Beginnings

Beginnings

‘T HIS IS brILLIANT,’

Bella says, throwing down her bag and squishing beside me on the bench, receiving a furious look from the woman with whom I had been sitting in pleasant silence – her eating her chicken-and-mayo sandwich and me eating a scotch egg. Now Bella has squeezed between the two of us, thighs all a-smooshed, the woman tuts and rises, giving both of us a look.

‘I don’t think she

thinks it’s brilliant,’ I say.

‘No, you,’ Bella says. ‘I couldn’t stop thinking about it last night when I went back to work. One of the biggest moments of your life is still ahead of you.’

‘It is?’

‘Your first kiss is something you never forget.’ She pauses. ‘Well, some girl in the year below me had her first kiss at a party where she got so drunk she was taken to A&E to get her stomach pumped.’

‘Crikey.’

‘She was fine.’ Bella waves a hand. ‘We’ve all been there.’

‘I haven’t.’

‘That’s exactly my point!’ she says. ‘You have one of the biggest things in life still to do. It’s so exciting!’

I have never seen her like this.

‘It is?’

‘I can help you,’ she says, and then, appearing to want to hedge how enthusiastic she is to help me, she adds, ‘You know, if you want.’

And I recall what Bhav said when she dropped off the bags of jewellery for me to search through. ‘So exciting to be searching for something. It gives us purpose, don’t you think?’

‘Maybe …’ I begin to say.

A pigeon flaps down from the tree above us and lands at my feet. We look at it for a moment. It looks back at us with its dark eyes.

‘I often think,’ I tell her, ‘that if it were going to happen, it would have happened by now. Perhaps my first kiss was just not meant to be.’

Bella and the bird exchange a glance. And she shakes her head.

‘It’s not too late, Eddie Winston.’