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‘Hot. Damn,’ she says. ‘White suits you, sis. I knew it would. It accentuates that Nordic skin of ours.’
I roll my eyes. Poppy loves to wax lyrical about our ‘Nordic genes’ even though we have literally one Norwegian grandmother. Everyone else hails from Wolverhampton. To be fair, we did both inherit Grandma’s Scandinavian looks. Long limbs, ice-blond hair and skin prone to freckles in the summer time.
‘Excellent.’ Poppy nods. ‘The jeans make your legs look a mile long. There’s a tiny hint of boob but nothing more, which is perfect.’
I pause over my reflection. ‘It does feel nice to step away from the black.’
‘Now go have fun!’
Chapter 7
The temperature is standard February fodder (freezing) and I wrap a coat around me as I make my way out into the night. Joe’s chosen a pub not far from either of us for our first ‘proper’ date without the kids and first impressions are … surprising. The building looks unremarkable, borderline tatty. I push open the doors and spot Joe sat immediately ahead of me, one arm propped up against the bar, his long legs sprawled out in front of him. He’s wearing dark jeans, those vegan trainers everyone loves and a shirt that matches the exact colour of his eyes. He has a pencil in his hand and he looks like he’s doing homework.
‘What’s happening here?’ I ask. ‘Are you doing work by hand? Retro.’
Joe watches me, a small smile lighting up his face as he pulls out a stool.
‘Not bothering with any pleasantries today, Rogers?’
‘Too confused by this.’ I motion towards the pen and paper. ‘Have we stumbled into the nineteen eighties?’
Joe smoulders at me. ‘This is what we call a pencil. You use it to write down words. And right here I have paper, which is something we use to write on.’
I roll my eyes. ‘But why, Joe?’
‘I’m marking papers. I head up the English Literature department at the university.’
‘Hmm. Don’t you have computers for that sort of thing?’
Joe exhales loudly. ‘Yes, Sophie, we do. But I like to give myself a screen break from time to time. You look … wow, by the way.’
I’m momentarily flummoxed by this. Then I realise he’s doing the fake-dating thing.
‘Ah, getting straight in there with the date chat I see. Excellent, well done. You look “wow” too.’
‘Ha,’ he barks, pushing his hair off his face.
I go to shake his hand, he attempts a kiss on the cheek and we end up rubbing our faces together. At least he smells good. Musky.
‘This is going authentically well already. Beautiful woman turns up, date is stunned into silence,’ Joe says once we recover ourselves.
‘Oh sure, I bet you’ve used that one before.’ I perch on the stool.
‘Shots fired and you’ve not even taken your coat off.’ Joe eyes me. ‘Shall we start again? Sophie, hi, it’s good to see you. May I tell you, genuinely, that you look lovely tonight?’ With that he positively twinkles at me and maybe for the first time I understand exactly why the other mums go into overdrive in Joe’s presence. Obviously I have noticed the eyes and the hair and the gravitational pull of charm, but I don’t think I’ve put it all together properly before.
‘Joe, hi.’ I smile, looking him up and down. ‘I think we’ve both done a good job with getting the aesthetics right.’
‘Thanks for the compliment, I think?’ He laughs.
I look around the pub. ‘This place seems …’ I trail off as I reach for something to praise and come up short. Tired wallpaper peels off the walls. The black-and-gold carpet is stained with decades of drunken spillages. The green leather on my bar stool is scuffed and sagging. I resist the urge to run my finger along the bar and check for dust because I already know the outcome won’t be great. It’s a surprising choice for a fake first date, I must admit.
‘Like a dump?’ Joe offers cheerfully. ‘I love it. It’s one of the few places in this city that hasn’t been turned into a wanky gastropub or a glitzy wine bar.’
‘Does that mean you’re a real ale man, Joe? You like to come here on a Sunday with your pen and paper and grumble about the weather with your old man friends.’
‘Less of the old man, thanks. Anyway, they have an excellent selection of craft beers and Maggie makes a fresh batch of salted popcorn to serve as bar snacks.’
‘Maggie?’
