My friend Dawn says, ‘You can’t make new friends at our age’ but I made one at Christmas when a lovely woman called Caroline, a friend of a friend, came to stay. She invited me to her 60th birthday celebration on Monday. ‘I’ve booked us tickets to see Jason Rebello at Ronnie Scott’s.’
I got the train to London and popped into Harrods to buy her a Diptyque candle. The nice Frenchman on the Sisley counter recognised me, and offered to do my make-up. ‘Oo would you like to look like?’ he asked me. Jennifer Lawrence? Keira Knightley? ‘Um, Amanda Holden on Britain’s Got Talent.’ I emerged, an hour later, smoky of eye, with highlighted cheekbones and nude lips.
I was the first to arrive at Ronnie’s. Caroline was catching the train from Bath, then getting the last one home, while I’d invited Dawn and my oldest friend Sue. I ordered champagne for the others, and we settled down to listen to the jazz, which was very loud. I felt normal, being out with three girlfriends, and started to relax and survey the room.
There, seated at the bar, was a huge grey cloud of hair. An enormous afro. Only one man in London has hair like that. I kept looking, furtively, sitting up straight. I wished I’d brought a telescope. But it was him. The Osama Bin Laden lookalike, the most handsome man in London, whom I’d passed over one New Year’s Eve when he had rung my house, and my future husband was standing in front of me, having handed me the phone, looking broken, his mouth a Charlie Brown wiggly line of fear.
I haven’t seen him for 17 years. Thank heavens for Sisley, that’s all I can say, and the corset qualities of my Victoria Beckham dress. I passed my empty flute to Sue. ‘Fill her up,’ I told her. I nudged Dawn violently and told her who it was in a stage whisper, even though there was a note in front of us requesting we not talk during the performance. To her credit, she didn’t dial MI5 but instead mouthed, ‘No! Where?!’ head swivelling like a puppet on a stick.
‘I have to talk to him!’ I told her. ‘I have to find out if I made the right choice, whether he’s married, or has been pining for me all these years. If that were the case, I could look on David as just a blip.’
I felt it was fate, that I was here tonight. Maybe we are destined to be together? I made Dawn go with me to the bar, and told her to speak first. He looked up from beneath his hair. ‘Hi!’ Dawn said, while I did my best teapot pose, inches away. ‘We spoke once on the phone 20 years ago when I worked in music PR. I’m Dawn. Do you remember Liz?’
He was still looking at Dawn. I heard him say, ‘Liz Jones?’ Dawn nodded and gestured towards me, soaking me slightly with her drink. I’m sure he knew I was there, but he didn’t even look at me. Not one glance. I now know what it feels like to be blanked. I caught a brief glimpse of his chiselled face and that was it.
We staggered back to our table and sat down. ‘Well,’ said Dawn. ‘That was really shitty. That would have really upset me. You are very strong, you don’t let things get to you like I do.’
‘No I’m not! Yes they do!’ I felt even worse now. ‘I think he was in shock. Did he see me properly, d’you think? What do you think was going on in his mind? What?’
Dawn looked tired and hot. We already resembled the friends in Sex and the City, and then she said, Miranda fashion when counselling Carrie over Big: ‘Liz, they don’t even know who killed Kennedy.’
‘Yes, but why be rude? I never wrote anything bad. Just that I loved him. Anyway, what is he, an elephant?’ She gave me a hard look, getting up to leave. ‘You have to see that writing about people in a defamatory manner will piss them off even if you think it’s funny. Please, seriously. See how it appears to others. Night night.’
A man had ruined my evening yet again. But it was about to get worse. It was only 10pm and the others had left already. I got out my phone and wrote a text to David. ‘Hi. Am in Soho. Fancy meeting up for a drink?’ I pressed send.