Chapter Twenty
The rest of Josh’s visitflies by without drama, but as I hug him goodbye at the airport, he makes me promise to think about what he said. Since I’ve never been able to say no to him, that means it’s time to get back out there. Thankfully, I know exactly the right person to help me.
Over lunch in the staff cafeteria, I explain to Sadie that I think it’s time for me to dip a toe back into the dating pool and watch as her face lights up. She slides her phone to me and pulls up an annotated Google Map, with pins marking her favorite bars around the city. Her nails clack on the screen as she points to them in turn, assessing their relative merits and the attractiveness of their usual clientele. It’s like watching someone defend their dissertation, so thoroughly has she researched the watering holes of Liverpool. I’m impressed and also slightly worried that I haven’t fully reckoned with what I’m getting myself into, but her eagerness will buoy me through. Also, before he left, Josh added “Use Sadie as wingman” to Erica’s List, so at least I’ll get to check off another box.
“What are you going to wear?” she asks.
The question stops me in my tracks. After all, the last time Ibought a dress it was long and satin and white and came with a beautiful veil.
And that’s why, five hours later, I’m in the front seat of Sadie’s car, heading into the city to go shopping. It’s been so long since I’ve done this type of “going out”—Steven’s idea of date night was Chinese take-out and a desultory attempt at sex. I explain this to Sadie and she shakes her head. “If I ever meet this Steven guy, he’s going to have a very bad day.”
“If you ever meet Steven, it will be a very bad day for all of us, because hell will have frozen over.”
She laughs as she parks the car and leads me into a store. I quickly realize that Sadie is both great and terrible as a shopping partner. Great because she is effusive in her praise when things look good and very honest about what’s not working—I hate it when people blow smoke up my ass when we both know something doesn’t look right. But terrible because she looks good in literally everything. Also, fun fact, women’s sizes in the U.K. are two numbers bigger than the equivalent U.S. size, so even though the clothes are literally the same dimensions, I feel ten times worse.
But Sadie is persistent and undaunted. She tells me not to look at the tags as she pushes me into a fitting room and draws the curtain behind me.
“So how are things going with Bashie?” I ask as I slip into the first dress, bright red with ruching across the middle.
“I don’t know. The same, I guess. Why?”
I think back to my conversation with him at Lachlan’s a couple of weeks ago. I’ve been watching them and it’s becoming clear to me that these two are crazier about each other than they’re letting on. “Have you ever wanted it to become something more serious?Not just a regular hookup?” I step out to show her the dress, but she wriggles her nose.
“That hits your hips weird. Try the purple one.”
I go back into the room. “Don’t dodge the question, please.”
She’s quiet for a moment, then: “Do you know the story of Agrippina and Emperor Nero?”
“Is she the one who bought him the fiddle he played while Rome burned? Because that’s all I’ve got.”
“She was his mother. The whole drama leading up to this isn’t important, but he eventually decided to execute her. But he wanted to be subtle about it, so he designed a self-sinking boat whose bottom would open while it was on the water, drowning her but making it look like an accident.”
I come out in the purple dress. “First of all, loving this, even though I think it’s an elaborate ruse to get out of answering my question. Second of all, what do you think?”
“Your tits look great, but the fabric looks cheap. Good color, though. Let’s call it a maybe.”
The curtain gets drawn again and the story resumes.
“What’s interesting is that according to Tacitus, Agrippina knew Nero was plotting against her. She even suspected that the boat was rigged and that’s how he was going to do it. And yet she still got on board. Why?”
It’s a black dress this time; Sadie’s rejection is just the word “Boring.” There’s only one left to try on.
“Why did she get on the boat?” I repeat her question. “I don’t know. Honor or pride or something? I feel like that’s always why Romans did anything. What does this have to do with you and Bashie? Are you…the boat?”
“I’m Agrippina. A serious relationship is the boat. Iknowitwould end in disaster. But there’s a part of me that still really wants to get on.”
I poke my head out of the curtain. “I think it’s highly unlikely that even a bad relationship will end up with you drowning in some Roman lake.”
“Oh, she didn’t actually die on the boat. It sank but she survived and swam to shore.”
“Well, there you go!”
“Yeah, Nero just hired people to stab her to death later.”
I zip up the last dress. “Okay, I’m going to admit I’ve lost the metaphor.”
Sadie sighs. “Yeah, sorry. I don’t know what I’m blathering on about.”
