Falling in Love With English Boys (6 page)

How Seasons May End, by A Gentleman

My first may come before your Comfort or your Pleasure.
My second leads you, Miss, and begins your Vow.
My third, after your Needle, is a skill one might treasure.
My last shall be behind you should you Commit or Depart now.

Charles imbibed too much port last night and said one good riddle would quite do his head in. Mama is so clever at this sort of thing, but she is unwell and has taken to her bed with her chamomile tisane and her lap desk. With much reluctance, I showed it to Nicholas when he arrived to collect Charles (who is not so ill, apparently, that he cannot attend the races). He gave it the most cursory glance, and when I complained that I have been trying to work it out all
morning
to no avail, and that I believe I shall do best to put it aside, the wretched man merely said, “Not at all. In your case, you would do best to try harder.”

He would do best to try harder as well—at any semblance of civility!

I am quite out of sorts now. I believe I shall take my needlepoint and go sit in the garden. I feel the urge to impale something.

July 4

(What’s So Funny
’Bout) Peace
,
Love and Understanding

The scene:

Me. Still utterly humiliated by my disastrous meeting with the cute English boy. Thinking I’ll go to Hyde Park and either drown myself in the Serpentine, the little river that runs through it (note to all who might care: the Serpentine is apparently only waist-deep at most points), or head farther south and gaze longingly at the Harvey Nicks cosmetic counters. I’m feeling a blue (liner) moment coming on.

And I gotta get some walking in. Cadburys, y’know.

So southward do I tromp. Right into Grosvenor Square, as usual, home of the American embassy and antiwar protests. There’s one going on, as usual, but also as usual, I didn’t pay any attention to the date when I got up this morning. Check the date, ladies. This was the biggest, loudest, angriest protest I’ve personally ever seen.

So I’ve kinda forgotton about eye shadow for the moment. I’m standing next to this incredibly pretty girl who looks like she should be in a Bollywood musical, only she’s wearing cargo pants and a killer silver shirt with a peace sign on it, and thinking I would give up chocolate forever to have her boobs, and just deciding I had to ask where she bought her shirt when this crazy big black car complete with tinted windows and motorcycle escort comes driving out of some hidden orifice. The police (I dunno if they were all really the police or something far more serious, ’cause they had guns . . . like no bobbies the BBC ever showed us) are holding the crowd back. Like anyone’s really pushing. Just lots of shouting, much of which I wouldn’t repeat. Half because I couldn’t understand what they were saying (I don’t think “oigly” is a word, even in Cockney), and half because it was so angry (several possible new meanings for “slag” discovered) I felt it in my stomach.

Then I see this little tiny girl—not really a girl, I guess. Maybe eighteen, but
tiny
. Hair like a baby chick—you know, yellow, and fluffy and spiky at the same time. She had on this huge, shocking pink jacket that made her look even smaller, but totally made her visible. So she wiggles her way to the front, all five foot nothing of her. And heaves something at the car. At first I thought it was a bomb. I think a lot of people thought it was a bomb, judging from the number of angry folk who suddenly looked terrified and hit the deck. Then I thought it might be a paintball, ’cause it hit the windshield with a huge splat. An actual splat. And the car was covered with something wet and red, and people were gasping and laughing and cheering.

She threw a grapefruit.

Her aim was incredible. So was her arm. The Phillies could use her in center field. But what I kept thinking,
keep
thinking, is how incredibly
enraged
this little tiny person must have been to throw a piece of fruit with so much force that it was pulverized. Wow.

Of course the police were right there, shoving into the crowd after her, but more Bollywood: everyone squeezed in, a big, colorful, rippling wave of people moving inward, swallowing her completely. She was just . . . gone.

The minute after was the weirdest thing. Everyone stepped back, quiet and orderly, and so polite that you just knew you were in London. Then someone shouted,
“Hey, hey, U.S.A., you don’t rule the world today!”
and it all erupted again.

Suddenly Hyde Park didn’t seem quite so appealing. Fuzzy socks and a corner of the sofa, yup. Chocolate, absolutely. Eye shadow, not so much. I decided to pay a visit to Mr. Sadiq, stock up on Curly Wurlies, and comb the BBCs for some reruns of
All Creatures Great and Small
.

I don’t know if it really was there, but as I headed back toward Oxford Street, I thought I saw an empty pink jacket crumpled on the ground at the edge of the square. People kept stepping on it. It’s seriously un-sunny today. Someone that little will be cold.

Part Deux: Mr. Sadiq’s shop

I was debating between Curly Wurlies and Bounty. Mr. Sadiq had, with a small smile and no prompting, put an
OK!
in a bag (I’ve already read the current
Hello!
), and was waiting patiently for me to make my choc choice.

“May I suggest something a bit different today?” he asked after I’d walked back and forth in front of the display for five minutes.

I never got to hear what his suggestion was. The door of the shop banged open, and a girl breezed in. The gorgeous, peacechested girl from the protest. She didn’t see me, but lifted herself half over the counter, smooched Mr. Sadiq on the cheek, and then started talking a mile a minute. I expected her voice to be lyrical, musical, full of cardamom and cinnamon and silk.

So smack me for stereotyping. She sounded like Keira Knightley.

“It was brilliant, Dad! There were thousands of people and all the press, and I swear I saw Robbie Williams in the scrum. The police could barely hold us back, and then this titchy little thing chucks a grapefruit—”

“Elizabeth.” Mr. Sadiq didn’t raise his voice, but she stopped and followed his eyes. And saw me. “Catherine, this is my daughter, Elizabeth. Elizabeth, this is Catherine. She—”

“Was there today!” Her huge eyes literally sparked. “Wasn’t it brill? The Yanks couldn’t possibly ignore
that
! Didn’t you just
love
the grapefruit?”

“Elizabeth,” Mr. Sadiq said again, and this time we both heard the warning.

“What?” she demanded.

“Do you think she got away okay?” I asked. And her jaw dropped.

“You’re American!” Not said in that
“Oh, cool, you must know all about hip-hop”
kinda way.

“Elizabeth!” Mr. Sadiq snapped.

“Well, she is!”

“I am,” I agreed, in her defense rather than mine. I realized that as little as I knew about Elizabeth Sadiq, I knew she was someone I could be friends with. Maybe it was the fab clothing, or the gold streaks in her wild, endless hair. Or the fact that she had a Razor Apples button on her messenger bag. “Our chocolate is complete pants,” I said. It’s a line I took from last week’s
Eastenders
. Only there, Stacey (resident biatch-just-needing-to-beloved was referring to her husband’s sexual prowess). “I’m emigrating.” Then: “The grapefruit was pretty impressive, but your shirt is brilliant.”

It was a long moment while she sized me up. Then she laughed. “Five quid in Oxford Street,” she confided cheerfully. “Public objection is no excuse for bad presentation, but I’m not paying good money for something that might get ripped in the crush.”

“My Elizabeth is changing the world one photographic opportunity at a time.” There was pride in Mr. Sadiq’s voice, behind the teasing. I wonder how Dad would respond if I were suddenly to go activist. Betcha he would laugh. The stepmonster-to-be would probably be confused by the similarity to the word “active” and try to get me interested in pink spandex and spinning.

“For all the opportunity I’ll get to change anything in Aberystwyth.” Elizabeth shrugged. “You at university?”

And I told her. About being a senior-in-waiting. About the (s)mother and the BM and this blog. I almost told her about Will, but caught myself. She’s starting college in Wales (“West of Nowhere,” she calls it) in August, is going to be a lawyer (“a barrister, as soon as they get rid of the god-awful wigs”), and is spending the summer alternating between selling processed food matter for her father and protesting several great evils. Today was the current situation in Pakistan and Afghanistan. I could tell she still wasn’t sure about me. About my being American. I could tell she was dying to ask about my politics. I suspect her father’s very polite, slightly formal influence was holding her back. Although considering the fact that she’s got so much . . .
vavoom
(I dunno, do people say “
vavoom”
anymore?), I’m surprised she doesn’t burst something. I doubt much constrains her.

I fingered a
Times
, wondering if it would just be too obvious a plea for admiration if I were to buy a newspaper. She can lift one eyebrow at a time. I’ve always wanted to be able to do that. “
Guardian
or
Spectator
?” she asked, a tad slyly, I might add. It took me a sec to realize she wasn’t quizzing me on which I am in the workings of the world. I know one of the papers is liberal, the other conservative. But for my life I couldn’t remember which is which. If I ever knew.

I snuck a peek at a
Guardian
. I recognized the face on the front. And took a chance. “I’m a
Hello!
girl, myself, but I think Al Gore’s pretty fab for a grandad.”

“Well, that’s okay, then.” Elizabeth grinned and I felt like an eight-year-old. I so want her to be my friend.
Pleasepleaseplease.
“Give me your number. I’ll ring you next time I’m objecting to something.”

I didn’t notice till I got home that Mr. Sadiq had slipped a Dairy Milk bar into my bag.

There is little as wretched as a party that ends too soon.

It all began well enough. I was quite gratified by the persons in attendance at Mrs. Stuart’s supper dance. I spied Mr. Baker immediately upon arriving. He was leaning against the mantel in the drawing room, looking far too handsome in his black coat and white breeches. Surrounded as he was by gentlemen all dressed in much the same way, he quite outshone all present. I confess the ribbon about my waist suddenly seemed to have been tied too tightly.

Why, I feel compelled to ask, do young gentlemen so often stand about in packs, muttering and chortling among themselves? They do it in the country, and I should not have expected them to do so as well in Town, but they do. I cannot imagine they have much of interest to discuss. Horses? Business? How terribly dull. But there they stood, for what seemed an eternity, appearing as comfortable as if it were their home and hearth, while I stood
not
comfortable,
not
quite chatting with Miss Winnie Stuart, who is perfectly pleasant but, I feel compelled to note, is just the sort of earnest, bookish girl one does not want to be standing with while hoping to attract the attention of the likes of Mr. Baker and his set. She would insist on recommending some Scottish novel called
Waverley
. Even worse, she must accompany her discourse with flailing arms. She looked as if a bee were trying to interrupt her tale of tartans and haggis. Her excitement probably matched exactly my embarrassment. I wished to be noticed, but not because of silly Miss Stuart and her imaginary bee swatting.

I was quite ready to ease myself miserably behind the nearest potted plant, when suddenly,
at last,
Mr. Baker glanced my way. I had thought he must have seen me before, but I had been watching him quite intently, and though he several times tossed his curls and angled his face in such a way that he should have spied me, he clearly did not. For this time, he smiled the most bone-melting, slow smile, and levered himself from the mantel. I believe I stopped breathing entirely as he approached.

I barely heard Miss Stuart say, “How very handsome he is! Just as one would imagine Waverley.”

“Perhaps,” I agreed, trying to sound nonchalant, as if gentlemen such as Mr. Baker (and dramatic Scottish novels) were quite ordinary. Miss Stuart is hardly competition, but still—

He greeted her first, which I suppose was correct, as it was her home, but it rather rankled. Especially as the entire encounter lasted no longer than a blink and consisted almost entirely of the expected pleasantries anyone under the age of five-and-thirty abhors and which any of the rabbit-eared matrons standing guard would demand to hear. He was delighted to see us both, wasn’t the weather uncommonly fine, what better way to pass an evening than among such pleasant company? Then, finally,
at last
, he requested a dance. Of course, he had to include Miss Stuart, and she is not quite so silly as to refuse, but it was from me that he requested the quadrille. Which, while miserably short, allows for the most time with one’s partner. The most conversation. The most clasping of hands. How I wish the waltz were not so scandalous! I think I should very much like twirling about the floor in Mr. Baker’s arms.

My acceptance was far too quick and eager. I reminded myself immediately, and repeat now: I must not be eager. I
must
not be eager.
I must not be eager
. I must be cool and reserved and, like Miss Hartnell, behave for all the world as if Mr. Baker were just any other gentleman.

I might just as well try to pretend that diamonds are just another bit of rock.

“He is clearly taken with you,” Miss Stuart said as he walked away. She said it quite wistfully, I believe, and in the moment I felt very fond of her, plain bookish creature that she is.