March
The main town
on Beamont Island is St Pierre and Saxvirdan is a small hamlet north of the
town, made up of former labourer’s cottages close to the remains of the old
Roman fort site.
As a result,
all of the house’s contain to some extent, materials acquired from the old
Roman Buildings, and Phil Jacques lived in one of them, but he worked in a
butcher’s shop in St Pierre.
At the
beginning of March, he was feeling very pleased with himself because it was a
day of particular significance to him as he had a date that evening, and it was
his first date with Antoinette Venter.
It was
significant because it had been a long time coming and he had asked her out
countless times and she had always said no, but he persevered, and he
eventually got his reward.
Antoinette was
28 years old, single, and happy to be so.
She had studied
business at University, but after graduation she still ended up working in the
family Greengrocers.
When she was in
her first year at University, she had her heart broken very badly, and it
happened again in the third year, and the second time nearly cost her, her
degree, so she resolved to have no more truck with love, and that was why she
was single and glad to be so.
It suited her
living and working in St Pierre as she could live at home in the flat above the
shop and didn’t have to interact with people, other than the customers who went
into the shop, and even then, she spent as little time as possible interacting
face to face.
When she wasn’t
at work she hid in her room, it meant that she spent a lot of time on her own,
but she didn’t mind that as she was happy in her own company and she was a
voracious reader.
Antoinette had
taken a bold step by agreeing to go out to dinner with Phil, and open herself
up for disappointment again, for the possibility of heartbreak, but she
couldn’t help herself, she had tried to resist, she had rebuffed his advances
so many times, saying no every time she wanted to say yes, but no one was more
surprised than she was when she said yes, but once it had happened she found
herself looking forward to it more than she could ever have imagined.
However, if she
was going to make the most of it she had to make the most of herself.
When she had no
interest in relationships she dressed down to make herself invisible to the
opposite sex, she found that if she made herself look undesirable men tended to
leave well alone.
Not Phil
Jacques though, he saw through her disguise, he had also had his heart broken,
just the one time for him though, but it had also left him cautious, but when
he saw Antoinette for the first time, he knew that she was his soul mate.
As it was five
years since her previous date and she had been dressing down for all that time
she didn’t have anything remotely suitable for a date, so she took the early
ferry to Pipershaven and spent all day shopping for girl clothes.
Phil spent his
day fending off questions from his boss and best friend, Kenny, about where he
was going and who he was taking.
Phil was sat at
the bar of the Sword and Shield a full half an hour before he was supposed to
meet Antoinette and he was ridiculously nervous, he hadn’t felt like that since
he was 14 and he was waiting outside the bowling alley for his first ever date
with Sally Knowles, however he was soon thinking it was a mistake to arrive
early as his stomach was doing somersaults.
Antoinette was
second guessing herself and as she stood in front of the mirror wearing the
outfit she had spent all day searching for.
Her long
brunette hair was down, and her face was, subtly made up, it had been a while
since she had bothered with makeup and the face she was wearing had taken three
attempts, she wasn’t one hundred percent happy with the result, but she was
running out of time, so the third one would have to do.
“Why on earth
did I say yes?” she asked her reflection.
“Because you
wanted to” she replied aloud to the mirror.
When Phil
turned around and saw a brunette in a black skirt and pale-yellow blouse
walking towards him, he couldn’t stop himself from saying.
“Wow”
And Antoinette
smiled.
“I was
expecting a tomboy” he said, and she laughed.
“I decided I
should make an effort” Antoinette said as she sat on the stool beside him.
“I thought this
might be more appropriate for a date.”
The evening
passed by really quickly, and they were so absorbed in each other’s company
that they completely lost track of time, to such an extent that they both
jumped when the last order’s bell rang, and neither of them were ready for it
to end but end it must.
Unfortunately,
the walk from the pub to the Greengrocers was less than one hundred yards and
even walking very slowly got them to her door in a very short time and for the
first time that evening they struggled for the words that would secure them
another date.
“I really
enjoyed this evening” she said.
“Me too” he
agreed “I’d like to do it again.”
“That all
depends on whether you’re a good kisser or not” she said cockily.
“Well, I like a
challenge” he retorted and kissed her and when it was over he added “Well?”
“I don’t know”
she said, “It was adequate.”
“Adequate?”
“Yes, I think there’s room
for improvement, so you may take me out again tomorrow” she said and kissed him
again.
No comments:
Post a Comment