Sophie's Turn

by Nicky Wells

  “Yes, well...ehm, would you mind…over there on the table?” I croaked, now somewhat embarrassed. However, our lovely waiter didn’t bat an eyelid and walked right over to the dressing table. I fervently hoped he would overlook my knickers nestling gently next to Tim’s boxers right there…on the table. He did. Well, he had to have seen them, but he simply placed the tray on the table, sliding it gently across and thus swiftly and barely noticeably dislodging the offending items such that they fell to the floor. I gulped.

  Then I had another shock. A tip. I needed to tip the waiter. I looked around in panic. I was still by the door, trying to look my most modest and inoffensive now in this rather too-revealing attire. The waiter was by the dressing table. And my purse was…across the room on the other side of the bed, accessible to me only by walking past the waiter, bending down to retrieve it, and then going back. I hadn’t thought this through well enough after all, had I?

  “Purse,” I hissed at Tim, who looked at me uncomprehendingly. “Get me my purse. Beside the bed there, next to you.” Tim followed my gaze and rose to the occasion. We were obviously a “decadent couple,” and my spirit had infected him too. Wrapping the duvet just that little bit tighter around himself, he slid across the bed, extended a naked arm, retrieved my purse, retrieved a few notes, then slid back across the bed and handed them to me. I waggled them briefly in my hand before handing them to the waiter, who couldn’t suppress the flicker of a grin on his otherwise inscrutable professional face.

  “Merci bien,” I offered.

  “Et je vous remercie, moi aussi,” he responded. And smoothly closed the door behind him.

  On the bed, Tim was shaking with laughter and extended his arms out to me, inviting me to join him. “You are incredible,” he declared. “And I’m sorry for my sulk earlier. I just wanted things to be perfect, you know!”

  “I know,” I soothed. “I’m starving though—let’s see what we got here…”

  Two hours later, there was still no sunshine in Paris, but at least the drizzle had ceased and all we had to contend with was grey skies. We did have that walk down the Champs Elysées that we had both wanted, and we also saw some of the major other sights—Arc de Triomphe, Eiffel Tower, the Tuileries, Montmartre, and the Sacré Cœur. We had lunch in a cute little bistro and afternoon coffee in a street café. We snacked on crêpes and hot sugared almonds. We did everything a couple could want to do on a romantic day in Paris, and after a while, Tim even forgot to bemoan the lack of sunshine. By six o’clock, we were both knackered from all the walking, eating, and seeing of things, so we decided it was time for a little rest, and we returned to the hotel. However, fate was against me—or should I say, Tim? We had another little setback when we got back to the hotel. This whole trip was turning into a bit of an up-and-down-and-up-and-down-again rollercoaster.

  The first thing that was slightly amiss when we returned to the hotel was the faint but undeniable smell of sweaty trainers in our corridor. I had acute smelling abilities, so I noticed as soon as we stepped out of the lift. Tim took a little longer to pick up the scent, and by that time, I had already identified the cause of the pong. It was indeed a solitary and abandoned trainer lying just by the potted palm by the lift door. I managed to steer Tim away from the offending item before he could go into another rant.

  However, we would not be able to escape the inevitable. Halfway down the corridor, the door on our right burst open and two picture-perfect teenagers spilt out, chatting to each other at maximum volume.

  “Charlene…Paris is so cool, can you believe it?” one of the teenagers exclaimed excitedly. She had pink skin, pink eye make-up, highly glossy pink lips, and a blonde, cheerily swinging, perfect-length ponytail. To complete the statement, she was wearing a pink jumper with white lacy trimmings over a white mini skirt, and her honey-brown, unbelievably shapely teenage legs ended in white Nike trainers and little white cotton socks.

  Charlene could have been her twin, except her hair was brown, her ponytail was not free-swinging but done into a French braid, and her clothes were all-white. She looked like she should be in an ad for Wrigley’s chewing gum. “Oh, man, yeah, it’s cool.”

  We didn’t get to hear any further opinions from Charlene because another door opened and more teenagers emerged, this time accompanied by a loud blast of pop music. By now, there were ten of them congregating in the corridor and without any apparent intention of disappearing. Tim’s face was a cloud of thunder, and I hastily propelled him forward so that we could reach the—hopefully—relative sanity of our room. Just as I closed the door behind me, I could hear an authoritative adult voice asking the kids to assemble by the lifts so that they could all go for dinner. And no, they would not be allowed to split and explore clubs after dinner; they would all return to the hotel together, in orderly fashion, for an early night. A full day of educational sightseeing lay ahead tomorrow.

  Quiet descended as suddenly as it had been shattered. “Phew,” I declared breezily, “they’re gone.” But that was no consolation for my Tim.

  “They’ll be back,” he mouthed, almost rendered speechless with shock. “How could they do this to us?”

  “How could who do what to us?” I asked, although I had a shrewd suspicion of what was going to come next. Tim was no joker when it came to getting value for money, and an incident such as this would easily be interpreted as a deliberate attempt at defrauding us.

  “The hotel. Put a corridor of school kids with us.”

  Ten out of ten for reading my man right. He pondered for a second. “Call reception and ask them to move us to a different room,” he suddenly instructed.

  I stared question marks at him.

  “Go on, do it,” he insisted.

  Now that would be one of those things that would embarrass me to death. I didn’t like complaining. Well, I did like complaining—I could moan to friends or to Tim for hours about things that annoyed me. But I was a little hypocritical about actually complaining to anyone with the intent of changing anything about the offending circumstance. Perhaps I was just too British—stiff upper lip and all that.

  I gave a little moan. “Must I?”

  “Please. For me. For us.” The sulky puppy-dog eyes were back. I heaved a massive sigh and gave it a go. But a few minutes of back-and-forth with the concierge confirmed what I had feared; there were no other rooms to be had, and management was terribly sorry—but not very sincere—about any disturbance that might be caused by other visitors. Great.

  Although I was secretly just a touch worried myself, there was patently nothing to be done about it. We only had one more night there. Plus the teacher-chaperone had sounded quite efficient, and I was determined to track down her room for emergency complaints later on. Tim took it quite hard and descended into another gloom. However, sensing my growing impatience with his mood swings, he did his best to be game and disappeared in the shower to sulk quietly on his own, leaving me to flop on the bed and watch a bit of French evening telly.

  Reasonable mood and energy somehow restored to both of us after a little rest, we were ready for dinner by about eight. Meanwhile, it had started drizzling again and the evening looked uninviting. My feet were killing me and I really didn’t fancy any more walking, and Tim didn’t want to go out in the rain. It wasn’t a difficult decision, then, to settle for one of the hotel’s restaurants. A quick tour of the hotel guide convinced us to try the hotel’s main restaurant for dinner, and off we went.

  I had just polished off my third glass of wine when I noticed a beautiful woman staring at us from two tables away. Initially, I thought I had disgraced myself in some way and tried to examine my face in the shiny cutlery. However, I only had spoons left unused, and I couldn’t really make out much in the distorted, bendy reflections they yielded. Tim observed my resulting contortions with wry amusement—obviously I wasn’t going to lift the spoons off the table, so instead I tried to catch a glimpse by twisting my head into some kind of useful position.

  �
��What are you doing?” he asked at length.

  “Err…do I have something on my face?” I asked in a tiny, tiny whisper. “A bogey? A piece of parsley stuck in my teeth? Has my mascara run?” I listed all female appearance mishaps that I could think of.

  “No, you look fine to me. Beautiful,” he assured me, and we clinked glasses. But the woman was still staring. She herself looked immaculate—immaculate brown hair cut into an immaculate layered bob, with immaculate make-up and immaculately French-manicured rose fingertips. The composed, cool type of woman who would make me feel uneasy and…gauche somehow, however much attention I had paid to my own looks and attire.

  “Then why is that woman staring at me?” I hissed. Tim turned to take a look. Meanwhile, the woman—whose companion looked just as discomfited as I felt—had risen from her chair and actually walked toward our table.

  Tim exhaled sharply.

  “My God…it’s Dina!” Before I could ask who the heck Dina was, Tim, too, had risen and went to greet her, a big grin on his face and arms wide open. Hang on, Dina, not that Dina?

  Dina’s companion and I were left at our respective tables open-mouthed, watching this unexpected reunion spectacle with little comprehension.

  Quickly, a glowing Tim and a radiant Dina turned, first to me, then to her partner, to exclaim on the complete randomness of their chance encounter here, in Paris of all places, and wasn’t it utterly wonderful?

  Personally, I wasn’t convinced. As far as I had gathered, Tim’s relationship with Dina hadn’t ended on the best of terms. She had dumped him, brutally and without any warning whatsoever, the day he took up his position in London. Tim rarely spoke of Dina, and when he did, it was usually with a fair amount of bitterness. I had, once or twice, wondered whether he perhaps hadn’t quite got over her, but he denied that viciously. All of that was years ago. I hadn’t given my only predecessor that much thought. Perhaps I should have? She was beautiful and Tim was responding to her presence altogether too enthusiastically.

  Dina’s dinner companion looked equally baffled and just as unsure as I when the happily-reunited pair decided that it would be “just grand” if we all spent the rest of the evening together. I tried meaningful looks and snorts, but Tim was totally unreceptive. After some excited consultation between Dina and Tim, it was decided that we should repair to the bar on the top floor to enjoy cocktails and the spectacular vista.

  Before I could react, Tim and Dina rushed ahead to the lifts, walking rather too close together for my liking, and chatting animatedly. Dina’s companion and I were left trailing behind like abandoned puppies.

  As the four of us finally squeezed around a tiny table in the bar, Tim had a look of suffused happiness about him that was most unsettling. I suddenly felt out of place.

  “Dina was just telling me about her day’s shopping,” he gushed. “Look at this divine dress!”

  Divine dress? I choked on my cocktail. I had never heard Tim use the word “divine” in the same breath as something as mundane as an item of clothing. Okay, Dina’s dress was very chique, but in a very…green, conservative kind of way. It suited her but it really wasn’t me. Yet…

  “Maybe you could take Sophie out in the morning, show her where you got this?” Tim suggested helpfully, and I felt myself blush at the implied slight. The look of horror on Dina’s face was priceless.

  “I bet you two have all sorts of plans for tomorrow,” she tinkled merrily, trying to defuse the sudden tension. “Maybe some other time?”

  I didn’t know whether she rescued me out of sympathy or self-interest, but I was grateful either way. After that, the evening passed swiftly, and I relaxed considerably once it emerged that Dina’s companion, Robert, was actually her fiancé. Nonetheless, I would have preferred not to share Tim that night. He would never propose now, if that was indeed what he had planned.

  Chapter Six

  “I had a lovely time,” Tim beamed at me the next evening as we settled into our seats on the Eurostar on the way home.

  “Me, too,” I replied automatically, even though inwardly I was, well, just a little disgruntled. We had had a lovely time of sorts, just not the sort I had wanted. At Tim’s suggestion, seconded with much enthusiasm by Dina, we had spent most of the day traipsing round the Louvre with her and Robert—and yes, it had been fine.

  But.

  But it had been unnerving, watching Tim and Dina in action together all day, recalling a shared history and laughing at private jokes. Robert had stood by indulgently, secure in the knowledge that we would reclaim his fiancée later. I had felt mostly like I was dating someone else’s boyfriend for the day.

  Moreover, although grateful for Tim’s unwavering—and, for once, unflinching—commitment to picking up each and every bill, I couldn’t help but feel a little cheated that another type of commitment still didn’t seem to be forthcoming. I wondered whether I would have felt equally hurt if Dina’s engaged appearance hadn’t brought the whole lack-of-proposal thing to the front of my mind. Maybe. Probably. Anyway, she had been there, she was engaged—the lucky cow—and here I was with Tim, who just couldn’t get his act in gear. What was wrong with me? With him? With us?

  I chewed my lower lip furiously, the way I tended to when I was deep in thought or upset. Tim gave me a searching look and took my hand.

  “What’s up?” he enquired gently. “Why are you upset?”

  “I’m not upset,” I denied automatically. “I’m just a bit tired.” I tried to screw my face into something resembling a smile, but it felt a little stiff and awkward.

  He pondered that for a few moments. “You know, I had meant to make this weekend special in more than one way,” he finally announced.

  I waited.

  “Well, we’ve been going out for such a long time now…and we’re so good for each other…I mean, we’re not living together, actually, yet…but we might as well.” He paused. My heart started hammering in my chest. Was he going to do it? What, here? Now? On a train? The little cogs in my brain turned fast and furious. I guessed that a proposal on a train might have a certain amount of eccentric romance to it. I imagined telling our grandchildren how Grandpa Tim proposed, wobbling on one knee as we crossed through the tunnel, brandishing a ring in one hand and a fizzy plastic beaker of champagne in the other…hmm.

  Tim looked at me closely, rubbing my hand. “I really, really meant to pop that question over the weekend. You know, propose.”

  Oh did I ever? Of course I knew. I had been waiting for such a long time. I looked at him expectantly. Don’t say anything, I told myself sternly, don’t break the mood.

  Tim gave a shaky laugh. “But you know what?”

  What? What? What could he possibly say now except, “Will you marry me?”

  “I forgot the ring.” He let that hang for a few seconds, trying to gauge my reaction. I had none forthcoming. How was I supposed to respond? Was he proposing, or was he not?

  He obliged with a clarification. “So anyway, I forgot the ring, and you can’t propose to the woman you love without a ring. And so that’s why I didn’t. I thought you might like to know.”

  I blinked at him. I could feel my eyes open and close slowly, like a cartoon character’s in slow motion. Open. Close. Open. Close. Blink. Blink. Blink.

  Inwardly, I screamed. Why tell me? Why tell me such a thing? I was utterly lost for words. Why not propose anyway, pretend that he wanted me to choose the ring myself, perhaps? Or why not simply wait a few days longer—what were a few days after all this time? Or why not wait just until we got to his place later tonight, where presumably he kept the ring? Tim looked at me intently. “Soph? Are you all right? Aren’t you happy?”

  “All right” and “happy” weren’t the first words I would have chosen to describe my frame of mind at that precise moment in time, but what could I say? In a manner of thinking, I guessed I ought to have been happy. I had been made some kind of promise of marriage here, hadn’t I? So I gave the most almighty gulp and said, “Ye
s.”

  Tim mistook the errant tear that escaped my right eye as a sign of emotional overload, because he gave me a quick hug before settling to read the Sunday Times that he had been able to pick up at the station.

  “He what?” Rachel’s mouth had formed into a big wide open “O” of astonishment. “He actually said those things?”

  I nodded my head, furiously chewing on a piece of bagel with cream cheese and salmon. It was Monday lunchtime and Rachel had frog-marched me out of the office for a blow-by-blow account of the weekend. So far, things had gone well. I had toned down the rain and school-kid upsets, and blown up the Naughty Monopoly and sex goddess episodes. I had almost, but not quite, managed to gloss over the Dina interlude, and I was worried that I would hear more about that from Rachel in due course. But for now, Rachel was distracted by the abortive marriage proposal. I hadn’t meant to disclose this detail to her, but somehow it had just come out.

  “Wow. That really takes the biscuit.”

  “Well, I don’t know,” I declared over-brightly, “It’s kind of sweet, isn’t it? At least he wants to do it properly. At least he’s wanting to propose.”

  Rachel scoffed. “What utter rubbish. What kind of nice guy would put his woman through this kind of shit? Why didn’t he whip out that ring last night? There are a million things he could have done, but he didn’t. How long will it take him now to come up with the goods? Huh?”

  I crumbled. I was more upset by the whole episode than I had imagined. I was tired and stressed out from the weekend. For once, I let myself be swayed by Rachel’s attitude.

  “You’re right,” I said, performing a dramatic and wholly unprecedented one hundred and eighty degree turn. “You’re absolutely right.” I nodded vigorously in confirmation several times, more for my sake than for hers. “You’re right,” I said again, this time banging my cappuccino cup on the table for extra emphasis.