Our Stop - Laura Jane Williams Page 0,83

and Eddie said, ‘All the best, Nadia. I hope you find what you’re looking for.’

Nadia watched him turn away, in the opposite direction to the one Emma and Gaby had taken, and said in return, ‘All the best, Eddie.’

She watched him amble down the road, his hands in his pockets and his overnight bag slung over his shoulder, and once he’d disappeared Nadia looked back towards where her friends had been. She’d been left in one direction, and left in the other, and as evening fell and the temperature dropped, she stood, all alone, not knowing where to head next.

38

Daniel

Daniel stood in the line that snaked around the field, wrapped up in his winter coat for the first time this season. The early days of November meant winter was officially on the way. He blew into his cupped hands and rubbed them together for warmth, and pulled his navy cashmere scarf a little higher up his neck.

‘Bloody hell,’ he said. ‘I reckon there must be three hundred people in front of us, you know.’

Jeremy rolled his eyes, hitting him on the shoulder playfully. ‘Ah mate, calm down – we’ll be in there soon enough. Drink your juice.’

Daniel shook his empty can at him, signalling that he already had.

The group of them – Daniel and Jeremy and Sabrina, as well as Sam and Rashida, were queuing for a Romeo + Juliet-themed immersive cinema event at a covered parking lot near White City. Under their coats, which they’d stored in lockers inside, everyone was in costume according to a character they’d been assigned, and for four hours they’d roam through a set designed to look just like the film, interacting with actors who milled about in amongst guests, acting out scenes from the movie and making everyone feel like they too were part of the imagined world.

Eventually they’d settle down to watch the film surrounded by thousands of tea-lights, snuggled under blankets. Daniel had been to the Blade Runner immersive event last year, run by the same company, and it had blown his mind. He was beyond pumped to be back. He had high expectations for the night – despite the massive queue to get in.

‘Here,’ Jeremy’s partner Sabrina said. ‘Have another gin in a tin.’ She handed him an M&S can, which he accepted gratefully.

‘Gin in a tin,’ Daniel said. ‘Who knew?’

‘We did!’ chorused Rashida and Sabrina, clinking their cans against one another, laughing. It was nice how great they got on together, chatting away as much to each other as to the other men in the group. The uni WAGS had become friends in their own right.

‘Pissheads,’ admonished Sam, smiling.

Daniel had accepted his fate, lately – mostly hanging out with either Romeo after work or the couples from uni when he could. He didn’t see much of Lorenzo, really, save for the odd five-minute toast-eating session before work, where their chat was full of the effort of keeping it light. He was mostly a permanent gooseberry, the forever third wheel. Every woman he knew had offered to introduce him to somebody (even his mother!), but Daniel had decided to take a break from dating after just three days on Guardian Soulmates, where he’d been confronted with women who specified the height of their preferred guy in their bios, or had a list of personality requirements so long that Daniel went cross-eyed even trying to get through them all.

Must have own house, own car, own friendship group and be able to deal with a confident woman who knows her place in the world, said one. I wanna have kids, not date them!!!! said another. He’d flicked through Michelle Obama’s autobiography when it came out, and seen the bits about how she’d met Barack, and how he arrived to her fully formed, knowing who he was. Daniel kind of understood what these women meant: they all wanted their Barack too. A man who wasn’t looking for a woman to mother them, Daniel supposed, who wouldn’t feel emasculated by a woman with her own money and life. He got that. Daniel appreciated a strong woman – his mother was one – and knew what it took in what was still a man’s world to achieve great things and have a voice … but in a relationship he wanted a partner, somebody to build something with, not somebody who’d built her own thing and be mad that he didn’t have his. From what he knew about a Barack and Michelle kind of love, it