came early.
Gaby texted back, Hurry! The poor guy is a bag of nerves! It’s cute, but also get here and put him out of his misery!
Nadia sent back the running girl emoji, signalling a pace she didn’t feel. Her friend was only trying to be good to her, she knew.
She was about thirteen minutes into the twenty-minute walk when her mood lifted. The fresh air blew away her cobwebs and gave her back some perspective on her life. Nothing bad was about to happen: the feeling she’d had all day was the simple biology of her menstrual cycle. She was about to walk in to a beautiful venue with a summer view of the London skyline, her two closest friends in the world there with an open bar and a potentially handsome man. Even if nothing came of tonight, she’d read in Get Your Guys! that refusing to practise flirting with men you didn’t fancy was like saying you’d learn your lines only once you got on stage. That book advocated flirting with everyone, always, everywhere, just to be polite and friendly and getting used to being a little nervous, so that when the true man of your life is finally in front of you, you don’t blow it.
Yes, Nadia thought to herself. I will go and practise my flirting. She lined up some witty things to say, imagining herself smiling and charming and drinking and laughing. She would have as good a time as she had set her mind to, and in the half-mile walk in the sunshine, she’d decided she’d have a lovely time.
And then she saw him.
Awful Ben.
The night she broke up with him – an act that took more courage than anything she had ever known, and a full three weeks to build up to – she sat and took it as he said horrible, hurtful things to her.
He told her she was worthless, that nobody would ever want her, that she was broken and didn’t know how to love anyway.
She’d called him a cab and knew she would never hear from him again: that his proud Brazilian blood would mean she was dead to him, which suited her just fine. She needed to not see him. He worked just outside of London, meaning the chances of passing him on any day were minimal; but, of course, though London is big, the daily paths most people take are small, and just as the posh people knew Notting Hill like the back of their hands, and ad execs knew every twist and turn of Soho, single and hipster mid-thirties professionals knew by heart the streets of Spitalfields and Commercial Road. Of course if Awful Ben was to come into town for a date, this was the part he’d come to. And it looked like a date too – or even like he could be with a girlfriend.
While her thoughts were drifting ahead to the summer party, Nadia had glanced up from her feet only to experience the horrifying realization that her emotionally manipulative and downright disordered-personalitied ex-boyfriend was stood before her – she had literally walked into him.
She hadn’t seen him since she’d live-tracked his Uber home on her app, making sure he got back to where he lived before she took the photo of them out of the frame on her bedside table and cut it into tiny little pieces.
She could see him saying something, but she couldn’t hear the words. Her body was ice cold and it felt like not enough air was reaching her lungs. Awful Ben was still moving his mouth. It was like time had frozen and sped up, both at the same time. She blinked several times in quick succession and felt sick and suddenly her tummy hurt.
‘You are in a world of your own,’ he said.
It was weird how he said it. It was an accusation, but also said totally neutrally. It felt aggressive to Nadia, but the woman on his arm – a beautiful, radiant woman, with full cheeks and kind eyes – smiled, as if that must be a private joke between them. What had he said about her? Did this woman on his arm know what he was capable of yet?
‘I … I don’t want to talk to you. Excuse me.’
Nadia pushed past the two of them, stepping out into the road to do so and only narrowly missing a cyclist who screamed at her, ‘Fucking hell! Watch it!’
She heard Awful Ben say something about the ex