Proposer’s Blog
Day 6: The Alphabetti Proposal. Location: My kitchen.
Suzie ended up staying at mine last night, in my guest room of course. After a hard day for her yesterday and a hard one facing her today, I wanted to give her something to cheer her up. What better way to wake up than with a proposal breakfast in bed.
I luckily had a tin of Heinz Alphabetti Spaghetti in my cupboard. My nephew loves the stuff, so I always have some in for when he comes to stay. I figured I would do spaghetti on toast and spell out the proposal around the rim of the plate. I cooked the Alphabetti carefully, ensuring that I didn’t break up any of the letters whilst stirring, then tipped the contents onto the plate whilst I was cooking the toast. Finding all the letters needed for the proposal was a lot harder than I thought. There was no Y – there were six Zs, six, but no Y. So I used a V and part of an L. There was only one R, so I had to use a P and the other part of the L. By the time the haphazard proposal was in place, the Alphabetti was cold and the toast was black, and the smoke had set off the smoke alarm, which roused Suzie from her sleep. I quickly cooked eggs instead, and fresh toast, and positioned the eggs like eyes on the plate. I gave the plate a squirt of ketchup for the smiley mouth, perfected the arrangement of the proposal, and added the remains of the Alphabetti – which I warned Suzie not to eat as I had messed with it so much – as hair. The breakfast in bed part was ruined as Suzie came down to make sure I was still alive as the house was filled with smoke, so we ended up having breakfast in the kitchen instead.
The reaction. I haven’t seen Suzie smile like that for a long time. It seems everyone has an inner child and Suzie’s likes Alphabetti.
I sat in the car outside Jules’s place with Harry sitting next to me.
‘Are you ready for this?’
I nodded.
‘I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do. I feel like I’ve pushed you into this.’
‘No, I want to do this. I’m not delighted, of course I’m not. But you can’t control who you fall in love with.’ If it was that easy, I wouldn’t have spent the last two years in love with my best friend. I sighed. ‘I want her to be happy again and if Badger can help with that then I’m ok with it.’
I got out the car before I could change my mind and strode up the path.
When Jules opened the door, I tried to find some words to apologise, to make things good between us but I had nothing. I was still hurting over this.
Tears welled in her eyes and I found myself stepping forward to hug her. I held her tight as she sobbed against me, and I soaked her jumper with my own tears.
I felt Harry shuffle us forward so we were no longer standing on the front door step, then he closed the door behind us.
‘Badger!’ Harry called. ‘Put the kettle on, I think we’ll all need a cup of tea in a minute.’
*
I tucked into a slice of Jules’s delicious banana cake as I watched Badger lying on the floor, playing with Bella. It was clear for everyone to see how much he adored this little girl that wasn’t his.
Harry was outside in the garden, taking some of our calls.
Jules and I had cried and apologised and cried some more whilst Harry and Badger had loudly and diplomatically talked about football. It would be a while before things were back to normal between us, but we were getting there.
‘So you spent the night with Harry last night,’ Jules said as she wiped the table.
I swallowed a big lump of cake. ‘How do you know that?’
‘We’re following the blog too. It sounds like a lot of fun. But my point being that Harry doesn’t have a guest room. Badger told me he doesn’t.’
‘He does. Just not one with a bed in it.’
‘So…’ she smiled as she sat down opposite me with her tea in her hand.
‘So I slept in his bed. It doesn’t mean anything. We’ve done it before.’
‘Of course it means something, you’re in love with him.’
‘In love with who?’ Harry asked as he came through the back door.
Jules paled.
‘Tiny Tim,’ I blurted out in panic at the same time Jules said, ‘Ryan Gosling,’ and slapped her hand down on Ryan’s photo in the magazine she had been reading.
Harry looked between us. ‘Which is it?’
‘Well, we were talking about Tiny Tim before and Jules said he reminded her of Ryan Gosling and I said I loved him and Jules thought I was talking about Tiny Tim, but I wasn’t.’
Jules stared at me, open mouthed, as I prattled on with my excuse. Way to play it cool.
Harry seemed to buy this, or in the least was willing to humour me. He joined me at the table, stealing a large crumb from my plate, as he slid the magazine towards him.
‘So Ryan Gosling eh? What is it about him?’
I stared at Harry and dragged my eyes down to look at Ryan’s photo. As beautiful as Ryan was, he was no match for Harry. Now I had to find something I liked about a man that had barely even registered on my radar. No man had, not since Harry had walked into my life.
‘The white shirt,’ I said, triumphantly, glad I had found something. ‘There’s something very sexy about a man that wears a white shirt. Ryan wears it particularly well.’
Jules’ incredulous look deepened. Then she quickly recovered herself as Harry looked up. ‘Have you ever been in love, Harry?’
I stared at Jules behind Harry’s back. Why was she asking when she knew all about his past and his determination to protect himself?
He looked away as he cut himself a slice of the cake, though I suspected it was so he had something to do with his hands, rather than actually wanting any cake. ‘Once. A year or so ago. It didn’t work out.’
I stared at him. He’d fallen in love. After everything he’d said about not believing in it, he’d let himself fall in love anyway and whoever she was had let him down. There had been so many women for Harry, moving from one to the next before any emotional attachments could be made on either side. But somehow, amongst the many was one he had fallen for. A year or so ago? So someone he was seeing when I knew him. I racked my brain for faces and names of conquests past.
A thought occurred to me. ‘There hasn’t been anyone for you for nearly a year. Apart from Samantha. Was it the girl you were seeing before the big gap? Amelia. Did she break your heart?’
‘No.’ He laughed. ‘Things were never that serious with Amelia.’
‘But why have you not been with anyone for so long?’
He shrugged. ‘Just haven’t found anyone that took my fancy.’
‘That didn’t stop you before, anything with a pulse took your fancy.’
‘It was just... I’ve been busy. A girlfriend would have just got in the way.’
I was confused. He was clearly embarrassed about this and I didn’t understand why.
‘So Harry.’ Jules interrupted, clearly trying to change the subject. ‘Did you catch that documentary on the pyramids?’
Harry was a big history buff, something he shared in common with Jules. But I was not to be put off.
‘But you’ve not been busy. You’ve been with me at work, and most nights you were round my house or I was round yours.’
He looked at me and the penny suddenly clunked into place. He literally had dropped everything for me, to be with me in my moment of need, including any potential girlfriends.
I was so confused. Was all of that really just down to pity? Or something more… But Samantha was right, if he wanted to be with me, he would be.
Badger walked into the kitchen carrying Bella, slicing through the silent tension like a knife through butter.
‘Want some juice, Bella?’ Badger said, plonking her on my lap, which was a welcome distraction.
‘Joows,’ said Bella, her hands reaching out for the cup that Badger was quickly filling.
Seeing that Badger was on the case, Bella relaxed into me, sucking her thumb as she played unconsciously with my hair.
Badger stopped to look at the paper on the table. As he leaned over he touched Jules’s shoulder which made her smile. It made me smile too, but I was distracted as Bella wriggled around impatiently on my lap.
‘Dada,’ she said to Badger, reaching out her hands for her juice.
My heart jolted like a punch to the chest and Badger paled.
‘I’ve been showing her photos of Jack and trying to get her to say it. Now she says it to me too. To be fair, everything is Dada at the moment – the ducks, the ice cream van, the butterflies – she just points and says Dada,’ Badger gabbled in a wild panic.
‘Its fine, Badger, don’t worry.’ I swallowed a huge lump in my throat.
‘I’ll tell her all about her Daddy, when she’s older, show her the photos, tell her about all the mischief we got up to. Jack won’t be forgotten.’ Badger was so serious. I looked down, brushing away imaginary crumbs from my lap. I looked at my watch, wanting to be out of there.
As always, Harry came to my rescue. ‘Well, we better go, I’ve got that meeting with the magazine shortly and I’ve got some emails I need to send.’
I got up quickly, planted a kiss on Bella’s soft cheeks and passed her back to Badger. I gave Jules a quick hug and hurriedly said my goodbyes and was out on the street a moment later. We rounded the trees at the end of their garden, sheltering us from the view of the house.
I put my hands to my knees and let out a gust of breath as if I’d been running or holding my breath for a really long time.
Harry stroked my back soothingly.
‘Did I do ok?’
‘You did brilliantly.’
I looked up at him to see if he was being honest or just being kind.
‘No seriously. It takes a shit load of courage to do what you did today.’
‘I want her to be happy again, I do, but it still bloody hurts.’
‘I know, there would be something wrong with you if it didn’t.’
I exhaled again. ‘The ‘Dada’ moment was a step too far.’
‘Yes, I gathered that.’
I smiled as I straightened. ‘You know me so well.’
‘I know you need ice cream right about now.’
‘Yes please.’
‘Fortunately for you I know the perfect place.’
*
There were lots of Italian ice cream places in town, with thick, delicious ice creams and an array of different toppings. I wondered which one Harry was going to take me to. The one on Leicester Square was wonderful. I fancied a sundae, maybe with chopped bananas and chocolate sauce over the top. Mmmm…
So I was surprised when we parked up and walked down towards Tower Bridge. The place was teeming with tourists, but sitting on the side of the road, with quite a long queue considering how cold it was, was a battered pink and white ice cream van.
I finished another call, the fifth since we had left Jules’s house. I didn’t know why we were so busy all of a sudden, but I certainly wasn’t complaining.
I stared at the van in confusion as we joined the back of the queue.
‘Don’t look like that, you ice cream snob.’ Harry nudged me as he saw my face.
‘There was no look.’
‘Oh there was. It looked like this.’
Harry sucked in his cheeks and scowled like he was sucking on a bitter lemon.
I laughed. ‘I like a ninety-nine as much as the next person.’
‘Well you’re going to be disappointed, Roberto doesn’t do ninety-nines. But he does do the best ice creams for miles around.’
We shuffled up the queue, but I remained unconvinced.
I took another call whilst we waited, this one wanted candy floss and fairground rides in his back garden. Now that was sweet. I promised to email him back as soon as I could check the prices of the things he wanted.
Then we were next in the queue.
‘Banana ok?’ Harry asked. ‘Or the chocolate orange is to die for.’
‘Banana’s fine.’
Roberto was not the Italian looking man I was expecting. There was no curly Mario moustache or dark eyes. I sort of expected him to be wearing a red and white stripy apron and have a big chef’s hat, I’m not sure why. I was even more disappointed when instead of greeting Harry in Italian, he grunted to us in a thick Yorkshire accent as he swapped money for two pots of ice cream. Harry’s was so dark it looked almost black.
We went and sat on benches overlooking the Thames to watch the boats that always seemed to go up and down it, no matter what time of day it was.
I dug into my ice cream and took a big mouthful.
‘Oh my God.’ I closed my eyes as the tastes exploded on my tongue. ‘This is amazing.’
Harry grinned. ‘I told you so.’
‘It tastes so bananery.’
‘Well it is banana ice cream.’
‘Yes but banana flavoured things taste like powdered banana. Most banana things have never even seen a banana in their whole lives. This actually has banana bits in it.’
‘Here, try mine.’
Harry scooped up a large lump of the black ice cream and fed it to me. The dark chocolate was complemented perfectly by the coffee and walnut.
‘We need to come back here again and try the other flavours.’
‘He only does ten with the occasional special, no toppings, no sauce, but he makes an absolute fortune.’
‘I bet he does. And what a pitch too, with the tourists visiting the Tower and the bridge.’
I curled my legs up to my chest as I carried on eating.
I wanted to talk to him about what he had said before, that he had taken a year off from women so he could be there for me when I needed him most.
As I licked the last of the ice cream from my spoon, I reached down and held his hand, entwining my fingers with his. Although he gently squeezed my hand, he barely seemed to notice as he busily typed an email on his phone.
Suddenly he leapt up as if he had been burnt. My hand fell from his and back onto the bench.
‘Crap, I better go, I have that meeting with Silver Linings, the magazine that wants to feature my blog. You ok to get back on your own?’
I nodded.
Harry passed me his half eaten pot of ice cream, kissed me fleetingly on the cheek and took off at a run, smashing into a tall, beautiful redhead as he went. She toppled and nearly hit the floor but Harry’s reflexes were fast and he caught her, pulling her back to her feet with ease and gentleness.
I couldn’t hear what was said as they stood there talking, Harry’s hands still on her arms, but as she twirled her hair round her finger and threw her head back laughing, it was obvious he was working his charm again. Sure enough, within thirty seconds of them meeting, the redhead was handing over her number.
Samantha’s words rung in my head. If he wanted to be with me, he would be. Watching him so effortlessly charm this woman without any reticence cemented that in my brain. He just didn’t see me that way, never had, never would.
Harry threw me two big inane thumbs up as the girl fumbled in her bag and I threw two sarcastic ones back. As the swap was made, Harry kissed her on the cheek, just as he’d done to me seconds before, and ran off again.
The redhead and I watched him go and then we locked eyes as he disappeared from view. Her face was a picture of smug happiness. I’m not sure what mine was, but obviously not anything good as she recoiled slightly from me as she walked away.
*
I was standing naked in my bedroom when the front door crashed open. After Harry’s departure hours before, I’d treated myself to a bit of retail therapy – buying a wildly inappropriate dress and ridiculously high heeled shoes. I’d just been trying them on, realised the underwear that I was wearing was not suitable and had just taken them off to replace them with something else when Harry’s feet thundered up the stairs.
‘Suzie!’ Harry roared.
I launched myself across the bed and slammed the door just as he reached the top.
‘Where are you?’
‘Bedroom. I’m naked. Hang on a sec.’
To my great surprise, Harry burst in, with his hand clamped over his eyes.
‘Harry!’
‘This can’t wait.’
‘Yes it bloody well can.’
Harry turned and grabbed my robe from the back of the door. With his eyes tightly closed he offered it out and I quickly pulled it on.
‘Ok, what the hell was so urgent?’
Harry opened one eye and then, seeing I was safely covered up, he opened both. He reached out and grabbed my arms, his smile so big, his eyes so wide, I wasn’t sure if he’d taken some hallucinogenic drug.
‘Suzie, shit, I don’t know where to start.’
Oh please don’t let this be another woman story. Seeing him with that redhead this morning was bad enough.
‘The beginning.’ I wrapped my hands around his arms as he didn’t seem likely to let me go any time soon.
‘The video of my cow proposal has over two million hits on Youtube.’
I stared at him whilst the weight of those words sunk in.
‘Holy shit!’ I whispered.
‘That’s just the start. We now have close to thirty thousand followers on the blog.’
That at least explained the increase in calls today.
‘You need to sit down for the next bit.’ He pushed me down gently onto the bed, with his hands on my shoulders. Then he changed his mind. ‘No, stand up. I think.’ He pulled me to my feet.
‘Just tell me.’
‘I had a chat with the magazine people today.’
The bottom dropped out of my world. ‘You’re leaving, aren’t you? The magazine wants you to go and work for them instead.’
He stopped with his excitement for a moment and kissed my forehead so sweetly that my heart leapt into my mouth.
‘No. It’s not that. They’ve offered us a deal. You won’t believe this. I can’t believe it myself. I can’t believe that I actually managed to talk them into it.’
‘Harry, for the love of God, what?’
‘They asked me where I foresaw this proposal thing going and I told them I wanted to show you the world – I wanted to take you to every tiny little pocket of it and propose to you in the most beautiful, most barren, most extreme places. They were keen, very keen, I could see that. Suddenly I found myself telling them that I had a meeting with The Daily Mail later this afternoon, that they were interested in making it a daily article. I don’t know why I said it, but it worked. The next thing they did was offer me this.’
He pulled out a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and passed it to me. I read it, and read it again. The words danced in front of my eyes.
I looked at Harry. ‘Is this what I think it is?’
He swallowed. ‘Two round-the-world tickets. We leave on Friday.’
I sat down heavily on the bed as I read the words again.
‘This is a joke.’
‘No joke. They want exclusivity. I’m allowed to blog one more time on our website to tell our followers where to catch me next, after that I’ll be writing for Silver Linings. They will feature my daily blog on their website and the best bits will be featured in their weekly magazine. We can post pictures and stuff as well. I made a deal too, that every blog will have links back to our website and our contact details et cetera, so you’ll gain good exposure for your company out of this too.’
‘Our company.’
He waved it away.
‘Harry we can’t leave, our company is just starting to take off. We’ve worked so hard to get where we are. We need to be here to help our clients.’
‘You need a holiday, and it’s just three months – ninety days. We can handle emails on our mobiles, take our laptops with us. I’ve had a word with Jules and, as she’s at home with Bella, she was happy to take all our calls and then she can email over the main details to us. We can go through it with her before we go and Badger says he’d be happy to help too.’
I stared at him and read the contract again.
‘Suzie, you have to say yes.’
‘Then yes.’
Harry whooped like a big kid, yanked me to my feet and swung me round so fast I could barely breathe. I laughed and giggled against him. Around the world. Apart from a couple of family driving holidays to Spain and France, I’d never been out of Britain. I’d never even been on a plane.
The phone rang in the office but for once I ignored it.
‘Harry, wait, wait, stop swinging me round, you’re making me dizzy.’
Harry slowed and stopped, holding me steady as I wobbled a bit.
‘Where are we going first? Do you have a plan? What do I need to pack?’
‘I need to thrash a lot of this out with Sunlounger, the holiday company that the magazine are working with to run this feature. I have a meeting with them tomorrow. There will be a rough plan but also room for improvisation too. We’re going to Australia - ’
My heart roared in my chest. ‘Harry I’ve always wanted to go there. It’s so beautiful.’
He grinned. ‘I know. I was quite insistent that was on our list. We fly to The Galapagos Islands first.’
‘But this is all so expensive.’
‘I would love to take credit for that, but Silver Linings and Sunlounger are paying for everything. A lot of it will be freebies or heavily discounted from the hotels and flight companies, knowing that they will get good coverage in the magazine.’
‘But why?’
‘Two million reasons why. Two million people and counting have watched our cow proposal, that’s potentially two million people that will go and buy Silver Linings to follow our story.’
None of this made any sense.
‘Harry, are we seriously doing this?’
He nodded
I squealed and launched myself at him, throwing my arms round his neck.
‘Now that was the reaction I was hoping for,’ he said, holding me tight against him.