Excepts from the first two chapters, Daiquiri and Americano.
Daiquiri
Frank opened his brown mole eyes to the blur of his pillow. The alarm on his phone was ringing. Reaching to find the phone he knocked the beer can onto the carpet. No no, don't get mad. The beer was sucked into the carpet. Through squint-vision he saw the carpet change colour beneath the froth. The phone he brought to his face like a flatpack booklet. Seven:forty-Fuck. He hit snooze and sunk back into his spittle for what his mind told him were vital minutes. Testosterone, thick from sleep, tightened his muscles and turned his thoughts from a pint head to the deed. Always on a Sunday. Together or apart in the week, that'd been the day for it. Synchronised as spies is how the birds call. They'd wake Frank and Molly these mornings to the dull awareness of another body. They'd start slow. Soft brushes between doses of dreams. Their light-bashful eyes would meet, and after turns in the bathroom, they'd begin.
The snooze counter told him six minutes. Here he was, years away, in their first home. He'd got up early to finish applying to more apprenticeships. She'd come from the kitchen with a cup of lapsang souchong to ask if he'd heard any from the landlord about the boiler. He'd winked. Told her he was all over it, Mrs. Bloom.
"Oh are you! Don't you know Mrs. Bloom took a lover?" She said in patchwork lilt, moving towards him. Bare legs all the way up; eyebrows like the trailing edge of falcon feathers. Her voice poured into him like Circe's enchanted wine. Shite.
What had he done to deserve her? He managed to muster, "You're not going to distract me are you?" But his heart wasn't in it. He was hoping she was thinking of his hands. Cumbersome at the keyboard which they hovered over, but a fine fit for the tailor's scissors. When he'd told her what he'd like to be, she'd called them comely, these hands. At the word, he'd seen their shade, startling against starched linen.
"Well I just don't want you to forget I'm here, or I might have to find someone more, attentive. Shall I check this for you?"
She leaned forward and the cotton swam along her as she moved the mouse. Man Ray's violin. One day he'd make her a pistachio coloured suit of silk and take her for fruits de mer and rosé crement after a lavender drive through Provence. If he never could, he hoped she knew what it meant to him, this fantasy of their lungs filled with lavender.
"S'not done yet."
He pulled her to meet him in the chair. They'd bought it on the road to Camberwell. The shop was named after a disco song. She'd advanced on the place, bomber jacket over her right shoulder, like Barry Gibb from the Bee-Jee's. Just how old was it, this chair? With a neat tug she landed in his lap.
"Stop it you. I'm hungry. I'm going to make some eggs. Finish your work Frankenstein." She said, giggling, elongating. She slipped from his grip how children eel from parents. Moray. Then off she went, the smell of tea following her like tracer fire. Smoking.
His alarm went off and he knew he'd lived on memories too long. But what if she was the one? What then?
Americano
Looking at her dress where it had been shut upon, Molly saw oil, or dirt and how the dress had creased against the pleating.
“Shit.” She said. Doesn’t matter. Not really. Sam-wise won’t even notice. Warm air blew in from the driver’s window, which he wound all the way down. The tattoo of a swallow on his forearm distorted as he rested his arm on the doorframe.
Something shifted in Molly as she looked down at the text on her phone:
-See you at 3? Looking forward to seeing your face. It’s been too long.
09:11
It had been too long. Three weeks is forever. Especially after just two months. No call since their last time together. All she got was a text saying he’d gone to his mothers in Longton for a couple of weeks. That wasn’t what made her angry. She could understand family. It was just that he sent it a week after they should’ve met. A week after she booked the reservation at what had already become their place. After she sat there alone for forty minutes trying to text and call him. Even then, it'd 've been easier to deal with if it hadn’t happened before. She scrolled through her old texts:
- Hey babe, how about I meet you after work today? We can go to that cute little Italian opposite your place? X
11:57
-That sounds lovely. I got that summer feeling today. Looking forward to summer! X
12:03
- Yeah me too. Do I get to see you in your bikini? ;-)12:03
12:20
-If you’re good, you might get to see me out of it xxx
12:26
12:26
And if I’m bad? X
12:44
-Lol. We’ll just have to see. Just on lunch. I’ll see you tonight xxx
13:11
13:11
-Hey, where are you? Are you running late?
17:09
Samuel?
17:16
17:09
Samuel?
17:16