The Waitress

by Melissa Nathan

  As she made the lunch-time sandwiches, she dwelt on the fact that she couldn’t have got Dan more wrong. The hardest thing in all of this, she mused, would be reminding herself that the Dan she’d met at Sandy’s engagement party and the Dan she’d thought he was at the wedding were figments of her imagination. They did not exist.

  “You know,” said Sukie to the room in general, “when the sun’s out, it really does help you forget that your life is a great big pile of steaming poo.”

  Everyone agreed with her.

  “But my life isn’t a great big pile of steaming poo,” said Patsy happily.

  Katie and Sukie gave her a look. “You continue to remind us of that, sunshine,” warned Sukie, “and we’ll do our best to rectify it.”

  “To what it?” asked Patsy.

  “Correct it,” said Katie.

  “Ah thanks,” smiled Patsy.

  Sukie, Katie and the commuters rolled their eyes, and then Sukie’s and Katie’s widened in stunned silence as Dan walked in. He looked at them all and stopped.

  “What?” he demanded.

  “What?” demanded everyone back and then pretended to get on with what they were doing before.

  “What?” demanded Patsy generally.

  “You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Dan told Sukie and Katie.

  “Well, you look as if you are a ghost,” Sukie told him back.

  “Cheers,” said Dan. “‘Welcome back’ would have done.”

  A few of the commuters started welcoming him back but the moment had passed. “Katie,” he sighed, “can I have a word?” And he walked past them all into the kitchen.

  Katie was reluctant to follow him, firstly because he looked so terrible. Secondly because she was going to miss the group dissection, led by Sukie, out front in the café. Thirdly, because she was now furious that he knew that she knew he was engaged when they’d kissed and had felt no need to defend himself. As soon as she followed him, she heard him tell Nik to leave them alone for a minute. She and Nik stared at each other as they crossed paths and Dan asked Nik to close the door behind him.

  Then he stood looking at the floor for a while. She crossed her arms. He looked up and her breath caught. He was crying.

  “Oh God!” she gasped. She wanted to go to him but was too confused by all her conflicting emotions.

  He bit his trembling lip, coughed and impatiently wiped his eyes.

  “I’ve got some bad news,” he said hoarsely.

  Katie swallowed.

  “Paul has withdrawn as a partner of Crichton Brown’s.” He gave a big sigh and wiped his face with his sleeve. She stared.

  “Financially, you mean?” she asked.

  He nodded.

  “So…” she began, “what does that mean? Exactly?”

  He gave a short, hard laugh. “It means I’m going to have to sell up.” He gave a very long, hearty sniff.

  She stared at him for a while.

  “Is this why you’re crying?” she asked quietly.

  He nodded, blinked and wiped his eyes with his sleeve.

  “And why you’ve been off for the past couple of days?”

  He nodded.

  “And why you didn’t return my calls?”

  He hid his eyes in his arm. “Sorry.”

  She was unable to speak for a moment; too many thoughts were going through her mind; let alone emotions, which were looping round the spaghetti junction in her stomach. She opened her mouth, then shut it. Then she opened it again.

  “How much money do you need?” she asked quietly.

  He told her. At this, she was unable to speak again; thoughts, emotions and various bodily functions experiencing momentary gridlock.

  To both their surprise, she let out a laugh. He looked up at her and she said affectionately, “You are a great twerp.”

  He frowned. “Well, thank you for being so honest—” he started, before being unable to continue.

  “No,” she cut in. “I mean—you should have told me earlier.”

  “Really? Why?” He gave her an earnest look.

  “Because it just so happens that I have that much money.”

  Dan gasped. “Wha-wha-how?”

  “None of your business!” she laughed. “Now…let me see.” She pretended to think hard. “What do I want to do with my money? Hmm.”

  “Can I ask what you had planned to do with it?” Dan whispered.

  She started laughing and then tried to work out where to start.

  Hugh lay on his rug on the patch of grass that was called a London garden. If he wasn’t able to go into work he might as well get a tan. Anyway, he was absolutely exhausted. He was going to the party tonight at Katie’s café, and maybe she’d like the new, tanned him.

  When the doorbell rang, he woke with a start. He tried to ignore it, but the ringing was persistent. Eventually he got up, wiped his face and chest with a towel, put on his flip-flops and stepped into the house. As he flip-flopped through the hall it took his eyes a while to adjust to the dark, and then, when he opened the front door, it took them a while to adjust to the dazzling light again. Then it took them a while to adjust to who was standing in front of him.

  “Hello, Hugh,” said Maxine. “Are you going to invite me in?”

  While Sukie, Patsy and Nik waited impatiently outside the café’s kitchen, Sukie’s mobile rang. She gave it a quick look before walking over to the furthest table and taking the call.

  “Hi Greta,” she rushed. “Listen, before you say anything, I have to apologize.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I have to apologize to you.”

  “Whatever for?”

  “For not taking your advice seriously. For being precious about my stupid art. For moaning about my bad luck when I’ve got my health and my looks and my youth. For not appreciating all the work you do for me. For being a pain in the backside. I’m really really sorry. I know I don’t deserve you. I’ve never even made you much money. From now on—”

  “Well all that’s about to change, oh sweetest of hearts,” laughed Greta.

  “What? More money?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “Another advert?”

  “No, just the part of Lucie Manette in the BBC’s adaptation of A Tale of Two Cities.”

  Sukie couldn’t believe her ears. She made Greta repeat herself and then swear on her mother’s grave that she wasn’t lying. Greta pretended to be hugely insulted that she should assume her mother was dead—she was a lively octogenarian on a golfing holiday in Malta—but no she was not lying. It turned out that Miranda Armstrong had just won a part in a Hollywood film. It was only a walk-on part, but you don’t turn something like that down. Not if you want to be asked twice. Lucie was hers.

  “Just remember always to keep some mints on you, my dear,” concluded Greta.

  When Sukie finished the call she sat back, gave a squeal and then waited for the elation to hit home. She was rather surprised when she just felt extraordinarily tired and emotional. She wanted to tell Katie and Jon, but forced herself to wait and tell them tonight at the party, when they were all together and when she could toast them a thank you for seeing every single play she’d been in.

  Dan stared in disbelief at Katie.

  “A café?” he blustered. “You were going to buy a café?”

  “Yes!” breathed Katie, “I—”

  “You were going to leave me—I mean us—leave the café?”

  “Well yes, but—”

  “When were you going to tell me?” he cried.

  “I tried—”

  “After all we’ve been through together? What the hell was I supposed to do without you—”

  “Now hold on a minute!” cried Katie. “Give me a chance to explain.”

  Dan gave her a curt nod. The skin round his eyes seemed to have suddenly shrunk.

  Katie took a deep breath. “I realized when I went home that I wanted to run my own café, not run someone else’s. Ideally,” she paused
, “ideally it would have been this one. But you and Paul were the owners so I’d never really be technically in control. So I talked it over with my great-aunt—whose money it is—and we both worked out that it was probably better for me to invest in a café that was more…” she struggled to find the right word, “safe.”

  He frowned at her and she spoke quietly. “I think we both know that our kiss at Sandy’s wedding was very wrong. You were—and are—engaged.”

  Dan stared at her in shock. So Sukie had told her he was engaged. What else had he expected? His chest tightened. “I—”

  She held up her hand. “Please. I know I wouldn’t have been one of the first you’d tell, but it was not a very nice way to find out.” He grimaced at the thought of Sukie breaking the news to her. “It’s a lot of money to invest in a business,” she said, “and I need to feel…in control,” she raised her voice to stop him interrupting, “emotionally as well as technically.” It worked. Dan was speechless. “I can’t be in control,” she clarified, “when my boss is someone who would kiss one woman when he’s engaged to another. It’s as simple as that.”

  Dan stared at her. “But-but—” he started, “you didn’t exactly—”

  “I didn’t exactly what?” shrieked Katie, instantly furious.

  “You didn’t exactly take the kiss seriously.”

  “You were engaged!” she shouted. “So does it make it all right if the other girl doesn’t—”

  “No, of course not.” He tried to say something else, stopped and then shook his head, eyes on the floor. “I can’t say anything,” he finished, almost inaudibly.

  Katie realized how much she’d hoped for a contradiction. But no. He really was going to marry Geraldine. The hurt was almost as much as the sudden dip in her respect for him.

  She needed to talk to Great-Aunt Edna again. This café would be a wonderful investment and now that she had confronted the painful truth about Dan and accepted him for what he really was, maybe she would fall out of love with him and finally be safe.

  Or would she be kidding herself and subconsciously hoping that he would leave Geraldine? If so, would he be able to see through her, and abuse that knowledge? Would it all end in tears? Should she just leave now?

  “On my part,” she said finally, “that kiss was a momentary lapse. I am not someone who wants to do that to another woman—or to myself.”

  “I know—”

  She held up her hand. “As for you,” her voice was low, “it makes you…very unattractive.”

  “Please, Katie—” his voice was agonized.

  “I may not be able to see through a first date,” she said sadly, “but I’ve never two-timed anyone. Particularly if one of them was someone I was engaged to.” He hung his head down as if it was suddenly too heavy. “Anyway,” she took a deep breath. “My great-aunt and I discussed it at length and eventually we decided that it would be a very sensible idea for me to buy the café in my home village. I could do a lot to it and it could be mine for life. That way I’d be back with my family, I’d see my nephew grow up, and my great-aunt would know that her money was keeping a village institution alive.” Dan gave a feeble nod. “It was a tough decision to make,” insisted Katie. “I mean, although I was excited at the idea of taking it over, I knew it was going to be really hard to leave…everything here.”

  Dan seemed unable to speak. They stood in silence for a while, the only sound his occasional sniff.

  “But,” murmured Katie slowly, “the fact that Paul is no longer involved and that you are actually looking for a business partner—”

  “—like you,” cut in Dan throatily, “a business partner like you, it would be perfect, just think of it—”

  She put her hand up and he stopped. “It does change things,” she conceded. He stared at her. “I have to talk to my great-aunt,” she said. “It’s all very confusing. I mean for a start, I love this place, but it’s yours and Paul’s—”

  “We’d change it!” he cried. “You and I would be partners—we’d call it Crichton Simmonds—” She blinked and Dan interrupted himself, “Simmonds Crichton—Katie and Dan’s!” he rushed. “Whatever you want! If you were joint owner…if we owned it together, every decision—every single decision—would be made together.”

  They stared at each other.

  “Katie, you know it makes sense,” he whispered. “We work so well together. We’re a team. I can’t do it without you. I don’t want to do it without you. Please, Katie. I’m begging.”

  She looked at him. “And how the hell would Geraldine feel?”

  “Bugger Geraldine!” he cried.

  “Dan!” she cried, dismayed. “That’s a terrible thing to say. And it’s terrible if you think I’d want you to say that.”

  He rushed to her. “Katie. This is our life.”

  She shook her head, annoyed. “You need my money, Dan. I’m not a fool. And I won’t let you hurt Geraldine. Or me.”

  “God,” said Dan, ashen-faced, “what do you think I’m like?”

  “I think you’re desperate at the moment,” she said softly, “and you think you’ve suddenly found the answer. But I deserve more than that. And so does Geraldine. It’s her life too,” she insisted. “You’re going to marry her. She matters, Dan. Don’t make me despise you.”

  His head jerked back like he’d been slapped in the face. “I have to talk to her,” he murmured, as if to himself.

  “Yes. Talk to her. About everything, Dan. About what happened at Sandy’s wedding as well as the possibility of me becoming your business partner. Or I’ll tell her. And only if she is absolutely fine with that, will I consider putting my money into Crichton Brown’s. I won’t take anything less.”

  He paused and then gave a firm nod. “I’ll tell her everything.”

  “All right,” said Katie. “And I have to talk to my great-aunt. It may be a very wise investment for me, but a very foolish direction. I’m more than money, Dan.”

  He held her by the arms. “Katie, I’d leave this place in an instant and come with you to your café if you’d let me.” She stared at him. “Sod the money,” he continued. “I want you.” She gasped and he stopped her by talking over it. “Look, let me talk to Geraldine.” She couldn’t move. He suddenly took her hands in his and held them firmly against his chest. “Katie. Please. Trust me.” She let out a spikey laugh. “I know you don’t believe me because of…but I’ll tell you everything—I’ll explain everything—after I’ve spoken to her. Believe me. Please, Katie. I need to talk to Geraldine. And then I need to talk to you. Meet me back here before the party. Promise me.” She held her breath. “Please Katie.”

  She gave a small nod.

  They stood in the kitchen, hands held, staring at each other for what felt like hours but was probably only moments. Dan seemed to be struggling to say more, but instead he gave her hands one final squeeze and then let go, turned and left.

  She watched him go, his words, “I want you,” ringing in her ears. Did he just mean as a business partner? Or more? Could she ever really be safe with him if she felt like this? Could she ever really trust a man who had treated his fiancée the way he had? She stared at the door after him as if it could explain everything. When it opened again, she almost jumped.

  She blinked at him. He stopped. She held her breath. Were the next few words going to answer all her questions? Was her future about to be mapped out? He gave her an apologetic smile.

  “Forgot my keys,” he said, picked them up off the counter, turned and left again.

  She had to phone Great-Aunt Edna. She needed advice.

  Chapter 30

  THE CAFÉ WAS CLOSING AT SIX SO THAT THE PARTY COULD START AT eight, so Katie had two hours to make contact with Great-Aunt Edna before Dan got back from seeing Geraldine. Plenty of time, she told herself, but after forty minutes of no reply, she was beginning to get concerned. She’d give her another ten minutes and then phone home to ask them to pop round and check that she was all right. Meanwhile, it
was officially party preparation time. The others got excited and when Matt turned up after one of his exams to join in the fun, he was greeted like a long-lost friend. They all sat at one of the tables with their preferred choice of caffeine for a quick break.

  “Is Dan coming back?” asked Sukie.

  “Of course,” replied Katie. “He’s just got some business to attend to.” It suddenly dawned on her just how horrible the next two hours could be for Geraldine—and Dan. She stared at her coffee. Was she making a big mistake? Was she getting carried away with the moment? Was she playing people off against each other to get her own way? Oh dear, she really did need to talk all this through with Great-Aunt Edna. She took out her mobile and went back into the kitchen to try again.

  In her flat, Geraldine placed the veil delicately on her bed, just below the tiara. She smiled at it in awe. How could such a fragile thing be so magical? She looked at her engagement ring again and moved it in the light, marveling at the exquisite twinkle a diamond gave. She placed a box at the bottom of the bed and gently took out the shoes. She lifted them to her nose and drank in the aroma of leather and satin. She pulled the tiny carrier bag out of the wardrobe and eased the stockings out of it as if they were leaves of gold. Then she unrolled them over her knees and up her thighs, where she clipped them on to her suspenders. She slid her feet into the shoes and, with trembling hands, picked up the tiara and veil and secured them firmly on her head.

  She turned and looked at herself in the mirror and smiled at her reflection. The basque was simply divine, giving her the waist and cleavage she’d always dreamed of. She couldn’t wait for the dress to be ready.

  She put her hands round her waist and one leg slightly in front of the other. She had tried on this charming ensemble every day since she’d bought them—until the row. The row had totally immobilized her. It was only the second time in their whole relationship that Dan had ever not apologized afterward, and the first time had been followed by an unceremonious dumping in Pizza Express. She’d been absolutely terrified he was going to do it again and had waited, petrified, for his call and those four ugliest words in a relationship: We Have To Talk.