There he is. Joshua. Strong name. Sitting in the corner. Strong choice of table. Not playing on his phone to compensate for sitting alone. Strong character. He sees me. Well, Gretel. Must recognise me from the photo. He stands, and we both, within milliseconds, make ten gazillion micro-decisions about the other based on nothing but body language and scent and the filter of our past experiences. And hope. On his side, maybe, there’s a filter of hope. He’s on a first date after all, he must not have given up just yet.
‘Hi, Gretel, nice to meet you.’ He strides over and we awkwardly kiss on the cheek.
‘Nice to meet you too.’ It’s insane that he’s just called me Gretel. What am I doing? What the actual fuck am I doing? I have totally lost all my marbles. My voice is a bit too shrill and I try to drop an octave. ‘Sorry I’m a little bit late. I couldn’t find the place.’
He guides me to the table, bumping into another bloke on the walk over.
‘Watch it mate.’
‘Whoops, whoa, sorry,’ Joshua says, before swearing under his breath once we pass. I catch a whiff of his nervousness. Normally I’m so consumed by my own nerves that my date could be bleeding from the eyeballs and I wouldn’t notice, but, tonight, I can sense his anxiety bubbling. A jolt of power crackles through me. Again, a totally novel experience on a first date. ‘Sit, sit.’ He gestures to a chair. ‘I didn’t order you a drink because I had no idea what you’d like. But I can make eye contact with the waitress for you.’
‘Umm, shouldn’t it be me you’re making eye contact with on a first date?’ I settle myself in my chair, enjoying the way his gaze subtly registers my appearance. ‘I don’t want to be competing with the waitress.’ We both laugh at the same time, though I can see the joke has thrown him off-kilter. So I lean in and look up at him through my eyelashes. ‘A bottle of beer would be great to start with, thanks,’ I say. ‘And I’m rubbish at getting attention from waiting staff, so please do the honours.’
His ego soothed, Joshua’s shoulders loosen. He takes pride in beckoning the lady over and ordering me a Corona and lime even though April doesn’t really like beer.
My drink arrives, just as Joshua and I finish filling each other in on the thrilling details of our journeys here.
‘Oh, yes, the Jubilee line really is weirdly exciting and grown up, isn’t it?’
‘Oh, so you can walk from Blackfriars? That’s useful.’
‘One Corona.’ The waitress bends and places it on the table between us.
‘Cheers.’ I pick it up and take a swig, trying not to pull a face. ‘Sorry, it’s terribly undignified to order beer on a first date, isn’t it?’ I place the bottle back down. ‘It’s just so hot today. I promise I’ll be sophisticated and order red wine later.’
Josh laughs again. ‘Are you one of those people who understand wine?’
Always make them feel at ease, Gretel’s voice whispers to me, so they associate feeling at ease with being around you.
I shake my head. ‘No. Are you?’
He shakes his head too.
But don’t hand yourself over on a plate; make him feel mildly uncomfortable so he knows he doesn’t certainly have you.
‘Good,’ I say. ‘Because if you are one of those people who actually knows what to do in a restaurant when they make you try the wine, then I don’t think it’s going to work between us.’
Another hearty laugh. I’ve never made a man laugh this much so quickly on a first date.
Ask them lots of open-ended questions about themselves.
I gulp down another mouthful of beer. ‘So, Mount Kilimanjaro then?’
That’s all I need to say. I don’t even have to explain why I’m bringing it up, or remind him he put it as a picture on his app. His face lights up with the opportunity to talk about it. ‘Yes, it was completely amazing. I’m still buzzing, I swear, even though it was over six months ago … so we camped in this beautiful place called … most challenging thing I’ve ever done, you learn so much about yourself … got the bug now, planning the next one … the important thing is that you have to train, you can’t skimp on the training … altitude sickness is the worst of course.’
I prompt his monologue with the occasional ‘wow’ and ‘why?’ so we have a deep emotional connection, but mostly use the time to take in Joshua’s appearance. He is neither good-looking nor bad-looking, I decide. He is neutral-looking, like Switzerland. He just looks like ‘a bloke’. Definitely one of those faces that you need a slight emotional connection with before you want to rip his clothes off. Then, once all those problematic bonding hormones flood in, I can imagine the mole by his lip would be magical, and his eyes, green, well that’s unusual enough to find riveting once your unmet childhood needs make him an attachment figure to glue yourself to.
‘Yeah, so three peaks next … as an amuse bouche … hahahahaha …’ He’s made enough of an effort with his appearance. The grey of his shirt suits him and brings out his eyes. I imagine a past girlfriend told him that information and he’s clung to it ever since. The shirt settles well around his normal body, toned enough by the mountain-hiking side of him, but he definitely isn’t a gym-goer – he would’ve mentioned protein by now if that was the case. He maintains an acceptable level of hygiene. My guess is two serious relationships, the last one hurting enough to plough his grief into climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. Maybe the girl who told him he suits grey is the one who made him need to climb the mountain to get over her? All in all, if I wasn’t using him as a social experiment, he seems a good bet. Especially at my age. Aren’t I lucky to be on a date with someone like Joshua? Better not fuck it up by being myself …
‘So, yeah, Everest is the dream, but it’s like thirty fucking grand. Whoops, I just swore. Sorry, you don’t mind swearing, do you?’
I shake my head and smile. Gretel doesn’t mind anything, that’s the point of her.
‘Phew!’ He mock-wipes his brow like he’s a comedian from the eighties making a joke about his mother-in-law. I giggle. He remembers himself, recognises how much he’s been speaking. He picks up his drink, and gestures out to me. The way he gulps it reveals he’s still nervous. And, despite myself, I feel a pang of sorrow for him. God, the things we put ourselves through, on the quest to find someone. ‘Anyway, how about you? You like the odd adventure?’
I nod because I know that you have to pretend you want adventures. God forbid if my idea of branching out is ordering a slightly different type of coffee one day and then regretting it instantly. ‘Oh yeah,’ I say, forcing myself to take another swig of beer. ‘Of course I love an adventure. Who doesn’t?’ Me me me me me me me. ‘I’m thinking of going to Africa, actually.’
The line has the desired effect. He looks impressed. ‘Wow.’
‘I just think it would be so amazing, you know?’
‘Oh yeah, of course. I’d love to go back at some point. I didn’t see enough of it, for sure, when I was there. Whereabouts in Africa?’
‘Oh, all over. I want to see it all, you know? It’s such a fascinating place.’ I realise, much like saying you’re writing a novel, or running a marathon, just saying you are planning to go to Africa instantly gives you so much social gravitas, you never have to really bother following through with it. ‘So, what is it you do?’ I ask, chasing it with more ‘why?’.