David Nicholls - One Day

‘What does that mean? You keep saying it and I still don’t know what it means.’

‘It means don’t keep fighting battles that are already lost. The feminist movement should be about equal pay and equal opportunities and civil rights, not deciding what a woman can or can’t wear of her own free will on a Saturday night!’

Her mouth fell open in indignation. ‘That’s not what I—’

‘And anyway, I’m buying you dinner! Don’t give me a hard time!’

And it was at moments like this that she had to remind herself that she was in love with him, or had once been in love with him, a long time ago. They stood on the edge of a long pointless argument that she felt she would win, but which would leave the evening in tatters. Instead, she hid her face in her drink, her teeth biting the glass, and counted slowly before saying: ‘Let’s change the subject.’

But he wasn’t listening, gazing over her shoulder instead as the maître d’ beckoned them over. ‘Come on — I’ve managed to get us a banquette.’

They settled into the purple velvet booth and scrutinised the menus in silence. Emma had been expecting something fancy and French, but this was basically expensive canteen food: fishcakes, shepherd’s pie, burgers, and she recognised Poseidon as the kind of restaurant where the ketchup comes on a silver salver. ‘It’s Modern British,’ explained Dexter patiently, as if paying all that money for sausage and mash was very Modern, very British.

‘I’m going to have oysters,’ said Dexter. ‘The natives, I think.’

‘Are they friendly?’ said Emma weakly.

‘ What? ’

‘The natives — are they friendly?’ she persevered and thought My God, I’m turning into Ian.

Uncomprehending, Dexter frowned and returned to the menu. ‘No, they’re just sweeter, pearly and sweet and finer than rock oysters, more delicate. I’ll get twelve.’

‘You’re very knowledgeable all of a sudden.’

‘I love food. I’ve always loved food and wine.’

‘I remember that tuna stir-fry you cooked me that time. I can still taste it in the back of my throat. Ammonia—’

‘Not cooking , restaurants. I eat out most days now. As a matter of fact I’ve been asked if I want to review for one of the Sundays.’

‘Restaurants?’

‘Cocktail bars. Weekly column called “Barfly”, sort of man-about-town thing.’

‘And you’d write it yourself?’

‘Of course I’d write it myself!’ he said, though he had been assured that the column would be heavily ghosted.

‘What is there to say about cocktails?’

‘You’d be surprised. Cocktails are very cool now. Sort of a retro glamour thing. In fact—’ He put his mouth to the empty martini glass ‘—I’m something of a mixologist myself.’

‘Misogynist?’

‘Mix ol ogist.’

‘I’m sorry, I thought you said “misogynist”.’

‘Ask me how to make a cocktail, any cocktail you like.’

She pressed her chin with her finger. ‘Okay, um. . lager top!’

‘I’m serious, Em. It’s a real skill.’

‘What is?’

‘Mixology. People go on special courses.’

‘Maybe you should have done it for your degree.’

‘It would certainly have been more fucking useful.’

The remark was so belligerent and sour that Emma visibly winced, and Dexter seemed a little taken aback too, hiding his face in the wine list. ‘What do you want: red or white? I’m going to get another martini, then we’ll start with a nice biscuity Muscadet for the oysters then go onto something like a Margaux. What d’you think?’

He ordered and then was off to the loo again, taking his second martini with him, which Emma found unusual and vaguely unsettling. The minutes stretched. She read the wine label then read it again then stared into space and wondered at what point he had become such a, such a. . mixologist? And why was she sounding so spiky, mean and joyless? She didn’t care what the Cigarette Girl wore, not really, not that much, so why did she sound so priggish and judgemental? She resolved to relax and enjoy herself. This was Dexter after all, her best friend whom she loved. Didn’t she?

In London’s most amazing toilets, Dexter hunched over the cistern and thought much the same thing. He loved Emma Morley, supposed he did, but more and more resented that air of self-righteousness, of the community centre, the theatre co-op, of 1988. She was so, so. . subsidised. It wasn’t appropriate, especially not in a setting like this, a place specifically designed to make a man feel like a secret agent. After the grim ideological gulag of a mid-Eighties education, its guilt and bolshy politics, he was finally being allowed to have some fun, and was it really such a bad thing to like a cocktail, a cigarette, a flirtation with a pretty girl?

And the jokes; why was she always getting at him, reminding him of his failings? He hadn’t forgotten them. All that stuff about things being ‘posh’ and my-fat-bum and orthopaedic high-heels, the endless, endless self-deprecation. Well God save me from comedi ennes , he thought, with their put-downs and their smart asides, their insecurities and self-loathing. Why couldn’t a woman have a bit of grace and elegance and self-confidence, instead of behaving all the time like some chippy stand-up?

And class! Don’t even mention class. He takes her to a great restaurant at his own expense, and on goes the cloth cap! There was a kind of vanity and self-regard in that working-class-hero act that sent him crazy. Why is she still harping on about how she went to a comp, never went abroad on holiday, has never eaten an oyster? She’s nearly thirty years old, all that was a long, long time ago, and it’s time she took responsibility for her own life. He gave a pound to the Nigerian man who passed him his hand towel, stepped out into the restaurant, saw Emma across the room fiddling with her cutlery in her High Street funeral dress, and he felt a new wave of irritation. In the bar, to his right, he could see the Cigarette Girl, standing alone. She saw him, and smiled, and he decided to make a detour.

‘Twenty Marlboro Lights, please.’

‘What, again?’ she laughed, her hand touching his wrist.

‘What can I say? I’m like one of those beagles.’

She laughed again, and he pictured her in the banquette next to him, his hand under the table on her stockinged thigh. He reached for his wallet. ‘Actually, I’m going to this party later with my old mate from college over there—’ Old mate, he thought, was a nice touch. ‘—and I don’t want to run out of cigarettes.’ He handed her a five-pound note, folded crisply lengthwise in two, held between first and second finger. ‘Keep the change.’

She smiled, and he noticed a tiny speck of ruby lipstick on her white front teeth. He wanted very much to hold her chin and wipe it off with his thumb.

‘You have lipstick. .’

‘Where?’

He extended his arm until his finger was two inches from her mouth. ‘Just. There.’

‘Can’t take me anywhere!’ She ran the point of her pink tongue back and forth across her teeth. ‘Better?’ she grinned.

‘Much.’ He smiled and stepped away, then turned back to her.

‘Just out of interest,’ he said, ‘what time do you finish here tonight?’

The oysters had arrived, lying glossy and alien on their bed of melting ice. Emma had been passing the time by drinking heavily, with the fixed smile of someone who’s been left alone and really doesn’t mind at all. Finally she saw him weaving across the restaurant a little unsteadily. He bundled into the booth.

‘I thought you’d fallen in!’ This was something that her granny used to say. She was using her grandmother’s material.