Page 29 of Only Fangs

“Oh no. It’s not that.” The waitress smiles. “My girlfriend’s a vamp. It’s just that you’re Ari Haywood…” She trails off but still seems unable to drag her stare away. “Is it true? That you were friends with Kitty Marion back in the day?” The question comes out almost breathless.

Ari smiles, a warm and genuine smile as if she’s remembering a time she was particularly fond of. “Oh yes. Good times. Well, not good, not really, but it was certainly interesting.”

“Some might say explosive,” the waitress adds.

“They might,” Ari replies with a wink. “I mean, not that I needed to threaten to blow things up to strike a little fear into people.” She flashes the tips of her fangs.

“Umm. I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say, desperate to know what they mean.

“Dear Kitty was a suffragette with a rather militant streak. Great fun. And we did win in the end.”

“You were a vampire suffragette?” I ask. But of course she would have been.

“If you’re going to live forever, I think you need to fight for the best possible world,” Ari says.

From a few metres away, Gregory motions at the waitress as if to tell her to get a move on. Ari glares at him and he scurries back behind the desk by the front door.

“I’d better get back to work,” the waitress says. “It was an honour to meet you, Miss Haywood.”

The starter is surprisingly good with toasted sourdough, ham, and pickled vegetables. Ari tells me the French name for everything but all I can think of is how sexy the words sound on her lips. Perhaps I shouldn’t have another glass of wine, this whole experience is going to my head a little. As we eat Ari tells me a few stories about her antics with the suffragettes and I’m surprised to learn just how radical they really were.

“I thought it was mainly placard waving and marches,” I tell her after she’s regaled me with how Kitty and another woman – also called Clara but no relation to her friend and definitely not a vampire – burned down the grandstand of Hurst Park Racecourse.

Ari laughs. “I guess all you’ve seen is a few black and white pictures and it all looks so different, like it was made up, somehow. But it did happen, and in glorious technicolour. It was brilliant and vibrant and… well, real.”

Just as the plates from our starter have been cleared, the front door of the restaurant opens and in walks a familiar face. Sharon from my old office. The one I used to join for Baking Thursday and Secret Santa and the occasional post-work drink in the local pub. She’s a fellow Danely hater.

She looks terrified. Far more than Gregory the concierge. He consults the list in front of him and shakes his head. Then he leads her to the bar.

Our mains arrive and it looks delicious, the chips crisp and the steak the perfect amount of pink in the centre. I’m starting to see why this place is so popular for dates. I keep half an eye on Sharon as we tuck in. She’s obviously waiting for someone. I tell Ari.

“Do think she was meant to be on a date?” Ari asks.

I nod. “Probably.”

“Jeez. Just another reason I don’t want to do any of this. If he’s still not turned up when we’ve finished this course please rescue her.”

Once our plates are cleared I excuse myself from Ari and go to find Sharon.

“Hey. You OK?” I ask her.

She bursts into tears.

“Oh. Umm. Sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you,” I stutter. I’m a great listener but normally I know why someone is crying before they are crumpled in front of me wiping snot from their nose with the sleeve of the jumper they’ve obviously bought specially for the occasion.

“He didn’t turn up,” she says eventually.

“Bastard.” I say it so emphatically she stops crying for a moment and a tiny smile breaks through.

She calls him another name. I won’t repeat it. But the shock of hearing that word from the mouth of someone I think of like an auntie makes me laugh. She claps her hand over her mouth.

“You should join us,” I tell her and motion to Ari who is currently engrossed in the dessert menu. “We’re about to eat our bodyweights in sugar.”

“You’re on a date.”

“It’s not a date.”

She gives me a look that says she doesn’t believe it. “You’re telling me that you’re in the Castle Brasserie with a beautiful woman and it isn’t a date.”