graham! I didn’t know what to say or do. I just sat there. What could I say?”