In last week’s instalment Annie makes an appointment to meet the new builder and also arranges her date with celebrity, Reef Mayer!
Now read on …
Bea has come to help me prepare for my date with Reef. She’s more of a hindrance than a help. For every outfit she pulls from my wardrobe and asks, ‘what about this?’ she tries it on herself. Before giving me the opportunity to choose anything at all, she looks herself up and down in the mirror and says, ‘No this won’t do.’ Bea is a foot shorter than me and about two sizes smaller so my clothes swim around her and look absurd. She cinches everything she tries on around the waist with something from my accessories hanger, my small collection of belts and scarves.
‘Don’t forget, Bea, I’m the one going on the date and they might look better on me being as they’re my clothes.’
I sit on the pillows on my bed, leaning on the headboard, my knees crossed, cradling a cup of peppermint tea. We’ve been at this for an hour and in my head I’ve already chosen what I’m going to wear. It’s the only thing I have that’s less than a year old and should still fit me. It’s a dark blue, silk dress I’d bought to cheer myself up with from the Next website one night when I’d been awake for hours and didn’t know what to do with myself. It fitted well and though I’d thought the colour might have been sombre, it looked classy and I’d convinced myself to keep it in case of emergencies. Bea had tossed it over her shoulder towards the bed, unconvinced. It had sailed up in my general direction but being so light it had fluttered like a leaf between the small gap between the side table and bed, a sleeve holding onto the quilt for dear life. I have it laying neatly on the bed by the pillows.
‘This will be fine,’ I say looking at the thin belt around the waistline and the slight pleats around the skirt. The neckline is deep and v-shaped and while I consider a necklace or chain Bea wriggles out of my dungarees.
‘Are you sure?’ she asks with a frown. ‘Won’t it make you look frumpy?’
‘I hope not,’ I say re-arranging it on the bed as if someone were wearing it. I had thought it made me look sophisticated, yet sexy, in an expensive sort of way. It had also occurred to me that I needed silk lingerie to go with it but hadn’t gone as far as making a purchase. Something I am regretting now that I discover Bea’s underwear is sexier than mine and she’s more than twice my age.
‘Well I suppose it will have to do.’ Bea busily pulls on her own clothes and shoes. ‘What about make up? Can I trust you to get that right?’
I nod.
‘Good, because I need to get going. I have a booty call.’
‘A what?’
‘You heard. This old friend of mine, haven’t seen him in yonks and he’s up for a wild evening so I’d better get ready and go over there.’
I look at the time on my phone.
‘Bea it’s five in the afternoon. I thought booty calls were late at night.’ I hold my dress up in front of me and look in the mirror.
‘I know,’ she says, ‘but by the time I shower, do my make up and things it could be almost seven. And you know what these old codgers are like. In bed by nine with a cup of Horlicks. I need to get in there before rigor mortis sets in or he forgets he suggested a get together in the first place. Old people forget things, that’s why I don’t date them.’ She touches my cheek. ‘You have a bloody good time, my darling and make sure he spends a fortune.’
I give a weak smile. I’m just happy to be on a date.
‘And make sure you mention that engagement party. Get him to escort you. You’ll be the talk of the town when they hear who you’re on a date with tonight.’
Like a rushing wave, Bea leaves the house and I know full well that no one in this town or anywhere is going to be talking about me. One dinner with Reef Mayer is hardly newsworthy stuff and I wouldn’t dare mention the engagement party. It’ll make me sound as if I haven’t had a date in ages and Reef doesn’t need to know that.
At six-fifteen, the taxi arrives. It’s over an hour to Birmingham city centre and over 60 miles of creases being etched into my new silk dress. I try to sit sideways on one hip for a lot of the way, swapping from hip to hip when the numbness gets to me as we zip along the M5. I undo my coat and begin to smooth along the seat of my dress, hoping I won’t have that ‘seated’ look people get in their clothes by the end of an evening out.
At least I’d worked out what to do with my hair. I’d blow dried the whole mass of it that morning. It had taken well over an hour and my arms ached. Now my buttocks ache from sitting awkwardly for so long. My abdominal muscles have undergone an intense workout because in the end I’d decided to hover above my seat to prevent more wrinkles in my dress.
I get a text from Reef to ask how far away I am and I tell him I’ve just seen a sign for Birmingham O2 Academy so I must be close.
‘Great,’ he says. ‘I’ll look out for you.’
When the driver pulls up outside the hotel Reef is standing outside in a raw silk suit of peacock blue. It started raining minutes ago and a fine sheen of water droplets covers his hair which he wears loose and collar length tonight. He is backlit by the hotel foyer and though his face is in shadow, his teeth still shine through. He steps up to the car door and pulls it open with a flourish before offering me his hand to take. It’s large and smooth, a thick ring with a green stone circles his little finger. I step out and adjust the strap of my handbag. Reef runs a hand through his hair and smells expensive. The rain begins to pelt down from the starless sky. Reef crooks his arm and rushes me to the glass doors of the hotel which open automatically.
‘I had them set up a room in the suite for dinner.’ He turns to me. ‘Are you okay with that?’ Reef has a suite, not just a room. I’ve never stayed in a suite. All of a sudden I am aware of how I must look in my coat which is far too thin for this weather but was the dressiest I had. It’s French Connection, which isn’t bad but still very High Street compared to my date.
‘Er, yes, that’s fine.’ I’m starving and the fewer people who see Reef Mayer out with a woman in a crumpled dress, the better.
He places a warm hand into the small of my back and glides me to the row of lifts beyond reception. As we ascend, I glance at his smiling eyes briefly before focussing my attention on the floor numbers blinking their way skywards. I have no idea how many floors we have or will be travelling upward, my mind has already shifted to the scene in Funny Girl in which Omar Sharif invites Barbara Streisand to dine in his hotel suite. It’s a musical and she proceeds to sing her way through a decision making process of whether she will sleep with him or not. Without singing a note I have already decided I’m not staying overnight. I won’t be sleeping with Reef until I’m sure this isn’t some kind of social experiment and that I’m not part of a candid camera reality show. I must wake up in my own bed, in my house, in Ross on Wye, no matter how tempting the prospect of spending the night in a luxury hotel with this man is.
It is with a nervous shiver through my arms that I tentatively take off my coat to reveal my wardrobe faux pas. Reef takes in the deep V in the front of my dress, rather than the creases, as he helps me off with the French Connection offering. I rush over to the sofa and flop down quickly. This will incur further creasing but I need to steer his hopeful attention away from my cleavage. I’m not going to stay the night. I’m not.
‘I’ve got some champagne on ice.’ Reef gestures to the set table by the window that looks onto a rainy city night with yellow lights from distant buildings visible from miles away. Two high backed chairs are tucked underneath, their seats covered by the crisp table linen draping onto the deep pile carpet. There’s an ice bucket stand beside the table. I don’t recognise the label on the champagne bottle but the expense surrounding me knows no bounds.
‘Champagne?’ I say in a small voice I hardly recognise. ‘Isn’t that be for special occasions?’
Reef bounds over to the bottle and begins to open it.
‘It’s special for me,’ he says as a loud pop makes me jump. He pours some champagne and brings over two frothy glasses. Handing one to me he sits beside me on the sofa so that our knees brush. ‘Cheers.’
Our glasses touch softly together and Reef sips his champagne with Omar Sharif eyes that never leave mine and I down champagne with gusto and no attempt to savour it. I hold the near empty glass and begin smoothing the skirt of my dress down my thighs in a way I hope isn’t suggestive.
‘You can’t go wrong with champagne,’ says Reef. ‘I didn’t know what you drank so I thought we could start with this.’ He lifts his glass again. I giggle because I don’t know what else to say or do. I feel the reality of not having dated in forever, in my vocal chords. A physical force renders them inactive and though my mind cycles a list of topics we could discuss, no voice comes out, not even the action of moving my lips to allow for sound. All I can do is drink. I drain the last of my champagne and Reef leaps off the sofa.
‘More?’ He already has the bottle in his hand and I’ve already angled my glass towards him knowing that ending up drunk is the worst thing I can do, especially as I intend to leave straight after the meal.
‘I’ve got menus,’ Reef hands one to me and I happily put my champagne glass onto the side table.
‘This all looks tasty,’ I say. ‘What’s the food like here?’
‘Pretty good.’
It’s difficult to concentrate on the list of starters and main courses with Reef regarding me so closely. I can’t imagine how many times he must have wined and dined a woman in his hotel suite before.
‘I haven’t been out with anyone for a while,’ Reef says and rests his menu on his knee. ‘If truth be told, I’m a bit nervous. I ordered champagne to break the ice a bit and I thought dinner in the room might seem romantic.’
A nervous guffaw gushes from my lips into his face and he blushes.
‘Sorry. No,’ I say. ‘It’s very romantic. I love it, I do, but I’m shaking like a leaf. I got myself so worked up about tonight and on the way here my dress got creased. I mean, seriously, I didn’t know it was possible to suspend yourself above the seat in the back of a taxi for that long. I didn’t think my abs would hold out but they did. For a good ten miles. And I don’t want to stay the night and I wish I could stop talking so fast and embarrassing myself in front of Reef Mayer. And I’m really sorry I didn’t know who you were. I just don’t follow football. I’m sorry.’
Reef’s eyes have been bright with a smile during my monologue. He takes the menu out of my hand.
‘There’s a Pizza Express around the corner. Fancy it?’
‘Love to,’ I say puffing my cheeks as I exhale.
The rain comes down more heavily as we leave the hotel. There are a couple of photographers at the door, two tired looking middle aged men. Somebody from the hotel must have informed them that Reef was here on a date. I hear one or two clicks of the camera and I turn to see the men vanish into the rain splashed night. Reef completely ignores them and has his arm around my shoulder as he guides me down a side street of closed shops and open restaurants. Their lights reflect onto the wet ground making the puddles dance with flecks of pale yellow. Water splashes my ankles, it settles in my hair and Reef pulls me towards the door of Pizza Express.
‘Table for two?’ he asks a moon faced boy who stares at Reef with his mouth agape. The boy nods, pulls two menus from the glass pocket by the door and wordlessly leads us to a table that is slap bang in the middle of the restaurant. His lips move like a goldfish in a bowl blowing bubbles as he points out a table for two hemmed in by two rather boisterous ones. The rowdy diners are alarmed when they see Reef. They hold up their phones and begin a series of one sided conversations. ‘Is that him?’ ‘You’re joking, right?’ ‘Low key, that’s Reef Mayer.’
‘If you’ve got something a bit quieter …’ Reef says.
‘Um,’ says the boy and takes us to a small table by the window which faces a narrow street of expensive apartment buildings.
‘This is great, thanks.’ The boy puts the menus on the table, mutters something about a waitress and leaves us to it. Reef offers me a chair and I sit in my wet coat before peeling it off at the shoulders and pulling it out from under me one buttock at a time. Reef gets up, grabs my coat and looks for a coat stand, as do I but there are none in sight so he eases the coat onto the back of my chair.
‘Right,’ I say, looking at familiar pizza names.
‘Is this okay?’ Reef leans forward.
‘Perfect,’ I say as a short girl bobs up to the table.
‘Any drinks?’ She hasn’t acknowledged me, only Reef, who nods towards me and asks what I’d like.
‘We could share a bottle of red. The house wine looks nice.’
‘And some still water,’ Reef says.
I ask Reef how the documentary is going and he begins to tell me all about it. The subject is a footballer I’ve never heard of and Reef is following the course of his intriguing life; the journey starts in his boyhood home in Selly Oak to the playing field where he first scored a goal for the school and on to Birmingham City F.C. where he scored his first goal against Wolverhampton Wanderers.
This is the waitress’s third trip to the table. The first was to deliver the drinks and ask if Reef was ready to order. He’d smiled at her and asked for more time. He was enjoying telling me about filming and what it was like memorising his lines for the “docu”. Apparently, there is media speculation about Reef becoming the new manager at Birmingham City F.C. where they have a caretaker manager in place since the last one was sacked, but no decisions have been made. He tells me this with his eyes on the small pink flowers in the white vase between us.
‘So, what are we having?’ The waitress looks at Reef who in turn looks at me and as the waitress’s eyes reluctantly land in my general direction she gasps and looks at the area slightly above my head. I immediately want to touch my hair but resist the urge. There can only be one reason a person would be alarmed if they saw me with blow dried hair. It would be because I’d been caught in rain and the once smooth lines of my blow out are no longer smooth but frizzed up and wiry and weirdly misshapen. How could I have forgotten the fundamentals of straightened hair and precipitation? I lower my eyes and feel the heat travel up my neck, into my face, past my temples and onto my already clammy forehead. I pray that my hair is hiding most of the redness and shame. I ask for a Margherita pizza when I actually always want a La Reine. Reef orders a Sloppy Joe and hands our menus back to the waitress.
‘More drinks?’
Reef and I both say no at the same time and I can’t bring myself to look up. Just when I thought the evening was picking up and I was finally able to relax. I desperately want to get to a mirror or to find a hat shop but I know everywhere will be closed. The napkin could act as a bandanna but I dare not move a muscle.
‘You’ve gone quiet,’ Reef says.
‘I’m just. That is …’ I look at the pink flowers. ‘How bad does my hair look?’
‘Oh that! Not too bad, really.’
‘If someone says that, it means it is bad. Shit. Sorry. I wanted to look nice. I know I’m no match for –’
‘Who? Look, Annie I’m not looking for a replacement for Noé’s mother. I know what they’ve been saying in the magazines and everything. I saw that thing on Tik Tok with all the similarities between my exes.’ I’d seen an article myself. A parade of women who all looked like Natalia De Veras: Moroccan mother, Spanish father, her honey coloured skin and thick black hair, eyes large, her feline charm. I have the whitest skin, I’m shapeless and even my attempts to do something with my hair hadn’t come close to Natalia’s or any of the other women Reef has been pictured with. The paparazzi had papped us for a total of two seconds when they saw who Reef was with outside the hotel earlier. I wasn’t pappable.
Reef leans forward and I still haven’t looked up from the vase.
‘What about me?’ he says. ‘Do I need to feel insecure because you’ve never dated an ex professional footballer?’
‘Who says I haven’t?’ My eyes slant towards his face and finally I smile at him.
‘As long as he didn’t play for Man United, that’s okay.’ He takes both my hands and I sit up fully. Looking around I catch the reflection of myself in the window beside me. The upper half of my hair is a fuzzy ball and pretty much like a used pan scourer. The rest lies limply down my back and, just like popcorn, each massive wave and curl is getting ready to explode back to its true nature. Wild and crinkly and too big to tuck into my coat on the way out. I make a mental note to myself that rain brings out the Mr Hyde in my hair and to check the weather before attempting a blow dry.
The waitress places two large plates in front of us and offers Reef some additional black pepper and a grating of Parmesan cheese. He accepts and I say no thank you although the offer wasn’t exactly extended to me. She asks Reef, personally, if there is anything else we need. He looks at me and I say no but she says to Reef, just let me know if you need anything else, okay? And I say thank you very much and she leaves our table.
Half a tiramisu and a coppa gelato later, we’re walking aimlessly through puddles and I’ve forgotten about my hair, my dress and the rude waitress who denied my existence even when I thanked her for her hospitality. She’d asked Reef for an autograph but he said he had a no autograph policy for restaurants as it can get out of hand. He’d winked at me as he paid the bill. I was so glad he’d noticed how she’d tried to freeze me out.
‘What would you like to do next?’ Reef asks. I picture the king sized bed I’d spied through the open door of the lounge in Reef’s hotel suite.
‘It’s a long way home for me,’ I say. ‘I’d better call the taxi company.’
‘Really? I thought we could do something. Go for a coffee at least. Do you need to be anywhere tomorrow? It is Sunday.’
‘I know but I have masses to do in the house to get ready for the builder.’ Among the many things we’d talked about over dinner I’d told Reef about my plans to do up the house. I’d told him about the fun times Cat and I had there as young girls. I didn’t go into any of Mum’s mental health issues but I did talk about her jazz collection and how I knew the head of hundreds of jazz standards. Reef can’t stand jazz.
‘I’d better make a start before they come and give me a quote.’
‘Ah yes, the big renovation,’ Reef says. ‘I know a great interior designer who could give you a great price.’
‘I think great is the operative word. I can’t afford the kinds of people you hire and besides, my house is so small, I’m sure your designer has never had to work on a shoe box before.’
‘You’re funny.’
‘And economical.’
He laughs and then takes my hand.
‘Of course I’ll call the taxi for you, we can wait in reception for it, but you have to promise I can see you again.’
‘You know where I am and I’ll have to start treatment on your shoulder because I can see it’s causing you pain. You really need to watch your posture.’
Reef has disregarded everything I’ve said and pulls me close so that he can kiss me. He hesitates just before he does and I move my lips towards his so that he will kiss me and stop me rambling on about his shoulder. It’s a nice kiss, soft, with lots of film-worthy sighing coming from Reef. When we break away he looks so happy and I smile back, just as cheerily, and allow him to lead me by the hand, back to the hotel. Reef orders two black coffees from reception as we wait for my car.
On the drive home I can fully relax into the seat. My appearance no longer matters. I let out a long sigh and settle in for the long journey home.
The traffic in the city has thinned down considerably. I rub condensation from the glass to look out onto tall buildings and shiny black roads as the driver speeds merrily along to the sound of Nat King Cole on the radio.
‘Don’t mind do yer?’ he says to his mirror.
‘Love this song,’ I say.
We listen as Nat King Cole sings Unforgettable, one of Mum’s favourite shower songs. I can’t wait to tell her about my date, she’ll be happy I’ve met someone and that he wants to take me out again.