Falling in Love With English Boys (25 page)

MyText: Sorry! Will call, Will. Crazy bizy x 2. :-)

Did you know that if you drop potato chips into a glass of Club Orange, they dissolve in, like, a second? This stuff is the piranha of drinks.

That London pigeons come in no less than seventeen color variations?

Or, that if you stay in front of the telly long enough, you can actually plot the downward spiral of
Friends
?

I fear I have regressed somewhat. I would hit Mom up for fifty quid and hit H&M, but I just don’t feel like shopping.

Woo-ahhh, woo-ahhh.

That’s the sound of an English ambulance. I seem to have fallen into a ridiculous funk, and I can’t get up.

I haven’t seen the girls in a couple of days. Elizabeth has been crashing an EU conference on human rights. She knows one of the Slovenian aides from school. She says the food is great, but she hasn’t been able to get into any of the really interesting talks. Security’s too tight. She tried blending in with the Spaniards, but apparently their junior attendees all just want to party. Consuelo is in Ireland; Bayard is doing a Bike-and-Pub around the Ring of Kerry. Imogen met a member of the Norwegian royal family the night of my meltdown (he’d just stepped in dog poop on his way to a party in her neighborhood; she gave him a roll of toilet paper . . . excuse me,
loo roll
, and a cup of tea) and is trying to decide whether she should abandon Oxford for Helsinki Tech.

One of them has called me every day. Chocolate-Overdose-Watch in rota. Elizabeth will be back at the shop tomorrow. Consuelo gets back the next day. I’ve been looking up key phrases in Norwegian for Imogen. Just in case.

Unnskyld meg, men jeg er en prinsesse.
Excuse me, but I am a princess.

Kommer dette i en størrelse §?
Does this come in a size 6?

Har du en bror for min Amerikansk venn her?
Do you have a brother for my American friend here?

Det er et reinsdyr i min sjokolade.
There is a reindeer in my chocolate.

Chocolate. As soon as
Eastenders
is over, I’m heading out for my daily fix. I’ve gone every day this week at this time. Yesterday, Mr. Sadiq called, “Hullo, Catherine!” as I walked in. Only notable when I mention that he was sorting tea boxes in the back and couldn’t see me. So I’m becoming predictable. So what.

Today, I think . . . Curly Wurly. I’m in a caramel state of mind.

(later)

They were lying in wait for me.

I got to the shop, exchanged my pleasantries with Mr. Sadiq, and was just heading for the candy shelf when they came tumbling out of the back: Elizabeth, Imogen, Consuelo, even Joanna and Sarah.

“God, I thought you’d never get here!” Elizabeth complained. “Smells like feet back there!”

“It’s Consuelo,” Imogen informed her.

“Well, I’m sorry,” Consuelo shot back, “but I
have
been traveling with a group of disgustingly sweaty boys, and you didn’t give me a chance to go home and have a bath.”

She got up at five this morning in order to make it back from the west west of the west of Ireland for me. Imogen turned down an invitation to an England-Australia test match in Birmingham. Apparently Ragnar-Haakon Ludvig-Knute is a cricket fan. Elizabeth missed a luncheon for Eastern European delegates to which her Slovenian actually had tickets.

“No big deal,” she told me with a shrug. “Really. The menu was going to be beet-heavy, anyway, and I can’t understand a word the Croats say.”

“Honestly, Cat, as if I wanted to go to
Birmingham
,” Imogen drawled.

“I smell like feet” was Consuelo’s addition. “Need I say more?”

Joanna and Sarah hadn’t given anything up; they came because they didn’t have anything better to do.

It was the best prebirthday party I’ve ever had.

We improvised on the refreshments. Apparently the bakery where Imogen ordered the cake last week was a front for a counterfeiting operation and got raided by the police early this morning. Imogen said she could
see
the cake in the case. They’d baked it. But she couldn’t get the constable inside to open the door and give it to her. “I already paid for it!” she muttered. “It’s not like I was going to ask him to give me potential evidence as change for a fifty-pound note.”

Fortunately, we were in the right place for improv. Everyone chose something from the shelves. I can’t say I loved the Roast-Beef-and-Mustard flavored crisps (Joanna), but I quite enjoyed the Cheese-and-Onion Hula Hoops (Consuelo). Elizabeth tried to stick candles in the Hobnobs (Imogen), but they kept breaking apart.

I chose Curly Wurlys. In celebration, Mr. Sadiq gave one to everyone who came into the shop while we were there.

There were presents, too. Elizabeth gave me a black tee with a sequined Union Jack across the front. “Don’t kid yourself,” she said affectionately. “Peace isn’t really your thing. Besides, you’re always going on about your boobs. This will make them look bigger.” I put it on. She was right. Something to do with the horizontal and diagonal stripe combo, I guess.

Imogen gave me an all-in-one makeup kit from Space-NK Apothecary. It’s the size of a paperback and has
everything
—including sparkly eye shadow. Most cool.

But I gotta say I liked Consuelo’s best. It’s a digital subscription to
Hello!
For the next year, all I gotta do is click a button every week, and I get the entire edition online. How perfect. The other two agreed (“Fab, Swell!”), although Elizabeth still thinks I should be reading the
Guardian
. I made sure to point out that Keira Knightley has been featured there, too.

Mr. Sadiq gave me a CD (“What? You expected chocolate?”) of Iraqi hip-hop. He obviously was tickled by the idea. Sarah rolled her eyes. “I wanted to give you Lily Allen,” she told me.

“Thanks,” I said to both of them. I really meant it.

In the middle of it all, Will texted.

HisText: Ur B-Day 2moro. 2 Bizy? Or canICU4 it?

“Maybe you should try to forgive him,” Consuelo suggested quietly. “He’s certainly trying. Seems like he really wants to see you.”

“Seems like he’s a complete tosser,” Imogen disagreed, “springing the girlfriend on Cat like he did.”

I’ve been thinking about it a lot. I think maybe he’s just clueless. That maybe he had no freakin’ idea how much I liked him.

“Rubbish!” Imogen snapped when I offered that possibility.

“Not bloody likely” was Elizabeth’s addition. Consuelo didn’t say anything.

“We are frequently clueless, just so.” Mr. Sadiq stood behind the counter. He looked embarrassed. “I am sorry. You probably do not wish to hear anything from me on this matter.”

Well, yes, actually, I would rather have discussed my love life with Bayard’s entire crew, the men fixing the street outside, and the tweedy old guy in frayed corduroys at the crisps display, before discussing it with a friend’s dad. But I couldn’t really say so, could I? I managed a weak smile.

“He’s right, love,” the tweedy old guy said to me, bringing his salt-and-vinegars to the counter. He extracted a twenty-pound note from a wad in a shiny silver money clip. “Thick as bricks, we are, until you spell things out.”

“But damned if we don’t feel like the king of the world when you finally do. Eh, lads?” This one had a shaved head, tattoos up his neck, and wanted a pack of unfiltered cigarettes. He and the old guy and Mr. Sadiq grinned at each other like complete idiots.

Consuelo tugged on my ponytail. “So, Cat Cat, here’s one for you: Would you rather have him in your life as a friend, or not at all?”

That’s a good one.

“How would you answer if it were Bayard?”

She laughed. “Don’t be daft. Bayard’s not my friend; he’s my lobster
(“lobstah”—it is easy to occasionally forget how posh and clever Swell is, especially when she smells like socks or is dipping Pringles in chocolate syrup)
and is complete crap in the Häagen-Dazs moments. You girls (
“gels”)
are my friends.”

Hmm. Häagen-Dazs for thought.

MyText: Bizy 2moro. Friday?

HisText: Y. M glad.

We always think that they know, right? That they know we’re making sure to be walking near their lockers right when they’re getting out of class. That they know we’re writing their names on the back of our notebooks, but without ink, so you have to look really closely to see the indentations in the cardboard. That they know, and are either being conceited or shy or are pretending not to know because they’re really just not that into us and would rather it be über-popular Francesca Newberg or Molly Perry hanging out by their lockers . . .

I’m beginning to wonder.

So here’s one for you, my Yank posse: Would you rather that every guy walked around with a cartoon thought balloon over his head, or a keyboard that allowed us to put the words in his mouth?

July 30

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to me. Happy Birthday to Me. Happy Birthday to Meeeeeee. Happy Birthday to Me. The H&M gift cert came through, O Goddesses of Friendship. I adore it. I adore you. I should shop. I will shop. When “upright” once again refers to both my morals and physical state.

It’s nearly noon. I feel like I swallowed a cat. Well, maybe only a kitten now. It was Garfield when I woke up. Elizabeth and Imogen and Consuelo took me to a club last night. Of course, they’re over eighteen and are legal. I think Consuelo paid off the bouncer.

The club was good. Really good. Loud, packed, hot as hell. Literally. And we danced so much that I single-bodily raised the temp at least another ten degrees (Celsius). I wore my new shirt and slap. I looked pretty great.

There were boys. Of course, they were three-deep around Imogen, but the rest of us did just fine. I danced and danced and downed the faintly green drinks that seem to be the thang, then made one false-alarm rush to the ladies’, and danced some more.

At one point, I found myself wedged between a table and a three-hundred-pound guy in a white-suit-black-shiny-shirt combo while his much smaller and slightly better dressed friend (no suit jacket anyway) told me about his SUV.

“Brill,” he gushed. “Flippin’ brill. Come up fast behind those poncey little Smart Cars on the M1 and they get out of the way right sharpish!”

He had long blond hair that he kept flippin’ around while he talked. I looked around for any sign of the Girls.

“D’ya know ya look just like that bird in the American telly program?” he asked. “Ya know. The one with all the talking. What’s it called again?”

“
My So-Called Life?
Claire Danes?”

“Who? Nah, the one who’s married to that actor bloke. Tom Cruise.”

Ah.
Suddenly he seemed almost cute.

“Katie Holmes.
Dawson’s Creek
.”

“Right,” he said. “That’s it. Brill. Wanna go someplace private?”

Oh.
Suddenly Imogen and Elizabeth were there. Imogen steered me one way; Elizabeth and my new friend went the other. “All right, Cat, no more mojitos for you. What
were
you thinking?” Imogen demanded.

“He’s not so bad!”

“He’s over thirty,” she shot back, “and looks like Draco Malfoy’s squib uncle.”

She was right, I fear. I have no idea what Elizabeth said to the Malfoy, but I didn’t see him again.

I am slightly embarrassed to admit the evening ended a little earlier than expected. That’s what happens when you have several mojitos on top of Vietnamese pho and then bounce around under strobe lights. Believe me, you don’t want the details. Suffice it to say there was no false alarm the second time, and there will be no more alcohol, lime juice, or bean sprouts in my foreseeable future.

They got me back to the flat and into bed. It’s all a little hazy at that point. But when I got up this morning and staggered into the bathroom to see if there really was fur growing on my tongue, I found
Happy Birthday, Yank
written across my forehead (backward, no less, so I could read it in the mirror) in black eyeliner pencil.

I love them. Mojitos, not so much, but these three English girls, I love.

Mom offered to stay home from the BM and spend the day with me. Didn’t want her to. I had other plans, and she’s taking me out to dinner tonight anyway. The Kashmiri place.

I don’t know how much of my return she heard last night. Enough, probably. I remember Consuelo singing “Live Your Life” (that’s “Lev Din Liv” in Norwegian, in case you missed that) on the way out of the club, in the taxi, and in front of the flat. Mom didn’t come out of her room. I’m guessing she’ll have something lengthy to say on the subject. But after my b-day is over. The note she left propped in front of the king-size glass of orange juice this morning said only:
Happy Birthday, C—I know this is your day, but I just have to tell you—it’s my favorite day of the year, every year, for the last eighteen and the next fifty. Love you.—Mom

I think there’s the iPod of my dreams in that box. I’ll open it when she gets home. I opened everything else as it arrived. I am not good at delayed gratification. GM gave me a whopping eBay gift card. And another one for Fourbucks. She likes to stick it to Mom every once in a while. Now who’s the child in that scenario?

Dad and Samantha sent a card. There’s a pair of fuzzy ducklings wearing party hats on the front. Inside it says,
Quacking Great Birthday Wishes from Both of Us.
She signs her name in pink ink with little hearts after it. She’s twenty-seven. My father is marrying a woman almost twenty years younger than he is, who signs her name with hearts. There is so much wrong with that that I can’t even be bothered to list it.

I looked twice, even shook the envelope, just in case, but there was nothing else there. I gave him a birthday present, a thumb drive with his name engraved on it. So who’s the child in this scenario? I know if I remind him, he’ll take me shopping for a guilt gift. It’s happened before. So here’s the question of the (b-)day, My Beloveds: What’s worth more, a pair of expensive jeans or my pride?