Old Fashioned

Old Fashioned

‘E DDIE,’

B ELLA SAYS,

popping up in front of me as I am tucking into the peanut-butter sandwiches I made at home. ‘Shall we go somewhere proper for lunch?’

I don’t need asking twice. There’s something to be said for eating at a table. I’m up like a flash. The pigeons descend on my sandwich the moment I set it down on the ground.

‘Not too shabby,’ Bella says, looking around the Italian bistro we have found ourselves in. We are the only patrons in here. It is very fancy.

‘And not a pigeon in sight,’ I agree.

Since I met Bella, I’ve been eating my lunch in Pigeon Park a lot more frequently. But I haven’t told her that. Partly it’s because I like to give Marjie some time in the shop to eat her beefy wares in peace. But mostly because I think Bella and I might be friends, but I’m not sure yet.

‘Well,’ I say, unfurling my linen napkin across my lap. ‘What are we celebrating?’

‘It’s Jake’s birthday.’

Oh.

‘Oh,’ I say.

She tries for a smile, but it betrays her and shows how sad she is.

The waiter places a carafe of water and two teeny glasses between us. He hands us a heavy menu and leaves. Bella looks up at me.

‘He would have been twenty-five today,’ she says.

‘He should

have been twenty-five today,’ I agree.

‘Yes. He fucking should.’ She begins pouring the water, but her hands are shaking. I take over for her and, once we both have full glasses, I look at her, wishing I could help.

‘We had our first kiss on his fourteenth birthday,’ she says. ‘So it’s the anniversary of that, too.’

There is a pause, and then I have an idea. ‘What was Jake’s favourite drink?’

Bella doesn’t look up ‘An Old Fashioned.’

The waiter reappears and looks from Bella to me. He must notice how sad and how drawn she looks because he asks, ‘Are you okay?’

Bella sits up straighter, fluffs her fringe, shakes herself like a cat. ‘I just got fired,’ she lies.

‘Oh, man, I’m sorry,’ the waiter says. ‘What did you do?’

‘Investment banking,’ she says, and I try very hard not to choke on my sup of water.

‘Sorry to hear it,’ he says.

She nods, grateful for his real sympathy for her invented woes.

Though he looks too young to drink alcohol himself, let alone serve it, I ask him, ‘Do you do Old Fashioneds?’

‘Um, no, we don’t.’ He looks at Bella. Her eyes are still red, but she’s recomposing. ‘But I know how to make them. I could make you one and charge you for a Daiquiri?’

I look at Bella.

‘Two Old Fashioneds, please,’ she says.

Our third Old Fashioneds arrive and I take a sup. ‘Gosh, that is still horrible!’

‘I know,’ Bella says, wincing. ‘I never understood how he drank them. I think he liked to order them because they sound sophisticated.’

‘Bella,’ I whisper.

‘Yes, Eddie?’ she whispers back.

‘I’m a bit drunk.’

‘Me too!’ she says, and for some reason, we both find this hilarious.

The door gives way unexpectedly and we stumble into the island-themed bar with its stunning view of the ring road, and the look that crosses the barman’s face is one of calculation: the risk that we will cause a ruckus versus the presumably low takings of the completely deserted bar.

He motions for us to come in as though we are clambering into a treehouse in secret.

We get to the bar, and I am relieved to have something against which to lean. My knee did not care for the steep walk up to the bar.

‘What’ll it be?’ the barman asks, fastening the top button on his Hawaiian-print shirt, which looks like it was originally part of a Halloween costume.

‘Two Old Fashioneds,’ Bella orders as my phone rings and Marjie asks me if I’m okay and if I plan to return to my place of work at any point.

As I turn away to answer the call, I hear the barman ask Bella, ‘Is that your grandad?’

‘Don’t be so ageist!’ I hear her scandalized response and then something, something, ‘… he’s my friend.’

Friend.

So we are

friends . That’s truly lovely

, I think through my Old Fashioned haze.

Marjie seems to find it hilarious that I’m a touch tipsy in the middle of the day. She tells me to take the rest of the day off, and when she asks me who I am having my impromptu bar crawl with, I decide to use Bella’s word. ‘A friend,’ I tell Marjie. ‘A new one.’

‘Well, good for you, Eddie,’ Marjie says. ‘Go out and have some fun. If you need a lift home later, let me know.’

When I return to the bar, I give the barman a smile and say, ‘Do you know, I think I’m too old to be her grandad. Wouldn’t I have to be her great

-grandad?’ He looks embarrassed. ‘No, no,’ I say, waving a hand at him, ‘I’m not offended, and – fantastic shirt, by the way – if her mother is in her forties, I’d have had to have had her when I was nearly fifty. So I’m probably great-grandfather age. Maybe even older.’

‘Mick Jagger had a child in his seventies,’ the barman says helpfully.

‘That’s very helpful,’ I tell him, and make my wobbly way over to the table Bella has secured for us by the window, where we can watch the cars on the ring road whizz by.

‘I’ve not been this drunk in years,’ I tell Bella as I sit down

on a squishy cube that wasn’t designed with the stability of a nonagenarian in mind. I had forgotten how silly and fun it is to be drunk. ‘I can’t even feel my teeth.’

We clink our glasses together.

‘To Jake,’ she says.

‘To Jake.’

‘I miss him,’ she says, and, just as I think she might cry, she takes a huge swig of her Old Fashioned and says, ‘Tell me, then, Eddie. Who was your

first kiss?’

Oh no. Not this.

‘I, er—’ I look around the bar for some sort of distraction. ‘What do you think of the barman’s shirt? It’s growing on me.’

But she is not so easily dissuaded. ‘Tell me. Go on. I can keep a secret.’

My stomach twists. ‘I can’t tell you about my first kiss. It’s not possible.’

‘Are you respecting his or her privacy?’

‘No, no, nothing like that.’

‘Then are you embarrassed about who it was?’

‘I am embarrassed.’

‘How bad can it really have been? A girl at my school kissed a guy who turned out to be her second cousin.’

‘What? No. I just— It’s not the time.’

‘It is

the time.’

‘And it’s not the place.’

‘It is most definitely the playze.’

‘Playze?’

‘Plays. Plaize. Pla-eee-ssss.’ She laughs.

‘It’s none of those things, either.’

‘ Ed-die

,’ she whines. ‘Why won’t you tell me about your first kiss?’

‘I can’t tell you,’ I say, raising my glass and toasting to her. ‘Because it hasn’t happened yet.’