Yes Chef, No Chef - By Susan Willis Page 0,81
again and he could organise a strict training schedule for them. And maybe, he thought buzzing with excitement, they could get tickets for the athletics’ events at the Olympics’ next year. On his way down Fulham Road the nagging doubts whirled through his mind until he began to wonder why he’d even asked Julie on a date in the first place. She wasn’t his Kate because nobody could be, but there again she was a woman and someone to talk to instead of spending his night off with the depressing never ending silence that seemed to have invaded the apartment since Kate left.
“Oh don’t you look good?” she said, when he bent to plant a kiss on her cheek and inhaled the light flowery perfume she wore.
He beamed at her and felt the earlier tension leave his body. “Do you want to eat first or have a drink?” he asked and was surprised when she agreed to the pub and then was even more surprised when standing at the bar she asked for a pint of cider.
She wore a white clinging cat-suit which had a zip that started between her voluptuous breasts and ran the length of her body ending in her crotch area. She looked sensational and he knew from glancing around the bar that he was the envy of every other guy in the place.
While he was imagining pulling the zip down to expose her fabulous body, she said, “I know exactly what you’re thinking?”
You couldn’t possibly; he mused, but smiled at her raising an eyebrow. “You do?”
She stroked the side of his cheek with a long pink-painted finger nail which instantly sparked his arousal and he felt his trousers tighten.
“Yeah, you’re wondering how I can drink so much. Everyone does because I can drink pint for pint with any guy, and eat like a horse without putting on weight. I just seem to have that type of a constitution.”
He knew the stroking of his cheek was definitely an intimate gesture and unless he was very much mistaken she was as turned on as he was. Her body language when she leant towards him, the slight shiver as he touched the base of her back guiding her though the door of the restaurant, and the small tactile gestures she made convinced him happily that he wouldn’t be making coffee for one the next morning. And, although she wasn’t Kate, the fullness of Julie’s breasts which seemed to bulge out from the scoop neck of the cat suit was so tempting he decided, that she came a very close second.
The restaurant had been her choice and when the food arrived he thought it was poor, second rate and struggled to eat it. His smoked salmon was a cheap quality, and he picked at it cautiously, and then after two mouthfuls of the chicken risotto, he decided it was simply a glutinous mess. But, because she enjoyed her prawn starter, chicken escalope, sticky toffee pudding, and practically a whole bottle of Canti to wash it down with, he didn’t want to cause any or awkwardness by complaining.
He decided it was easier and kinder to tell her he wasn’t that hungry when she mentioned how little he’d eaten, but it did mean that he’d had nothing to soak up the alcohol and because his idea of moderating the amount of wine he was drinking had long since gone, when he stood up to go to the toilet the room swayed and he gripped hold of the back of his chair to steady himself.
“Whoa!” he said grabbing the dado rail which ran along the wall behind his chair, “I…I haven’t been drinking much lately and the red wine’s gone straight to my head.”
She tittered, “As long as that’s the only place it’s gone to?”
He heard her soft laughter while making his way through to the toilet and had to agree with what she’d said earlier in the pub, considering the amount she’d had to drink she did look comparatively sober.
He managed to negotiate his way through to the male toilets without mishap but when he returned to the room he momentarily forgot he wasn’t with Kate and for a few drunken seconds he scoured the room looking for her glossy brown hair. Remembering she wasn’t there brought another pang of pain because he was so used to being with her but then winding his way between the tables he saw Julie’s blonde hair and her beaming smile, and he pushed the thought