it must’ve been serious. This means he’s capable of a long-term relationship. Well, is he though? Because they broke up. I wonder why? I shake my head to dislodge the thoughts.
‘Sounds like you had quite the escape,’ Gretel says.
‘From my ex, or my crazy replacement housemate?’
‘Only you know the answer to that,’ Gretel says, because she is not threatened by the mention of exes. She understands that we all have a past, that’s just life, isn’t it.
‘I’m still trying to figure out the answer to that,’ Josh mumbles into his pint.
I raise my eyebrows. Uh oh. Emotional baggage. Here it comes. We made it to almost-date two before it surfaced. I find the exchanging of ‘why-I’m-fucked-up’ suitcases comes earlier in a relationship the later into your thirties you get.
‘Sorry,’ he says, smiling again. ‘I take you away from your night out to chat about operating systems, and then take you away from them to tell you about all my problems.’
I smile like it doesn’t bother me at all. ‘It’s great. You should turn it into a themed club night.’
‘It will be the talk of London.’ We both look at one another and laugh over the rims of our drinks. Mutual attraction obvious and unfurling. Joshua’s workmates have re-clumped with their backs to us, like penguins, leaving us to flirt.
‘So, no skeletons in your closet then, Gretel?’
I point out my finger. ‘Hey, this is technically only date one point five. Surely it’s too soon for the skeleton chat?’
Joshua takes another sip of his beer alongside another appreciative body scan of me. ‘I just don’t get how someone like you is single.’
Gretel smiles serenely. ‘I’m just picky, that’s all. If I’m going to jump, and change my life, it’s going to have to be for someone pretty special.’ I return his glance, to give him a hint that maybe, just maybe, he is the someone special. I want to vomit down myself as I do so.
‘That’s wise,’ he replies. ‘That’s very wise.’
I let there be silence so he can talk more because men so very love talking. I expect him to go off on a monologue, like he did on our first date, but he surprises me by asking more questions about me and acting genuinely interested in my replies.
‘So Gretel, that’s an interesting name. Where did that come from?’
I’d already rehearsed this answer. ‘My mum always loved fairy tales,’ I reply. ‘We used to read them all the time when I was little. It must’ve come from there.’
‘Why Gretel though? Why not Cinderella or I dunno … what’s another fairy-tale name?’
‘Rumpelstiltskin?’
He barks his seal laugh. ‘Yeah, why didn’t she call you that?’
‘Oh, you know, the usual. Cos it would’ve been child abuse.’
‘Well, Gretel’s a good name. Congratulations.’
Gretel curtsies, that’s just how cute she is. ‘So do you like your job?’ I ask him, to make it less about me.
‘Does anyone like their job?’
‘I like mine.’
‘You work for a charity, don’t you?’
I nod. ‘Yes, it’s great. I genuinely love it.’ It feels nice to have just one part of April match with Gretel. My job is that. ‘Like, I rarely get sad on Sunday evenings because I really like going in most days. Not every day, of course, but most of them. I sound like I’m in a job interview, but honestly, working for a charity is so rewarding.’
‘That’s amazing,’ he says. ‘Really amazing.’
We launch into mutually drunken conversation, becoming one of those pissed couples you see, standing outside a pub on a summer’s evening, leaning in a bit too much to hear what the other is saying. He asks me about my plans for the summer, and I say I’m saving up for Africa. He is going to Green Man festival with his friends from university, something they do every year. Apart from the ones who have kids now, of course. We stumble into politics, relieved to learn that we are both of the left-voting persuasion. This excitement dims a bit on my part as now, predictably, Josh is explaining politics to me. Regurgitating facts he has read on the Guardian’s website, claiming them as his own, subconsciously dismissing the fact that I have just admitted to him that I, too, read the Guardian, and therefore am likely to have read the same articles and know the same facts and know where he’s got them from.
But Gretel is so grateful that he’s teaching her more about politics. ‘Oh, yes, you’re right,’ she says, putting her hand on his, just for a