Arrows

Arrows

I ’M IN THE

lift on the way down to the basement bin store, clutching a bag full of Pushkin’s sawdust, which I’ve just replaced. He loves running about on the carpet while I change it.

The lift stops on level 5 and the doors slide open and there is Thitima. She looks ravishing. Hair in a bouffant of sorts, red lipstick, red dress. She’s carrying a red clutch bag and when she sees me, she smiles, but the nerves are evident.

‘Please.’ I gesture beside me for her to enter.

As the lift begins to descend again, she fiddles with one of the pins holding her hair at the back.

‘It looks first-rate,’ I tell her.

‘Really?’ she asks.

‘Not a wisp out of place.’

She shifts from foot to foot in her red, strappy heels. She smells nice too. A sweet plummy perfume. I hope that seeing me in my slippers with my bin bag full of guinea-pig excrement and sawdust isn’t ruining the beginning of her elegant evening.

As we reach the ground floor, the lift clunks and the doors slide open, and there is Daniel, hair combed neatly to one side, holding a red rose wrapped in cellophane. I can’t hide my grin.

For a moment, Thitima doesn’t move. ‘Go get ’em,’ I whisper to her, and give her a gentle elbow in the right direction. She smiles and whispers, ‘Thanks, Eddie.’

Off she bravely goes, a little unsteadily in her heels, and Daniel beams at her. The doors slide closed and I descend into the basement. Like an ancient, subterranean refuse Cupid.