stories possessed in spades. If I’d known when I was thirteen that someone who looked like him would ever have asked me out I’d have died of joy, but life’s moved on a bit since.
Soon I’m straddling his roaring machine, setting off for who knows where. Our destination turns out to be an Italian restaurant near the river (but on the right side, thank God). Although it’s slightly starched and formal, there’s something appealing about the fact that he hasn’t gone for the predictable gastro pub option. We won’t be troughing hunks of dry meat surrounded by drunkards; instead I’ll be waited on and called ‘Signorina’. Not to mention being called Alice: am I really going to be able to keep this up?
‘So this is random,’ I say, immediately realizing how ungrateful I must sound.
‘Jesus, have I left you feeling stalked?’ he asks. ‘I wouldn’t have arrested you if you’d turned me down. Might’ve fixed a few speeding fines, but nothing too serious.’
He’s fun. At least he’s fun.
‘I don’t, I promise. It’s flattering.’
‘I’ll issue me with a restraining order if you like.’
‘That won’t be necessary,’ I laugh, picking up my menu.
‘Sorry, Alice, let me get you a drink. What would you like?’
Alice, Alice. When we were little I used to think I’d drawn the short straw name-wise. When Mum read Alice in Wonderland I was utterly beguiled by the idea of a girl finding a magical dimension hidden somewhere beneath this one. There aren’t many Lulus in the literary canon; it’s such a silly, diminutive sort of a name. But Alice christened me Lulu when she was too small to say Louise, and the rest is history.
‘Um, something white? Dryish?’
I look around the room, taking it in. This is not the type of restaurant liable to serve the kind of paint stripper that Rufus foists on us. The waiters are smart, the cutlery’s heavy: it’s a proper old-fashioned Italian. It’s definitely not one of those gruesome destination restaurants, which endlessly pipe ‘emulsion’ over tiny squares of endangered fish and then fleece you mercilessly. I bet that’s the kind of place Tarquin would take someone on a date. And then insist they paid half.
Ali orders a couple of glasses and apologizes for not getting a bottle. ‘I wanted to collect you, but it meant I had to bring the bike.’
‘Don’t apologize, it’s lovely to be collected,’ I tell him. Which God knows it is; if only I could throw off this pervasive sense of flatness.
‘Where I’m from, the girls expected nothing less. You’d get a slap if you told them to get the bus.’
And he fills me in on where he grew up, a remote community in the West of Scotland. He moved down to London a couple of years ago to work for the Met.
‘So what on earth lured you away?’ I ask. ‘Being a copper in London must be so scary. I’d just hide out in my panda car, willing the robbers to change their minds and go home.’
He laughs. ‘Are you saying I’m a bumpkin, Alice?’
‘No, I’m just wondering what would make you want to engage with it all. All that evil, I suppose. You must come up against some pretty nasty characters.’
‘What, like gorgeous girls who don’t know how to get their foot off the accelerator?’
Ooh, good riposte. I so wish it was hitting the sides. We break off to order and I realize that I’ve managed to chuck back my glass of wine in a heartbeat. The waiter asks me if I want another.
‘I’m not sure. If you’re driving, I don’t want to turn into some drunken old fishwife.’
‘Go on – I promise I’ll go slowly round the bends.’
I smile a yes at the waiter, who also pauses to take our food order.
‘So, is this a regular haunt?’ I ask Ali.
‘Is that a posh girl way of saying “Do you come here often”?’
Does he think I’m posh? I don’t feel posh. I’m way less posh than Charles.
‘N-o-o-o. I’m just curious.’
‘Can I be straight with you?’
I smile an assent.
‘I hardly ever manage to get out. My job takes up all my time, which is maybe why I’m reduced to picking up reckless drivers.’
‘Thanks!’ I tell him.
‘I’m teasing you, Alice,’ he says, suddenly sounding very Scottish. ‘No, it really does swallow up my life. I had to hunt for somewhere date-worthy on the Internet. I only know my way round London from the inside of a patrol car.’