Jenny Colgan 3-Book Collection: Amanda’s Wedding, Do You Remember the First Time?, Looking For Andrew McCarthy. Jenny Colgan
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send her on a cruise, maybe?’
‘I don’t know … How much money do you spend on your mother?’
‘Hmm, well, about thirty pounds, I suppose.’
‘Oh.’
There was a long pause, during which I started to worry in case I’d insulted his mother: I knew what the Scots were like. And just what I needed, too: to upset someone else in the world. I was losing a popularity contest with the ebola virus.
He frowned. ‘That would get her about halfway into the Camden canal then?’
‘Well, she is a bit of an old boot.’
He laughed at my utterly shit joke, which made me realize that he was feeling as uncomfortable as I was.
‘Yes, I don’t spend thirty pounds lightly,’ I went on.
‘I know. I could tell by those pink trousers.’
I smiled for the first time all day.
‘Oh, thanks for the fashion tip, Anorak Man.’
He half smiled.
‘What?’ I demanded.
‘Oh, nothing.’
‘What? Is it, like, a magic anorak?’
‘No.’ But he was grinning now.
‘Yes, it is, isn’t it? It’s a magic anorak that gives you – oh, I don’t know, a supernatural ability to notate trains.’
‘Hff. Actually, my lovely anorak is North Sea standard issue. I had to go see the BP people today and they take you more seriously if they think you just got out of the helicopter.’
‘Wow, you’ve been in a helicopter?’ D’oh. Who was I – Amanda?
‘Yes,’ he said seriously, ‘just like Noel Edmonds.’
‘Well, I didn’t know you got to go in helicopters. I thought you went down pipes and stuff.’
‘I do. But I need a helicopter to get me to the pipes. And the pipes are underwater.’
I was impressed, but wouldn’t show it.
‘So what are you saying, that this is, like, your James Bond anorak?’
He stared me straight in the eye.
‘Yesh, schweetheart, thish ish my James Bond anorak.’
And, weirdly, that was the moment I fell in like with Angus McConnald.
An hour and a half later we’d bought his mother some hideous golfing memorabilia from the Disney shop. (She golfed. I’d wondered if maybe this was an obligatory Scottish thing to do, but apparently it was a real hobby.) And I’d bought some comfortable size fourteen navy blue trousers from Racing Green, which proved I was getting old, but I had to buy something.
A boy who liked shopping? I’d cheered up considerably, as I must have appeared to the world like the kind of girl that boys liked enough to go shopping with, even if they were a bit ginga. And we chatted easily about everything under the sun – except when we passed an enormous crystal display in one of the glassware departments. A young, smartly dressed couple were looking at it and checking things off on an enormous list.
‘Marcus, you must hurry up and choose the place settings,’ the girl was saying bossily. Marcus, who looked exactly as he must have done at the age of six, only larger, pouted and turned red.
Angus leaned over to me.
‘Does everyone in London look up new minor peers five minutes after their fathers have died and move in on them like piranha fish?’
I turned to him in surprise. ‘Do you know him?’
‘I know the type,’ he said darkly, looking at the girl. That pissed me off.
‘Well, excuse me. I didn’t realize it was international sexist day. And for your information, the answer is yes. I personally am killing time with you on my way to seduce Prince William.’
‘Huh!’ he said. Then, less grumpily: ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’ Then he clammed up like a, umm, clam.
Still, it was time to go home anyway, and I really felt quite relaxed.
‘It was good to bump into you,’ I said lamely at the tube station.
‘Serendipity.’ He grinned through his anorak.
‘Oh, a word with lots of syllables in it! Was that meant to turn me on?’
God, WHY did I say that? Angus turned red and neither of us knew what to say.
‘Erm, no, no, it wasn’t. I’ll … see you later.’ And he scuttled off into the crowd.
‘Angus!’ I yelled after him.
I caught a glimpse of his neon orange trim bobbing up and down towards the tube, then just in time he turned round.
‘Thanks,’ I shouted. ‘Thanks for last night. Fran was really appreciative.’
He grinned again, infectiously. ‘At your lady’s service, ma’am,’ he said, bowing low in the middle of Piccadilly Circus.
Alex had left a message saying he’d gone to the football, so I looked almost as mournful as Linda when we came face to face in the hall. Then I remembered my niceness campaign.
‘Hey, Linda, how’s it going? Off out?’
God, could I say nothing right?
‘No, eh …’ she hesitated, ‘I was going to watch The English Patient.’
This girl was so weird. But, what the hey, there was more to life than drinking, uncommitted men and falling out with all your mates, so I joined her and slumped down with a large glass of white wine (it doesn’t count as drinking if you’re in watching TV).
I spent most of the film trying to figure out why Kristin Scott Thomas got to be Kristin Scott Thomas and I had to be me, until I happened to glance at Linda. Her whole face was overflowing – tears, snot, the works.
‘Are you OK?’
‘It’s so saaad!’ she snortled.
‘But you’ve seen it like two hundred times. What, are you thinking, “Hey, maybe he’s going to make it to the cave this time”?’
‘Shut up. It’s my film and you don’t care. Nobody does.’ She stared down at her toes, her face looking like it was melting. I had noticed a Kit Kat wrapper in the bin earlier, which didn’t seem excessive, but who knew?
Oh God, situation. If Fran were here she’d say something smart and buck-upish, but it was only me. Someone once said that only the young can afford to be selfish, which gave me about two and a half more years. I didn’t want to cope with this now.
‘Are you OK?’ I asked again. ‘Do you do this every time you watch this film?’
She sniffed loudly. ‘Maybe. Where’s Alex?’
That put me off a bit. ‘Ehm, he’s at the football with the boys. He’s moving in with Charlie, in Fulham.’ That ought to cheer her up.
‘Oh.’ She looked at me through her thick spectacles, all steamed up from crying. ‘Oh … you’ll miss him.’
‘Yes, yes, I will.’
Good Lord, we were bonding.
‘We’re still seeing each other … It’s just till we find somewhere for both of us, know what I mean?’
She nodded her head vaguely. Oh no, I hoped she didn’t find anyone else to move in, that would be rubbish. But when I looked at her I realized she wasn’t listening at all; she had re-immersed