But he’s already on his way. He’s probably already arrived. Gail’s is literally right below my flat and across the street. It would be rude to cancel now. And I really do need a coffee. Make that three.
Yanking myself up, groaning as I go, I pull on my oldest jeans and an oversized sweater, hoping to hide under the fabric and put as much space between my skin and the world as possible. I apply a quick coat of makeup, finishing with an excessive amount of lip balm to help the dry, cracked feeling in my body.
Pulling on my hooded raincoat, I hobble down the stairs and out the door. To overcome my conditioning to American traffic patterns, I look both ways before crossing Upper Street.
Rory is there, standing outside under Gail’s red awning. He’s wearing a raincoat and wellies today. There’s a half second where I still see him as the dreamy and dapper Oxford man I was once enraptured by. But then he gives a goofy wave from under the touristy Union Jack umbrella he’s holding, and the posh picture is punctured. He’s bouncing on his toes in a jittery, ungraceful way, and he looks even scrawnier than I’d remembered, just about swimming in his oversized raincoat.
“Kat!” he says, flagging me down as if I haven’t seen him or remembered what he looked like. “It’s me, Rory!” His face springs into that boyish smile, and I have a strong urge to clamp his mouth shut so he looks more like the refined picture I’d had of him.
“Hi there,” I say, hoping he can’t see or smell my hangover. “Good to see you again.”
“Great day, isn’t it?” he says, with no trace of irony. “The London rain reminds me of the spray coming up when you’re out wakeboarding on a lake.” His gold-flecked eyes stretch wide with excitement.
“That’s one way to look at it,” I grumble, already regretting coming. His positivity is too much to bear, especially right now.
He holds the door for me, bells jingling as we walk inside. Yeasty aromas and cinnamon roll scents twirl through the bakery, and a pang of hunger shoots through me. My last proper meal was lunch yesterday.
Rory orders hot chocolate with whipped cream—a disappointingly fitting diversion from the oat flat white I’d imagined for Alexander. I ask for an almond croissant and a double-shot latte, and I pay for it all before Rory can get out his wallet.
“You didn’t need to do that,” Rory says, looking a bit out of sorts, like it’s an insult to his masculinity to be treated by a woman.
I nearly make a comment about antiquated gender norms, but I’m too tired to go there. “No big deal,” I say. It comes out short and spiky.
Gail’s is a long, skinny café, with a seating area in the back. We scout for a table, but they’re all packed full of young families. Parents cling to coffee mugs like medicine bottles as toddlers paw at pain au chocolates and coloring books, shrieking for attention with “Mummy, look!” and “Daddy, noooo!” Through the bowed skylight, the spire of St. Mary’s church rises up like an anchor in the air, pigeons and seagulls vying for real estate atop the cross summit.
“How do you feel about a walk in the rain?” Rory asks when it’s clear there’s no space for us in Gail’s. “I haven’t spent much time in Islington—just passing through on the bus. I’m up in Finsbury. More affordable.”
He doesn’t say it like he’s self-conscious at all, but I can’t help but feel embarrassed for him anyway. “A walk sounds fine,” I say, which is true. Being outside feels less oppressive, less stifling.
“Cool beans,” Rory says, because apparently “cool beans” is an expression that still exists in the modern age. Pulling out that flimsy Union Jack brolly, he holds it over us as we walk outside.
In the rom-coms, this is where the man keeps the woman perfectly dry and murmurs sweet nothings in her ear as they cozy up under the spacious umbrella. In real life, this is where a nasty gale hits us head-on, and the runty thing turns inside out and snaps, leaving us standing there, damp and platonic under the spitting skies.
“Dang it,” Rory says, fiddling with the spokes to try and fix them, though it’s clear they’re mangled beyond repair. “I paid twenty pounds for this.” He doesn’t look upset, just dejected.
Rory seems like exactly the kind of person who’d get swindled by merchants. I want to feel sorry for him, but I’m too busy feeling sorry for myself now that I’m cold and soaked straight through to the bones.
“I could get my umbrella from my flat,” I offer, because that seems like the most expedient solution (other than saying, “Ah well, looks like this coffee chat just isn’t in the cards. Hope you have a great day—see you never!” which is what the hungover, short-tempered part of me is inclined to do).
“Do you live near here?” Rory asks.
“Right there, actually.” Without thinking, I point up to my sitting room window. Too late, I realize I’ve just made it uncomfortably clear that I’ve had him commute to my literal doorstep.
He doesn’t seem to be put off by my lack of thoughtfulness. “Oh awesome,” he says, gazing up at Marlow House. “I’ve actually noticed that window before.”
Curiosity surfaces, pricking through the Annabel’s-related ignominy that’s still coating me in crusty dirt. I look at Rory,wondering if this is it, if he actuallywasaware of our eye contact all this time. And if now he’s finally going to admit to it.
“You have?” I ask, doing my best to sound very blasé about this development. Though the situation can’t be rectified in that Rory still won’t be anything like I’d hoped, my own judgment and eye-contact fluency can still be redeemed. It would be a small consolation, but a consolation, nonetheless.
“Yeah,” Rory says. “I have this quirk where it bothers me if things are crooked. And um”—his raindrop-splotched face flushes, and he pauses awkwardly, as if he’s wishing he hadn’t brough this up but is now too far along to abort the topic—“I saw that your curtains are a little off center.”
I stand there, blinking at him through the drizzle, waiting for the punch line. “What’s that?” I say, because there’s got to be more to the story. My pride needs there to be.
“Your curtains aren’t symmetrical,” he says, now looking down at his wellies. “Just a little off-center, that’s all.”
He says it in that down-home way that makes it impossible to question that he’s telling the truth. I still do question it because I can’t bear to think thatthatwas the reason he was looking up at my flat—not because he was transfixed by my breathtaking beauty, but simply because he was irked by the lack of symmetry of my curtains.
It’s preposterously insulting, and insultingly preposterous. I keep thinking this situation can’t devolve any further, and yet here we are, sinking lower once more.
