Lunch At The Cornerstone

"Well he's young, isn't he. I mean, really young. He's, I mean, you know."

"Young." I didn’t like her smug tone. I hadn’t expected to like it; knowing her so well I could usually predict her response if not her exact words, but now that I was hearing it rather than just rehearsing our conversation in my head, I really didn’t like it. We shook the rain off our brollies, hurried down the steps and joined the noisy, ravenous queue.

Major tactical error really, meeting at 1pm in a city centre café for a catch up girlie chat. Not that we were girls any more. Oh no. Heaven forfend.

"You’re going to have to face it you know."

"Yes."

"He's at a..."

"...at a different stage. Yes. I know." We’d been through all this before. And each time she’d said it I noticed the way her mouth twisted as she spoke, making her dark red lipstick bleed and collect in the corners. You should really invest in a decent lip-liner, I thought. Or wear a lighter colour. After all, one reaches a stage… But I didn’t say it aloud.

"He won’t stay interested for long, anyway." She was ordering spicy tomato soup and an apple. I slid my tray along the counter behind hers, pretending to consider an enormous cheese scone. She looked at it, then at me, and raised an eyebrow. I picked it up with a pair of stainless steel cake tongs and dropped it neatly on to my plate along with two pats of butter. Her lips were thin lines of sticky blackcurrant jam.

“Still off the carbs?” I asked.

“I’m never hungry and the weight’s falling off me. You should try it. I’ll email you the diet plan if you like.”

“No thanks.”

We paid for our food and homed in on a table by the window where a studenty-looking French couple with a chubby toddler were just putting their coats on. They'd left a mess but a waitress soon whisked by with a damp cloth and a tray.

"I mean WHY..." she began, as we sat down. I buttered my scone, and waited as she arranged herself.

"WHY," she continued stridently, after a slurp of soup, “WHY would he?” Did she know she was strident? Didn't she care? After twenty years of uneasy friendship I still wasn’t sure.

"Why would he what?" I struggled with "he". Such a sharp, deep pain. It brought back the smell of his skin, the texture of it, the warmth of him. He was so pale. I loved that...I'd never see him again, I knew that. She didn't know that - she merely hoped.

Now she was fixing me with her beadiest glare, staring at me over a spoonful of carb-free soup.

"WHY would he be interested in someone like you?"

I broke off a piece of thickly-buttered scone, put it in my mouth and turned away as I chewed. The young French family were passing the window, and I wanted to cry.

- THE END -